BAKU: When representatives from nearly 200 countries, along with hundreds of journalists, arrive in Azerbaijan in November for the UN climate conference known this year as COP29, they’ll bring a level of scrutiny the hosts aren’t accustomed to — and don’t often tolerate.
Azerbaijan has had a poor human rights record for many years and the government has regularly targeted journalists, activists and independent politicians. President Ilham Aliyev and his administration are accused by human rights organizations of spearheading an intensifying crackdown on freedom of speech ahead of the climate summit, including against climate activists and journalists.
Aliyev’s father, Haidar, ruled Azerbaijan from 1993 until he died in 2003 and Ilham took over. Both suppressed dissent as the country of almost 10 million people on the Caspian Sea basked in growing wealth from huge oil and natural gas reserves.
Elections since independence from the Soviet Union in the 1990s haven’t been regarded as fully free or fair. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said Azerbaijan’s most recent parliamentary elections in September took place in a “restrictive” environment. They were marked by turnout of 37 percent and no opposition party won any seats.
Human Rights Watch said the “vicious” crackdown against journalists and human rights activists has intensified over the last two years with phony criminal charges against critics and highly restrictive laws that make it hard for media and activists to work.
Ahead of COP29, Azerbaijan’s authorities have extended the pretrial detention of at least 11 journalists from Azerbaijan’s remaining independent news outlets on currency smuggling charges related to alleged funding from Western donors.
Azerbaijani government officials did not respond to numerous requests from The Associated Press for an interview or comment on their actions.
A look at just five of Baku’s critics currently detained in Azerbaijan:
Ulvi Hasanli and Sevinj Vagifgizi
Hasalni and Vagifgizi are journalists and leaders of Abzas Media, an independent online outlet. Abzas Media has investigated reports of protests and pollution at a gold mine in western Azerbaijan, reconstruction in the Karabakh region and corruption allegations against high-ranking officials.
Hasanli and Vagifgizi, along with four colleagues, were arrested in November 2023. Azerbaijani officials allege they conspired to smuggle money into Azerbaijan and claim they found more than $40,000 in Hasanli’s home. The journalists deny the allegations and Hasanli said the money was planted.
“That is why they decided to eliminate Ulvi and his team ... to make sure they would no longer be able to expose their wrongdoings,” Rubaba Guliyeva, Hasanli’s wife told The Associated Press.
Hasanli and Vagifgizi are imprisoned in Baku with no trial date. Guliyeva called conditions there “extremely bad” and said she had seen bruises on her husband and had been told that their meetings and phone calls are monitored. Hasanli is allowed brief visits with his 2-year-old daughter but struggles when she leaves, his wife said.
Vagifgizi’s mother Ophelya Maharramova said the prison has water shortages and that the water isn’t drinkable. Prisoners “suffer from hair loss and their teeth are rotting,” she said.
Despite being imprisoned, Vagifgizi still asks what investigations Abzas Media is publishing, her mother said: “It’s what makes her feel motivated.”
Guliyeva said states should boycott COP29 because of Azerbaijan’s poor human rights record.
Gubad Ibadoghlu
Ibadoghlu is an academic and economist at the London School of Economics who was detained in Azerbaijan in July 2023. He was moved to house arrest in April after spending months in prison.
He was accused by Azerbaijan of selling counterfeit money, but his children dispute the charges. They believe he was targeted because he investigated corruption in Azerbaijan’s oil and gas industry and because he is an opposition figure. Ibadoghlu’s sons say he also set up a charitable organization in the United Kingdom to work with the UK Home Office to try to transfer money confiscated by the National Crime Agency from rich Azerbaijanis to the charity to serve the people of Azerbaijan.
Ibadoghlu is also the chairman of the Azerbaijan Democracy and Prosperity Movement, which has been denied registration as a political party in Azerbaijan.
His son Emin Bayramov told AP his father was arrested by unidentified police officers who beat his mother when she questioned who they were. Ibadoghlu has heath issues including diabetes and his family say he is being denied medical care. Another son, Ibad Bayramov, told AP the International Committee of the Red Cross had tried to visit him four times but were not allowed to see him.
Ibadoghlu also has no trial date. His sons have accused Azerbaijan’s government of delaying it until after the climate summit to avoid negative publicity.
