Thursday, October 13, 2016

Why You Don't Realize That You're Probably Eating Endangered Fish | MUNCHIES

Why You Don't Realize That You're Probably Eating Endangered Fish | MUNCHIES: "Nigel Preston—the Director General of WorldFish, an international aquaculture and fisheries nonprofit—said: “Most of the world’s fish comes from small-scale fisheries where access to certification schemes is an expensive luxury. Transparency in supply chains is crucial not only in terms of protecting fish stocks, but also for securing a just space for these small-scale fishers. WorldFish is working with partners including national governments to reduce the burden on these fishers by building capacities to meet international standard requirements and gain a better share of those markets. By doing so, poorer fishers will be less likely to draw on depleted resources.”"



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Dramatic photos show how Shiite Muslims mark Ashura, one of the most emotional events in Islam - The Washington Post

Dramatic photos show how Shiite Muslims mark Ashura, one of the most emotional events in Islam - The Washington Post: "The defeat and death of Hussein, at the hands of forces loyal to Yazid, a caliph from the Arab Omayyad dynasty, was the seminal event that led to the division of Islam into Sunni and Shiite sects, with the major difference relating to the line of succession after the death of the prophet and lesser differences over issues of ritual and prayer. That split has come to divide the Middle East into camps dominated by Shiite Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia, and it has led to sectarian violence in countries such as Iraq and Pakistan. Sunnis also observe Ashura, but as a day of gratitude and fasting in honor of the prophet Moses, rather than a day of sorrow and public mourning for Hussein."



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Syrian terror suspect Jaber al-Bakr found dead in cell in Germany - BBC News

Syrian terror suspect Jaber al-Bakr found dead in cell in Germany - BBC News: "When police raided the flat in the eastern city of Chemnitz, they found 1.5kg of TATP, a home-made explosive used in the deadly jihadist attacks in Paris last year and in Brussels last March. The explosives were "extremely dangerous", police said.
But al-Bakr managed to slip the net, and made his way to the city of Leipzig where he asked the Syrians for help.
The three told police they had heard about the manhunt and tied him up while one of them knelt on him.
They alerted police who finally managed to arrest him.
Since then there have been calls for authorities to honour the three. Bild newspaper described them as "the Syrian heroes from Leipzig"."



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Russians, lies and WikiLeaks - POLITICO

Russians, lies and WikiLeaks - POLITICO: "Still, security experts of both parties have been warning of potential Russian fakery in the document leaks since late July, shortly after the first huge batch of hacked internal emails from the Democratic National Committee forced the resignation of Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz and widened the split between the party’s Clinton and Bernie Sanders factions.

“It is not unthinkable that those responsible will steal and release more files, and even salt the files they release with plausible forgeries,” a bipartisan group of national security experts from the Aspen Institute said in a statement July 28.

More broadly, the spreading of false information by intelligence services “is a technique that goes back to Tsarist times,” said James Lewis, a cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, in an interview Wednesday. Past examples include the Soviet-spread rumor that the U.S. government developed the AIDS virus, as well as a 2014 incident in which hackers modified the reported vote totals for the Ukrainian presidential election — falsely showing a right-wing victory that Russian state television reported almost immediately.

Cyberspace offers Russia both increased opportunities for using faked information to sow chaos and improved chances of doing it convincingly."



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Thursday, October 6, 2016

10 countries host half world's refugees: Amnesty

10 countries host half world's refugees: Amnesty: "Ten countries accounting for 2.5 percent of world GDP are hosting more than half the world's refugees, Amnesty International said Tuesday as it slammed what it called the selfishness of wealthy nations.

In a report on the plight faced by the world's 21 million refugees, the London-based human rights body lamented that countries immediately neighbouring crisis zones bear the brunt of the global refugee problem.

Fifty-six percent of refugees are being sheltered in 10 countries, according to the report, in which Amnesty proposed a solution whereby the world's countries find a home for 10 percent of the planet's refugees every year."



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Monday, October 3, 2016

CSIRO scientists create world's first fish-free prawn food Novaq - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

CSIRO scientists create world's first fish-free prawn food Novaq - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation): "A team of CSIRO scientists has cracked the holy grail of aquaculture by developing the world's first fish-free prawn food.

The royalties from worldwide licensing deals for the Novaq product will earn the CSIRO tens of millions of dollars.

"The research cost about $10 million. We are very confident that this will generate a return on investment back to Australian taxpayers of many, many times the initial investment," CSIRO's Dr Nigel Preston said.

There is intense global interest in Novaq because it solves one of the farmed prawn industry's biggest problems - its reliance on wild fisheries as a core ingredient in prawn food.

But aquaculture has reached "peak fish", where demand for wild harvested fish meal now outstrips supply.

Without a solution, soaring world demand cannot be met.

"It is absolutely a critical issue for the global aquaculture industry. There's no more room to get more wild harvest fish, so we've got to find alternatives," Dr Preston said."



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