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India's deaths during pandemic 10X official toll
India’s excess deaths during the pandemic could be a staggering 10 times the official COVID-19 toll, likely making it modern India’s worst human tragedy, according to the most comprehensive research yet on the ravages of the virus in the south Asian country.
Most experts believe India’s official toll of more than 414,000 dead is a vast undercount, but the government has dismissed those concerns as exaggerated and misleading.
Read: Covid-19: Bangladesh behind India, Pakistan in recovery rate
The report released Tuesday estimated excess deaths — the gap between those recorded and those that would have been expected — to be between 3 million to 4.7 million between January 2020 and June 2021. It said an accurate figure may “prove elusive” but the true death toll “is likely to be an order of magnitude greater than the official count.”
The report, published by Arvind Subramanian, the Indian government’s former chief economic adviser, and two other researchers at the Center for Global Development and Harvard University, said the count could have missed deaths occurring in overwhelmed hospitals or while health care was delayed or disrupted, especially during the devastating peak surge earlier this year.
“True deaths are likely to be in the several millions not hundreds of thousands, making this arguably India’s worst human tragedy since Partition and independence,” the report said.
The Partition of the British-ruled Indian subcontinent into independent India and Pakistan in 1947 led to the killing of up to 1 million people as gangs of Hindus and Muslims slaughtered each other.
Read: India's COVID-19 death toll crosses 350,000
The report on India’s virus toll used three calculation methods: data from the civil registration system that records births and deaths across seven states, blood tests showing the prevalence of the virus in India alongside global COVID-19 fatality rates, and an economic survey of nearly 900,000 people done thrice a year.
Researchers cautioned that each method had weaknesses, such as the economic survey omitting the causes of death.
Instead, researchers looked at deaths from all causes and compared that data to mortality in previous years — a method widely considered an accurate metric.
Researchers also cautioned that virus prevalence and COVID-19 deaths in the seven states they studied may not translate to all of India, since the virus could have spread worse in urban versus rural states and since health care quality varies greatly around India.
And while other nations are believed to have undercounted deaths in the pandemic, India is believed to have a greater gap due to it having the world’s second highest population of 1.4 billion and its situation is complicated because not all deaths were recorded even before the pandemic.
Dr. Jacob John, who studies viruses at the Christian Medical College at Vellore in southern India, reviewed the report for The Associated Press and said it underscores the devastating impact COVID-19 had on the country’s under-prepared health system.
“This analysis reiterates the observations of other fearless investigative journalists that have highlighted the massive undercounting of deaths,” Jacob said.
The report also estimated that nearly 2 million Indians died during the first surge in infections last year and said not “grasping the scale of the tragedy in real time” may have “bred collective complacency that led to the horrors” of the surge earlier this year.
Over the last few months, some Indian states have increased their COVID-19 death toll after finding thousands of previously unreported cases, raising concerns that many more fatalities were not officially recorded.
Several Indian journalists have also published higher numbers from some states using government data. Scientists say this new information is helping them better understand how COVID-19 spread in India.
Murad Banaji, who studies mathematics at Middlesex University and has been looking at India’s COVID-19 mortality figures, said the recent data has confirmed some of the suspicions about undercounting. Banaji said the new data also shows the virus wasn’t restricted to urban centers, as contemporary reports had indicated, but that India’s villages were also badly impacted.
Afghan president slams Taliban; rockets target Kabul palace
At least three rockets hit near the presidential palace on Tuesday shortly before Afghan President Ashraf Ghani was to give an address to mark the major Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha.
There were no injuries and the rockets landed outside the heavily fortified palace grounds, said Mirwais Stanikzai, spokesman for the interior minister.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the rocket attack, but police quickly fanned out across area. One car parked on a nearby street was completely destroyed; the police said it was used as launching pad for the rockets.
