0x815

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/2963866

Archived link

• Research from Infyos has identified that companies accounting for 75 per cent of the global battery market have connections to one or more companies in the supply chain facing allegations of severe human rights abuses.

• Most of the allegations of severe human rights abuses involve companies mining and refining raw materials in China that end up in batteries globally, particularly in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) in northwest China.

• “The relative opaqueness of battery supply chains and the complexity of supply chain legal requirements means current approaches like ESG audits are out of date and don’t comply with new regulations. Most battery manufacturers and their customers, including automotive companies and grid-scale battery energy storage developers, still don’t have complete supply chain oversight," says Sarah Montgomery, CEO & co-founder, Infyos.

• Supply chain changes are needed to eliminate widespread forced labour and child labour abuses occurring in the lithium-ion battery market, Infyos added.

Archived link

• Research from Infyos has identified that companies accounting for 75 per cent of the global battery market have connections to one or more companies in the supply chain facing allegations of severe human rights abuses.

• Most of the allegations of severe human rights abuses involve companies mining and refining raw materials in China that end up in batteries globally, particularly in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) in northwest China.

• “The relative opaqueness of battery supply chains and the complexity of supply chain legal requirements means current approaches like ESG audits are out of date and don’t comply with new regulations. Most battery manufacturers and their customers, including automotive companies and grid-scale battery energy storage developers, still don’t have complete supply chain oversight," says Sarah Montgomery, CEO & co-founder, Infyos.

• Supply chain changes are needed to eliminate widespread forced labour and child labour abuses occurring in the lithium-ion battery market, Infyos added.

Here is the report (pdf): Dirty Money: How Fossil Fuel Sponsors Are Polluting Sports

Report finds that oil and gas sponsorship of global sports hits $5.6 billion, but this scale of “sportswashing” likely to be an underestimate, authors says

Top sports sponsors include Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil company ($1.3 billion); British oil major Shell ($469 million); petrochemicals giant Ineos ($776 million); and French oil company TotalEnergies ($327 million), the study by the New Weather Institute found.

“Taking money from fossil fuel sponsors is sport signing a deal for more devastating impacts on floods, bush fires and heatwaves,” said Australian former rugby captain, now Senator, Dave Pocock. “If we are going to transition we need to stop fossil fuel companies trying to extend their social license through sponsoring sport.”

The authors said the report represented the first attempt to quantify the value of fossil fuel sports sponsorships globally, and warned that a lack of transparency over the deals meant the figures were likely to be an underestimate.

“Oil companies who are delaying climate action and pouring more fuel on the fire of global heating, are using Big Tobacco’s old playbook and trying to pass themselves off as patrons of sport,” said Andrew Simms, co-director of the New Weather Institute. He added that if sport is to have a future, “It needs to clean itself of dirty money from big polluters and stop promoting its own destruction.”

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/2958203

There is an interesting study (May 2024), also linked in the article: When Online Content Disappears

Historians of the future may struggle to understand fully how we lived our lives in the early 21st Century. That's because of a potentially history-deleting combination of how we live our lives digitally – and a paucity of official efforts to archive the world's information as it's produced these days.

However, an informal group of organisations are pushing back against the forces of digital entropy – many of them operated by volunteers with little institutional support. None is more synonymous with the fight to save the web than the Internet Archive, an American non-profit based in San Francisco, started in 1996 as a passion project by internet pioneer Brewster Kahl. The organisation has embarked what may be the most ambitious digital archiving project of all time, gathering 866 billion web pages, 44 million books, 10.6 million videos of films and television programmes and more. Housed in a handful of data centres scattered across the world, the collections of the Internet Archive and a few similar groups are the only things standing in the way of digital oblivion.

"The risks are manifold. Not just that technology may fail, but that certainly happens. But more important, that institutions fail, or companies go out of business. News organisations are gobbled up by other news organisations, or more and more frequently, they're shut down," says Mark Graham, director of the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, a tool that collects and stores snapshots of websites for posterity. There are numerous incentives to put content online, he says, but there's little pushing companies to maintain it over the long term.

Despite the Internet Archive's achievements thus far, the organisation and others like it face financial threats, technical challenges, cyberattacks and legal battles from businesses who dislike the idea of freely available copies of their intellectual property. And as recent court losses show, the project of saving the internet could be just as fleeting as the content it's trying to protect.

