news

https://archive.is/GILKl

It's pretty obvious this was coming, given the policy change a few days ago.

Summary

• Date and venue for summit to be determined

• Zelenskiy wants China to be involved

• Russian invasion enters third year next month

"We would like the Global South to be present ... it is important for us to show that the whole world is against Russia's aggression, and the whole world is for a just peace."

Ukraine said on Sunday that it was vital that Beijing was involved in talks to end the conflict.

For years, investors and financial planners have advised purchasing land as one of the best and safest strategies for growing wealth, due to the old adage that “god’s not making any more of it.” That may prove to be untrue, however, as the United States recently announced plans to expand its territory by over a million square kilometers. The expansion comes in the form of ocean-floor territory which the US has claimed as a means to mine resources and grow its global presence.

This newfound ownership of land is not unprecedented, though it serves as new territory for the United States, as the nation hasn’t formally expanded its land since the ratification of Hawaii as a state in 1959. Dozens of other countries across the world have begun extending their ownership of seabed space, mostly dividing the regions along continental fault lines hundreds of miles away from their landmass coasts. The US State Department agreed to finally throw its own hat in the ring as of December of 2023, when the country began dividing up seabeds in the Arctic, Atlantic, Pacific, Bering Sea, and many other underwater fields.

The land accumulates to more than 386,000 square miles of undeveloped ocean floor, accounting for more than double the landmass of California. The land serves as part of the United States’ Extended Continental Shelf, which resides over 230 miles from the nearest coast of the massive nation. The move comes as part of a collaboration between the State Department and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which seeks to gather geological data and resources from the newly acquired regions.

Though the United States has laid claim to the land, experts are unsure of how the legality of the move will be examined on the international stage. As part of their ownership, the US will be made to submit data defining the newly acquired region to the United Nations Convention on Law of the Sea, though the US has not technically ratified the organization’s existence. The UNCLOS is currently recognized by the European Union and a litany of other sovereign nations, despite the fact that the United States refuses to sign on due to a complex series of legal and political issues at the core of the group’s foundation.

The United States has previously condemned nations such as China and the Philippines for attempting the same kind of border expansion, though this has largely been due to the aforementioned countries trying to construct man-made islands to extend their maritime borders. Without the US formally ratifying UNCLOS, it stands to reason that the international community may hold a few objections to the expansion, though experts seem to agree that the United States is well within its rights to engage in this acquisition of continental shelf land.

For the United States, the most significant new region is the continental shelf land acquired in the Arctic Ocean, which allows the country newfound access to fishing, shipping, and mining opportunities. Of course, numerous studies will have to be done regarding the existing ecosystems in the region before any of these changes can take effect, as manmade interference could be devastating to local wildlife if it is not handled carefully.

https://www.giantfreakinrobot.com/cltr/united-states-grows.html

Changes they wanted:

Australia was increasingly isolated in opposition to the Indigenous right of self-determination at the time, fearing it may encompass secession, the records show. It wanted the term deleted and replaced with "self-management."

Canada accepted the term self-determination, conditional on it being expressed through negotiation and "agreement with government."

The governments jointly proposed deleting references to demilitarization, restitution of land, armed conflict and cultural genocide, while adding language affirming the territorial and political integrity of sovereign states, ultimately yielding mixed results.

A line affirming states' political and territorial integrity was eventually added, for instance.

But an article banning the forcible removal of Indigenous peoples from their lands — which the governments wanted changed because, in Australia's view, "there are circumstances where removal is legitimate (eg. for child welfare purposes)" — was left unchanged.

Why?

At the time, the Indigenous caucus had an absolute "no changes" stance, Deer said. Australia hoped the substitute would compel "moderate" factions to break ranks with "hardline" leaders, the records show.

Australia saw promise in a 1999 Canadian proposal to develop "states-only" text on certain "easier" articles.

"Divisions are beginning to appear in the Indigenous caucus between hardline adherents to the original [declaration] and those Indigenous representatives who are prepared to contemplate negotiated compromises," the 2002 memo says.

Amid such pressures, some Indigenous leaders did begin proposing amendments, opening the gates for negotiation, said Deer. Post-2003, the original was overhauled — talks Deer recalled as horrible — though it wasn't totally gutted like Canada and Australia wanted.

Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the U.S. were the only four countries to vote against the declaration in 2007 when it was adopted by the UN.

The lesson?

Never fucking compromise.

Image is of legal adviser to Israel's foreign ministry Tal Becker and British jurist Malcolm Shaw at the ICJ hearing.

The ICJ case against Israel might not achieve much for the Palestinian cause directly, given that Israeli politicians have explicitly stated that the Hague will not stop them - and I believe them. The Resistance will be what stops them, and they are doing quite well for themselves. Hezbollah has hit highly sensitive and important Israeli military sites over the last couple weeks, and in general persist in several border attacks every day. The battles in Iraq and Syria also continue. Hamas remains largely intact, and is successfully forcing Israeli forces in the northern Gaza Strip to retreat, and other parts of the Gazan Resistance are continuing to battle down in Khan Yunis. And, last but not least, Yemen is firmly dedicated to the blockade, warding off another ship literally minutes before I started writing this paragraph.

What the ICJ is battling over isn't Palestine and Israel - not really - but the legitimacy of international law itself, and to what degree victimized countries can rely on it to solve problems, versus needing to take more militant routes for justice. In a weird sense, it might be an L for Israel either way. If international law sides with Palestine, then when Israel refuses to stop, it will invalidate international law. If international law sides with Israel, then it will invalidate international law. There is no conceivable way for the West to come out of this looking good.