Read: Pulitzer Prize-winning Indian photojournalist killed in Afghanistan
The palace is in the middle of a so-called Green Zone that is fortified with giant cement blast walls and barbed wire, and streets near the palace have long been closed off.
The barrage came as the U.S. and NATO complete their final withdrawal from Afghanistan. Many Afghans are worried whether their war-ravaged country will fall deeper into chaos and violence as foreign forces withdraw and the Taliban gain more territory on the ground, having captured several districts and key border crossings with neighboring countries over the past weeks.
The withdrawal is more than 95% complete and the final U.S. soldier will be gone by Aug. 31, President Joe Biden said in an address earlier this month.
“This Eid has been named after Afghan forces to honor their sacrifices and courage, especially in the last three months,” Ghani said in his address to the nation following morning prayers for Eid al-Adha, or the “Feast of Sacrifice.”
“The Taliban have no intention and willingness for peace” Ghani said. “We have proven that we have the intention, willingness and have sacrificed for peace.”
Read: Women’s groups call for UN peacekeeping force in Afghanistan
Ghani also deplored his government’s decision to release 5,000 Taliban prisoners to get peace talks started last year as a “big mistake” that only strengthened the insurgents.
“We released 5,000 prisoners to start peace talks, but until today the Taliban haven’t shown any serious or meaningful interest in peace negotiations.”
Abdullah Abdullah, the No. 2 official in the government, was inside the palace during the rocket attack on Tuesday, having returned on Monday from peace talks with the Taliban in Qatar. Those inside the palace, however, were far removed from where the rockets landed.
The two days of meetings in Doha — the highest level of negotiations between Kabul and the Taliban so far — aimed at jumpstarting stalled talks but ended with a promise of more high-level talks.
In his speech, Ghani also assailed neighboring Pakistan, which Kabul blames for harboring the Taliban leadership and providing a safe haven and assistance to the insurgents. In the most recent fighting in the Afghan border town of Spin Boldak, Taliban fighters were seen receiving treatment at a Pakistani hospital across the border in Chaman.
Read:Taliban surge in north Afghanistan sends thousands fleeing
Pakistan is seen as key to peace in Afghanistan. The Taliban leadership is headquartered in Pakistan and Islamabad has used its leverage, which it calims is now waning, to press the Taliban to talk peace.
Pakistan has also been deeply critical of Kabul, saying it has allowed another militant group, the Pakistani Taliban — Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan — to find safety in Afghanistan from where they have launched a growing number of attacks targeting the Pakistan military.
“Pakistan does not want a Taliban regime in its homeland” but their media have been “campaigning for a Taliban regime in Afghanistan,” Ghani added.
The Eid al-Adha is the most important Islamic holiday, marking the willingness of the Prophet Ibrahim — Abraham to Christians and Jews — to sacrifice his son. During the holiday, which in most places lasts four days, Muslims slaughter sheep or cattle and distribute part of the meat to the poor.
Size of Oregon wildfire underscores vastness of the US West
The monstrous wildfire burning in Oregon has grown to a third the size of Rhode Island and spreads miles each day, but evacuations and property losses have been minimal compared with much smaller blazes in densely populated areas of California.
The fire’s jaw-dropping size contrasted with its relatively small impact on people underscores the vastness of the American West and offers a reminder that Oregon, which is larger than Britain, is still a largely rural state, despite being known mostly for its largest city, Portland.
The 476-square-mile (1,210-square-kilometer) Bootleg Fire is burning 300 miles (483 kilometers) southeast of Portland in and around the Fremont-Winema National Forest, a vast expanse of old-growth forest, lakes and wildlife refuges.
If the fire were in densely populated parts of California, “it would have destroyed thousands of homes by now,” said James Johnston, a researcher with Oregon State University’s College of Forestry who studies historical wildfires. “But it is burning in one of the more remote areas of the lower 48 states. It’s not the Bay Area out there.”