"More and more of our intellectual endeavours, more of our entertainment, more of our news, and more of our conversations exist only in a digital environment," Graham says. "That environment is inherently fragile."

There is an interesting study (May 2024), also linked in the article: When Online Content Disappears

Historians of the future may struggle to understand fully how we lived our lives in the early 21st Century. That's because of a potentially history-deleting combination of how we live our lives digitally – and a paucity of official efforts to archive the world's information as it's produced these days.

However, an informal group of organisations are pushing back against the forces of digital entropy – many of them operated by volunteers with little institutional support. None is more synonymous with the fight to save the web than the Internet Archive, an American non-profit based in San Francisco, started in 1996 as a passion project by internet pioneer Brewster Kahl. The organisation has embarked what may be the most ambitious digital archiving project of all time, gathering 866 billion web pages, 44 million books, 10.6 million videos of films and television programmes and more. Housed in a handful of data centres scattered across the world, the collections of the Internet Archive and a few similar groups are the only things standing in the way of digital oblivion.

"The risks are manifold. Not just that technology may fail, but that certainly happens. But more important, that institutions fail, or companies go out of business. News organisations are gobbled up by other news organisations, or more and more frequently, they're shut down," says Mark Graham, director of the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, a tool that collects and stores snapshots of websites for posterity. There are numerous incentives to put content online, he says, but there's little pushing companies to maintain it over the long term.

Despite the Internet Archive's achievements thus far, the organisation and others like it face financial threats, technical challenges, cyberattacks and legal battles from businesses who dislike the idea of freely available copies of their intellectual property. And as recent court losses show, the project of saving the internet could be just as fleeting as the content it's trying to protect.

"More and more of our intellectual endeavours, more of our entertainment, more of our news, and more of our conversations exist only in a digital environment," Graham says. "That environment is inherently fragile."

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/2956996

Archived link

At a less well-reported meeting in Beijing late last year, organised by the China-Africa Business Council, officials pushed for the rapid expansion of Chinese private security firms [in countries of the Global South]. ‘Outbound Chinese investors face security challenges and a complex environment,’ said an official statement.

[...]

Officials are concerned about the fate of programmes under China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which started as a global infrastructure programme, but has evolved into an umbrella for just about everything China does overseas to further its influence. Projects have stalled or collapsed under a mountain of unsustainable debt and growing resentment at the outsize role of Chinese firms and labour. In Pakistan, for instance, Gwadar Port, built by China as key part of a $62 billion (£47 billion) China-Pakistan economic corridor has been under virtual siege by Baloch separatists, who have targeted Chinese engineers. Chinese-owned mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo have also been targeted.

A BRI working group recently highlighted the need to ‘hammer out the safety protection in a detailed way,’ according to the state-owned Xinhua news agency.

[...]

China now has overseas economic investments and assets worth well over a trillion dollars by most estimates. It has set up around 47,000 overseas firms across 190 countries or regions, according to the Ministry of Commerce.

[...]

Beijing now seems to have concluded that they are dangerously exposed, particularly at a time of growing economic stress and geopolitical tensions and require a local security apparatus to match.

[...]

The Solomon Islands provide a template for China. Last year, they signed a deal on police cooperation with Beijing as part of an upgrade of their relations to a ‘comprehensive strategic partnership’. The Chinese telecoms company Huawei is building a cellular network on the Islands, and a Chinese state company plans to redevelop the port in the capital, Honiara.

[...]

China had less success with Thailand, where the government scrapped plans for joint patrols with Chinese police in popular tourist spots following criticism that it compromised Thai national sovereignty, and a rebuke from the country’s police chief. There was also anger on social media. ‘Thailand will become a complete surveillance state’, was one typical response, though among other autocrats more welcoming of Chinese, that seems to be precisely the point.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/2956996

Archived link

At a less well-reported meeting in Beijing late last year, organised by the China-Africa Business Council, officials pushed for the rapid expansion of Chinese private security firms [in countries of the Global South]. ‘Outbound Chinese investors face security challenges and a complex environment,’ said an official statement.

[...]

