Tuesday, September 23, 2014
The summit is being held
The summit is being held after marches drew hundreds of thousands of demonstrators on the streets in cities worldwide on Sunday in a show of "people power" directed at leaders reluctant to tackle global warming.
Key players from the private sector are also stepping into the fray to trumpet their commitment to greening, with Apple CEO Tim Cook announcing on Monday that the tech giant would prioritize low-carbon growth.
"Excuses for inaction have run out. The summit can be a major milestone, but only if it delivers the real world changes that we need," said Andrew Steer, of the World Resources Institute.
The summit talks are separate from the negotiations held under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which will culminate with the Paris conference in December 2014.
China is sending Vice Premier
Leaders then take turns at the podium, from President Barack Obama representing the world's second biggest polluter to Prime Minister Enele Sopoaga of the Pacific island-nation of Tuvalu, which faces the prospect of being wiped out by rising sea waters.
China is sending Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli while India will be represented by Environment.
Despite much enthusiasm from climate activists for the summit's potential to create impetus, some see the event as falling short of what is needed to get serious about the environment.
"Few governments will be in a position to make any real commitments," wrote the aid agency Oxfam in an assessment of the summit's likely outcome.
The initiatives to be unveiled by the private sector, foundations, and green groups at the summit "are helpful but few, if any, are really ground-breaking," it added.
Monday, September 22, 2014
Air Force and Navy aircraft
Syria's Foreign Ministry said the U.S. informed Syria's envoy to the U.N. that "strikes will be launched against the terrorist Daesh group in Raqqa." The statement used an Arabic name to refer to the Islamic State group.
At a conference on Sept. 11 with Secretary of State John Kerry, key Arab allies promised they would "do their share" to fight the Islamic State militants. The Obama administration, which at a NATO meeting in Wales earlier this month also got commitments from European allies as well as Canada and Australia, has insisted that the fight against the Islamic State militants could not be the United States' fight alone.
Because the military operation was ongoing, no details could be provided yet, said Rear Adm. John Kirby, the Pentagon's press secretary. He said the military made the decision to strike early Monday. A White House official said Obama was being updated.
The strikes were carried out by manned Air Force and Navy aircraft, and the Tomahawk missiles were launched from U.S. ships in the northern Persian Gulf and the Red Sea. The aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush is in the Gulf.
An anti-militant
Abdurrahman said about 20 air strikes hit Raqqa province, adding there were casualties among jihadi fighters, mostly on checkpoints. He said that in addition to the city of Raqqa, there were strikes on the towns of Tabqa, Ein Issa and the border town of Tel Abyad on the border with Turkey.
An anti-militant media collective entitled "Raqqa is being silently slaughtered" said that the targets included the governorate building or municipality used by Islamic State militants as their headquarters, and the Brigade 93, a Syrian army base that the militants recently seized.
Other airstrikes targeted a military air base recently captured by jihadi fighters in the town of Tabqa as well as the town of Tel Abyad on the border with Turkey.
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