CounterVortex

Watching the Shadows

Podcast: artificial intelligence and the abolition of truth

In Episode 182 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg takes heart in SAG-AFTRAjoining the Hollywood writers’ strike, demanding limits on the use of artificial intelligence by the industry. This is a sign of human resistance to robot rule and the growing hegemony of silicon-based “intelligence” over carbon-based intelligent life-forms. Although journalists are not yet at risk of being rendered redundant as script and copy writers are, Weinberg’s own trade of journalism is already being impacted. The post-truth zeitgeist and online cognitive environment of total propaganda is set to become exponentially worse, quantitatively and qualitatively, with the advent of “deep-fakes,” indistinguishable from actual reality. Objective truth, even as a concept, is about to be abolished—unless the human race stands up and says no to AI, before it’s too late. Contrary to the dogma that the “advance” (sic) and ubiquity of this technology is inevitable, resistance is possible. Italy has banned use of ChatGPT within the country. Listen on SoundCloud or Patreon. (Image: Earth First! Newswire)

South Asia

UN court to rule on Indus River dispute

The Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) at The Hague dismissed India’s objections concerning its authority to address the ongoing Indus River disputes between India and Pakistan. The ruling reinstates a case that had been impeded for several years. Pakistan asserts that India’s proposed hydroelectric energy projects will substantially diminish the Indus’ flow, negatively affecting Pakistani agriculture. Pakistan initiated legal proceedings against India in 2016, seeking arbitration to address the issue. India raised objections regarding the jurisdiction of the PCA. (Photo: Heartography/Pixabay via Jurist)

North Africa

Tunisia: mass expulsion of Black African migrants

Hundreds of Black African migrants were rounded up from the Tunisian port city of Sfax, expelled across the country’s border with Libya and left stranded in the desert, sparking street protests by the large community of migrants waiting in the city. According to reports, some managed to escape back to the Tunisian side after being confronted by Libyan militiamen, but the fate of all those expelled has still not been accounted for. The expulsions came after mobs attacked Black Africans in Sfax following the funeral of a Tunisian man who was stabbed to death in an altercation with migrants. Tensions have been rising for months in Tunisia, which has seen a sharp increase in people attempting to cross the Mediterranean from its shores this year. (Map: Google)

The Amazon

Brazil: Amazon deforestation drops rapidly under Lula

The rate of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has fallen significantly since President Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva took office in January 2023, according to government data. The area of deforestation detected by space agency INPE‘s forest monitoring system amounted to 2,649 square kilometers in the first half of the year, a 34% decline from the same period last year. The loss in the first six months of 2023 is the lowest since 2019, according to the satellite-based tracking system. Lula has prioritized reining in deforestation since assuming the presidency. Last month, he announced his administration’s plan to eliminate deforestation by 2030 as part of Brazil’s pledge to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. (Photo: Mongabay)

The Caucasus

UN: Russia must investigate Chechnya attack

A group of United Nations human rights experts called on the Russian Federation to investigate a violent attack in Chechnya against journalist Yelena Milashina and human rights lawyer Alexander Nemov, and bring to justice the perpetrators. Milashina was covering, and Nemov participating in, the trial of Zarema Musaeva, the mother of exiled opposition activists who challenged the leader of the Chechen Republic, Ramzan Kadyrov. Milashina is known for breaking the story of the “anti-gay purges” in Kadyrov’s Chechnya in 2017, which sparked international outcry. (Image: OHCHR via Twitter)

Europe

US to provide Ukraine with cluster munitions —despite protests

The US announced it will provide Ukraine with cluster munitions, despite a plea from Human Rights Watch for both Russia and Ukraine to cease their use of the controversial weapons, which have already caused many civilian deaths and injuries over the course of the war. In a White House press briefing, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan stressed that the US deferred the decision for as long as possible due to such considerations, but ultimately found that the harm of a continued Russian offensive outweighed the risks of providing the munitions. Russia and, to a far lesser extent, Ukraine have used cluster munitions since the start of the war in February 2022, despite international criticism from bodies including the UN Human Rights Council. (Photo from Little Ukraine, NYC: CounterVortex)

