Famine: Africa's Worst Locust Plague In Decades Threatens Millions

Africa’s Worst Locust Plague in Decades Threatens Millions

By 

Nicholas Bariyo

In Kenya, police facing the country’s largest outbreak in 70 years have fired machine guns and tear gas into swarms in an effort to prevent them from consuming fields. Ethiopia is spraying pesticide from small planes to displace hovering throngs, though swarms have forced passenger jets in the region to make emergency landings.

In Eritrea and Djibouti, teams in the hundreds are chasing swarms with hand-held pesticide pumps and truck-mounted sprayers.

The rising number of desert locusts presents an unprecedented threat to food security and livelihoods in the Horn of Africa, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization said on Wednesday.

“This has become a situation of international dimensions that threatens the food security of the entire subregion,” Qu Dongyu, director general of the FAO said last week.

Desert locusts—the most devastating of all locust species—can consume their weight in food each day. Swarms potentially containing hundreds of millions of insects each can travel over 90 miles a day; a swarm the size of Manhattan can consume as much food in a day as the population of the New York tri-state area, said FAO locust expert Keith Cressman. Some swarms are far bigger.

If the outbreak isn’t controlled and conditions remain favorable for breeding, it could reach 30 countries in Africa and Asia, the U.N. said.

“This is a more serious emergency than we had earlier anticipated,” said Guleid Artan, the climate prediction director at East Africa’s Intergovernmental Authority on Development. “More locust swarms are entering northern Kenya daily and at this rate they could soon spread into Uganda and South Sudan.”

Extreme weather is behind the infestation, according to the U.N. East Africa experienced abnormally heavy rains late last year, flooding regions that are normally semiarid. Such conditions are favorable for locust breeding, which can grow substantially if not disrupted—a challenge in cash-strapped countries contending with insurgencies and other security challenges. Continued breeding in some areas is already deepening the crisis.

Swarms entered Kenya in late December from Somalia, where security challenges had left a large breeding area uncontrolled. 

Locusts have continued to spread; this week, the swarms moved to around 90 miles east of the capital, Nairobi, alarming the region’s corn and fruit growers, local officials said.

The U.N. estimates that 23.6 million people in the region are already facing food shortages due to rains, insecurity and now locust infestation. Some 8.4 million people in Ethiopia alone may need food aid because of crop losses from the locusts, the U.N. warned. 

Aerial spraying is the only effective method to reduce locust numbers, according to the U.N., which said it needed more than $70 million from donors to address the crisis.

Spraying, expensive and dangerous in areas where there are militants operating, has so far covered less than a third of affected areas, according to East Africa’s Intergovernmental Authority on Development.

In Ethiopia, Africa’s second-most populous nation, locusts have invaded around 700 square miles of cropland, pastures and forests, in the country’s largest infestation this century. Less than 10% of the affected area has been sprayed, according to FAO data. Spraying in grazing areas is particularly challenging as it can take days for herders to move their livestock out of the way.

The nexus of the locust breeding is around the Red Sea plains in the borderlands between Sudan and Eritrea. 

If unchecked, the locust swarms could grow by 500 times by June, when drier weather is expected to slow breeding, according to the FAO.

“We need to deal with the locust invasion now,” said an FAO spokeswoman. “And also take forward-looking action to protect rural livelihoods and safeguard food security.”

Iran Bashes Peace Plan: 'Betrayal And Scandal Of The Century'

Iran uses Friday prayers to bash Trump’s 'Deal of the Century' 

SETH J. FRANTZMAN 

Prayer leaders in Iran were encouraged to use Friday prayers to communicate the Islamic regime’s anger with US President Donald Trump’s “Deal of the Century.” Ayatollah Mohammad Movahedi-Kermani, the Friday prayer leader in Tehran, slammed the deal as the “betrayal and scandal of the century.”

Movahedi-Kermani’s sermon enumerated the ways that Iran dislikes Trump and the proposal. He called it a unilateral decision by Israel, the US and several Arab countries. 

“The plan has been protested by freedom-loving peoples in the region and the world.”

The Iranian regime has been trying to use the deal to leverage support across the region against the US and Israel. Tehran is under tough sanctions and has faced protests at home. It wants to channel the distraction of the deal to push a new narrative, including Iran’s claim that it supports the Palestinians. 

The ayatollah said that the Palestinians “reject this treacherous plan and will fight for the end of the occupation in a serious and permanent way.” 

“The shameful deal is the result of the betrayal by some Arab governments,” Iran said on Friday. He said that various allies of Iran, which he termed “resistance groups,” would oppose the proposal. 

This likely means Hezbollah and Shi’ite militias in Iraq. “The enemies are seeking to disarm and push the resistance.” But he said that Palestine will be liberated.

China's Bid To Take Over South China Sea:

Is This Picture How China Takes Over the South China Sea?

Kyle Mizokami

In recent years the People’s Republic of China has laid claim to ninety percent of the South China Sea, buttressing this claim by creating artificial islands with dredging equipment. These claims run roughshod over Beijing’s neighbors, which have competing claims. The discovery in 2016 that China had militarized these artificial islands was not exactly surprising, but just how useful are these islands in defense of China’s strategic goals?

China’s campaign to militarize the South China Sea began in 2009, when it submitted a new map to the United Nations showing the now-infamous “Nine-Dash Line”—a series of boundary dashes over the South China Sea that it claimed demarcated Chinese territory. Since then, China has expanded at least seven reefs and islets in the sea with sand dredged from the ocean floor, including Subi Reef, Mischief Reef, Johnson Reef, Hughes Reef, Gaven Reef, Fiery Cross Reef and Cuarteron Reef.