Read:Huge Oregon blaze grows as wildfires burn across western US
At least 2,000 homes have been evacuated at some point during the fire and another 5,000 threatened. At least 70 homes and more than 100 outbuildings have gone up in flames. Thick smoke chokes the area where residents and wildlife alike have already been dealing with months of drought and extreme heat. No one has died.
Pushed by strong winds from the southwest, the fire is spreading rapidly to the north and east, advancing toward an area that’s increasingly remote.
Evacuation orders on the fire’s southern edge, closer to more populous areas like Klamath Falls and Bly, have been lifted or relaxed as crews gain control. Now it’s small, unincorporated communities like Paisley and Long Creek — both with fewer than 250 people — and scattered homesteads that are in the crosshairs.
“The Bootleg Fire is threatening ranch houses that are in pretty far-flung areas,” Johnston said. “There are no suburbs in that area.”
But as big as the Bootleg Fire is, it’s not the biggest Oregon has seen. The fire’s current size puts it fourth on the list of the state’s largest blazes in modern times, including rangeland fires, and second on the list of infernos specifically burning in forest.
These megafires usually burn until the late fall or even early winter, when rain finally puts them out.
The largest forest fire in modern history was the Biscuit Fire, which torched nearly 780 square miles (2,000 square kilometers) in 2002 in the Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest in southern Oregon and northern California. The largest fire of any type was the Long Draw Fire in 2012, which incinerated 872 square miles (2,260 square kilometers) of mostly sagebrush and rangeland in the endless expanses of southeastern Oregon, where almost no one lives.
By the time the Bootleg Fire is extinguished months from now, it will likely be as big or bigger than those fires, but research shows that Oregon once experienced megafires much larger than these fairly often, Johnston said.
“I think it’s important for us to take the long view of wildfire. In the context of the last couple hundreds years, the Bootleg Fire is not large,” he said. “One of the things my lab group does is reconstruct historical fires, and fires that were burning in that area in the 1600s and 1700s were just as big as the Bootleg Fire or bigger.”
Read:Western wildfires threatening American Indian tribal lands
That’s little reassurance for fire crews battling the current blaze, which is 25% contained.
On Monday, flames forced the evacuation of a wildlife research station as firefighters had to retreat from the flames for the ninth consecutive day due to erratic and dangerous fire behavior. Sycan Marsh hosts thousands of migrating and nesting birds and is a key research station on wetland restoration in the upper reaches of the Klamath Basin.
Fire pushed by winds and fueled by bone-dry conditions jumped fire-retardant containment lines and pushed up to 4 miles into new territory, authorities said.
Fire crews were also rushing to corral multiple “slop fires” — patches of flames that escaped fire lines meant to contain the blaze — before they grew in size. One of those smaller fires was already nearly 4 square miles (10 square kilometers) in size. Thunderstorms with dry lightning were possible Monday as well, heightening the dangers.
“We are running firefighting operations through the day and all through the night,” said Joe Hessel, incident commander. “This fire is a real challenge, and we are looking at sustained battle for the foreseeable future.”
The Bootleg Fire was one of many fires burning in a dozen states, most of them in the U.S. West. Sixteen large uncontained fires burned in Oregon and Washington state alone on Monday, affecting a total of 767 square miles (1,986 square kilometers), the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center said.
Extremely dry conditions and heat waves tied to climate change have made wildfires harder to fight. Climate change has made the West much warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make weather more extreme and wildfires more frequent and destructive.
At the other end of Oregon, a fire in the northeast mountains grew to nearly 26 square miles (49 square kilometers).
The Elbow Creek Fire that started Thursday has prompted evacuations in several small, rural communities around the Grande Ronde River about 30 miles (50 kilometers) southeast of Walla Walla, Washington. It was 10% contained.
Read: Wildfires threaten homes, land across 10 Western states
Natural features of the area act like a funnel for wind, feeding the flames and making them unpredictable, officials said.