Africa

Fulani pitted against rebels in Cameroon conflict

Amnesty International urged Cameroon’s authorities to investigate human rights violations committed in the country’s conflicted Anglophone regions, the North-West and South-West. According to a new report, armed separatists and the military alike are responsible for killings, torture, rape and destruction of property. In the North-West in particular, long-standing conflicts between Mbororo Fulani herders and sedentary farmers have been fuelling armed violence. As the situation has deteriorated over the past years, militias, mainly composed of Mbororo Fulani and supported or tolerated by the authorities, have committed atrocities against civil populations. The official security forces have responded to this situation with further rights violations. (Photo: Moki Edwin Kindzeka/VOA via Wikimedia Commons)

Southeast Asia

Podcast: geopolitics of the Barbie affair

In Episode 181 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg discusses the strange reality that the Barbie move has been banned in Vietnam over a brief image of a world map appearing to show the “nine-dash line” demarcating China’s unilaterally claimed territory in the South China Sea. While US-China brinkmanship over Taiwan wins headlines, Beijing’s maritime dispute with Hanoi holds unsettling potential for escalation. In a surreal paradox (for those who remember their history) Vietnam has actually been tilting to the US in the new cold war with China. It has also been increasingly resorting to internal police-state measures to protect the interests of foreign capital in the country. All of this constitutes a rebuke both to the neoliberals, who cling to the discredited dogma that “free markets” inevitably lead to peace and democracy, and to the tankies, who rally around both the regimes in Beijing and Hanoi, in defiance of political reality. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Map via IDSA)

Europe

France: far-right parties invoke ‘civil war’

French police have arrested more than 3,000 protesters in unrest that has spread since the fatal police shooting of 17-year-old delivery worker Nahel Merzouk, the son of North African immigrants, during a traffic stop in the Paris suburb of Nanterre. The Ministry of the Interior has mobilized some 45,000 police troops and gendarmes, as fierce clashes with police have spread across the country. The French far right is meanwhile baiting President Emmanuel Macron for what they portray as a weak response to the uprising. Marine Le Pen issued an inflammatory video statement warning of “anarchy” and calling for a state of emergency to be declared. Marion Maréchal, Le Pen’s niece and a former National Front parliamentarian, has called for armed vigilantism and repeatedly invoked “civil war.” (Photo via Crimethinc)

East Asia

Hong Kong pro-democracy radio station closed down

Hong Kong’s pro-democracy Citizen Radio aired its final broadcast, with the founder citing the “dangerous” political environment. Tsang Kin-shing, a veteran political activist, wrote in the station’s closing Facebook post of mounting difficulties. Under the National Security Law imposed by the Chinese government in 2020, the station’s bank account was “frozen,” and consequently it could only afford rent for the studio through August. “We could do nothing but to stop the broadcasting,” said Tsang. In a press conference at the studio, Tsang also told reporters of the growing obstacles to journalistic work: “If we invite guests, they may not be able to speak freely, because there are so many red lines.” (Image: Citizen Radio)

Europe

Hague prosecutors prepare case against Russia

A Hague-based international prosecutorial team launched preparation of case materials against Russia for the crime of aggression—an offense that is notoriously difficult to prosecute. The International Center for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression (ICPA) was established within Eurojust, the European Union’s agency for judicial cooperation. The new office will draw together prosecutors from various European countries, as well as from the International Criminal Court (ICC), to gather evidence of Russian aggression in Ukraine. The center will collect evidence with the awareness that it remains unclear where the crime of aggression will ultimately be prosecuted—in national courts, a dedicated international tribunal, or before the ICC. (Photo via Twitter)

Planet Watch

UN grapples with definition of ‘climate refugees’

The United Nations must update its 70-year-old refugee convention to address the growing numbers displaced across borders by the climate crisis, according to the special rapporteur on climate change. Speaking before the Human Rights Council in Geneva, Ian Fry said there’s an “urgent need” to protect the rights of the displaced as the climate crisis builds. While few contest the need to address climate-related displacement, how to do so is a sticky question. The UN’s two main agencies for displacement, the UNHCR and IOM, shun the term “climate refugees,” saying that it’s misleading and could even undermine existing protection law. (Photo of displaced families in Somalia: UN Photo/Tobin Jones via Flickr)