Big cat crisis: Africa's lions being crowded out by people

 

 

The lions that roam Africa's savannah have lost as much as 75% of their habitat in the last 50 years, a study has found. 

 

African lions are running out of room to roam and some local populations, especially in west Africa, are heading for extinction, a new study warns.
New satellite data, studied by scientists from Duke University, found about three-quarters of Africa's wide open savannah had disappeared over the last half century, broken up into farms or engulfed by development.
"The reality is that from an original area a third larger than the continental United States, only 25% remains," Stuart Pimm, a conservation ecologist at Duke and co-author of the study, said in a statement.
Lion populations have dropped by two-thirds over the last half century – down to as few as 32,000, confined to isolated pockets of land. Only 10 of those 67 lion areas are stable and well-protected – lion "strongholds". Other populations, especially in west and central Africa, were so small and so threatened – by poachers, disease, or inbreeding – they may not survive for long into the future.
The study estimates that more than 6,000 lions are in populations with a very high risk of local extinction.
Human populations in west Africa have doubled over the last 20 to 30 years. Fewer than 500 lions remain there.
"Lion populations in west and central Africa are acutely threatened with many recent, local extinctions even in nominally protected areas," the study said. "Only immediate, energetic conservation measures can offer any hope for their survival."
The US Fish and Wildlife Service announced last week it was considering adding lions to the list of endangered species. The measure would ban American hunters from bringing home lion trophies and hides.
Researchers used new high-resolution satellite images from Google Earth to build up accurate maps of the remaining areas that would still be suitable for lion habitats. They compared that information with lion population records. Some areas identified as savannah on earlier, more crude satellite maps were in fact broken up into small farms, the study said.
"The really big, productive, well-watered savannah that are well protected outside of the national parks are a complete fallacy," said Luke Hunter, director of the Panthera conservation group, which also sponsored the study. "It's true lions are not in as bad shape as tigers but that is the trajectory," he said.
"Lions are not going to disappear overnight, but it is quite possible they will wind up in a couple of decades in as dire a straits as the tigers are today."

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Israel defies international criticism of settlement plans

Traditional allies heaped criticism upon Israel this week over plans to build new settlements on Palestinian territory, but the Jewish state lashed out Tuesday, saying it would not bend to the international pressure.

Israel's actions are in answer to the Palestinians' successful bid last week at the United Nations for an upgraded status to non-member observer state, said a senior official from the office of Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In a statement, the official called it a "one-sided move" and said "Israel is not sitting with her hands tied."

"Israel will continue to stand by its essential interests even in the face of international pressure, and there will be no change in the decision that was taken," the official said, who asked not to be named.

Australia joined Tuesday in high-level diplomatic reprimands, following five European countries and the United States, which expressed their concerns Monday over Israel's decision to construct 3,000 new settler domiciles.

Foreign Minister Bob Carr had the Israeli ambassador to his country summoned Tuesday to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade over Israel's decision on new construction in East Jerusalem and on the West Bank, according to a statement on the ministry's website.

Officials of the department expressed on Carr's behalf Australia's "grave concern" to Ambassador Yuval Rotem that Israel intended "to unfreeze planning in the area known as E1 and to withhold tax revenue from the Palestinian Authority." Carr was in Papua New Guinea at the time.

The government in Canberra joins the five European nations Britain, Denmark, France, Spain and Sweden, who previously summoned Israel's ambassadors to their respective countries over the same concerns.

The White House has also expressed its opposition Monday to settlement activity, but has not summoned Israel's ambassador.

The location of the construction in the Ma'ale Adumim area would block the formation of a contiguous Palestinian state, the Obama administration has warned.

Israeli settlements are widely considered illegal under international law; Israel insists they are not.

An Israeli crew accompanied by military and security forces tore down a mosque in the village of Farqqa in the Hebron region of the West Bank Tuesday, according to the head of the village council.

An Israeli government spokesman said the building was not a mosque but "a building that was used for prayer." A court decided that the building was illegal and has no connection to recent political developments, said Guy Inbar.

"I am extremely disappointed with these reported Israeli decisions," said Australia's Foreign Minister Bob Carr from his trip abroad. He added that they would make peace negotiations more difficult.

The government has also communicated its concerns directly to Jerusalem, he said. "Australia has long opposed all settlement activity."

The British Foreign Office called Israel's move "deplorable" Monday and said it threatens a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The foreign ministries of France, Spain and Denmark issued similar statements asking Israeli officials to reverse their decision.

Louvre-Lens hopes to bring the glory of art to France's mining heartland

The Louvre-Lens Museum will showcase artworks from throughout history.