A complex of fires where the states of Oregon, Washington and Idaho meet also grew, reaching 167 square miles (433 square kilometers). The Snake River Complex was 44% contained. The complex was made up of three fires started by lightning on July 7. Flames were chewing through a mix of grass and timber in an extremely remote area of steep terrain about 20 miles (32 kilometers) south of Lewiston, Idaho.
And in Northern California, authorities expanded evacuations on the Tamarack Fire in Alpine County in the Sierra Nevada to include the mountain town of Mesa Vista. That fire, which exploded over the weekend and forced the cancellation of an extreme bike ride, was 36 square miles (93 square kilometers) with no containment.
Thunderstorms expected to roll through Monday night could bring winds to fan the flames and lightning that could spark new ones, the National Weather Service said.
Largest fire grows, forces evacuation of wildlife station
The nation’s largest wildfire torched more dry forest in Oregon and forced the evacuation of a wildlife research station Monday as firefighters had to retreat from the flames for the ninth consecutive day due to erratic and dangerous fire behavior.
Firefighters were forced to pull back as flames, pushed by winds and fueled by bone-dry conditions, jumped fire-retardant containment lines and pushed up to 4 miles into new territory, authorities said.
The destructive Bootleg Fire in south-central Oregon is just north of the California border and grew to more than 476 square miles (1,210 square kilometers), an area about the size of Los Angeles.
READ: Wildfires rage in Russia’s Siberia, cause airport to close
Fire crews were also rushing to corral multiple “slop fires” — patches of flames that escaped fire lines meant to contain the blaze — before they grew in size. One of those smaller fires was already nearly 4 square miles (10 square kilometers) in size. Thunderstorms with dry lightning were possible Monday as well, heightening the dangers.
“We are running firefighting operations through the day and all through the night,” said Joe Hessel, incident commander. “This fire is a real challenge, and we are looking at sustained battle for the foreseeable future.”
On Monday, the fire reached the southern edge of Sycan Marsh, a privately owned wetland that hosts thousands of migrating birds and is a key research station on wetland restoration.The blaze, which was 25% contained, has burned at least 67 homes and 100 buildings while threatening thousands more in a remote landscape of forests, lakes and wildlife refuges.
At the other end of the state, a fire in the mountains of northeast Oregon grew to nearly 19 square miles (49 square kilometers).
READ: Huge Oregon blaze grows as wildfires burn across western US
The Elbow Creek Fire that started Thursday has prompted evacuations in several small, rural communities around the Grande Ronde River about 30 miles (50 kilometers) southeast of Walla Walla, Washington. It was 10% contained.
Natural features of the area act like a funnel for wind, feeding the flames and making them unpredictable, officials said.
In California, a growing wildfire south of Lake Tahoe jumped a highway, prompting more evacuation orders, the closure of the Pacific Crest Trail and the cancellation of an extreme bike ride through the Sierra Nevada.
The Tamarack Fire, which was sparked by lightning on July 4, had charred about 36 square miles (93 square kilometers) of dry brush and timber as of Monday. Crews were improving a line protecting Markleeville, a small town close to the California-Nevada state line. It has destroyed at least two structures, authorities said.
About 500 fire personnel were battling the flames Sunday, “focusing on preserving life and property with point protection of structures and putting in containment lines where possible,” the U.S. Forest Service said.
Meteorologists predicted critically dangerous fire weather with lightning possible through at least Monday in both California and southern Oregon.“With the very dry fuels, any thunderstorm has the potential to ignite new fire starts,” the National Weather Service in Sacramento, California, said on Twitter.
Extremely dry conditions and heat waves tied to climate change have swept the region, making wildfires harder to fight. Climate change has made the West much warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make weather more extreme and wildfires more frequent and destructive.
Firefighters said in July they were facing conditions more typical of late summer or fall.
