Trench warfare, drones and cowering civilians: on the ground in Nagorno-Karabakh
The battle over Nagorno-Karabakh, waged on and off for a century, has flared anew and civilians once again suffer the consequences
by Bethan McKernan in Stepanakert. Pictures by Achilleas Zavallis
Tue 13 Oct 2020 06.00 BST
Over the road from the 8-metre-deep crater left by a medium-range missile, Sergei Hovhnnesyan and three of his neighbours are hunkering down in the basement storage space of their local grocery shop in Stepanakert, a mountain town in the heart of the Nagorno-Karabakh territory claimed by both Armenia and Azerbaijan.
Whenever there is a gap in the airstrikes and shelling, their elderly legs make the trip up the stairs to bring down enough provisions to survive what could turn into a siege as the two ex-Soviet neighbours go to war once again.
About 70,000 Armenians in Nagarno-Karabakh have fled the poorly aimed Azerbaijani rockets and drones, which appear to have hit civilian neighbourhoods more often than infrastructure and military bases. Those who stay – many of them from older generations like Sergei and his friends – say they would rather die than abandon their homes to Azerbaijan.
Coronavirus vaccine: Multiple jabs to be ready ‘by early next year’, says Indian health minister
India awaits results of three Covid vaccines being trialled in the country
India’s health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan has claimed the country will have at least one viable Covid-19 vaccine by the beginning of 2021.
During a meeting with a group of ministers on Tuesday, Dr Vardhan said: “We're expecting that early next year we should have vaccine in the country, from maybe more than one source.
"Our expert groups are formulating strategies to plan on how to roll out the distribution of the vaccine in the country,” he added, according to the ANI news agency.
Humanitarian aid is an investment in the future
The coronavirus pandemic is disproportionately affecting the poorest. They need support and assistance now more than ever, write German minister of state, Niels Annen, and UN emergency relief coordinator Mark Lowcock.
At the start of the year, the United Nations thought it would need to get humanitarian assistance to 168 million people. Now it's 250 million. The biggest increase we have ever seen in a year and it is entirely down to COVID-19.
The COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdown measures triggered a global recession that hit the world hard. The world's most vulnerable countries have been hit hardest. This has aggravated existing humanitarian crises — and provoked new ones.
In Pennsylvania, fracking might not be the winning issue US presidential candidates think it is
In the battle for the White House, Pennsylvania and fracking have become all but synonymous. Yet in one of the state’s largest gas-producing counties, FRANCE 24 found residents’ relationship with the industry to be far more vexed than the national debate suggests.
Rose Friend’s family has a long history with natural gas. For decades, the family’s home in rural Washington County, Pennsylvania, got a free supply of the fuel from a local conventional well, as compensation for one of the several active gas lines running across the property.
It was a straightforward, convenient arrangement for the family, and a testament to the region’s longer-running relationship with fossil fuels. Alongside coal, which powered the area’s iconic steel mills, oil and natural gas production in southwestern Pennsylvania dates back to the late 19th century. For Friend, who grew up ploughing the land with horses, and whose nephew worked in the coal mines, the benefits of the area’s abundant energy reserves were obvious.
Indonesia is putting business before the environment and that could be disastrous for its rainforests
Updated 0254 GMT (1054 HKT) October 13, 2020
Last week, Indonesia's parliament passed a controversial and sweeping jobs law that environmentalists say will have a disastrous impact on the country's forests and rich biodiversity.
Cyprus abolishes citizenship through investment programme
The move comes after an Al Jazeera investigation showed that politicians were willing to help criminals acquire passports.
Cyprus has announced it will abolish a controversial passport scheme following an investigation by Al Jazeera that revealed how high-ranking politicians were willing to issue passports to convicted criminals.
The interior and finance ministries said in a statement posted in Greek on Twitter that the citizenship through investment programme in its current form will be abolished from November 1.
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