The South African portion detailing Israeli atrocities against Gaza was largely ignored by the western media. They have instead, obviously, decided to focus on the Israeli portion. Their defense appears to amount to "We didn't do it, Hamas did it. And if we did do it, it doesn't matter, because that's just urban warfare for you. Please get this whole thing thrown out on a very dubious technicality so we don't have to advance to the next stage."

From Craig Murray, who has been physically going to the Hague:

It is important to realise this. Israel is hoping to win on their procedural points about existence of dispute, unilateral assurances and jurisdiction. The obvious nonsense they spoke about the damage to homes and infrastructure being caused by Hamas, trucks entering Gaza and casualty figures, was not serious. They did not expect the judges to believe any of this. The procedural points were for the court. The rest was mass propaganda for the media.

...I am sure the judges want to get out of this and they may go for the procedural points. But there is a real problem with Israel’s “no dispute” argument. If accepted, it would mean that a country committing genocide can simply not reply to a challenge, and then legal action will not be possible because no reply means “no dispute”. I hope that absurdity is obvious to the judges. But they may of course wish not to notice it…

What do I think will happen? Some sort of “compromise”. The judges will issue provisional measures different to South Africa’s request, asking Israel to continue to take measures to protect the civilian population, or some such guff. Doubtless the State Department have drafted something like this for President of the court Donoghoe already.

I hope I am wrong. I would hate to give up on international law. One thing I do know for certain. These two days in the Hague were absolutely crucial for deciding if there is any meaning left in notions of international law and human rights. I still believe action by the court could cause the US and UK to back off and provide some measure of relief. For now, let us all pray or wish, each in our way, for the children of Gaza.

The weekly update is here on the website.

The Country of the Week is South Africa! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week's thread is here.

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/3326689

Nearly one-fifth of Israeli soldiers killed in Gaza died due to friendly fire and other accidents, IDF says 😂

unelected leader making unelected decisions

normal day in shithole country

the zionist entity's narrative continues to fall apart

Completely insane. Declares no state will stop it from permanently defeating the children of darkness, the axis of evil lead by Iran of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Houthis.

They will kill every Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist and return residents to north and south (is this settlements?) and stop Iran from getting nukes.

Some highlights:

We are continuing the war until the end – until total victory, until we achieve all of our goals: Eliminating Hamas, returning all of our hostages and ensuring that Gaza will never again constitute a threat to Israel. I believe that after the massacre of Oct. 7, we will not compromise on anything less than total victory. I say this, on your behalf, to every world leader who I speak with – we will not compromise and we will not stop. We are continuing until victory; we have no other choice.

Tomorrow we will submit a budget that will ensure the continuation of the war: More money – a lot more – for security. More compensation and grants for reservists, families, the self-employed and for all who are bearing the burden.

We will restore security to both the south and the north. Nobody will stop us – not The Hague, not the axis of evil and not anybody else. In recent weeks, we have proven to Hamas and Hezbollah that every terrorist is a dead man, wherever they are. This is the war of the sons of light against the sons of darkness.

The State of Israel, the IDF and our security services are fighting a moral and just war that is without parallel, against the Hamas monsters, the new Nazis. In the murder tunnels of Gaza, our forces have found copies of Hitler's Mein Kampf. In a home in Gaza, they found a child's tablet with a picture of Hitler as the screensaver.

This is a war against the axis of evil led by Iran and its three proxies: Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis. I do not forget, not even for a moment, that in addition to the war in Gaza, in addition to the return of our hostages and the return of the residents to their homes in both the north and the south, we have another, constant, existential mission – To prevent Iran from attaining nuclear weapons. This is my mission. This is our mission.

“Essentially, overshoot is a crisis of human behaviour,” says Merz. “For decades we’ve been telling people to change their behaviour without saying: ‘Change your behaviour.’ We’ve been saying ‘be more green’ or ‘fly less’, but meanwhile all of the things that drive behaviour have been pushing the other way. All of these subtle cues and not so subtle cues have literally been pushing the opposite direction – and we’ve been wondering why nothing’s changing.”

The paper explores how neuropsychology, social signalling and norms have been exploited to drive human behaviours which grow the economy, from consuming goods to having large families. The authors suggest that ancient drives to belong in a tribe or signal one’s status or attract a mate have been co-opted by marketing strategiesto create behaviours incompatible with a sustainable world.

“People are the victims – we have been exploited to the point we are in crisis. These tools are being used to drive us to extinction,” says the evolutionary behavioural ecologist and study co-author Phoebe Barnard. “Why not use them to build a genuinely sustainable world?”

Just one-quarter of the world population is responsible for nearly three-quarters of emissions. The authors suggest the best strategy to counter overshoot would be to use the tools of the marketing, media and entertainment industries in a campaign to redefine our material-intensive socially accepted norms.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two U.S. Navy SEALs are missing after conducting a nighttime boarding mission Thursday off the coast of Somalia, according to three U.S. officials.

The SEALs were on an interdiction mission, climbing up a vessel when one got knocked off by high waves. Under their protocol, when one SEAL is overtaken the next jumps in after them.

Both SEALs are still missing. A search and rescue mission is underway and the waters in the Gulf of Aden, where they were operating, are warm, two of the U.S. officials said.

The U.S. Navy has conducted regular interdiction missions, where they have intercepted weapons on ships that were bound for Houthi-controlled Yemen.