A network of centers run by Libya’s Department for Combating Illegal Immigration, or DCIM,  is supported by the European Union as a bulwark against mainly African migrants crossing the Mediterranean Sea.

Human rights groups and U.N. agencies say abuse also takes place in the official DCIM-run facilities.

“Sexual violence and exploitation are rife in several detention centers (for migrants) across the country,” said Tarik Lamloum, a Libyan activist working with the Belaady Organization for Human Rights. 

The U.N. refugee agency has documented hundreds of cases of women raped while in either DCIM detention or traffickers’ prisons, with some even being impregnated by guards and giving birth during detention, said Vincent Cochetel, the agency’s special envoy for the Central Mediterranean. 

At least two of the girls attempted to kill themselves in late May following alleged beatings and attempted rapes, according to local rights group Libyan Crime Watch and U.N. agencies.

When Libyan security forces rescued her earlier this year, the young Somali woman thought it would be the end of her suffering. For more than two years, she had been imprisoned and sexually abused by human traffickers notorious for extorting, torturing and assaulting migrants like her trying to reach Europe. Instead, the 17-year-old said, the sexual assaults against her have continued, only now by guards atthe Shara al-Zawiya detention center,  the government-run center in the Libyan capital Tripoli where they are being kept. 

“While it is not the first time I suffer from sexual attacks, this is more painful as it was by the people who should protect us,” the 17-year-old said, speaking to The Associated Press by a smuggled mobile phone. “You have to offer something in return to go to the bathroom, to call family or to avoid beating,” she said. “It’s like we are being held by traffickers.” 

Nearly 13,000 men, women and children have been intercepted by the Libyan Coast Guard and returned to Libyan shores from the start of the year up to June 12, a record number. Most are then placed in DCIM-run centers. At some of the 29 DCIM-run centers around the country, rights groups have documented a lack of basic hygiene, health care, food and water as well as beatings and torture. DCIM receives support, supplies and training, including on human rights, through the EU’s 4.9 billion-euro Trust Fund for Africa.

“The guns are silent, a cease-fire is in place … but human rights violations are continuing unabated,” said Suki Nagra, representative of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Libya.

Libyan guards accused of sexually assaulting minors (apnews.com)

 Patricia Espinosa, who leads the UN on climate policy, told the Observer that progress had not been made on honouring past commitments to find $100bn (£72.5bn) a year to help developing countries invest in green technologies.

“We’re still very far away from being fully confident of having a full success at Cop26,” she said.  Espinosa expressed disappointment, saying: “Regarding finance, I’d have really hoped for a clearer signal on how and when we will be able to see the commitment to mobilise the $100bn fulfilled.”

At the G7, there was a lack of detail about precisely how much money wealthier nations would be willing to give to cut emissions and take costly steps necessary to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels.

“This is one condition to be able to have a good basis to have a successful Cop26,” Espinosa said. “It is essential. We cannot afford a lack of success. Cop26 should be able to give some sense of hope to the world. There isn’t much time. We are already in the second half of June.”

Rachel Kyte, dean of the Fletcher School at Tufts University in Massachusetts, and a former UN climate envoy explained, “The G7 failed to lead when it didn’t agree how to fulfil the $100bn promise. Their apparent strategy of brinkmanship is wrong-headed. Many around the world are already at the brink.” 

 Women in Istanbul took to the streets on Saturday to protest Turkish President Erdogan’s decision to withdraw from the Istanbul Convention, effective July 1.  Conservatives in Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AK Party)  claim the convention actually encourages violence by undermining Turkey’s traditional family structures. Protesters gathered on the streets of Istanbul on Saturday to voice their anger. Melek Ondas of the Women’s Council association was quoted by AFP as saying that women came from 70 provinces to the rally in Istanbul.

“We believe in the strength of our organizations. And whether the decision is overturned or not, we will continue our struggle in every way possible,” Ondas told AFP.

The convention targets violence against women and domestic violence. The convention requires signatory states to investigate allegations of violence and prosecute those responsible. Additionally, signatories agree to promote gender equality through legislation and education. Turkey was the convention’s first signatory in 2011, lending it the name of its commercial capital. Since then the convention has been signed by 45 countries, along with the European Union.

In Turkey, at least 300 women were murdered in Turkey last year. In May alone, 17 cases of confirmed femicides were reported and another 20 suspected cases were reported.

