AFP

The United States is committing support to promote sustainable safaris in Africa, hoping to prevent environmental destruction as the tourism sector recovers, officials said Thursday.

The US Agency for International Development (USAID) made the announcement at a three-day summit that brought nearly 50 African leaders in Washington.

The nascent Africa Conservation and Communities Tourism Fund, led by investors and conservationists, aims to raise $75 million to fund safari operators across the continent.

USAID said it was committing $2.5 million to reduce risks and jumpstart the fund, which it estimated would benefit 44,000 people.

The fund will work with safari operators in Botswana, Kenya, Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zambia.

A notice on the project earlier this year by advisors Impact Align said that ecotourism operators had been devastated by Covid-19, which shut down international travel.

“The fate of millions of acres of wildlands and wildlife hangs in the balance,” it said.

“If operators fail to financially recover, once protected wildlands will be at high risk of destruction which would worsen planetary health, exacerbate climate change and deprive local communities of employment and management opportunities.”

The United States during the summit has laid out some $55 billion in funding over the next several years including to improve health infrastructure, promote green energy and stave off hunger.

Harvard University named Claudine Gay, a dean of the Faculty of Arts and Science, as its new president on Thursday, the first African American to hold the post at the prestigious university.

Gay, 52, is just the second woman to be elected to head the school in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Harvard said that Gay, the daughter of Haitian immigrants, will take over as the university’s 30th president on July 1, 2023.

“Claudine is a remarkable leader who is profoundly devoted to sustaining and enhancing Harvard’s academic excellence,” said Penny Pritzker, chair of Harvard’s presidential search committee.

Gay took the helm of Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences in 2018, steering it through the difficult period of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Today, we are in a moment of remarkable and accelerating change — socially, politically, economically, and technologically,” Gay said after the announcement.

“So many fundamental assumptions about how the world works and how we should relate to one another are being tested,” she added.

One of those tests will come just as she assumes the leadership role, the New York Times said, noting that next July the university faces a Supreme Court decision that may force it to revise its longstanding admissions processes.

Suits have been brought against Harvard and the University of North Carolina, challenging their policy of affirmative action.

That policy emerged from the Civil Rights Movement in the late 1960s to help address the legacy of discrimination in higher education against African Americans.

The suits against Harvard and UNC were brought by a group known as Students for Fair Admissions, which claims that race-conscious admissions policies discriminate against equally qualified applicants of Asian American origin.

US justice officials on Thursday said a former Twitter worker convicted of spying for Saudi officials was sentenced to 3.5 years in prison.

Ahmad Abouammo was found guilty in August on criminal counts including money laundering, fraud, and being an illegal agent of a foreign government, according to a copy of the verdict.

Prosecutors in federal court in San Francisco told jurors that Abouammo sold Twitter user information for cash and an expensive watch some seven years earlier.

“This case revealed that foreign governments, here, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will bribe insiders to obtain the user information that is collected and stored by our Silicon Valley social media companies,” US attorney Stephanie Hinds said in a statement.

“This sentence sends a message to insiders with access to user information to safeguard it, particularly from repressive regimes, or risk significant time in prison.”

The defense team for 45-year-old Abouammo contended in court that he did nothing more than accept gifts from free-spending Saudis for simply doing his client management job.

“The evidence shows that, for a price and thinking no one was watching, the defendant sold his position to an insider of the crown prince,” US prosecutor Colin Sampson said in final remarks to the jury.

Defense attorney Angela Chuang countered that while there certainly appeared to be a conspiracy to get revealing information about Saudi critics from Twitter, prosecutors failed to prove Abouammo was part of it.

Abouammo quit Twitter in 2015 and took a job at e-commerce titan Amazon in Seattle, where he lives, according to court documents.

Jurors found Abouammo guilty on 6 of the 11 charges against him.

Chuang conceded to the jury that Abouammo did violate Twitter employee rules by not telling the San Francisco-based company that he had received $100,000 in cash and a watch valued at more than $40,000 from someone close to the Saudi crown prince.

However, she downplayed the significance of the gift, saying it amounted to “pocket change” in a Saudi culture known for generosity and lavish presents.

US district court Judge Edward said while pronouncing the sentence that “exposing dissident information is a serious offense,” and ordered Abouammo to forfeit the value of “bribes” received, according to prosecutors.

Abouammo is to begin serving his sentence at the end of March.

Prosecutors accused Abouammo and fellow Twitter employee Ali Alzabarah of being enlisted by Saudi officials between late 2014 and early the following year to get private information on accounts that were critical of the regime.

The then-Twitter workers could glean email addresses, phone numbers, birth dates and other private data to identify people behind anonymous accounts, prosecutors said.

Alzabarah, a Saudi national, is being sought on a charge of failing to register in the United States as an agent of a foreign government as required by United States law, according to an FBI statement.

It could be the perfect Christmas present for the Donald Trump fan in your life — a $99 digital trading card showing the former president in various guises including a cowboy, astronaut and fighter pilot.

Trump, whose bid to win back the White House in 2024 appears to be stalling, had hyped that he would be making a “major announcement.”

Speculation had mounted that he could name his vice presidential pick.

But the unveiling of his NFT (non-fungible token) card collection — timed to cash in during the holiday shopping season — instead attracted widespread ridicule.

In a promotional video that showed Trump in a muscled-up Superman-style costume with laser-beam eyes, he gave the cards his classic hard sell.

“These cards feature some of the really incredible artwork pertaining to my life and my career. It has been very exciting,” he said.