According to the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, Beijing has created more 3,200 acres of new land. China initially claimed its “territory” was being developed for peaceful purposes, from aid to mariners to scientific research, yet many of the islands now feature military-length airfields, antiaircraft and antimissile guns, and naval guns. Cuarteron Reef now has a new High Frequency early-warning radar facility for detecting incoming aircraft, a development difficult to square with a peaceful mission. Farther north, but still in disputed territory, China has installed HQ-9 long-range surface-to-air missiles on Woody Island.

On the face of it, China’s territorial grab and apparent turn away from former leader Hu Jintao’s concept of “peaceful rise” is hard to understand. It has alienated China’s neighbors and drawn in other powers, including the United States, India and Japan. One theory is that the country’s leadership may have calculated that securing a bastion for China’s sea-based nuclear deterrent may be worth the diplomatic fallout it created.

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Hal Lindsey: Pestilence Rising

Hal Lindsey Report: Pestilence Rising

When it comes to the coronavirus, we have more questions than answers. But one thing we know for certain — health officials around the world are very much afraid. China normally downplays these kinds of events. But Chinese President Xi Jinping calls this outbreak a “grave situation.” 

 

For many Americans, it seemed to hit home when the Shanghai Disneyland closed. The original Disneyland in California has had only two unplanned all-day closures — after the assassination of John Kennedy and after 9-11. Not only did Disney in China close, but so did other regional tourist attractions. Even MacDonald’s and Starbucks closed along with other well-known restaurant chains.

 

As of this writing, there have been 4,100 confirmed cases in China, with at least 106 deaths. 56 million people in China have had their travel restricted. This adds a great deal to people’s fear and anxiety. Residents have said they feel trapped — locked in with a dangerous virus. In much of China, trains are either unoccupied or not running at all. Train and bus terminals are eerily empty. 

 

The US State Department is evacuating its personnel from the city of Wuhan. But another thousand Americans live in that city, and they have been told that the United States cannot get them all out of the hot zone. The State Department has issued a travel warning to Americans considering a trip to China.

 

Despite the flight restrictions and intense passenger screening, confirmed cases of the virus have popped up in 13 countries so far. That includes, as of this writing, five confirmed cases in the United States. Five Americans out 327 million may not seem like much. But the point is, it’s here!

 

Then we learned why the passenger screening process has not always been effective. According to China’s health minister, people with the virus may be contagious before they show symptoms. Testing people for fever doesn’t help if they are contagious before they get a fever. Dr. William Schaffner, an adviser to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said this would mean “the infection is much more contagious than we originally thought.”

 

Yes, health officials are afraid. They know that this virus has the potential of becoming a global pandemic.

 

But we’ve heard that before. Do you remember the SARS and MERS viruses? They, too, were coronaviruses and had the potential to ravage the earth. We still don’t have vaccinations against them, but they have largely disappeared. That’s what happens with these kinds of diseases. Even without human intervention, they rise and then they lose strength.

 

The current outbreak may turn out to be even less destructive than SARS or MERS. Or it could be worse. The question is how much damage the disease will do while it is most active. The Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 and 1919 infected one-third of the world’s population. It killed more Americans than World War I, World War II, Korea, and Viet Nam combined. 

 

Jesus said that the last days would be marked by pestilences. Revelation tells about specific pestilences that will arise during the tribulation period. As we get closer to the beginning of the tribulation, the world seems to be primed for a series of massive global pandemics. The ease and speed of global travel is one of the big factors here.

 

The other great danger is the rise of superbugs. Over the last hundred years or so, we humans have been inadvertently developing bacteria, viruses, and fungi that are stronger than anything in history. We call them superbugs because they are resistant to antibiotics, antivirals, and antifungal medications. By the extensive use of such drugs, we have made it so that only the strongest of each species survives. And the strong bugs are increasingly difficult to kill.

 

This is what the UK’s Chief Medical Officer, Dame Sally Davies, was talking about when she warned of a coming “superbug apocalypse.” 

 

Here’s the amazing thing. The Bible predicted this almost two thousand years ago. It’s just another example of something that should be crucially important to everyone. The Bible is true! We can trust it. We can trust its warnings and its promises. Even bleak news like this should remind us that our faith in God and heaven is built on a firm foundation.

Abbas: Palestinians Cutting All Ties With Israel, U.S.

Savaging Trump plan, Abbas says Palestinians cutting all ties with Israel, US

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announced he was cutting all ties, including security coordination, with both Israel and the US on Saturday, in a lengthy speech delivered at an Arab League meeting in Egypt’s capital denouncing the new White House plan for ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“We’ve informed the Israeli side…that there will be no relations at all with them and the United States, including security ties,” Abbas declared.

The US plan would potentially grant the Palestinians a state with restricted sovereignty in Gaza and in parts of the West Bank, while allowing Israel to annex all its settlements and keep nearly all of East Jerusalem.

The summit of Arab foreign ministers in Cairo was requested by the Palestinians, who responded angrily to the American proposal.

Abbas said that he told Israel and the US that “there will be no relations with them, including the security ties” following the deal that Palestinians say heavily favors Israel.

He said US President Donald Trump’s peace plan was in “violation of the (autonomy) accords” launched in Oslo in 1993 by Israel and the Palestinians.

Israel will have to “bear responsibility as an occupying power,” Abbas said.

There was no immediate comment from US or Israeli officials. Abbas has threatened to cut security ties in the past on several occasions though he has not followed through with action on the ground.