Azerbaijan hosting COP29 while carrying out a crackdown on freedom of speech brings “shame on the international community,” Emin Bayramov said.
Anar Mammadli
Mammadli is a human rights and climate activist who was detained by masked men and driven away while he was on his way to pick up his child from nursery in April in Baku. He has also been accused of smuggling and of trying to unlawfully bring money into Azerbaijan. He denies the charges.
He heads an election monitoring and democracy group that joined others to co-found the Climate of Justice Initiative in Azerbaijan. In an open letter, the groups criticized Azerbaijan as “one of the most problematic countries in Europe in terms of political and civil liberties.”
Azerbaijan, the groups said, has not implemented a systematic policy to monitor and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Climate emissions have continued to rise and oil production has polluted land, it said.
Human Rights Watch said Mammadli has been a key defender of human rights in Azerbaijan, highlighting violations of “fundamental freedoms.” He has called for freedom for political prisoners and an improved legal and political environment for human rights activists.
In a previous case, Mammadli was sentenced to 5 1/2 years in prison in 2014 on charges of tax evasion, illegal business and abuse of office. Amnesty International said the charges were trumped up, and he was awarded the Vaclav Havel Human Rights Prize shortly after he was sentenced. He was pardoned in 2016.
Like the others, Mammadli is imprisoned awaiting a trial date.
Akif Gurbanov
Gurbanov is chairman of the Institute for Democratic Initiatives, an independent organization that seeks to develop a more open society through democratic initiatives such as training young journalists, human rights defenders and economists.
He was detained in March after police searched his home and raided the IDI’s office. Later police accused him and others of currency smuggling. At the same time, authorities raided the offices of the online news platform Toplum TV and the civil society organization Platform III Republic — both co-founded by Gurbanov.
Toplum TV worked with the other organizations to train young journalists, Human Rights Watch said. Platform III Republic is an organization that promotes discussion about Azerbaijani politics, good governance and proposes development strategies for the country’s future.
Gurbanov’s wife, Ayan Musayeva, told AP that he was arrested for his work “defending human rights, providing alternative information, speaking the truth.”
States attending COP29 in Baku, she said, should be calling for his immediate release along with “all other political prisoners in Azerbaijan.”
Azerbaijan accused of ramping up repression of critics ahead of UN climate summit
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Azerbaijan accused of ramping up repression of critics ahead of UN climate summit
‘Chamber of horrors’ being exhumed at Ireland mass baby grave
A mass grave that could hold up to nearly 800 infants and young children — some of it in a defunct septic tank — is being excavated on the grounds of the former home run by the Bon Secours Sisters, an order of nuns.
The burial site has forced Ireland and the Catholic Church — long central to its identity — to reckon with a legacy of having shunned unmarried mothers and separated them from their children left at the mercy of a cruel system.
The grave was accidentally discovered by two boys a half century ago. But the true horror of the place was not known until a local historian began digging into the home’s history.
Catherine Corless revealed that the site was atop a septic tank and that 796 deceased infants were unaccounted for. Her findings caused a scandal when the international news media wrote about her work in 2014.
When test excavations later confirmed an untold number of tiny skeletons were in the sewage pit, then-Prime Minister Enda Kenny called it a “chamber of horrors.”
Pope Francis later apologized for the church’s “crimes” that included forced separations of unwed mothers and children. The nuns apologized for not living up to their Christianity.
A cold, cramped and deadly place
The homes were not unique to Ireland and followed a Victorian-era practice of institutionalizing the poor, troubled and neglected children, and unmarried mothers.
The Tuam home was cold, crowded and deadly. Mothers worked there for up to a year before being cast out — almost always without their children.
Corless’ report led to a government investigation that found 9,000 children, or 15 percent, died in mother and baby homes in the 20th century. The Tuam home — open from 1925 to 1961 — had the highest death rate.
Corless said she was driven to expose the story “the more I realized how those poor, unfortunate, vulnerable kids, through no fault of their own, had to go through this life.”
Discovering deeply held secrets
Corless’ work brought together survivors of the homes and children who discovered their own mothers had given birth to long-lost relatives who died there.
Annette McKay said there’s still a level of denial about the abuse, rape and incest that led some women to the homes while fathers were not held accountable.
“They say things like the women were incarcerated and enslaved for being pregnant,” McKay said. “Well, how did they get pregnant? Was it like an immaculate conception?”