“These murders often go unpunished,” said Marc Pierini, a visiting scholar from Carnegie Europe. This is why the Istanbul Convention was such a “crucial reassurance” for Turkish women.

Turkey: Women rally ahead of rights treaty official exit | News | DW | 19.06.2021

Covid vaccines will substantially benefit a number of pharmaceutical companies.

 The global market for vaccines is worth $70bn (£50bn) this year. Pfizer and Moderna, which are charging $30-plus per person for the required two shots in Europe and the US, will take the lion’s share.

Pfizer and Moderna stand to make tens of billions of dollars from their Covid-19 vaccines this year and next, given G7 governments’ pledge to vaccinate the entire world by the end of 2022.

Pfizer predicted it would make $26bn from its jab in 2021, a third of annual revenue. This was based on orders received by mid-April, so is likely to be an underestimate. Analysts at Morgan Stanley led by David Risinger raised their estimates for Pfizer to $33bn in 2021 and $32bn in 2022, halving to $16.5bn in 2023 and $8.2bn in 2024. Barclays analyst Carter Gould predicts even higher revenues for Pfizer this year – $38bn, falling to about $17bn in 2022, $8.5bn in 2023 and $6.3bn in 2024.

Moderna expects it to generate revenue of $19.2bn, as it aims to produce 1bn doses this year, and up to 3bn doses next year. Barclays analyst Gena Wang forecast slightly higher sales of $19.6bn, falling to $12.2bn in 2022 and about $11bn in each of the following two years. Morgan Stanley analysts have pencilled in $13.5bn next year, falling to $12.5bn in 2023 and 2024.

Johnson & Johnson, which charges the US government $10 per dose for its single-jab vaccine, is likely to generate $6.6bn in revenue this year, according to calculations made by Barclays in March, followed by $1.2bn in 2022 and $383m in 2023.

For AstraZeneca, which charges between $4.30 and $10 for two doses, Barclays forecasts $5.2bn in sales in 2021, falling to $2.3bn and $475m in the next two years.

Other Covid vaccines that could bring in billions of dollars for their makers include the CoronaVac jab developed by China’s Sinovac and the Russian Sputnik V. Nasdaq-listed Sinovac has built factories capable of producing 2 billion doses a year and reported a fourfold increase in sales to $328m between October and December.

  A Novavax report of 90% efficacy after trials in the US and Mexico sent its shares soaring last week. Its chief executive, Stan Erck, talked of “the potential for several billion dollars in revenue in the next 12 months”. Barclays forecasts $7.7bn revenues for Novavax in 2021, falling to $1.8bn and $538m in the next two years.

Covid jabs for billions of humans will earn their makers billions of dollars | Pharmaceuticals industry | The Guardian

 In ‘The Black Tax: The Cost of Being Black in America’, Shawn Rochester offers a statistical breakdown of the economic figures which shed light on slavery’s legacy and the debilitating laws enacted during the grim Jim Crow era and the wealth gaps that have widened even more in recent decades.

“Around $50 trillion of economic resources and labor has not been paid to Black people since slavery…”

By the end of 2020, the homeownership rate for Black families stood around 44%, compared with 75% for white families.

A typical middle-class Black household a wealth amount of approximately $13,024 compared to a staggering average of $149,703.

In 1968, a typical middle-class black household had $6,674 in wealth compared with $70,786 for the typical middle-class white household, according to data adjusted for inflation. 

In 2016, the typical middle-class black household had $13,024 in wealth versus $149,703 for the median white household, an even larger gap in percentage terms.

Black households had $8,762 in cash or equivalent liquid assets, compared with $49,529 for white households in 2016.

The real reason why Juneteenth is a point of contention for the GOP – Alternet.org

 The tobacco industry survives and thrives. It adapts to legislative and regulatory attempts to hinder the sale, promotion, and use of its products.

The number of smokers has increased from 0·99 billion in 1990 to 1·14 billion in 2019, who consumed 7·41 trillion cigarette-equivalents of tobacco in 2019. 

5·96 million (77·5%) of 7·69 million smoking-attributable deaths in 2019 occurred in low-income and middle-income countries and that 66 (93%) of 71 countries that had significant increases in such deaths were low-income and middle-income countries.

WHO reported that although global tobacco cultivation decreased by 15·7% between 2012 and 2018, it increased by 3·4% in Africa. The number of adult users of tobacco in Africa increased from 64 million in 2000 to 73 million in 2018.

