Near a wooden hut high up in the Kyrgyz mountains, scientist Gulbara Omorova walked to a pile of grey rocks, reminiscing how the same spot was a glacier just a few years ago.
At an altitude of 4,000 meters, the 35-year-old researcher is surrounded by the giant peaks of the towering Tian Shan range that also stretches into China, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.
The area is home to thousands of glaciers that are melting at an alarming rate in Central Asia, already hard-hit by climate change.
A glaciologist, Omarova is recording that process — worried about the future.
She hiked six hours to get to the modest triangular-shaped hut that serves as a science station — almost up in the clouds.
“Eight to 10 years ago you could see the glacier with snow,” Omorova told AFP.
“But in the last three-to-four years, it has disappeared completely. There is no snow, no glacier,” she said.
The effects of a warming planet have been particularly visible in Central Asia, which has seen a wave of extreme weather disasters.
The melting of thousands of glaciers is a major threat to people in the landlocked region that already suffers from a shortage of water.
Acting as water towers, glaciers are crucial to the region’s food security and vital freshwater reserves are now dwindling fast.
Equipped with a measuring device, Omorova kneeled over a torrent of melted water, standing on grey-covered ice shimmering in strong sunshine.
“We are measuring everything,” she said. “The glaciers cannot regenerate because of rising temperatures.”
A little further on, she points to the shrinking Adygene glacier, saying it has retreated by “around 16 centimeters (six inches)” every year.
“That’s more than 900 meters since the 1960s,” she said.
The once majestic glacier is only one of thousands in the area that are slowly disappearing.
Between 14 and 30 percent of glaciers in the Tian-Shan and Pamir — the two main mountain ranges in Central Asia — have melted over the last 60 years, according to a report by the Eurasian Development Bank.
Omorova warned that things are only becoming worse.
“The melting is much more intense than in previous years,” she said.
With scientists warning that 2024 is likely to be the hottest year on record, professions like hers have hugely grown in importance.
But resources are scarce in Kyrgyzstan — one of the poorest countries in former Soviet Central Asia.
“We lack measuring equipment and there is not enough money to transport things to our observation station, where we don’t even have electricity,” Omorova said.
She hopes the Kyrygz government will draw up a law to protect the ice-covered giants.
The shrinking glaciers have also created a new threat for Kyrgyz towns and cities, with meltwater forming new lakes before tumbling down mountains in dangerous torrents, including toward the capital Bishkek.
Further down the valley — in a grass-covered part of the mountain at 2,200 meters — two scientists, brothers Sergei and Pavel Yerokhin, worked on the banks of the fast-flowing water.
The elder brother, 72-year-old Sergei, warned of the dangers of the torrents.
“This water mass takes rocks with it, flows down the valley and can reach towns,” he told AFP.
He said their task was to monitor and predict the water flow and to “draw up maps to ensure people and infrastructure don’t end up in these dangerous areas.”
His brother Pavel had a sensor installed about 50 centimeters above the water that would send radio signals in case of flooding.
For the Kyrgyz government, the melting glaciers threaten more than infrastructure damage.
Water distribution in the region — devised in the Soviet era — remains a thorny issue and is a frequent source of tension between neighbors.
Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan — home to around 10,000 glaciers each, according to Omorova — are the main water providers for Central Asia.
“We share water with our neighbors downstream,” Omorova said, referring to Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, home to most of Central Asia’s population.
Aside from rising temperatures, the glaciers also face another threat: a growing appetite for immense natural resources in the region, including for gold, whose extraction with chemicals accelerates the melting of ice.
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan have stepped up efforts to draw attention to a looming catastrophe.
Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov warned last year that forecasts show Central Asian glaciers “will halve by 2050 and disappear completely by 2100.”
’Disappeared completely’: melting glaciers worry Central Asia
https://arab.news/5rpxd
’Disappeared completely’: melting glaciers worry Central Asia
US Republicans eye key votes on Trump tax cuts mega-bill
WASHINGTON: Republicans geared up Tuesday for a series of crucial votes on Donald Trump’s domestic policy mega-bill, with rows over spending threatening to unravel the US president’s plans for sweeping tax cuts.