So grim are the northern stereotypes still endured by the French former coalmining town of Lens that when fans of rival football team Paris Saint-Germain unfurled a banner at a match calling the locals "Paedophiles, unemployed and inbreds" it sparked a court case for hate speech.
But on Tuesday , the tiny, cash-strapped city of Lens – ravaged by the first world war, left struggling by the end of coalmining, best known for its red-brick terraces, slag heaps, football and love of chips – will celebrate the ultimate revenge for past injustices as it unveils France's most important arts event of the decade.
The Louvre will open a striking new outpost on the site of an old Lens coal pit, transporting some of its top works to a glass structure in the midst of housing estates.
The Louvre is Paris's biggest cultural attraction, one of the largest arts centres on the planet and the world's most visited museum, attracting more than 8 million people a year. Its Lens outpost could transform the post-industrial north, with local politicians hailing it as a miracle.
The Louvre-Lens project is seen as far bolder than other famous museum satellites, the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Tate Liverpool or more recently the Pompidou centre in Metz, because those cities are larger, better established and better funded. Lens, with a population of around 35,000, does not even have its own cinema, boasts two modest hotels and only opened a tourist office at the end of the 1990s. At the entrance to the museum site sits not a showy restaurant, but a small terraced betting shop and tobacconist.
The initiative in a depressed mining region is an act of great political symbolism, marking a return to the revolutionary roots of the Louvre. Already the architecture is being hailed as a mastery of understated minimalism, perched on the site of an old pithead. The Japanese architects of the firm Sanaa said they didn't want to create an "imposing fortress". But the glass structure – described as "boats on a river delicately floating into a huddle" – boasts views of the giant slag heaps at Loos-en-Gohelle, the largest in Europe and recently graced with world heritage status.
The gallery layout is also a world first: 200 key works, from Greek sculpture to 19th century French painting, will not be separated by theme, style and era as is the norm, but be showcased together in one long gallery, uniting 55 centuries. Elsewhere, the temporary exhibition space is larger than that of the Louvre in Paris and begins with a Renaissance show including Leonardo Da Vinci's newly restored The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne, which will leave its Paris home for the first time in 200 years.
But Daniel Percheron, the socialist head of the Nord-Pas de Calais region, which funded over half of the €150m (£122m) cost of the museum, felt the most important piece was the transfer to Lens of one of the Louvre's most famous paintings, Eugène Delacroix's French revolutionary masterpiece, Liberty Guiding the People.
"When the Lens miners came up from the pits, covered in soot, they had two distractions, football and their racing pigeons; they would look up to the sky waiting for the pigeons to return from a race. It's wrong to say there was a cultural void here, it was the miners who fought for rights, unions, pensions and healthcare.
"Their glory can be restored through this museum. There was a one in a million chance for the Louvre to come here. It's an unimaginable dream. The miners built France, they symbolise France. This museum is all about restoring justice to this region."
Local politicians hope it will take only 10 years for infrastructure and jobs to boom in an area that has almost double the national unemployment rate. The first move will be to build hotels if it is to have the impact of the Guggenheim in Bilbao on this post-industrial region. As well as a new young audience of locals and people who have "never set foot in a museum", the Louvre-Lens hopes to attract the same visitors as its Paris palace, including British tourists.
Easy to get to from Kent by train, and near crucial first world war battlefield sites, the museum hopes for 700,000 visitors this year. Henri Loyrette, the head of the Louvre, stressed the Louvre-Lens "is not an annexe, it's the Louvre itself".
Xavier Dectot, director of the Louvre-Lens, said the aim was to bring "humanity" to the museum-going experience and to create "a spark of happiness" in a region already transforming itself. When President François Hollande opens the museum on Tuesday, the town will lay on a vast celebration and fireworks display at the football stadium, advertising unlimited chips.
But amid the festivities, the museum will not be spared the exacting demands of world art critics. Already, the mould-breaking idea of a chronological display of works from 3,500BC to the 19th century, bringing scores of civilisations and styles into one room, is being questioned.
Harry Bellet, deputy culture editor of Le Monde newspaper, hailed the museum as a "revolution in spirits" but he feared the long gallery filled with so many styles and eras risked looking "like a bookshop where all the books are muddled up". As the Louvre-Lens will have no permanent collection but instead be renewed every five years, the museum will no doubt tweak its experience as it goes along.

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9 bodies recovered from vehicles crushed when tunnel collapses in Japan

Tokyo (CNN) -- Nine bodies -- eight of them burned -- have been pulled from vehicles crushed in a tunnel collapse about 80 kilometers (50 miles) west of Tokyo, a highway police spokesperson said early Monday.