 Cigarette taxes could be set high enough to crush the tobacco industry, but no governments will go that far. They rely on this revenue for deficit reduction and for things other than curbing smoking.

The vaunted 1998 Master Settlement Agreement between the US state attorneys general and the tobacco industry, ostensibly to recover medical costs for disease caused by smoking, epitomises government addiction to tobacco money. States have spent only 3% of the annual payments to them from the industry to fight smoking, which in some instances is less than before the Master Settlement Agreement.

 Increases in tobacco taxation might have reduced sales to the poorest consumers, but US cigarette manufacturers are still making huge profits and tobacco stocks remain a healthy investment.

In contrast to the trillions of dollars allocated by US Congress to address COVID-19, no major funding has ever been approved to fight smoking and its promotion.

 The number of displaced people has doubled in the last decade.

The number of people leaving their homes due to persecution, conflict, violence, and human rights violations has increased to 82.4 million, according to the Global Trends report from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). 

The vast majority of refugees around the world are hosted by countries that are low- and middle-income nations. The world’s least developed countries host 27% of the world’s refugees.

At the end of last year, there were 20.7 million refugees under the UNHCR mandate, 5.7 million Palestinian refugees, and 3.9 million Venezuelans who fled their homes.

Turkey hosts the highest with 3.7 million refugees. Colombia was second with more than 1.7 million, including Venezuelans displaced abroad. Germany hosted the third-largest number with nearly 1.5 million.

A further 48 million people were displaced within their own country while there are 4.1 million asylum-seekers.

The UN estimates that almost 1 million children were born as refugees between 2018 and 2020. Furthermore, 42% of displaced persons are girls and boys under the age of 18. Many of them are at risk of remaining in exile for years to come, some potentially for the rest of their lives.

At the height of the pandemic in 2020, more than 160 countries closed their borders while 99 countries made no exception for people who had sought international protection. Only 34,400 applications for resettlement were accepted — the lowest figure in 20 years. 

June 17 is the UN-designated day related to turning degraded land into healthy.

In many countries, a drought will bring hunger and the need for migration to working people, but when the Western states of the USA suffer a serious drought, its inhabitants need to be told that there is a water shortage.

“Not everybody in California understands how bad this drought is…and how bad it could be,” said State Water Resources Water Control Board Chairwoman Felicia Marcus when the report was first released.  “There are communities in danger of running out of water all over the state.”

“This is a real emergency that requires a real emergency response,” argues Jay Famiglietti, a senior water scientist at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “If Southern California does not step up and conserve its water, and if the drought continues on its epic course, there is nothing more that our water managers can do for us. Water availability in Southern California would be drastically reduced. With those reductions, we should expect skyrocketing water, food and energy prices, as well as the demise of agriculture.”

Groundwater, which is being treated as an endless and bountiful resource, maybe making up for recent water loss, but for how long remains to be seen.  Without significant rainfall, groundwater will not be replenished.

 America’s largest reservoir is at an all-time low. Lake Mead has the potential to hold an impressive 26.12 million acre-feet of water when it’s full. However, as of June 14, 2021, the reservoir held roughly 9 million acre-feet of water, about 36% of its full capacity after the region experienced over two decades of drought.

A study by University of California researchers that reported that the state has issued far more water rights than there is water to supply them.

 In Oregon, federal authorities announced that there would be no further release of water from the reserves in the Klamath Basin for irrigation schemes downstream. Protesters affiliated with right-wing People’s Rights Network are threatening to unilaterally opening the sluice gates of a reservoir. 

The protesters claim to represent the interests of farmers, they have been disavowed by agricultural leaders, including Ben DuVal, president of the Klamath Water Users Association, said the protesters were “idiots who have no business being here”, who were using the crisis as “a soapbox to push their agenda”.

 Progressive

The world is in perpetual motion,

Flux of change never rests: Whatever is

For a moment, will no longer be. This

Natural algorithm of creation

Generates broad oceans and continents,

Flora and fauna, births and extinctions,

Tribes and empires, settlements and migrations,

Societies and their discontents.

Those who declare themselves for radical change

Have such aspirations well grounded,

Who speaks otherwise shall be confounded;

Where the old’s conserved, the new must impinge.

No matter how distant the prospect seems,

Time can realise what the present dreams.

D. A.