Three key House committees are slated to finalize and vote on their portions of Trump’s much-touted “big, beautiful” bill, led by a roughly $5 trillion extension of his 2017 tax relief.
Republicans are weighing partially covering the cost with deep cuts to the Medicaid health insurance program that benefits more than 70 million low-income people.
Before it can get to Trump’s desk, the package must survive votes of the full House and Senate, where Republicans have razor-thin controlling margins.
“The bill delivers what Americans voted for — tax policies that put working families first — and kick-starts a new golden era of American prosperity and strength,” said Jason Smith, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, which is charged with drafting the tax proposals.
The marathon committee debates are expected to continue into the night and even spill into daytime Wednesday ahead of a make-or-break full House vote planned for next week.
If any of the committees fall short, the timetable for ushering in Trump’s priorities could be upended.
As the Republican billionaire seeks to cement his legacy with lasting legislation, every week is considered crucial ahead of 2026 midterm elections that could see his grip on the levers of power weakened.
But the package is threatened by bitter infighting, with conservatives angling for much deeper cuts and moderates worried about threats to health coverage.
Republicans plan to slash more than $700 billion from health care alone, which would leave several million people without coverage, according to a nonpartisan estimate by the Congressional Budget Office.
Democrats have angrily defended at-risk entitlements and hit out at tax cuts they say are a debt-inflating gift to the rich, funded by the middle class.
On the tax front, House Republicans released a nearly 390-page bill Monday detailing where they want to raise revenues to cover Trump’s promised extension of the expiring 2017 tax cuts.
The Joint Committee on Taxation estimates that this portion of the package will mean $3.7 trillion in lost revenue between 2025-2034, when savings in the text are taken into account.
The president appears on course to get most of what he wants — including a four-year pause on tax on tips, overtime and interest on loans for American-made cars.
There are big tax hikes on the endowments of wealthy colleges such as Harvard, Yale and Princeton, and an aggressive roll-back of Joe Biden’s clean energy tax credits.
But Republicans representing districts in high-tax states have rejected as too low a proposed increase in the relief they get in state and local taxes from $10,000 to $30,000.
Democrats hosted a press event at the US Capitol to decry the proposed cuts ahead of the committee meetings, deploying a mobile billboard criticizing Republicans over the Medicaid proposals.
“Let’s be clear: There’s nothing moderate, efficient, or reasonable about Donald Trump and Republicans’ dangerous plans to gut health care and force kids to go hungry so they can fund tax handouts for billionaires,” said Democratic National Committee spokesperson Aida Ross.
Twenty-five activists were arrested outside one of the committee rooms for “illegally demonstrating,” the US Capitol Police told AFP.
“It is against the law to protest inside the congressional buildings,” the force said in a statement.
Trump’s approval rating rises as Americans worry less about recession
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump’s approval rating rose this week as Americans worried less about his handling of the economy and prospects of a recession, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll that closed on Tuesday.
The two-day poll showed 44 percent of respondents approved of the Republican leader’s performance, up from 42 percent in a prior Reuters/Ipsos survey carried out April 25-27. The poll had a margin of error of 3 percentage points.
Approval of Trump’s economic stewardship rose to 39 percent from 36 percent.
Trump began his term with a 47 percent approval rating, and saw his popularity tick lower as Americans worried about a series of trade wars he launched since taking office on January 20.
Trump’s moves to hike tariffs to historic levels on major trading partners, notably China, fueled stock market declines as many economists predicted a recession was looming.
In recent weeks, Trump has eased back on his sharpest trade actions and announced on Monday morning he was slashing tariffs on China. The benchmark S&P 500 stock index is up about 17 percent from its lowest closing of Trump’s second administration, hit soon after he unveiled sweeping tariffs.
