Hurricane Debby is expected to slam into the Big Bend region of Florida’s Gulf Coast by midday on Monday before slowly crossing the state, causing potentially dangerous storm surges and catastrophic flooding, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.
By 11 p.m. EDT (0300 GMT) on Sunday, the hurricane had sustained winds of 75 mph (120 kph), growing from a slow moving tropical storm that gained strength from warm Gulf waters. It will likely just get stronger.
The hurricane center forecast life-threatening conditions, including storm surges up to 10 feet (3 meters) in some areas.
As it slowly moved north, the storm could bring “potentially historic rainfall” of between 10 and 20 inches (25 and 50 cm) and catastrophic flooding to Georgia and South Carolina, it said. Local areas could receive 30 inches of rain by Friday morning.
“This is going to be the story of this storm,” said Jamie Rhome, the deputy director of the hurricane center. “Its slow motion is going to dump historic amounts of rainfall — potentially over 20 inches. You’re talking about catastrophic flooding.”
The storm bears some of the hallmarks of Hurricane Harvey, which hit Corpus Christi, Texas, in August 2017. While downgraded into a tropical storm as it moved inland, it lingered over the state, dumping about 50 inches of rain on Houston.
Harvey is rated as one of the wettest storms in US history, causing more than 100 deaths and $125 billion in damage, primarily from flooding in the Houston metropolitan area.
Rhome said Debby was fueled by exceptionally warm Gulf waters.
Climate scientists believe man-made global warming from burning fossil fuels has raised the temperature of the oceans, making storms bigger and more devastating.
Preparing for Debby, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis called up 3,000 National Guard troops and placed most of the state’s cities and counties under emergency orders, while mandatory evacuations were ordered in parts of the Gulf Coast counties of Citrus, Dixie, Franklin, Levy and Wakulla.
DeSantis said there were more than 17,000 linemen and other electric workers ready to restore power.
The governors of Georgia and South Carolina also declared states of emergency ahead of the storm.
HEAVY RAIN
Debby became a tropical storm late on Saturday after pushing off north Cuba. As of 11 p.m. EDT, the hurricane was about 100 miles west of Tampa and moving toward the Gulf Coast at 12 mph (19 kph), with maximum sustained winds of 75 mph (120 kph), the NHC said.
The eye of Debby would move across the eastern Gulf of Mexico and reach the Florida Big Bend coast by midday on Monday, the hurricane center added. Debby was then expected to move slowly across northern Florida and southern Georgia on Monday and Tuesday, it said.
The storm is expected to lose some strength after landfall but bring heavy rain as it crosses central Florida out to the Atlantic coast, before crawling up to Savannah, Georgia, and then onward to Charleston, South Carolina, this week, lingering while dumping catastrophic amounts of rain.
Storm surges forecast for Bonita Beach northward to Tampa Bay could send sea waves further inland than normal, damaging structures and endangering anyone in their path.
The last hurricane to make a direct hit on the Big Bend region was Hurricane Idalia, which briefly gained Category 4 strength before making landfall as a Category 3 in August 2023, with winds of more than 125 mph. The National Centers for Environmental Information estimates there were $3.5 billion in damages.
Forecasters expect a large number of Atlantic hurricanes in the 2024 season, which began on June 1, with four to seven seen as major. That exceeds the record-breaking 2005 season that spawned the devastating Katrina and Rita hurricanes.
Only one hurricane, Beryl, has yet formed in the Atlantic this year. The earliest Category 5 storm on record, it struck the Caribbean and Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula before rolling up the Gulf Coast of Texas as a Category 1 storm, with sustained winds up to 95 mph.
Hurricane Debby takes aim at Florida’s Gulf Coast, expected to slog up East Coast
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Hurricane Debby takes aim at Florida’s Gulf Coast, expected to slog up East Coast
- Storm bears some of the hallmarks of Hurricane Harvey, which hit Corpus Christi, Texas, in August 2017
- Harvey is rated as one of the wettest storms in US history, causing more than 100 deaths and $125 billion in damage
WTO says trade alone won’t bridge gap between economies
- WTO’s 2024 report on global trade looked at role commerce has played to narrow gap between economies
GENEVA: The World Trade Organization said Monday that open trade alone was not enough to reduce inequalities between wealthy and developing nations and more was needed to help poorer countries.
