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Turkey, Malaysia Back South Africa's ICJ Genocide Case Against Israel
"Israel's murder of more than 22,000 Palestinian civilians, the majority of whom were women and children, in Gaza for nearly three months should not go unpunished in any way," said a Turkish spokesperson.
Jan 03, 2024
South Africa is no longer alone in bringing its claim of genocide by the Israeli government to the International Court of Justice, following announcements from the Turkish Foreign Ministry and the Malaysian Ministry of Foreign Affairs that they support the case.
Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesperson Oncu Keceli said Wednesday that those responsible for the killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza since October 7 "must be held accountable before international law."
"Israel's murder of more than 22,000 Palestinian civilians, the majority of whom were women and children, in Gaza for nearly three months should not go unpunished in any way," Keceli said. "We hope that the process will be completed as soon as possible."
The ICJ is scheduled to hear the case on January 11-12. Israeli representatives are expected to appear at the hearing.
International rights groups issued a call on Wednesday for other countries to file Declarations of Intervention at the court, whose authority Israel recognizes, to bolster South Africa's case.
The Turkish Foreign Ministry said it expects "that within the framework of this application, the ICJ will decide on provisional measures involving those to stop Israel's attacks on Gaza."
The Malaysia Ministry of Foreign Affairs said late Tuesday that it "welcomes the application by South Africa instituting proceedings against Israel... concerning the violations by Israel of its obligations under the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in relation to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip."
A spokesperson for the South African Foreign Ministry toldThe Jerusalem Post that it expects other countries to soon follow Turkey and Malaysia's lead and back its case.
In its 84-page complaint, South Africa detailed the genocidal intent that's been displayed in numerous public statements by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Isaac Herzog, and other top officials, as well as Israel's bombardment of civilian targets and forced displacement of civilians.
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‘The World Is Failing Forests’: Report Finds Leaders Way Off Track From Halting Deforestation by 2030
"We are investing in activities that are harmful for forests at far higher rates than we are investing in activities that are beneficial for forests," the assessment coordinator said.
Oct 24, 2023
Despite promising to halt global deforestation by 2030, world leaders have not done enough to protect forests, a new report has found.
The 2023 Forest Declaration Assessment, released late Monday, calculated that human activities destroyed 6.6 million hectares of forest in 2022, which means the world is 21% off track from meeting the 2030 deadline. In addition, 4.1 million hectares of especially vital primary tropical forests were cleared, 33% off where they need to be to stay on schedule.
"The world is failing forests with devastating consequences on a global scale," WWF Global Forests Lead Fran Price said in a statement. "It is impossible to reverse nature loss, address the climate crisis, and develop sustainable economies without forests."
The Forest Declaration Assessment has been published by a group of civil society organizations every year since 2015. Beginning last year, it started tracking the progress of governments towards the 2021 Glasgow Leaders' Declaration on Forests and Land Use, under which more than 100 nations attending the COP26 U.N. climate conference promised to "halt and reverse forest loss and land degradation by 2030."
"That 2030 goal is not just nice to have; it's essential for maintaining a livable climate for humanity," Erin Matson, senior consultant at Climate Focus and coordinator for the Forest Declaration Assessment, said during a press briefing ahead of the report's release.
Last year's report showed that deforestation had actually decreased by 6% compared to the baseline, which "was not enough, but it was progress," Matson said. "And it gave us hope that we could see continued progress in 2022."
"We really need to remember that every hectare of forest we lose pushes us further away from being able to keep global temperature rise to within 1.5°C, avoid irreversible tipping points, and restore nature."
Why wasn't that hope realized? The answer, Matson said, came down to money.
"We are investing in activities that are harmful for forests at far higher rates than we are investing in activities that are beneficial for forests," Matson explained.
