China has banned tourists from accessing its Mount Everest base camp in Tibet amid an ongoing campaign to clean up trash in the mountainous region, said state media Friday. The ban applies to “ordinary tourists”, not those with climbing permits, reported official news agency Xinhua. Access will be closed from
Indonesian firms owe at least US$1.3 billion in unpaid fines for environmental damage caused by widespread forest clearing and deadly fires linked to tens of thousands of premature deaths, a Greenpeace study said Friday. Citing government data, the environmental group said it examined 11 civil court cases between 2012 and
The viability of a key river that feeds into Australia’s biggest water system is under threat if poor conditions that killed millions of fish are not improved within six months, scientists warned Monday. The management of the Murray-Darling River system, which stretches thousands of kilometres across several states and supplies
A record 1.75 million Bavarians signed a petition to seek a referendum to “save the bees”, a move that could have huge consequences for the German farming industry and environmental protection. The proposal for a vote to protect species diversity sets a target to have 20 percent of farmland meeting
Zambia plans to slaughter 2,000 hippopotamuses to control overpopulation, officials said Wednesday, as conservationists lashed the scheme as a ploy to make money from trophy hunters. An official at the tourism ministry, who did not want to be named, said a five-year cull of hippos in a park in eastern
BEIJING: A Chinese technology firm has compiled a range of personal information on 2.6 million people in Xinjiang – from their ethnicity to locations – according to a data leak highlighting the wide extent of surveillance in the restive region. Xinjiang is home to most of China’s Uighur ethnic minority
HANOI : Wearing traditional dress, the children in Hanoi’s only North Korean-founded kindergarten belt out Korean songs and recite their Korean vocabulary – skills they hope to show off to Kim Jong Un when he visits Vietnam next week. The reclusive North Korean leader is making his first trip to Vietnam
NAIROBI: A Tanzanian court on Tuesday convicted a Chinese woman dubbed the “Ivory Queen” for her role in trafficking tusks from more than 400 elephants. Yang Fenlan, 69, was convicted in Dar es Salaam of trafficking 860 tusks between 2000 and 2014, a haul representing the slaughter of dozens of
TAIPEI: An alleged cat burglar from Hong Kong reportedly smuggled two stolen Persian kittens through Taiwan’s biggest airport by hiding them under her clothes and pretending to be pregnant, local media said Tuesday. The brazen theft prompted authorities at Taoyuan airport to launch an investigation into how the woman was
WASHINGTON: Senator Bernie Sanders announced Tuesday he is running for president, launching a second bid for the White House after a surprisingly strong run for the Democratic nomination in 2016. Sanders, 77, made the announcement in a radio interview in his home state of Vermont. “I wanted to let the