Atoll Power
NEED TO KNOW
Atoll Power
KIRIBATI
Around 1,300 miles south of the American state of Hawaii, Kiribati is a country of 115,000 people living on 150 square miles of atolls that stretch across more than 1.3 million square miles of the South Pacific. This strategic location blessed Kiribati with an amazing environment and potential seabed mineral riches – but has also made the former British colony a prize in the competition for influence between Australia, China, and the US.
“Like many other Pacific Island countries at the moment, it’s seeking to solidify its identity, its values, its place in the region and in the world,” Australian Strategic Policy Institute analyst Blake Johnson told Radio New Zealand. “Kiribati does seem to be doing that a little differently to some of the others, in terms of just the transparency.”
Kiribati President Taneti Maamau, for example, initially leaned toward Australia and the US – he was elected in 2016 on a pro-Taiwan platform. But in 2019, he rescinded his country’s recognition of the independent island state off the coast of China. He then won reelection in 2020 despite allegations that Chinese agents bribed officials in his administration to sway his government’s decision-making, explained Foreign Policy magazine.
Then, recently, without explanation or a public announcement of an agreement, Chinese police officers began patrolling Kiribati’s streets, Reuters reported, raising serious questions about the Chinese government’s operations there. The Chinese officers were part of a “community policing and a crime database program,” said Kiribatian law enforcement officials.
American leaders were particularly concerned. Port facilities on the country’s Christmas Island, within range of the US Pacific Command in Hawaii, could provide a good harbor for Chinese warships.
Voters are now deciding whether to continue this trend under Maamau when they elect a new parliament on Aug. 14 and 19 – these lawmakers will choose a new president in October, wrote Radio New Zealand. Maamau can run for one more term. His main rival is opposition leader Tessie Lambourne, who needs to win a seat in parliament before running for the presidency.
In May, Maamau deported Lambourne’s husband, David, a high court judge in Kiribati who is an Australian citizen. He was one of a handful of foreign judges whom Maamau removed, eliminating an entire tier of his country’s court system while making spurious accusations of judicial misconduct, according to the Lowy Institute, an Australian think tank. This shift clearly benefits Chinese interests, claimed the Australian Associated Press.
Maamau is likely popular because, rather than proposing to move much of his population to Fiji as sea levels rise, he plans to build a sea wall and expand tourism and other industries to develop the country’s poor economy, noted CNA. He might have meddled in the politics of the International Seabed Authority to boost ocean-bottom mining, too, added the New York Times. And he’s had a spat with the Pacific Islands Forum, a regional grouping, pulling his country out – then returning.
But then, analysts say, that’s all part of the country finding its footing.
THE WORLD, BRIEFLY
Truth and Consequences
BANGLADESH
A Bangladeshi court ordered an investigation into former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s alleged involvement in the death of a grocery shop owner during the country’s violent demonstrations, which resulted in the longtime leader fleeing to India last week, Reuters reported.
The probe marks the first investigation against Hasina and her senior officials following last month’s student-led protests that saw as many as 450 people killed.
The protests began over opposition against quotas for government jobs, but escalated into widespread unrest against Hasina and her ruling Awami League party, which has dominated Bangladesh’s politics for the past 15 years.
The case centers on the death of grocery store owner Abu Saeed, who was allegedly killed by police fire while crossing the street in the capital Dhaka on July 19. At the time, authorities were attempting to suppress demonstrations in the area.
The probe will target Hasina and some of her officials, including Obaidul Quader, general secretary of the Awami League party, and former Interior Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kama.
The ousted leader and her officials have long been accused of human rights violations and the persecution of political opponents, Agence France-Pressed wrote.
Hasina fled to neighboring India on Aug. 5 and only made her first public comments on Tuesday in a post on X (formerly known as Twitter) which she demanded “justice” and said those involved in “terror acts” of killings and vandalism must be brought to justice, the National Herald India reported. She also urged calm for the cancelled national holiday for Aug. 15 that commemorates the killing of her father, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who founded the country.
Following her removal, economist and Nobel Peace laureate Muhammad Yunus returned from Europe to lead a caretaker government as “chief adviser.” Yunus has pledged new elections and to address the human rights concerns raised during Hasina’s administration.
He added that recent high-profile resignations, including those of the chief justice and five supreme court judges that happened over the weekend after students again hit the streets in protest, were managed legally, according to the Voice of America.
Students also took over police duties when police officers, afraid of reprisals, failed to appear for duty, and also guarded Hindu temples and other places frequented by minorities in the Muslim-majority country after minorities were targeted during the protests.
Meanwhile, the political turmoil has affected Bangladesh’s critical garment industry, which accounts for 85 percent of the country’s $55 billion in annual exports.
The interim government has assured foreign investors they would protect investments.
Wanting In
AFRICA
United Nations officials and African leaders called for establishing a permanent seat for Africa at the UN Security Council (UNSC), a move they described as necessary to correct historical injustices and better represent the continent, Al Jazeera reported.
On Monday, Secretary-General António Guterres said during a high-level debate that the UNSC’s composition has not kept pace with the significant geopolitical changes seen since the end of World War II in 1945.
Instead, it reflects the geopolitical realities of 1945 when much of the African continent was under colonial rule. The council is made up of 15 members, 10 of which are non-permanent elected by regional allocation – with three seats for African nations.