Her mother ended up in the home after being raped as a teenager by the caretaker of the industrial school where she had been sentenced for “delinquency” after her mother died and father, a British soldier, abdicated responsibility.
Her mother, Margaret “Maggie” O’Connor, only revealed her secret when she was in her 70s, sobbing hysterically when the story finally came out.
Six months after giving birth in Tuam in 1942, O’Connor was hanging laundry at another home where she had been transferred when a nun told her, “the child of your sin is dead.”
She never spoke of it again.
Some 20 years later, a Sunday newspaper headline about a “shock discovery” in Tuam caught McKay’s attention. Among the names was her long-lost sister, Mary Margaret O’Connor, who died in 1943.
Shame’s long shadow
Barbara Buckley was born in the Tuam home in 1957 and was 19 months old when she was adopted by a family in Cork.
She was an adult when a cousin told her she’d been adopted and was later able to find her birth mother through an agency.
Her mother came to visit from London for two days in 2000 and happened to be there on her 43rd birthday, though she didn’t realize it.
“I found it very hard to understand, how did she not know it was my birthday?” Buckley said. “Delving deep into the thoughts of the mothers, you know, they put it so far back. They weren’t dealing with it anymore.”
She said her mother had worked in the laundry and was sent away after a year, despite asking to stay longer. Her lasting memory of the place was only being able to see the sky above the high walls.
At the end of their visit, her mother told her it had been lovely to meet her and her family, but said she’d never see her again.
Buckley was devastated at the rejection and asked why.
“She said, ‘I don’t want anyone finding out about this,’” Buckley said. “Going back to 1957 — and it was still a dark secret.”
Luck of the Irish
Pete Cochran considers himself one of the lucky ones.
He was 16 months old when he got out of the home and was adopted by a family in the US, where he avoided the stigma that would have dogged him as a so-called illegitimate child in his homeland.
During his visit to Tuam before the dig began, a man from town told him at a bar: “I respect you now, but growing up, I used to spit on you because that’s what I was taught.”
Cochran hopes the dig turns up few remains.
“I hope they don’t find 796 bodies,” he said. “That all these children were adopted and had a good life like I did.”
McKay has had the same hope for her sister. But even if they found a thimble full of her remains, she’d like to reunite her with her mom, who died in 2016.
“The headstone hasn’t got my mother’s name on it because I fought everybody to say I refuse to put my mom’s name on until she can have her child with her,” McKay said.
Ukraine’s parliament to consider restoring power of anti-graft agencies
- Thousands of protesters rallied in Kyiv and other cities in recent days after lawmakers led by Zelensky’s ruling party rushed through amendments last week defanging the respected agencies
- Ukrainian lawmakers on Thursday are expected to consider a bill restoring the independence of the country’s two main anti-corruption agencies
KYIV: Ukrainian lawmakers on Thursday are expected to consider a bill restoring the independence of the country’s two main anti-corruption agencies, aiming to defuse a political crisis that has shaken faith in President Volodymyr Zelensky’s wartime leadership. Thousands of protesters rallied in Kyiv and other cities in recent days in a rare show of discontent after lawmakers led by Zelensky’s ruling party rushed through amendments last week defanging the respected agencies.
Zelensky reversed course after the outcry and under pressure from top European officials, who warned Ukraine was jeopardizing its bid for EU membership by curbing the powers of its anti-graft authorities. Demonstrations had continued even after he submitted the new bill restoring their independence, with hundreds rallying near the presidential administration in Kyiv late on Wednesday to chants of “Shame!” and “The people are the power!.”
“I really want parliament to vote (for the new measure) just as quickly as it did last time,” said protester Kateryna Kononenko, 36, referring to last week’s fast-tracked approval of the controversial amendments.
Activists also called for demonstrations near parliament ahead of Thursday’s vote in an attempt to pressure lawmakers to approve the new bill.
Eradicating graft and shoring up the rule of law are key requirements for Kyiv to join the EU, which Ukrainians see as critical to their future as they fend off a Russian invasion.
Last week’s amendments had given Zelensky’s hand-picked general prosecutor the power to transfer cases away from the anti-graft agencies and reassign prosecutors — a step critics had said was designed to protect allies from prosecution.