“Buy your Trump Digital Trading Cards right now before they are all gone, and they will be gone!”

Slamming the message home, he added: “Remember Christmas is coming and this makes a great Christmas gift.”

President Joe Biden, who defeated Trump at the polls in 2020, clapped back at Trump’s self-styled “major announcement.”

“I had some MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENTS the last couple of weeks, too,” Biden tweeted.

“Inflation’s easing. I just signed the Respect for Marriage Act. We brought Brittney Griner home. Gas prices are lower than a year ago. 10,000 new high-paying jobs in Arizona.”

Since Trump announced he would seek to return to the Oval Office, he has suffered a series of setbacks including the defeat of many candidates he backed in midterm elections last month, growing criticism from former allies and multiple legal cases against him.

The NFTs — digital versions of collectible baseball cards — also offer the chance to win prizes such as dinner or a round of golf with Trump, autographs and one-on-one Zoom meetings.

“We are doing a lot. My Official Trump Digital Cards are $99 which doesn’t sound like very much for what you getting,” he added.

Canada’s TC Energy has restarted a portion of the Keystone Pipeline, which was shut down last week following a large spill of heavy crude oil in Kansas.

The company on Wednesday night resumed the flow of diluted bitumen, a heavy crude oil, from Hardisty, Alberta to Wood River/Patoka, Illinois, TC Energy said on its website.

The southern portion of the pipeline — which extends to Texas and includes Washington, Kansas where authorities are attempting to limit the spill’s environmental damage — remains off line.

The restored portion pipeline will operate at “reduced capacity,” said TC Energy. 

“We continue to progress our response and oil recovery effort,” the company said.

TC Energy said it has recovered 3,035 barrels of oil from the creek. The initial estimated spill volume was 14,000 barrels, said an order from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

A total of 414 personnel reported to the oil spill site on Wednesday, including emergency staff from TC Energy and state and federal agencies, according to an Environmental Protection Agency news release.

EPA said that there were four deceased mammals recovered from the site, along with 71 fish.

The expected US provision of Patriot missiles to Ukraine is a muscular message of support and will boost defenses against Russia’s relentless aerial assaults, but experts say its battlefield impact will be limited.

Patriots are “far from a silver bullet,” against the low-flying cruise missiles and drone bombs that Russian forces have pummeled Ukraine with, according to Ian Williams of the Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

But they will add a layer of protection on top of Ukraine’s current systems, and also defend against short-range ballistic missiles that Western officials think Russia is seeking from Iran, Williams said.

“Having layered defenses is helpful when you’re dealing with this kind of complex air attack,” he told AFP.

In addition, the move will send a strong message to both Moscow and European allies that Washington is prepared to support Kyiv with some of its most advanced weaponry to battle Russian invaders.

– What is the Patriot system? –

Made by Raytheon, the MIM-104 Patriot is a surface-to-air missile (SAM) system initially developed to intercept high-flying aircraft. It was modified in the 1980s to focus on the new threat of tactical ballistic missiles. Patriots proved themselves against Iraq’s Russian-made Scuds in the first Gulf War.

Patriot systems come in fully mobile batteries that include a command center, a radar station to detect incoming threats, and launchers.

The launchers can handle a pod of four PAC-2 missiles at a time, which have a 160 kilometer (100 mile) range, or 16 of the newer PAC-3, which have a range of 40 kilometers but greater precision with onboard radar.

– Why are Patriots needed? –

To battle Russia’s low-flying cruise missiles and bomb-like Shahed-136 drones, Ukraine has used a number of different short-range air defense systems, including Russian-made Buks and S-300s, old-generation US-made Hawk missiles,  and modern SAM systems from allies like Germany and Italy. 

The arrival of two US NASAMS systems in October helped limit the damage from Russia’s massive November 17 barrage; they were reportedly 100 percent effective in hitting their incoming targets, said Williams.

But modern SAM system launchers and missiles are in extremely short supply. For example, the US can’t send any more NASAMS until late next year. 

Meanwhile, Russia is expected to continue its air assault on Ukraine infrastructure.

Ukraine “needs capacity, they need volume” for air defense, said Williams.

The Patriot “allows them to layer their defenses a bit more.”

– What Patriots can do –

The Patriots’ biggest value is countering high-flying tactical ballistic missiles. Russia has not used many ballistic missiles in its war on Ukraine, but that could change if it does acquire them from Iran.

The Patriots have proven very effective in Saudi Arabia against Iranian-design ballistic missiles fired from Yemen.

Against cruise missiles and drones, Williams points out, Patriots have limited value because their radar systems only cover a 120 degree portion of the horizon, unlike the 360 degree coverage of NASAMS. 

“In the kind of environment we’re seeing in Ukraine, where threats can come in from multiple directions, you either have to have more radars or more batteries,” said Williams.

If the US gives Ukraine the longer-range PAC-2, he said, the likely target is the current cruise missile and drone threat. PAC-3s will indicate the focus is ballistic missiles.

The number of batteries the US will supply at first, he said, is likely to be just one or two. Training takes time, and US forces don’t have many if any spare systems. Washington might have to coax batteries from one of the 17 countries which have them. 

Then the question is where to put them: one battery could defend a city, or a power station, but not a broad swathe of territory.

“You have to decide what you’re going to defend. You have to prioritize. It’s not going to defend the whole country,” said Williams

Another limiting issue is the cost: an individual Patriot missile runs about $3 million, triple the price of a NASAMS missile.