The WTO’s 2024 report on global trade looked at the role that commerce has played to narrow the gap between economies since its creation in 1995.
“Perhaps the biggest takeaway from the report is its reaffirmation of trade’s transformative role in reducing poverty and creating shared prosperity,” WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said in the foreword.
This conclusion, she added, runs “contrary to the currently fashionable notion that trade, and institutions like the WTO, have not been good for poverty or for poor countries, and are creating a more unequal world.”
“But the second biggest takeaway is that there is much more we can do to make trade and the WTO work better for economies and people left behind during the past 30 years of globalization,” Okonjo-Iweala said.
The report found that low- and middle-income economies tend to engage less in international trade, receive less foreign direct investment and depend more on commodities.
They also export fewer “complex products” and “trade with fewer partners,” the WTO said.
“Protectionism, the report demonstrates, is not an effective path to inclusiveness,” Okonjo-Iweala said, warning that it can raise production costs and invite “costly retaliation from disgruntled trading partners.”
WTO chief economist Ralph Ossa added: “Less trade will not promote inclusiveness, nor will trade alone.”
“True inclusiveness demands a comprehensive strategy — one that integrates open trade with supportive domestic policies and robust international cooperation,” Ossa said.
The report said domestic policies that are needed to make trade more inclusive include vocational training, unemployment benefits and “education for a more skilled and mobile workforce.”
It also called for “competition policy to ensure consumers benefit from lower prices, reliable infrastructure, and well-functioning financial markets.”
Catherine, princess of Wales, says she’ll return to public duties
- The princess announced in March that she was being treated for an undisclosed type of cancer
LONDON: Catherine, the Princess of Wales, says she has completed chemotherapy and will return to some public duties in the coming months.
The 42-year-old wife of Prince William is expected to undertake a light program of engagements until the end of the year.
The princess announced in March that she was being treated for an undisclosed type of cancer.
Kate attended a ceremonial birthday parade for her father-in-law King Charles III in June, and the following month presented the men’s winner’s trophy at the Wimbledon tennis championships.
UN rights chief voices ‘abhorrence’ of Afghanistan ‘vice’ law
- Taliban published widely-criticized law in August further tightening restrictions on women’s lives
GENEVA: The UN rights chief on Monday slammed Afghanistan’s latest laws curtailing women’s rights, decrying the “outrageous” and “unparallelled” repression of half the country’s population.
Speaking before the United Nations Human Rights Council, Volker Turk made clear his “abhorrence of these latest measures.”
The Taliban government in Afghanistan — which took power in 2021 but is yet to be recognized by any other country — published a widely-criticized law in August further tightening restrictions on women’s lives.
While many of the measures have been informally enforced since the Taliban’s takeover in 2021, their formal codification sparked an outcry from the international community and rights groups.
The new “vice and virtue” law dictates that a woman’s voice should not be raised outside the home, and that women should not sing or read poetry aloud.
It requires them to cover their entire body and face if they need to leave their homes, which they should only do “out of necessity.”
These measures, Turk pointed out, come on top of previous measures that included “forbidding girls from attending secondary school and women from attending university; denying women’s rights to freedom of peaceful assembly, opinion, expression and freedom of movement; and severely curtailing women’s rights to seek employment.”
He emphasized that “women who have sought to protest such laws or express any different opinion or form of dissent have faced harsh punishments.”
“I shudder to think what is next for the women and girls of Afghanistan.”
His comments came after the UN Security Council last week called for the repeal of the new laws, warning they “undermine” efforts to reintegrate the country with the international community.
Turk meanwhile described the “repressive control over half the population in the country” as “unparallelled in today’s world.”
“It is a fundamental rupture of the social contract. It is outrageous and amounts to systematic gender persecution,” he told the council.
“It will also jeopardize the country’s future by massively stifling its development,” he warned.
“This is propelling Afghanistan further down a path of isolation, pain and hardship.”