Agriculture, including cattle ranching and the production of commodities like soy and palm oil, remains the leading cause of tropical deforestation. Yet Global Canopy found that, in 2022, 150 private financial institutions continued to channel $6.1 trillion to companies whose activities were likely to contribute to deforestation through commodity production, and two-thirds of the institutions did not have any policies in place to avoid investing in forest clearing. When it comes to public finance, between 2013 and 2018 governments invested $378 to $635 per year in "gray" finance—funding activities that could hurt forests—and only $26.5 billion total in "green" finance programs to protect them. That means that green finance flows were just $2.2 billion a year, or less than 1% of gray finance flows. Existing green finance also falls far short of the $460 billion a year that is needed to meet forest goals.
"We're financing deforestation through the products we buy and the activities that governments and businesses support through subsidies and investments," Mary Gagen, chief advisor on forests at WWF-UK, said during the briefing. "We really need to remember that every hectare of forest we lose pushes us further away from being able to keep global temperature rise to within 1.5°C, avoid irreversible tipping points, and restore nature."
There was some good news in the report. More than 50 countries are making enough progress to halt deforestation internally by the end of the decade, including Indonesia and Malaysia. Their success offers a potential road map for others.
"Much of their success is attributable to strong laws and enforcement, collaboration with the private sector and civil society, and strong support for and recognition for the rights of Indigenous peoples and local communities, as well as just sheer political will," Matson said.
The report also does not include data that reflects Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's success at reducing Amazon deforestation in 2023 by enforcing environmental laws and respecting Indigenous rights after former right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro worked to erode them.
The report offered several recommendations for governments, private institutions, and civil society, including protecting and securing Indigenous land rights, boosting finance, and channeling subsidies away from industries and activities that harm forests and towards those that help. Overall, the report authors argued that the definition of "business as usual" had to change.
"Global economic models must be re-structured to value forests for the benefits that they provide over the long term, rather than for the superficial and short-term gain that comes with clearing them," the report authors wrote.
Alongside the assessment report, WWF released its Forest Pathways report, "the first ever comprehensive global blueprint on how to stop failing our forests," as Gagen put it.
The report outlines four pathways to protecting forests:
- Accelerating the recognition of Indigenous land rights;
- Mobilizing finance;
- Reforming global trade so that supply chains don't rely on commodities tied to deforestation; and
- Shifting the economy to value nature.
The conservation group also debuted a graphic of "forest stripes." Based on the famous "climate stripes" visualizing the warming of average temperatures, it shows in green to red the 79% decline of forest-dependent species from 1970 to 2018.
"We're at a critical juncture," Price said during the briefing. "We don't need new forest goals. We need uncompromising ambition, speed, and accountability by both governments and businesses to fulfill their existing goals."
Yet governments and corporations may not act on their own, especially as Matson does not expect forests to be a priority at the upcoming COP28 climate talks in United Arab Emirates this November and December.
"It's so much more important that citizens and the media and civil society keep our attention and pressure on world leaders to meet their shared responsibility on forests," Matson said. "Every country has to get on track or else we have little hope of meeting the 2030 goal."
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Tropical Forest Loss Generated 2.7 Gigatonnes of Carbon Pollution in 2022
That's one figure from a new report finding tropical deforestation increased in 2022 despite global pledges.
Jun 27, 2023
Despite world leaders' pledge to halt and reverse global deforestation by 2030, the tropics lost 10% more primary forest in 2022 than in 2021.
That's the latest update from the World Resources Institute's (WRI) Global Forest Watch, released Tuesday, which found that tropical forests had lost 4.1 million hectares, generating as much carbon dioxide as India emits from fossil fuels in a year at 2.7 gigatonnes.
"One thing is clear: What happens in the forest, doesn't stay in the forest," Frances Seymour, a distinguished senior fellow in WRI's forests program, said, as Mongabay reported.
Seymour said that the data, gathered by the University of Maryland, was "particularly disheartening" because of its timing.
At the COP26 U.N. climate conference in Glasgow in 2021, 145 nations signed the "Glasgow Leaders' Declaration on Forests and Land Use" that included a promise to work "collectively to halt and reverse forest loss and land degradation by 2030 while delivering sustainable development and promoting an inclusive rural transformation."