Northern California’s Dixie Fire roared to new life Sunday, prompting new evacuation orders in rural communities near the Feather River Canyon. The wildfire, near the 2018 site of the deadliest U.S. blaze in recent memory, was 15% contained and covered 39 square miles. The fire is northeast of the town of Paradise, California, and survivors of that horrific fire that killed 85 people watched warily as the new blaze burned.
Pacific Gas & Electric equipment may have been involved in the start of the Dixie Fire, the nation’s largest utility reported to California regulators.
PG&E said in a report Sunday to the California Public Utilities Commission that a repair man responding to a circuit outage on July 13 spotted blown fuses in a conductor atop a pole, a tree leaning into the conductor and fire at the base of the tree.
The Dixie Fire has grown to nearly 47 square miles (122 square kilometers), largely in remote wilderness. The utility said investigators with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection have collected equipment from the location.
READ: Fires threaten Indigenous lands in desiccated Northwest
PG&E equipment has repeatedly been linked to major wildfires, including a 2018 fire that ravaged the town of Paradise and killed 85 people.
At least 16 major fires were burning in the Pacific Northwest alone, according to the Forest Service.
Haiti's interim prime minister to step down
Haiti’s designated Prime Minister Ariel Henry will replace the country’s interim prime minister to honor the wishes of the country’s slain president, an official told The Associated Press on Monday.
It wasn’t immediately clear how quickly interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph, who has been leading Haiti with the backing of police and the military since the July 7 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse, would step down.
“Negotiations are still in course,” Haiti Elections Minister Mathias Pierre said, adding that Joseph would go back to being minister of foreign affairs.
Joseph could not be immediately reached for comment, and Henry did not return a message for comment. However, he released an audio recording in which he referred to himself as prime minister and called for unity.
READ: Martine Moïse, wife of slain president, returns to Haiti
Henry said he would soon announce the members of what he called a provisional consensus government that would lead the country until elections are held.
“I present my compliments to the Haitian people who have shown political maturity in the face of what can be considered a coup. ... Our Haitian brothers gave peace a chance, while leaving the possibility that the truth could one day be restored,” Henry said.
“Now it is up to all the national leaders to walk together in unity, towards the same goal, to show that they are responsible.”
The political turnover followed a statement Saturday from a key group of international diplomats that appeared to snub Joseph as it called for the creation of “a consensual and inclusive government.”
“To this end, it strongly encourages the designated Prime Minister Ariel Henry to continue the mission entrusted to him to form such a government,” the statement from the Core Group said.
The Core Group is composed of ambassadors from Germany, Brazil, Canada, Spain, the U.S., France, the European Union and representatives from the United Nations and the Organization of American States.
READ: Power vacuum rattles Haiti in wake of president’s killing
Monique Clesca, a Haitian writer, activist and former U.N. official, said she doesn’t anticipate any changes under Henry, whom she expects to carry on Moïse’s legacy. But she warned Henry might be viewed as tainted because of the Core Group’s involvement.
“If he accepts this, there is not only a perception, but the reality that he has been put there by the international community, and I think that’s his burden to carry,” she said.
“What we’re calling for is for Haitians to really say this is unacceptable. We do not want the international community stating who ought to be in power and what ought to be done. It is up to us.”
The U.S. Embassy issued a brief statement saying it encouraged civil society to play an active role in building consensus in Haiti, adding that it was essential to strengthening democracy.
The Core Group statement was issued hours after Moïse’s wife, Martine, arrived in Haiti on Saturday aboard a private jet clad in black and wearing a bulletproof vest after being released from a hospital in Miami. She has not issued a statement or spoken publicly since her return to Haiti as the government prepares for the July 23 funeral that will be held in the northern city of Cap-Haitien. Other events to honor Moïse are planned this week in the capital of Port-au-Prince ahead of the funeral.
Moïse designated Henry as prime minister shortly before he was killed, but he had not been sworn in. The neurosurgeon was previously minister of social affairs and interior minister. He has belonged to several political parties including Inite, which was founded by former President René Préval.