While much smaller, the rallies of the past week have sparked comparisons to Ukraine’s 2014 Maidan revolution, when protesters toppled a president they accused of corruption and heavy-handed rule. More than two-thirds of Ukrainians support the recent protests, according to a recent survey by Ukrainian pollster Gradus Research.
Corruption Fighters
The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) have stepped up a closely watched campaign against graft since Russia’s February 2022 invasion.
They have produced charges against lawmakers and senior government officials, including a then-deputy prime minister who was accused last month of taking a $345,000 kickback. Speaking to Reuters last Friday, after Zelensky’s reversal, NABU chief Semen Kryvonos said he expected pressure against his agency to continue, fueled by what he described as corrupt forces uninterested in cleaning up Ukraine.
He added that he and other anti-corruption officials felt a greater sense of responsibility following the protests, but also called on the country’s leadership to help their effort.
“This responsibility must be shared with the government, which needs to react and say, ‘Okay, there’s corruption here — let’s destroy it.’“
Trump says Canada’s Palestine statehood stance may hurt trade deal
- Trump says Canada’s Palestine statehood stance may hurt trade deal
US President Donald Trump said on Thursday it will be difficult to make a trade deal with Canada after the country announced it is backing Palestinian statehood.
Canadian Prime Minster Mark Carney’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Carney announced on Wednesday Canada is planning to
recognize
the State of Palestine at a meeting of the United Nations in September
Canada’s announcement follows France and Britain in recognizing a Palestinian state.
Israel and its closest ally, the US, both rejected Carney’s statements.
Canada and the US are working on negotiating a trade deal by August 1, the date Trump is threatening to impose a 35 percent tariff on all Canadian goods not covered by the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement.
Carney said on Wednesday that
tariff negotiations
with US President Donald Trump’s administration have been constructive, but the talks may not conclude by the deadline.
‘Silent killer’: the science of tracing climate deaths in heatwaves
- Science can show that human-caused climate change is making heatwaves hotter and more frequent
- Unlike floods and fires, heat kills quietly, with prolonged exposure causing heat stroke, organ failure, and death
PARIS: A heatwave scorching Europe had barely subsided in early July when scientists published estimates that 2,300 people may have died across a dozen major cities during the extreme, climate-fueled episode.
The figure was supposed to “grab some attention” and sound a timely warning in the hope of avoiding more needless deaths, said Friederike Otto, one of the scientists involved in the research.
“We are still relatively early in the summer, so this will not have been the last heatwave. There is a lot that people and communities can do to save lives,” Otto, a climate scientist at Imperial College London, told AFP.
Heat can claim tens of thousands of lives during European summers but it usually takes months, even years, to count the cost of this “silent killer.”
Otto and colleagues published their partial estimate just a week after temperatures peaked in western Europe.
While the underlying methods were not new, the scientists said it was the first study to link heatwave deaths to climate change so soon after the event in question.
Early mortality estimates could be misunderstood as official statistics but “from a public health perspective the benefits of providing timely evidence outweigh these risks,” Raquel Nunes from the University of Warwick told AFP.
“This approach could have transformative potential for both public understanding and policy prioritization” of heatwaves, said Nunes, an expert on global warming and health who was not involved in the study.
Science can show, with increasing speed and confidence, that human-caused climate change is making heatwaves hotter and more frequent.
Unlike floods and fires, heat kills quietly, with prolonged exposure causing heat stroke, organ failure, and death.
The sick and elderly are particularly vulnerable, but so are younger people exercising or toiling outdoors.
But every summer, heat kills and Otto — a pioneer in the field of attribution science — started wondering if the message was getting through.
“We have done attribution studies of extreme weather events and attribution studies of heatwaves for a decade... but as a society we are not prepared for these heatwaves,” she said.
“People think it’s 30 (degrees Celsius) instead of 27, what’s the big deal? And we know it’s a big deal.”
When the mercury started climbing in Europe earlier this summer, scientists tweaked their approach.
Joining forces, Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine chose to spotlight the lethality — not just the intensity — of the heat between June 23 and July 2.
Combining historic weather and published mortality data, they assessed that climate change made the heatwave between 1C and 4C hotter across 12 cities, depending on location, and that 2,300 people had likely perished.
But in a notable first, they estimated that 65 percent of these deaths — around 1,500 people across cities including London, Paris, and Athens — would not have occurred in a world without global warming.