Among the public, concerns about recession have also eased but remain high.
Some 69 percent of respondents in the new poll said they were concerned about a recession, down from 76 percent in a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted April 16-21. The share who said they worried about the stock market fell to 60 percent from 67 percent.
Trump has said blame for the country’s economic problems should fall on former President Joe Biden, his Democratic predecessor. Inflation surged during Biden’s presidency amid the global economic chaos of the COVID-19 pandemic, but trended lower toward the end of his presidency. Annual price inflation cooled in April, the Labor Department said on Tuesday, though economists continue to warn that Trump’s trade actions are likely to boost prices later in the year.
In the Reuters/Ipsos poll, 59 percent of respondents said it would be Trump’s fault if the economy falls into recession this year, compared to 37 percent who said it would be Biden’s fault.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll, conducted nationwide online, surveyed 1,163 people.
Kabul says ready for ‘dialogue’ with US on Afghan refugees
- The country has faced a major economic crisis since 2021 and is enduring the second worst humanitarian crisis in the world after Sudan, according to the United Nations
KABUL: The Taliban government said Tuesday it was ready for “dialogue” with the Trump administration on the repatriation of Afghan refugees whose legal protections in the United States will be revoked in July.
Citing an improved security situation in Afghanistan, Washington announced Monday that the temporary protected status (TPS) designation for Afghanistan would expire on May 20 and the termination would take effect on July 12.
Kabul is “ready to engage in constructive dialogue with the US & other countries regarding repatriation of Afghans who no longer meet criteria to remain in host countries,” said Abdul Qahar Balkhi, spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, on X.
The Taliban government has already offered assurances that those Afghans who fled the country as they stormed back to power in 2021 could safely return.
However, the United Nations has reported cases of executions and disappearances.
Taliban authorities have also squeezed women out of education, jobs and public life since 2021, creating what the UN has called “gender apartheid.”
The move by Washington could affect more than 11,000 Afghans, many of whom supported the United States during two decades of war and fled Taliban persecution, according to Shawn VanDiver, president of AfghanEvac.
“Afghanistan is the shared home of all Afghans, & all have the right to free movement,” Balkhi said in his statement.
The country has faced a major economic crisis since 2021 and is enduring the second worst humanitarian crisis in the world after Sudan, according to the United Nations.
More than 100,000 Afghans have returned home since neighboring Pakistan launched a new mass expulsion campaign in April.
More than 265,000 undocumented Afghans also returned from neighboring Iran between January and April, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
US federal law permits the government to grant TPS to foreign citizens who cannot safely return home because of war, natural disasters or other “extraordinary” conditions.
But since taking office President Donald Trump has moved to strip the designation from citizens of countries including Haiti and Venezuela as part of his broader crackdown on immigration.
White House slams Episcopal Church’s refusal to resettle white South Africans
- The Episcopal Church said it would end its refugee resettlement program with the US government rather than comply with orders to help resettle the white South Africans
WASHINGTON: The White House questioned Tuesday the humanitarian commitment of the influential Episcopal Church after it refused to comply with a federal directive to help resettle white Afrikaners granted refugee status by the Trump administration.
Trump ran on an anti-immigrant platform and essentially halted refugee arrivals in the United States after taking office, but made an exception for white Afrikaners despite South Africa’s insistence that they do not face persecution in their homeland.
On Monday, around 50 white South Africans arrived for resettlement in the United States, after Trump granted them refugee status as victims of what he called a “genocide.”
That claim — oft-repeated by Trump’s Pretoria-born ally, billionaire Elon Musk — has been widely dismissed as absurd, including by the South African government.
On Monday, the Episcopal Church said it would end its refugee resettlement program with the US government rather than comply with orders to help resettle the white South Africans.
In a statement, White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly criticized the decision as raising “serious questions about its supposed commitment to humanitarian aid.”
She claimed white Afrikaners — who are primarily descendants of European colonizers and whose ethnic group dominated South African politics until apartheid was abolished in 1994 — had “faced unspeakable horrors.”
