NEW YORK: Climate change dominated the opening stages of the Bloomberg Global Business Forum in New York on Wednesday, as many of the 250 business and political leaders assembled for the event criticized the Trump administration’s stance on the issue.
Michael Bloomberg, the media entrepreneur and former three-time mayor of the city, announced a partnership with the World Bank and the UN to fund urban infrastructure development to take account of accelerating climate change, especially in emerging markets where cities often struggle to get access to funding.
He said: “Cities account for 70 percent of carbon emissions in the world, so they are part of the problem, but they are also big financial centers, so they are part of the solution too. New York has reduced carbon emissions by 20 percent in seven years, and it would have been faster if the city had more access to funding.
“In the developing world, it is even more the case that cities need access to greater funding to fight climate change, but they do not have the credit profile to get that.”
On the main issue of climate change, Bloomberg said that there had been “pushback” from the current White House. “I cannot speak for the current administration, but it’s new and is realizing that these problems are complex, so it gets laughed at. But Trump has done climate change people a great favor because he has galvanized them.”
The City Climate Finance plan is a partnership between Bloomberg Philanthropies, his charitable operation, the World Bank and the UN. It hopes to have definitive plans for climate change investment later this year, the president Jim Kim said.
Other leaders addressed themes including globalization, immigration and inclusion, all of which have been hot topics under the Trump administration.
Former President Bill Clinton said: “We are all well aware that a lot of people feel left out, left behind, alienated politically, socially and economically.”
Tim Cook, chief executive of Apple, said that recent moves to change immigration status for the children of illegal immigrants — the so-called “dreamers” — were wrong. “I am personally shocked there was even a discussion,” he said. “This debate goes to the basis of American values. I wish everyone loved America as much as the ‘dreamers.’”
Bloomberg agreed: “They may be here illegally but they have committed no crime. We need this new blood coming into our country.”
Other business leaders spoke of the need to address the problems of “big data” and digital change in the global economy.
Jack Ma, founder and chief executive of Chinese online retailer Ali Baba, said that the digital age should be regarded as an opportunity, not a threat.
“People are worried about big data, but people in history were worried about steam and electricity. But all three have led to an increase in employment.”
Christine Lagarde, managing director of the International Monetary Fund, also defended globalization in trade and business.
Justin Trudeau, prime minister of Canada, who is due to sign a trade agreement with the EU, agreed with her that the world needed more such free trade agreements. “We have to … eliminate barriers, but also ensure jobs, gender equality and growth,” he said.
Other speakers pointed to the imbalances in the global financial system.
Arif Naqvi, founder and chief executive officer of Dubai-based private equity group Abraaj, said: “The plumbing of the world financial system is broken. There is $9 trillion of investment value sitting in non-interest bearing assets. There are lots of other investment opportunities being missed in the fast growth markets.”
Larry Fink, chief executive officer of investment group Blackrock, warned against the rise of protectionism and exclusion in the world. “More than 50 per cent of family assets round the world are managed by women. We need more women on our boards.”
Climate change tops the agenda at Bloomberg Business Forum
Climate change tops the agenda at Bloomberg Business Forum
Britain has had ‘diplomatic contact’ with Syria’s HTS group
- “HTS remains a proscribed organization, but we can have diplomatic contact and so we do have diplomatic contact as you would expect,” Lammy said
LONDON: Britain has had diplomatic contact with the Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) group that swept Syrian President Bashar Assad from power last week, British foreign minister David Lammy said on Sunday.
“HTS remains a proscribed organization, but we can have diplomatic contact and so we do have diplomatic contact as you would expect,” Lammy told broadcasters.
“Using all the channels that we have available, and those are diplomatic and, of course, intelligence-led channels, we seek to deal with HTS where we have to.”
On Saturday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States has had direct contact with HTS.
Swiss court mulls closing Assad uncle war crimes case
- His part in February 1982 massacre in Hama, which left between 10,000 and 40,000 dead, earned him the nickname of “the Butcher of Hama”
- Tribunal said the defendant in his 80s was suffering from ailments preventing him from traveling and taking part in his trial
GENEVA: Switzerland’s Federal Criminal Court is considering dropping a case charging an uncle of deposed Syrian president Bashar Assad with alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, newspapers reported on Sunday.
Rifaat Assad is accused by Swiss prosecutors of a long list of crimes, including having ordered “murders, acts of torture, inhumane treatment and illegal detentions” while an officer in the Syrian army.
His part in the notorious February 1982 massacre in the western town of Hama, which left between 10,000 and 40,000 dead, earned him the nickname of “the Butcher of Hama.”
The date of the former vice president’s trial has not been announced.
On November 29, just a few days before his nephew’s overthrow by militants, the Federal Criminal Court informed the victim plaintiffs that “it wished to close the proceedings” into Rifaat Assad, according to the Swiss Sunday newspapers Le Matin Dimanche and SonntagsZeitung.
The tribunal said that the defendant in his 80s was suffering from ailments preventing him from traveling and taking part in his trial, the papers reported.
The federal public prosecutor’s office opened the criminal proceedings in December 2013 following a report by the Swiss non-governmental organization Trial International.
Alerted by Syrians living in Geneva, the rights group traced Assad to a major Geneva hotel.
“Trial confirms the intention expressed by the court to the parties to close the case. But the formal decision has not yet been taken,” Benoit Meystre, the NGO’s legal adviser, told AFP on Sunday.
“If the case is closed, the possibility of an appeal will be examined, and it is highly likely that this decision will be contested,” Meystre said, adding that any appeal would have to be brought by the plaintiffs and not the NGO.