“That’s a much stronger message,” said Otto.
“It brings it much closer to home what climate change actually means and makes it much more real and human than when you say this heatwave would have been two degrees colder.”
The study was just a snapshot of the wider heatwave that hit during western Europe’s hottest June on record and sent temperatures soaring to 46C in Spain and Portugal.
The true toll was likely much higher, the authors said, noting that heat deaths are widely undercounted.
Since then Turkiye, Greece and Bulgaria have suffered fresh heatwaves and deadly wildfires.
Though breaking new ground, the study has not been subject to peer review, a rigorous assessment process that can take more than a year.
Otto said waiting until after summer to publish — when “no one’s talking about heatwaves, no one is thinking about keeping people safe” — would defeat the purpose.
“I think it’s especially important, in this context, to get the message out there very quickly.”
The study had limitations but relied on robust and well-established scientific methodology, several independent experts told AFP.
Tailoring this approach to local conditions could help cities better prepare when heatwaves loom, Abhiyant Tiwari, a health and climate expert who worked on India’s first-ever heat action plan, told AFP.
“I definitely see more such studies coming out in the future,” said Tiwari from NRDC India.
Otto said India, which experiences tremendously hot summers, was a “prime candidate” and with a template in place it was likely more studies would soon follow.
Clock ticks on US tariff hikes as Trump expands trade wars
- Trump slapped 50 percent duties on imports from Brazil, saying its government’s policies and actions threaten US national security
- After twice postponing implementation of his threatened tariffs, he said the August 1 deadline “will not be extended” any further
WASHINGTON: Time is running short for governments to strike deals with Washington to avert tariff hikes that Donald Trump has vowed against dozens of economies — and the US president continues to expand his trade wars.
As the clock ticked down on a Friday deadline for higher levies to take effect on goods from various trading partners, Trump announced a trade deal with South Korea and separate duties on Brazilian and Indian imports.
He also signed an order Wednesday to impose previously-threatened 50 percent tariffs on certain copper products and end a tariff exemption for low-value shipments from abroad.
The tariff hikes due Friday were initially announced in April as part of a package where Trump slapped a 10 percent levy on goods from almost all trading partners — citing unfair trade practices.
This rate was set to rise to varying levels for dozens of economies like the European Union, Japan and others, but Washington twice postponed their implementation as financial markets gyrated.
So far, Britain, Vietnam, Japan, Indonesia, the Philippines, the EU and South Korea have reached initial deals with Washington to secure less punishing conditions.
While the United States and China earlier slapped escalating tariffs on each other’s products, both sides are working to further a truce maintaining duties at lower levels.
But Trump has been pushing ahead in his efforts to reshape global trade.
The US leader insisted Wednesday that the August 1 deadline “will not be extended” any further.
In a Truth Social post, he vowed that this would be “a big day for America.”
Although Trump has promised a surge in government revenues from his duties, economists warn that higher tariffs can fuel an uptick in inflation and weigh on economic growth. This could change consumption patterns.
Already, consumers face an overall average effective tariff rate that is the highest since the 1930s, according to a recent analysis by The Budget Lab at Yale University.
The effect on consumer prices has been limited so far. But analysts cautioned this could become more pronounced as businesses run down on existing inventory and pass on more costs to buyers.
Among Trump’s latest announcements were a 25 percent duty on Indian goods to begin Friday — slightly lower than previously threatened — after talks between Washington and New Delhi failed to bring about a trade pact.
India would face an unspecified “penalty” over purchases of Russian weapons and energy as well, Trump said.
He also unveiled a 50 percent tariff on Brazilian goods, saying its government’s policies and actions threaten US national security.
But he delayed its implementation from Friday to August 6 and crucially exempted many products from the prohibitive levy, including orange juice, civil aircraft, iron ore and some energy products.
Trump inked an order too for a 50 percent tariff to kick in Friday on goods like copper pipes and wiring, making good on an earlier vow to impose these duties.
But the levy, which came after a Commerce Department probe on national security grounds, was less sweeping than anticipated.
It left out products like copper ores, concentrates and cathodes, bringing some relief to industry.
Meanwhile, Seoul landed a deal with Trump in which South Korean products would face a 15 percent tariff when entering the United States — significantly below a 25 percent level threatened.