Officials are concerned about the fate of programmes under China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which started as a global infrastructure programme, but has evolved into an umbrella for just about everything China does overseas to further its influence. Projects have stalled or collapsed under a mountain of unsustainable debt and growing resentment at the outsize role of Chinese firms and labour. In Pakistan, for instance, Gwadar Port, built by China as key part of a $62 billion (£47 billion) China-Pakistan economic corridor has been under virtual siege by Baloch separatists, who have targeted Chinese engineers. Chinese-owned mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo have also been targeted.

A BRI working group recently highlighted the need to ‘hammer out the safety protection in a detailed way,’ according to the state-owned Xinhua news agency.

[...]

China now has overseas economic investments and assets worth well over a trillion dollars by most estimates. It has set up around 47,000 overseas firms across 190 countries or regions, according to the Ministry of Commerce.

[...]

Beijing now seems to have concluded that they are dangerously exposed, particularly at a time of growing economic stress and geopolitical tensions and require a local security apparatus to match.

[...]

The Solomon Islands provide a template for China. Last year, they signed a deal on police cooperation with Beijing as part of an upgrade of their relations to a ‘comprehensive strategic partnership’. The Chinese telecoms company Huawei is building a cellular network on the Islands, and a Chinese state company plans to redevelop the port in the capital, Honiara.

[...]

China had less success with Thailand, where the government scrapped plans for joint patrols with Chinese police in popular tourist spots following criticism that it compromised Thai national sovereignty, and a rebuke from the country’s police chief. There was also anger on social media. ‘Thailand will become a complete surveillance state’, was one typical response, though among other autocrats more welcoming of Chinese, that seems to be precisely the point.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/2927437

Archived link

High-tech CCTV, super-accurate DNA-testing technology and facial tracking software: China is pushing its state-of-the-art surveillance and policing tactics abroad.

Delegates from law enforcement across the world descended this week on a port city in eastern China showcasing the work of dozens of local firms, several linked to repression in the northwestern region of Xinjiang.

China is one of the most surveilled societies on Earth, with millions of CCTV cameras scattered across cities and facial recognition technology widely used in everything from day-to-day law enforcement to political repression.

Its police serve a dual purpose: keeping the peace and cracking down on petty crime while also ensuring challenges to the ruling Communist Party are swiftly stamped out.

During the opening ceremony in Lianyungang, Jiangsu province, China's police minister lauded Beijing's training of thousands of police from abroad over the last 12 months -- and promised to help thousands more over the next year.

An analyst said this was "absolutely a sign that China aims to export" its policing.

"Beijing is hoping to normalise and legitimise its policing style and... the authoritarian political system in which it operates," Bethany Allen at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute said.

[...]

"The more countries that learn from the Chinese model, the fewer countries willing to criticise such a state-first, repressive approach."

[...]

Tech giant Huawei said its "Public Safety Solution" was now in use in over 100 countries and regions, from Kenya to Saudi Arabia.

[...]

The United States sanctioned SDIC Intelligence Xiamen Information, formerly Meiya Pico, for developing an app "designed to track image and audio files, location data, and messages on... cellphones".

In 2018, the US Treasury said residents of Xinjiang "were required to download a desktop version of" that app "so authorities could monitor for illicit activity".

China has been accused of incarcerating more than one million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang -- charges Beijing vehemently rejects.

[...]

Several delegations expressed interest in learning from the Chinese police.

"We have come to establish links and begin training," Colonel Galo Erazo from the National Police of Ecuador told AFP.

"Either Chinese police will go to Ecuador, or Ecuadorian police will come to China," he added.

One expert said that this outsourcing of security is becoming a key tool in China's efforts to promote its goals overseas.

[...]

"China's offers of police cooperation and training give them channels through which to learn how local security forces -- many either on China's periphery or in areas that Beijing considers strategically important -- view the security environment," [Sheena Greitens at the University of Texas in the U.S.] said.

"These initiatives can give China influence within the security apparatus if a threat to Chinese interests arises."

[Corrected broken link.]

Archived link

High-tech CCTV, super-accurate DNA-testing technology and facial tracking software: China is pushing its state-of-the-art surveillance and policing tactics abroad.

Delegates from law enforcement across the world descended this week on a port city in eastern China showcasing the work of dozens of local firms, several linked to repression in the northwestern region of Xinjiang.

China is one of the most surveilled societies on Earth, with millions of CCTV cameras scattered across cities and facial recognition technology widely used in everything from day-to-day law enforcement to political repression.