Swiss prosecutors opened the proceedings on the grounds of universal jurisdiction in crimes against humanity and war crimes cases.
Assad went into exile in 1984 after a failed attempt to overthrow his brother, the country’s then-ruler Hafez Assad.
He then presented himself as an opponent of Bashar Assad, traveling to Switzerland and later France.
He returned to Syria after 37 years in exile in France to escape a four-year prison sentence for money laundering and misappropriation of Syrian public funds.
Israel says it will close Dublin embassy, citing ‘extreme anti-Israel policies’
- Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said the decision was deeply regrettable
- “I utterly reject the assertion that Ireland is anti-Israel. Ireland is pro-peace, pro-human rights and pro-International law,” he said in a post on X
JERUSALEM: Israel will close its Dublin embassy due to the “extreme anti-Israel policies of the Irish government,” Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said on Sunday, citing its recognition of a Palestinian state and support for legal action against Israel.
Israel’s ambassador to Dublin was recalled following Ireland’s decision on a Palestinian state in May, Saar’s statement added. Last week, Dublin announced its support for South Africa’s legal action against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ), accusing Israel of genocide.
Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said the decision was deeply regrettable. “I utterly reject the assertion that Ireland is anti-Israel. Ireland is pro-peace, pro-human rights and pro-International law,” he said in a post on X.
“Ireland wants a two state solution and for Israel and Palestine to live in peace and security. Ireland will always speak up for human rights and international law.”
Irish Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said in March that while it was for the World Court to decide whether genocide is being committed, he wanted to be clear that Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and what is happening in Gaza now “represents the blatant violation of international humanitarian law on a mass scale.”
A statement from Israel’s foreign ministry also announced the establishment of an Israeli embassy in Moldova.
Bangladesh inquiry recommends feared police unit shut over rights abuses
- The police unit was launched in 2004, billed as a way to provide rapid results in a country where the judicial system was slow
- But the unit earned a grim reputation for extrajudicial killings and was accused of supporting ec-PM Hasina’s political ambitions
DHAKA: A Bangladesh commission probing abuses during the rule of toppled leader Sheikh Hasina has recommended a much-feared armed police unit be disbanded, a senior inquiry member said Sunday.
Hasina, 77, fled by helicopter to neighboring India on August 5 as a student-led uprising stormed the prime minister’s palace in Dhaka.
Her government was accused of widespread human rights abuses, including the extrajudicial killing of hundreds of political opponents and the unlawful abduction and disappearance of hundreds more.
The Commission of Inquiry into Enforced Disappearances, set up by the caretaker government, said it found initial evidence that Hasina and other ex-senior officials were involved in the enforced disappearances alleged to have been carried out by the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB).
The RAB paramilitary police force was sanctioned by the United States in 2021, alongside seven of its senior officers, in response to reports of its culpability in some of the worst rights abuses committed during Hasina’s 15-year-long rule.
“RAB has never abided by the law and was seldom held accountable for its atrocities, which include enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and abductions,” Nur Khan Liton, a member of the commission, told AFP.
The commission handed its preliminary report to the leader of the interim government Muhammad Yunus late Saturday.
The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), one of the country’s largest political parties, also called for RAB’s abolition.
Senior BNP leader M. Hafizuddin Ahmed told reporters that the force was too rotten to be reformed.
“When a patient suffers from gangrene, according to medical studies, the only solution is to amputate the affected organ,” he said.
The elite police unit was launched in 2004, billed as a way to provide rapid results in a country where the judicial system was notoriously slow.
But the unit earned a grim reputation for extrajudicial killings and was accused of supporting Hasina’s political ambitions by suppressing dissent through abductions and murders.
German far-right leader questions NATO membership
- ‘Europe has been forced to implement America’s interests. We reject that’
BERLIN: The co-leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party on Sunday said Germany should reconsider its membership of NATO if the US-led military alliance did not consider the interests of all European countries, including Russia.
“Europe has been forced to implement America’s interests. We reject that,” the AfD’s Tino Chrupalla told German daily Welt.
“NATO is currently not a defense alliance. A defense community must accept and respect the interests of all European countries — including Russia’s interests,” Chrupalla said.
“If NATO cannot ensure that, Germany must consider to what extent this alliance is still useful for us,” he added.
The far-right AfD is polling at around 18-19 percent ahead of snap elections on February 23, following the collapse of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition government last month.
The score puts the party ahead of Scholz’s Social Democrats on 16-17 percent and behind only the conservative CDU-CSU bloc, which is polling around 31-32 percent.
The AfD has little chance of forming a government because other parties have ruled out cooperation with the far-right group.
But it could continue a streak of strong electoral showings, after a landmark win in Thuringia, one of the regions in Germany’s formerly communist east.
The far-right party has been a vocal critic of Germany’s military support for Ukraine and has argued for a swift end to the war prompted by Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
“The German government must finally get to the point of wanting to end the war,” said Chrupalla, whose colleague Alice Weidel will lead the AfD into the election as the party’s candidate for chancellor.
“Russia has won this war. Reality has caught up with those who claim to want to enable Ukraine to win the war,” he said.
The conflict in Ukraine is set to be one of the major themes of the campaign, which will culminate on the eve of the third anniversary of the invasion.
Scholz has pledged sustained support for Ukraine but has counselled prudence, as he hopes to tap into pacifist currents among voters, which are particularly strong in the east.
The chancellor has resisted calls to send long-range missiles that Kyiv could use to strike Russian territory for fear of being drawn into the conflict, and recently reinitiated direct contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