The upcoming change in leadership comes as authorities continue to investigate the July 7 attack at Moïse’s private home with high-powered rifles that seriously wounded his wife.
READ: Mystery grows with key suspect in Haiti president killing
Authorities say more than 20 suspects directly involved in the killing have been arrested. The majority of them are former Colombian soldiers, most of whom Colombian officials say were duped. Another three suspects were killed, with police still seeking additional ones, including an ex-Haitian rebel leader and a former Haitian senator.
Natural origins theory of Covid-19 still the most likely: Fauci
The natural origins theory of the novel coronavirus is still "the most likely," White House Chief Medical Advisor Anthony Fauci said recently.
"The most likely explanation is a natural evolution from an animal reservoir to a human," Fauci, also the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the US, told the media Saturday.
READ: Little new evidence emerges in US probe of Covid-19 origins
Paul Offit, a member of the US Food and Drug Administration's vaccine advisory committee, echoed Fauci's remarks. "I think the chance that this was created by laboratory workers – that it was engineered – is zero."
Meanwhile, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) recently said it was "premature" to rule out a potential link between the Covid-19 pandemic and a laboratory leak.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus Thursday said getting access to raw data had been a challenge for the international team that travelled to China earlier this year to investigate the source of Covid-19.
He said there had been a "premature push" to rule out the theory that the virus might have escaped from a Chinese government lab in Wuhan city – undermining the WHO' March report, which concluded that a laboratory leak was "extremely unlikely."
The first human cases were identified in Wuhan. Tedros told reporters that the UN health agency is "asking China to be transparent, open and cooperate, especially on the information, raw data that we asked for at the early days of the pandemic."
"I was a lab technician myself, I'm an immunologist, and I have worked in the lab, and lab accidents happen. It's common," he said.
In recent months, the idea that the pandemic started somehow in a laboratory – and perhaps involved an engineered virus – has gained traction, especially with President Joe Biden ordering a review of US intelligence to assess the possibility in May.
China has struck back aggressively, arguing that attempts to link the origins of Covid-19 to a lab are politically motivated and has suggested that the outbreak might have started abroad.
Most scientists suspect that the coronavirus originated in bats but the exact route by which it first jumped into people – via an intermediary animal or in some other way – has not yet been determined. It typically takes decades to narrow down the natural source of an animal virus like Ebola or SARS.
"We need information, direct information on what the situation of this lab was before and at the start of the pandemic," the WHO chief said, adding that China's cooperation was critical. "If we get full information, we can exclude (the lab connection)."
READ: 1st case of COVID-19 found in Tokyo Olympic village
Numerous public health experts have also called for an independent examination of Covid-19's origins, arguing the WHO does not have the political clout to conduct such a forensic analysis, and that the UN agency has failed after more than a year to extract critical details from China.
Jamie Metzl, who has led a group of scientists calling for a broader origins investigation, welcomed Tedros' comments but said it was "deeply unfortunate and dangerous" that there were no current plans for a probe led by experts beyond the UN health agency, saying that China has repeatedly blocked requests for all relevant records and samples.
Georgetown University law professor Lawrence Gostin, an expert in public health law, said Tedros' unusual plea for Chinese cooperation underlines how weak the WHO is. "It has no power or political heft to demand access to information critical for global health."
Any WHO-led mission to China also requires government approval for all experts who travel to the country, as well as permission to visit field sites and final approval on any trip report.
Tedros' appeal for transparency was echoed by German Health Minister Jens Spahn, who urged Chinese officials to allow the investigation into the origins of the virus to proceed.
READ: India's health ministry says not enough evidence to link COVID-19 with increase in TB
"We do appreciate the cooperation of the Chinese government so far for the first mission. But that's not yet enough," he said.
WHO official warns against easing coronavirus restrictions too quickly
The coronavirus pandemic is not over yet and restrictions should not be eased too quickly, WHO Regional Director for Europe Dr. Hans Kluge said in an op-ed available to TASS.