The five permanent members are the United States, Russia – previously the Soviet Union – France, China and the United Kingdom. Only the five permanent members have veto power.
Guterres said reforming the UNSC is not only a matter of ethics and justice but also a strategic imperative that could enhance the global acceptance of the council’s decisions.
His comments echoed similar statements by UN General Assembly President Dennis Francis, who stressed the need for the UNSC to reflect current global realities rather than those from nearly 80 years ago, the BBC noted.
A continent with more than a billion people and significant global influence, Africa lacks a permanent voice in this key peace and security body, he said.
The African Union (AU) wants two permanent seats and two additional non-permanent seats for Africa on the council.
During Monday’s debate, Sierra Leonean President Julius Maada Bio also spoke in support of reform, saying, “Africa must be heard, and its demands for justice and equity must be met.”
He also called for the abolition of the veto power, but if it is kept, it “must be extended to all new permanent members as a matter of justice.”
Carlos Lopes, a professor and former AU representative, told Al Jazeera that current global geopolitics favor Africa’s push for better representation.
He explained that African nations have become more adept at navigating global tensions and have used their unified voice to advance their interests, as evidenced by the AU’s recent inclusion in the Group of 20 intergovernmental forum.
Culture Wars
SLOVAKIA
Around 9,000 people took to the streets of Slovakia’s capital this week to protest the sacking of the heads of the country’s cultural institutions, a move critics said was politically motivated and part of an effort by populist Prime Minister Robert Fico’s ruling coalition to control public institutions, including the judiciary, Euronews reported.
On Monday, protesters demonstrated outside the National Theater and the Culture Ministry in Bratislava to denounce the dismissals by Culture Minister Martina Šimkovičová.
Last week, Šimkovičová ordered the firings of National Theater director Matej Drlička and National Gallery head Alexandra Kusá. The minister accused Drlička of involvement in “political activism” by criticizing her office and blamed the former director for the incident at the theater.
Šimkovičová, meanwhile, blamed Kusá for “several managerial failures” and intimated that because she was the daughter of architect Martin Kusý, who led the reconstruction of the gallery, she was also responsible for it turning out below standard.
Kusá countered the claims as “vague and mostly fabricated,” adding that her relation to Kusý was known before her appointment in 2010.
Šimkovičová, a former TV anchor, has come under criticism for her positions against the LGBTQ community, Covid-19 vaccinations and also for espousing pro-Russian views. Shortly after her appointment last year, she moved to reestablish cultural relations with Moscow which had been frozen since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The demonstrations also highlight anger toward some of the policies of the populist three-party coalition of Fico, who was reelected last year.
In June, Fico’s alliance passed a bill that would increase government oversight over public broadcasters, sparking protests from the opposition, civil society and artists.
Observers told news platform Balkan Insight that the media turmoil is seen as part of a wider assault by the government on Slovak institutions and the judiciary, which could undermine the rule of law and lead to conflicts with the European Union. Slovakia, once half of Czechoslovakia which itself was a Soviet satellite state for most of its 74 years, became an EU member in 2004.
Amid the demonstrations, Czech Radio suspended its cooperation with its Slovakian counterpart indefinitely, citing concerns over its independence – specifically, the political meddling in the public service broadcaster’s operations, Balkan Insight noted.
DISCOVERIES
The Big Boys
The Tyrannosaurus rex had titanic proportions, just like many other dinosaurs hundreds of millions of years ago.
Currently, the largest specimen ever found is “Scotty,” whose fossilized remains were discovered in Saskatchewan, Canada in 1991. Paleontologists estimate that the carnivorous dino weighed more than 19,000 pounds, or nearly nine tons, at the time of its death.
But scientists are still wondering what if there were larger T. rexes yet to be found.
That’s what paleobiologists Jordan Mallon and David Hone showed in their research paper published in Ecology and Evolution recently. The duo wanted to approximate how likely it is to discover fossils representing the largest size extremes.
“Our study suggests that, for big fossil animals like T. rex, we really have no idea from the fossil record about the absolute sizes they might have reached,” Mallon said.
The team used computer modeling to estimate the potential maximum size of the T. rex. Their model generated 140 million virtual T. rex individuals, while also factoring variables such as population size, growth rate and incompleteness of the fossil record.
They also used the American alligator as a reference, due to its size and evolutionary relationship to dinosaurs.
The findings showed that the largest possible species could have been 70 percent heavier than the Scotty – weighing about 33,000 pounds. The model suggests that Scotty belonged to individual dinos in the 99th percentile.
However, finding specimens in the 99.99th percentile – essentially the largest possible individuals – could take millennia at the current rate of fossil discovery.
So far, paleontologists have only found 84 reasonably complete skeletons, but it is estimated that 2.5 billion T. rexes lived over the species’ 2.4 million-year existence, according to Science Alert.
The authors also acknowledged challenges in the research, such as using the alligator species as a reference.
They highlighted the importance of using statistically controlled parameters rather than relying solely on the largest known specimens when comparing the body sizes of fossil species.
“Arguing about ‘which is the biggest?’ based on a handful of skeletons really isn’t very meaningful,” explained Hone. “It’s important to stress that this isn’t really about T. rex … but this issue would apply to all dinosaurs, and lots of other fossil species.”
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