Time for talks, not threats

February 19, 2016 - Daily News Briefing

Diplomacy and arbitration, not gunboats and missiles, are needed in maritime disputes of East Asia.

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Turkey's leaders on Thursday blamed top enemies, including Kurdish militant groups in Turkey and in Syria as well as the Syrian government, for the suicide bombing in Ankara and vowed strong retaliation against the perpetrators, threatening to further complicate the Syria conflict. The rush hour car-bomb attack on Wednesday evening targeting buses carrying military personnel killed 28 people and injured dozens of others as Turkey grapples with an array of issues. The blast was the second deadly bombing in Ankara in four months. Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told reporters that a Syrian national with links to Syrian Kurdish militia carried out the attack in collaboration with Turkey's own outlawed Kurdish rebel group, the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK.

The Southern Poverty Law Center’s annual list of extremist groups in the United States is often seen as an authoritative survey of racist and antigovernment activity, but some organizations that have been named by the civil rights advocacy say its list serves to silence conservative viewpoints. In its annual report, released on Wednesday, the group said that the number of antigovernment and hate groups jumped dramatically in 2015, due to a range of factors, including increased fears of terrorism following attacks in Paris and California, a growing divisiveness in political speech, and wider public attention to violent encounters between police and black men.

If the next US president decided to pull out of the recently negotiated Paris Climate Agreement, the US could face grave "diplomatic consequences," the US climate envoy said on Thursday. Todd Stern, the United States' lead negotiator in the landmark deal reached in Paris in December, said the global reaction would be greater than when the US left the Kyoto Protocol under President Bush in 2001, the BBC reports. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon has asked leaders to come to New York in April to officially sign the Paris agreement. To go into effect, the treaty needs 55 countries representing more than 55 percent of global emissions to sign and ratify it, the BBC reports.

Toyota said Thursday it is recalling nearly 2.9 million sports utility vehicles, including more than 1.1 million in the US, because of seat belts that might fail in a crash. The recall covers RAV4 SUVs from the 2005 through 2014 model years, the RAV4 electric vehicle from 2012 through 2014, sold in North America, and the Vanguard sold in Japan from 2005-2016, the Japanese automaker said.

Within just one generation, hatchery-born salmon can become drastically different from their counterparts in the wild, with hundreds of variations at the genetic level. Looking specifically at the steelhead trout salmon, researchers at Oregon State University, in collaboration with the Oregon Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, found more than 700 genetic variations between farm-raised and wild salmon.

Sky lanterns – also called wish lanterns, or Chinese lanterns – are floating paper luminaries that originate from Chinese culture. But because the miniature hot air balloons are lit from inside by flames and can end up floating onto trees and other flammable objects, Nebraska is now among at least 26 states that have banned them. The state senators unanimously approved the statewide ban on Thursday. Earlier this month, a New Zealand home was set on fire by a sky lantern released to celebrate a wedding. And in Britain two years ago, a sky lantern that ended up at a plastic recycling plant caused $9 million in damages. But proponents of sky lanterns argue that they should be regulated, not banned.

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