"It may be summer, but the pandemic is far from over. Pandemic fatigue has taken a toll on our collective mental health, and it is only natural that people want to relax after what has been a challenging time for everybody," he pointed out. "However, we were in this position last summer. When restrictions were eased too quickly we saw a devastating rise in cases and deaths across the Region that led us back into lockdowns," Kluge added.
READ: It was premature to rule out Covid lab leak: WHO
"Now, after over a year of pressure on our health systems, schooling, livelihoods, economies, physical and mental health, we cannot afford to make the same mistake," Kluge emphasized.
He noted that "although vaccination continues apace" across Europe, "a large proportion of the population remains unvaccinated, while highly transmissible variants of concern are circulating". "At the same time, we are seeing an easing of public health and social measures leading to an increase in COVID-19 cases; where vaccination rates are not high, especially among the most vulnerable, that translates into increased hospitalizations, stretched health systems - and lost lives," the WHO regional director for Europe stressed.
READ: WHO chief describes current stage of pandemic 'very dangerous'
Germany defends preparation for floods, considers lessons
German officials are defending their preparations for flooding in the face of the raging torrents that caught many people by surprise and left over 180 people dead in Western Europe, but they concede that they will need to learn lessons from the disaster.
Efforts to find any more victims and clean up the mess left behind by the floods across a swath of western Germany, eastern Belgium and the Netherlands continued on Monday as floodwaters receded.
Read:Merkel tours ‘surreal’ flood scene, vows aid, climate action
The downpours that led to usually small rivers swelling at vast speed in the middle of last week had been forecast, but warnings of potentially catastrophic damage didn’t appear to have found their way to many people on the ground — often in the middle of the night.
“As soon as we have provided the immediate aid that stands at the forefront now, we will have to look at whether there were things that didn’t go well, whether there were things that went wrong, and then they have to be corrected,” Economy Minister Peter Altmaier told the Bild newspaper. “That isn’t about finger-pointing — it’s about improvements for the future.”
The head of Germany’s civil protection agency said that the country’s weather service had “forecast relatively well” and that the country was well-prepared for flooding on its major rivers.
Read:Europe flooding toll over 180 as rescuers dig deeper
But, Armin Schuster told ZDF television late Sunday, “half an hour before, it is often not possible to say what place will be hit with what quantity” of water. He said that his agency had sent 150 warning notices out via apps and media.
He said he couldn’t yet say where sirens sounded and where they didn’t — “we will have to investigate that.”
Officials in the worst-affected German state, Rhineland-Palatinate, said they were well-prepared for flooding and municipalities had been alerted and acted.
Read:Deadly flooding, heatwaves in Europe, highlight urgency of climate action: WMO
But the state’s interior minister, Roger Lewentz, said after visiting the hard-hit village of Schuld with Chancellor Angela Merkel on Sunday that “we of course had the problem that the technical infrastructure — electricity and so on — was destroyed in one go.”
Local authorities “tried very quickly to react,” he said. “But this was an explosion of the water in moments. ... You can have the very best preparations and warning situations (but) if warning equipment is destroyed and carried away with buildings, then that is a very difficult situation.”
UNESCO chides Australia over Great Barrier Reef proposal
The Chinese host of this year’s meeting of the U.N. World Heritage Committee has defended the body’s proposal to label the Great Barrier Reef as “in danger” against Australian government suspicion that China influenced the finding for political reasons.
The committee, which is meeting both virtually and in the Chinese city of Fuzhou for the next two weeks, will consider the draft decision on Friday.
Read: China dinosaur footprint fossil named after Doraemon's "Nobita"
“Australia, as a member state of the World Heritage Committee, should ... attach importance to the opinions of the advisory bodies and earnestly fulfill the duty of World Heritage protection instead of making groundless accusations against other states,” said Tian Xuejun, the Chinese vice minister of education and the president of this year’s session, on Sunday.