"We had hoped by now to see signals in the data that we were turning the corner on forest loss," Seymour said, as Mongabay reported. "We don't see that signal yet, and in fact, we're heading in the wrong direction."
"Globally, we are far off track and trending in the wrong direction."
The analysis focuses on tropical forests because more than 96% of human-caused deforestation takes place there and because primary tropical rainforests are especially important for protecting biodiversity and regulating both the global climate and local temperature and weather patterns—temperatures near newly deforested areas can increase by twice the amount forced upward by the climate crisis alone.
The update found that the world lost an area of these essential forests the size of Switzerland at a rate of 11 soccer fields per minute. That's over 1 million hectares more than it should have to meet the global goal of halting deforestation by 2030, the WRI's Rod Taylor said, as BBC News reported.
"Globally, we are far off track and trending in the wrong direction," Taylor said.
This could have serious consequences for both forest communities and efforts to limit global heating to 1.5°C above preindustrial levels. Already, the world would be around 0.5°C warmer without forests, Mongabay pointed out.
"Since the turn of the century, we have seen a haemorrhaging of some of the world's most important forest ecosystems despite years of efforts to turn that trend around," Global Forest Watch director Mikaela Weisse said at a press briefing reported by AFP. "We are rapidly losing one of our most effective tools for combating climate change, protecting biodiversity, and supporting the health and livelihoods of millions of people."
In some instances, it is possible that policy shifts have not had the time to take root and sprout in the data. Brazil, for example, led the world for deforestation at 43% of the world total. It saw 15% more forest loss in 2022 than 2021 and the highest level of non-fire-caused tree loss since 2005.
However, the 2022 data reflects the last year of the administration of right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro, whose policies encouraged deforestation by decreasing protections for the environment and Indigenous rights, the report authors noted.
Bolsonaro lost the 2022 election to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who succeeded in significantly curbing deforestation during his previous term. Lula, who was sworn in in early 2023, has now promised to end deforestation by 2030.
"This will not be an easy task, with some officials cautioning that there may not be visible progress until 2024 at the earliest as enforcement agencies are re-equipped and re-staffed and illegal activities investigated," the report authors observed.
"As a consumer of the products that we export, the international community needs to not be buying products that come from deforested lands."
Catarina Jakovac, a biologist at Brazil's Federal University of Santa Catarina, toldDW that Lula—and Brazil—needed support to protect the Amazon.
"As a consumer of the products that we export, the international community needs to not be buying products that come from deforested lands," she said.
Seymour also added that, while it may take policies around the world some time to kick in, finance from wealthier countries for anti-deforestation measures is not where it needs to be.
"Collectively we don't seem to be addressing the problem as the planetary emergency that it truly represents," Seymour said, according to Mongabay.
Other countries that saw noticeable deforestation in 2022 were DRC and Bolivia, which lost the second and third most after Brazil respectively. In DRC, forest loss is complicated and often driven by poverty as people clear forest for charcoal and subsistence farming.
"Investments to lift people out of poverty and reduce reliance on a resource-based economy are urgently needed," the report authors wrote.
In Bolivia, meanwhile, government policy that favors commodity agriculture—especially soy—encourages tree cutting. The government offers land titles to farmers who clear their own plot.
"The standing forest isn't seen as fulfilling any social or economic function," Marlene Quintanilla, a research director at nonprofit the Fundación Amigos de la Naturaleza, toldThe New York Times.
Ghana broke records with its deforestation rates, with forest loss increasing in the country by 71%, the highest increase of any nation. The losses were mostly in protected areas and linked to cocoa farming, gold mining, and fires.
One positive data point came from southeast Asia, where government and corporate policy seems to be successfully curbing deforestation. In Indonesia, which led the way for reducing forest loss, the government has promised that its land use will generate a net carbon sink by 2030 and banned new logging in palm oil plantations in 2019, according to the report and BBC News. In Malaysia, rates of forest loss have also stayed low in recent years, with a majority of the palm oil industry signing on to No Deforestation, No Peat, and No Exploitation (NDPE) commitments.
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