Five of those were recovered in one charred station wagon, and three others were in another burned vehicle, according to the police spokesperson. The other fatality was in a truck.

The Sasago tunnel on the Chuo Expressway remained closed Monday morning, one day after the cave-in occurred on the highway's Tokyo-bound lanes, Otsuki police said.

Officials from the East Yamanashi Fire Department said the section of concrete that fell was about 50 to 60 meters long and about 20 centimeters (8 inches) thick.Soon after the collapse, Japanese public broadcaster NHK aired images showing smoke rising, a blue car with its side smashed in, and emergency vehicles on the scene.

Crews worked through the night trying to get to victims, all the while wary that the tunnel might collapse further. Those efforts continue, and authorities have not said if they believe more bodies will be found.

The privately held Central Nippon Expressway Company operates the 4.7-kilometer-long Sasago tunnel, among others, as well as expressways and toll roads around Japan.

Central Nippon Expressway conducts annual inspections of the tunnel, with one particularly thorough inspection held every five years, a company spokesperson said. A more intensive inspection of the Sasago tunnel was held sometime in the past two to three months, the spokesperson added.

The Chuo Expressway is a particularly busy stretch of highway that runs between Tokyo and, among other places, Mount Fuji.

While it is a ways from the Japanese capital, the partial tunnel collapse and its subsequent closure is expected to cause major traffic and other headaches, especially for those who rely on it for business.

Authorities have not given any indication as to when they expect the tunnel to reopen, nor is it clear why the collapse occurred.

$9K artwork bought for $12 at Milwaukee Goodwill

MILWAUKEE (AP) — "Red Nose" just meant a reindeer named Rudolph to Karen Mallet until she bought a print by that name for $12.34 at a Goodwill store in Milwaukee. It turned out to be a lithograph by American artist Alexander Calder worth $9,000.

Mallet's good fortune is at least the fourth time in six months that valuable art has turned up at Goodwill, where bargain-hunters search for hidden treasure among the coffee cups, jewelry, lamps and other household cast-offs.

Last month, a Salvador Dali sketch found at a Goodwill shop in Tacoma, Wash., sold for $21,000. Last summer, a North Carolina woman pocketed more than $27,000 for a painting she bought for $9.99 at Goodwill. And last spring, a dusty jug donated in Buffalo, N.Y., was discovered to be a thousands-of-years-old American Indian artifact — it was returned to its tribe instead of being offered for sale.

When told of the Milwaukee woman's find, a Goodwill spokeswoman said workers at its 2,700 stores try to spot valuables and auction them on the organization's online auction site to net more money for the charitable group. But things slip through the cracks and the workers aren't art experts.

"That's kind of part of shopping at Goodwill — the thrill of the hunt," said Cheryl Lightholder, communications manager for Goodwill in southeastern Wisconsin. "You never know what you're going to find."

Mallet, a media relations specialist for Georgetown University and others, didn't even like "Red Nose" when she first spotted it during one of her frequent Goodwill shopping trips in May.

"The big find that day was this great set of steel knives, in a block, for $18.99" by Wolfgang Puck, she said.

But the graphic black-and-white picture was striking. In low-browed terms, it might be described as an abstract image of an ape with a hangover, with spiral swirls for eyes like the ones in cartoons when someone gets punched. A large red nose is the only color.

Then she saw the Calder signature.

"I thought, I don't know if it's real or not but it's $12.99. I've wasted more on worse things," she said. A discount for using her Goodwill loyalty card brought the price down to $12.34.

Once home, she searched the Internet and found similar lithographs by Calder, who died in 1976 and is widely known for his mobiles and abstract sculptures at airports, office towers and other public places. Mallet's piece was No. 55 of 75 lithographs and was made in 1969.

Jacob Fine Art Inc., in suburban Chicago, recently set its replacement value at $9,000.

"This happens very frequently — you can't imagine," the company's owner, Jane Jacob, said of treasures found at thrift stores. "They don't know what they have. They're just not set up to understand art history."

Lauren Lawson-Zilai, a spokeswoman for Goodwill Industries International Inc. in Rockville, Md., gave these examples of art that Goodwill staff spotted and sold through the auction site:

— In 2009, a painting by Utah artist Maynard Dixon donated in Santa Rosa, Calif., sold for $70,001.

— In 2008, a Baltimore-area Goodwill store netted $40,600 from a Parisian street scene painted by Impressionist Edouard-Leon Cortes.

— In 2006, a Frank Weston Benson oil painting donated anonymously in Portland, Ore., brought in $165,002 — Goodwill's top haul so far.

Mallet has no immediate plans to sell her "Red Nose."

"It grew on me," she said. "Now I love it."