The UNESCO committee will consider adding new sites to the World Heritage list, taking some off and adding others to the in-danger category. A draft decision to put Venice on the in-danger list prompted the Italian government to ban cruise ships from the lagoon city in a bid to avoid the designation.
Tian, speaking at the first news conference since the meetings opened last Friday, said the Great Barrier Reef proposal was based on data from Australia and recommendations from an advisory body.
Australian Environment Minister Susan Ley, who is in Europe lobbying UNESCO delegates against supporting the in-danger listing, was not immediately available to comment on the Chinese criticism.
Her office on Monday released a report by the government-funded Australian Institute of Marine Science that indicated widespread recovery of the reef’s coral. Monitoring by the institute found coral cover had increased during the respite from severe weather over the last year.
“The release of the full report underlines our view that the World Heritage Committee proposed listing had not been based on the latest information,” Ley said in a statement.
Read:India cranking up border infrastructure to narrow gap with China
Australia reacted angrily when the draft was released last month.
“This decision was flawed. Clearly there were politics behind it,” Ley said, without mentioning China by name.
Relations between the two nations have soured in recent years, with Australia blocking Chinese technology and investment in key infrastructure, and China using tariffs and other measures to reduce its imports from Australia.
Australia was warned in 2014 that an in-danger listing was being considered for the Great Barrier Reef, which was designated a world heritage site in 1981.
The draft decision said that Australia’s long-term plan for the reef, a network of 2,500 reefs covering 348,000 square kilometers (134,000 square miles), “requires stronger and clearer commitments, in particular towards urgently countering the effects of climate change.”
“We acknowledge very much the work which has been done in Australia, but our text in the draft decision ... is a proposal for putting the site on the list of world heritage in danger because of the threats which were identified,” said Mechtild Roessler, the UNESCO director of the World Heritage Committee.
Read:Australian court upholds ban on most international travel
Ernesto Ottone Ramírez, the assistant director-general for culture at UNESCO, said that an in-danger listing should be viewed as a collective call for action from all the member states.
“It’s something that should be seen as something positive and not, as what we heard from some of the authorities in other countries, as a punishment,” he said, joining the news conference from Paris. “It’s how we preserve our heritage for future generations.”
Wildfires rage in Russia’s Siberia, cause airport to close
Heavy smoke from raging wildfires covered the Russian city of Yakutsk and 50 other Siberian towns and settlements Sunday, temporarily halting operations at the city’s airport.
Russia has been plagued by widespread forest fires, blamed on unusually high temperatures and the neglect of fire safety rules, with the Sakha-Yakutia region in northeastern Siberia being the worst affected.
Read:Huge Oregon blaze grows as wildfires burn across western US
Local emergency officials said 187 fires raged in the region on Sunday, and the total area engulfed by blazes has grown by 100,000 hectares (about 247,000 acres) in the past 24 hours.
“The situation with wildfires in our republic is very difficult. I repeat that we are experiencing the driest summer in the past 150 years in Yakutia, and the month of June was the hottest on record. This, together with the dry thunderstorms that occur nearly daily in our republic, brought about significant wildfires,” Aysen Nikolayev, Yakutia’s governor, told reporters.
Smoke from the fires covered 51 towns, settlements and cities in the region, including the capital Yakutsk, forcing authorities to suspend all flights in and out of the city.
Read: Western wildfires threatening American Indian tribal lands
“We can’t see each other because of the smoke, our eyes are burning and overall the smoke is very dangerous for the health of us villagers,” said Vasiliy Krivoshapkin, resident of Magaras. “We see on television planes that are dropping water on the burning forest but they aren’t sending these planes to help us for some reason. Why is there no help?”
Russia’s Emergency Ministry said Sunday it had deployed two amphibious aircraft to Yakutia to help tackle the fires. More than 2,200 people are involved in the firefighting effort.