Its police serve a dual purpose: keeping the peace and cracking down on petty crime while also ensuring challenges to the ruling Communist Party are swiftly stamped out.

During the opening ceremony in Lianyungang, Jiangsu province, China's police minister lauded Beijing's training of thousands of police from abroad over the last 12 months -- and promised to help thousands more over the next year.

An analyst said this was "absolutely a sign that China aims to export" its policing.

"Beijing is hoping to normalise and legitimise its policing style and... the authoritarian political system in which it operates," Bethany Allen at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute said.

[...]

"The more countries that learn from the Chinese model, the fewer countries willing to criticise such a state-first, repressive approach."

[...]

Tech giant Huawei said its "Public Safety Solution" was now in use in over 100 countries and regions, from Kenya to Saudi Arabia.

[...]

The United States sanctioned SDIC Intelligence Xiamen Information, formerly Meiya Pico, for developing an app "designed to track image and audio files, location data, and messages on... cellphones".

In 2018, the US Treasury said residents of Xinjiang "were required to download a desktop version of" that app "so authorities could monitor for illicit activity".

China has been accused of incarcerating more than one million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang -- charges Beijing vehemently rejects.

[...]

Several delegations expressed interest in learning from the Chinese police.

"We have come to establish links and begin training," Colonel Galo Erazo from the National Police of Ecuador told AFP.

"Either Chinese police will go to Ecuador, or Ecuadorian police will come to China," he added.

One expert said that this outsourcing of security is becoming a key tool in China's efforts to promote its goals overseas.

[...]

"China's offers of police cooperation and training give them channels through which to learn how local security forces -- many either on China's periphery or in areas that Beijing considers strategically important -- view the security environment," [Sheena Greitens at the University of Texas in the U.S.] said.

"These initiatives can give China influence within the security apparatus if a threat to Chinese interests arises."

[Corrected broken link.]

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/2926436

A Hong Kong man is facing as long as 10 years in jail after he pleaded guilty to sedition for wearing a T-shirt featuring a protest slogan.

In court on Monday, Chu Kai-pong, 27, was the first person to be convicted under Hong Kong’s tough homegrown national security law enacted in March.

[...]

He was arrested on June 12 at a train station wearing a T-shirt with the slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times”, and a yellow mask printed with “FDNOL” – the shorthand for another pro-democracy slogan, “five demands, not one less”. June 12 is a date associated with protests in the city in 2019.

[...]

Chu’s lawyer argued that the maximum he could be given would be two years.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/2926436

A Hong Kong man is facing as long as 10 years in jail after he pleaded guilty to sedition for wearing a T-shirt featuring a protest slogan.

In court on Monday, Chu Kai-pong, 27, was the first person to be convicted under Hong Kong’s tough homegrown national security law enacted in March.

[...]

He was arrested on June 12 at a train station wearing a T-shirt with the slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times”, and a yellow mask printed with “FDNOL” – the shorthand for another pro-democracy slogan, “five demands, not one less”. June 12 is a date associated with protests in the city in 2019.

[...]

Chu’s lawyer argued that the maximum he could be given would be two years.

Warning: The following article contains descriptions of violence. Some names have been changed to protect individuals’ identities.

Like many of the women inspired by the protests, Alef posted a photo on social media revealing her hair flowing freely in public. It was a simple act of solidarity with the movement against the forced wearing of the hijab.

“I didn’t really care enough to hide who I am or where the photo was taken,” she said. “I wanted to say, ‘we exist’.”

But the picture was seen by the authorities, which were trying to crush the protests, and Alef was arrested.

She says she was blindfolded, handcuffed and taken to an unknown location where she remained in solitary confinement for nearly two weeks. She was also interrogated multiple times.

In one interrogation, she says her inquisitors tried to force a confession out of her. She was made to hand over her phone to masked guards, who went through her social media posts and photos. Pictures showed she had participated in protests and that she had been shot at by security forces with pellet guns. Her interrogators also accused her of working for the US.

Alef was charged with, amongst other things, “appearing in public without a hijab” and “promotion of corruption and fornication”.

She was found guilty and although she was given a suspended sentence, she also received 50 lashes.

“A male officer told me to take off my coat and lie down,” she said. “He was holding a black leather whip and started hitting me all over my body. It was very painful but I didn’t want to show weakness.”