India, UAE enter into new agreements under comprehensive trade deal
- Modi, Sheikh Khaled agree to broaden CEPA to new, emerging areas
- Abu Dhabi crown prince will attend a business forum in Mumbai on Tuesday
NEW DELHI: India and the UAE signed new agreements and discussed ways to develop new areas of cooperation on Monday, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed in New Delhi.
Sheikh Khaled was on his first official visit to India, leading a delegation of ministers and business leaders.
“The two leaders discussed the multifaceted India-UAE relations and avenues to broaden the comprehensive strategic partnership to new and emerging areas,” Randhir Jaiswal, spokesperson of India’s Ministry of External Affairs, said in a statement.
India and the UAE signed the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement in 2022, which has become a template for similar trade pacts the UAE has since signed with other nations.
The pact reduced tariffs on about 80 percent of all goods and provided zero-duty access to 90 percent of Indian exports and has since significantly advanced bilateral exchanges.
As part of Sheikh Khaled’s visit, the two countries signed a number of agreements within their CEPA, including a memorandum of understanding in nuclear energy cooperation.
The Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. also agreed to a 15-year deal to supply Indian Oil, while UAE investment and holding company ADQ entered a preliminary agreement to develop a major food and agriculture park with the Gujarat government.
“These agreements and partnerships encompass a range of priority areas of mutual interest in both the public and private sectors, ensuring the continued achievement of comprehensive economic cooperation aspirations between the two friendly nations,” the Emirates News Agency reported.
On Tuesday, Sheikh Khaled will lead his delegation to attend an India-UAE business forum in Mumbai, which will be focused on exploring potential cooperation in emerging fields, including biotechnology, artificial intelligence and agricultural technology.
Bangladesh to seek extradition of ousted leader from India
- Weeks of student-led demonstrations in Bangladesh escalated into mass protests last month, with Hasina quitting and fleeing to India on August 5
- Hasina’s government was accused of widespread human rights abuses, including the mass detention and extrajudicial killing of her political opponents
DHAKA: Bangladesh’s war crimes tribunal is to seek the extradition of ousted leader Sheikh Hasina from neighboring India, its chief prosecutor has said, accusing her of carrying out “massacres.”
Weeks of student-led demonstrations in Bangladesh escalated into mass protests last month, with Hasina quitting as prime minister and fleeing by helicopter to old ally India on August 5, ending her iron-fisted 15-year rule.
“As the main perpetrator has fled the country, we will start the legal procedure to bring her back,” Mohammad Tajul Islam, chief prosecutor of Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal (ICT), told reporters on Sunday.
The ICT was set up by Hasina in 2010 to probe atrocities during the 1971 independence war from Pakistan.
Hasina’s government was accused of widespread human rights abuses, including the mass detention and extrajudicial killing of her political opponents.
“Bangladesh has a criminal extradition treaty with India which was signed in 2013, while Sheikh Hasina’s government was in power,” Islam added.
“As she has been made the main accused of the massacres in Bangladesh, we will try to legally bring her back to Bangladesh to face trial.”
Hasina, 76, has not been seen in public since fleeing Bangladesh, and her last official whereabouts is a military air base near India’s capital New Delhi. Her presence in India has infuriated Bangladesh.
Dhaka has revoked her diplomatic passport, and the countries have a bilateral extradition treaty which would permit her return to face criminal trial.
A clause in the treaty, however, says extradition might be refused if the offense is of a “political character.”
Interim leader Muhammad Yunus, a Nobel Peace Prize winner who took over after the uprising, last week said Hasina should “keep quiet” while exiled in India until she is brought home for trial.
“If India wants to keep her until the time Bangladesh wants her back, the condition would be that she has to keep quiet,” Yunus, 84, told the Press Trust of India news agency.
His government has been under public pressure to demand her extradition and trial over the hundreds of demonstrators killed during the weeks of unrest that ultimately toppled her.
More than 600 people were killed in the weeks leading up to Hasina’s ouster, according to a preliminary United Nations report, suggesting the toll was “likely an underestimate.”
Bangladesh last month opened an investigation led by a retired high court judge into hundreds of enforced disappearances by security forces during Hasina’s rule.
