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Brazil emissions rose in 2020 despite pandemic: study

AFP

Brazil’s greenhouse gas emissions rose by 9.5 percent last year, mostly because of deforestation, a report said Thursday, making it one of the only major economies not to cut pollution as the pandemic hit.

Even as worldwide emissions fell seven percent in 2020 — a silver lining of Covid-19 stay-at-home measures that paralyzed the global economy — Brazil released the equivalent of 2.16 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide, its highest since 2006, said the report from the Climate Observatory, a coalition of environmental groups.

“The increase in deforestation in Brazil, particularly in the Amazon rainforest, put the country at odds with the trend seen in the rest of the planet,” it said.

Deforestation in Brazil has surged since far-right President Jair Bolsonaro took office in 2019 with a push to open protected lands to agribusiness and mining.

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Like most countries, Brazil, Latin America’s largest economy, reduced pollution from the energy sector last year as the pandemic brought industry and aviation to a standstill.

Emissions there fell by 4.6 percent, to levels not seen since 2011.

But that gain was more than offset by increases of 2.5 percent for the agricultural sector and 23.7 percent for “land use changes,” which includes the cutting and burning of trees.

Driven largely by farming and cattle ranching, such land clearing releases carbon into the atmosphere — a major problem for the world’s biggest producer and exporter of soy and beef.

Under Bolsonaro, the Brazilian Amazon has lost more than 10,000 square kilometers (3,860 square miles) a year of forest cover, an area the size of Lebanon, up from 6,500 square kilometers a year over the previous decade.

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Climate Observatory executive secretary Marcio Astrini blamed Bolsonaro’s “anti-policies” on the environment for the emissions increase.

“Brazil managed the feat of being perhaps the only major carbon emitter to pollute more in the first year of the pandemic,” he said in a statement.

“This is one more blow to the international image of the country, which arrives completely discredited to the COP26” — the upcoming UN climate summit.

Opening Sunday in Glasgow, it is the biggest climate conference since the 2015 Paris talks produced a landmark accord on curbing global warming, and is seen as crucial for setting global emissions-cutting targets.

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International

Trump urges Putin to reach peace deal

On Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump reiterated his desire for Russian President Vladimir Putin to “reach a deal” to end the war in Ukraine, while also reaffirming his willingness to impose sanctions on Russia.

“I want to see him reach an agreement to prevent Russian, Ukrainian, and other people from dying,” Trump stated during a press conference in the Oval Office at the White House.

“I think he will. I don’t want to have to impose secondary tariffs on Russian oil,” the Republican leader added, recalling that he had already taken similar measures against Venezuela by sanctioning buyers of the South American country’s crude oil.

Trump also reiterated his frustration over Ukraine’s resistance to an agreement that would allow the United States to exploit natural resources in the country—a condition he set in negotiations to end the war.

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International

Deportation flight lands in Venezuela; government denies criminal gang links

A flight carrying 175 Venezuelan migrants deported from the United States arrived in Caracas on Sunday. This marks the third group to return since repatriation flights resumed a week ago, and among them is an alleged member of a criminal organization, according to Venezuelan authorities.

Unlike previous flights operated by the Venezuelan state airline Conviasa, this time, an aircraft from the U.S. airline Eastern landed at Maiquetía Airport, on the outskirts of Caracas, shortly after 2:00 p.m. with the deportees.

Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, who welcomed the returnees at the airport, stated that the 175 repatriated individuals were coming back “after being subjected, like all Venezuelans, to persecution” and dismissed claims that they belonged to the criminal organization El Tren de Aragua.

However, Cabello confirmed that “for the first time in these flights we have been carrying out, someone of significance wanted by Venezuelan justice has arrived, and he is not from El Tren de Aragua.” Instead, he belongs to a gang operating in the state of Trujillo. The minister did not disclose the individual’s identity or provide details on where he would be taken.

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International

Son of journalist José Rubén Zamora condemns father’s return to prison as “illegal”

Guatemalan court decides Wednesday whether to convict journalist José Rubén Zamora

The son of renowned journalist José Rubén Zamora Marroquín, José Carlos Zamora, has denounced as “illegal” the court order that sent his father back to a Guatemalan prison on March 3, after already spending 819 days behind barsover a highly irregular money laundering case.

“My father’s return to prison was based on an arbitrary and illegal ruling. It is also alarming that the judge who had granted him house arrest received threats,” José Carlos Zamora told EFE in an interview on Saturday.

The 67-year-old journalist was sent back to prison inside the Mariscal Zavala military barracks on March 3, when Judge Erick García upheld a Court of Appeals ruling that overturned the house arrest granted to him in October. Zamora had already spent 819 days in prison over an alleged money laundering case.

His son condemned the situation as “unacceptable”, stating that the judge handling the case “cannot do his job in accordance with the law due to threats against his life.”

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