On Monday, the church had said it would wind up its refugee resettlement grant agreements — amounting to more than $50 million annually — with the US federal government rather than comply with Trump’s orders.
In a statement, the church’s presiding bishop was scathing in his criticism of the administration’s decision to grant the white South Africans refugee status.
“It has been painful to watch one group of refugees, selected in a highly unusual manner, receive preferential treatment over many others who have been waiting in refugee camps or dangerous conditions for years,” said Sean W. Rowe.
Under eligibility guidelines published by the US embassy, applicants for US resettlement must either be of Afrikaner ethnicity or belong to a racial minority in South Africa.
The Episcopal Church said that it could not comply with Trump’s order “in light of our church’s steadfast commitment to racial justice and reconciliation.”
It said its programs with the US federal government would be wound up by the end of the fiscal year, but that its work on refugee resettlement would continue, including supporting recently arrived refugees from around the world.
20 Democratic attorneys general sue Trump administration over conditions placed on federal funds
- The lawsuits are the latest legal actions that Democratic-led states have taken against Trump since he took office earlier this year
PROVIDENCE, R.I.: A coalition of 20 state Democratic attorneys general filed two federal lawsuits on Tuesday, claiming that the Trump administration is threatening to withhold billions of dollars in transportation and disaster-relief funds unless states agree to certain immigration enforcement actions.
According to the complaints, both Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy have threatened to cut off funding to states that refuse to comply with President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda.
While no federal funding is currently being withheld, California Attorney General Rob Bonta said during a news conference on Tuesday that the threat was “imminent.”
“President Donald Trump can’t use these funds as a bargaining chip as his way of ensuring states abide by his preferred policies,” Bonta added.
Department of Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that the lawsuit will not stop the Trump Administration from “restoring the rule of law.”
“Cities and states who break the law and prevent us from arresting criminal illegal aliens should not receive federal funding. The President has been clear on that,” she said.
Duffy said in a statement that the 20 states have filed the lawsuit because “their officials want to continue breaking federal law and putting the needs of illegal aliens above their own citizens.”
Both lawsuits say that the Trump administration is violating the US Constitution by trying to dictate federal spending when Congress has that power — not the executive branch.
On April 24, states received letters from the Department of Transportation stating that they must cooperate on immigration efforts and eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs or risk losing funds.
New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin criticized the timing of Duffy’s letter when Newark’s airport struggles with radar outages and other issues.
“I wish the administration would stop playing politics with people’s lives,” Platkin said. “I wish Secretary Duffy would do his damn job, which is to make sure planes land on time, not to direct immigration enforcement.”
Meanwhile, on Feb. 24, states received letters from the Department of Homeland Security declaring that states that “refuse to cooperate with, refuse to share information with, or even actively obstruct federal immigration enforcement reject these ideals and the history we share in common as Americans.”
“If any government entity chooses to thumb its nose at the Department of Homeland Security’s national security and public safety mission, it should not receive a single dollar of the Department’s money unless Congress has specifically required it,” Noem wrote in her letter.
Attorneys general behind the lawsuits include the following states: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington, Wisconsin and Vermont.
The cases are being spearheaded by California but were filed in federal court in Rhode Island, a detail that the attorneys general defended by saying they filed in “any court that is going to be fair and objective and consider our factual presentation and legal analysis.”
The lawsuits are the latest legal actions that Democratic-led states have taken against Trump since he took office earlier this year. Bonta noted that California has filed more than 20 lawsuits against the administration, while Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha said his state has launched more than a dozen.
While the lawsuits have challenged policies on tariffs, federal employee firings and health care research, Trump’s focus on immigration enforcement and the mass deportation of immigrants in the United States illegally have received the most attention.
This has included the president’s promise to mass deport people and the start of a registry required for all those who are in the country illegally.
“What we’re seeing is a creeping authoritarianism,” Neronha said.
