Bottom line: I did not want to lie to my readers.

And puffing up their expectations for COP 26 would be doing exactly that.

A few paragraphs in, I was overwhelmed by deja vu making me look back on my files.

I’d already written the piece. five years ago, ahead of the Paris summit.

My skepticism was based on my covering COP 17 in Durban, back in 2011,

That meeting overran by more than 24 hours before delegations from nearly 200 countries arrived at a deal that would put the world on the the path to climate salvation.

It could not be said to actually save the world for the generations to come.

But it set a pattern that could be picked up in Paris.

Sound familiar?

My earlobes glow red with embarrassment when I recall that I actually told my readers and listeners this.

Within a day, Canada has reneged on the deal struck in Durban.

Just as the United States under President Donald Trump pulled out of the climate convention agreed in Paris four years later.

No punitive measures have been taken against either of these world powers.

Neither will there be anything more than  tsk tsk against India watering down the anti-coal mood of the Glasgow Agreement.

As a United Nations Correspondent in the 1970s, I recall all three of these nations taking an uncompromisingly  tough line against the apartheid regime.

They would not have brooked any backsliding on the arms embargo slapped on Pretoria in 1977. Rightly so.

Yet when it  comes to saving the planet, they give themselves some wriggle room.

I am an inveterate multilateralist. I never fail to support the United Nations against critics who dismiss it as a talk shop.

I am also a journalist committed to telling the unvarnished truth.

This means I cannot allow myself to be led by the nose to report on breakthroughs in fighting climate change that are nothing more than meaningless compromise.

Where is the commitment we expected from developed countries to pay developing countries to assuage the damage done by climate change?

So today, as they try to pick up the pieces and paint the bravest picture they can of what occurred in Glasgow, let me ask those journalists: Are you ready to do it all again at Sharm El Sheikh? 

The post When it comes to saving the planet, world powers need wriggle room appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

She’s expected to hear some criticism from the envoys about statements by prominent South Africans strongly aimed against foreigners.

ends intro

Since the xenophobic attacks of 2008 that left 67 people dead, South African authorities have been reluctant to use that word.

Speaking about recent attacks on foreign-owned shops in Durban, official spokespeople are blaming criminal elements.

Foreign minister Lindiwe Sisulu has referred to to the debt South Africans owe their neighbours for help in the struggle against apartheid.

African envoys say they will reinforce this and call on South African authorities to bring into line prominent personalities like Gauteng Premier David Makuru who have made inflammatory statements against foreigners

The post Sisulu to brief African envoys about xenophobic attacks appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

The statement today calls for an end to the human suffering experienced by the Rohingya people. 

South Africa’s consistently condemned human rights violations in Myanmar – most recently at the Indian Ocean Rim Association meeting held in Durban this month.
As South Africa approaches its third term as a rotating member of the United Nations Security Council, Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Lindiwe Sisulu has instructed her representatives at the world organization’s headquarters in New York and at its Human Rights Council in Geneva to reflect this concern in voting on any resolutions on Myanmar.

South Africa will avoid having its  votes used to engage in regime changes or  destabilizing  countries.

The post South Africa expresses concern over human rights violations in Myanmar appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

The alleged crimes relate to an arms procurement deal in the 1990s before he became president.

The French arms company Thales has also filed papers  seeking to have dropped the  charges its is  facing for allegedly paying bribes to Zuma.

The National Prosecution authority’s confirmed that applications have been received from former President Jacob Zuma and French arms company Thales.

Zuma’s due to appear in the High Court in east coast city of Durban on November 30 for a hearing in this case.

He has maintained his innocence throughout.

The alleged offenses occurred while he was provincial economy minister in KwaZulu/Natal and later Deputy President

Thales submits that the decision in 2009 to drop the charges was neither set aside nor challenged by the State.

By reintroducing the charges now, the prosecution is not following its own protocols and the unreasonable delay in dealing with the matter makes a fair trial impossible.

A separate judicial inquiry into alleged state corruption while Zuma was president is currently hearing evidence in `Johannesburg

The post Jacob Zuma files court application to quash corruption charges he is facing appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

In the latest incident a young woman auditor was shot in the legs by assailants who broke into her hotel room and stole her laptop computer containing crucial information about her investigation.

Minister of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs Zweli Mkhize has strongly condemned the attack and acts of intimidation against government auditors.

In Vanderbijlpark south of Johannesburg assailants broke into the hotel where  a member of the Auditor General’s front line staff was being accommodated while she performed her investigation.

They shot her in both legs and left unscathed

a colleague who was sharing the room.

The attack follows threats in recent weeks against  Auditor General’s staff in the east coast port city of Durban and in Pietermaritzburg,  the capital of KwaZulu/Natal.

The victims were all deployed  to undertake audits of financial statements and performance information.

Mkhize says municipalities are at the centre of the economic revival  being championed by President Cyril Ramaphosa.

They have to show prudence in how they spend public finances and the Auditor General’s office is busy checking on this.

The minister calls on law enforcement agencies to follow up on the attacks and threats and ensure the perpetrators are brought to book.

The post Auditors being threatened and attacked in South African municipalities appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

The shop owners say the attacks started after a newspaper reports that they were selling fake and expired goods  which they strongly deny.

A woman who was with a group of looters at a township west of Johannesburg was shot dead yesterday (Friday).

No arrested have been made with regards this incident. Police are waiting for the woman’s family to identify her.

On Wednesday and Thursday three people were shot during looting in the giant township of Soweto.

Police have made 27 arrests in connection with this.

They include one Somali who allegedly fired at a young man taking goods from his store.

All four victims are South African.

No foreigners have been killed.

Residents have attacked one another trying to get possession of stolen goods.

The attacks were most led by youths who broke locks and removed stock while the owners either fled or hid.

Police have seized goods from foreign-owned shops  and health authorities are testing the food for freshness.

Both Johannesburg and Durban were centre of the worst outbreak of xenophobic violence in 2008 wheat least 62  people were killed.

At least people were killed in attacks on foreign these two cities three years ago.

The post Death toll from attacks on foreign shops rises to four appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

The giant township neighboring Johannesburg has been at the centre of xenophobic violence in 2008, 2015 and 2017.

The attacks on the shops are believed to have been sparked by a Johannesburg newspaper reporting that foreign businesses are selling fake and expired goods to local consumers.

The first death occurred after a Somali shopowner owner fired a pistol in self defence.

A police spokesperson said one person has been arrested for murder and another for attempted murder.

Officials have  appealed for calm and warned people to refrain from taking the law into their own hands.

The police spokesman confirmed the targets of looting were foreign-owned businesses.

The ANC government, with its history of having  neighbors offer shelter and support to South African refugees during the struggle against apartheid, is particularly embarrassed by outbreaks of xenophobia.

The worst of these was in 2008 when 62 people died and special camps had to be erected to shelter  foreigners outside Johannesburg.

In 2015 at least seven people died  when gangs hunted down foreigners in Johannesburg and the east coast port city of Durban.

The post Two die in Soweto xenophobic violence appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

The post Second Mosque attack leaves three dead in Malmesbury, Western Cape appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

Some years ago I had the pleasure of driving a minister of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic and her ambassador from Durban to Johannesburg.

Several times along the N3, she said: “Look at this world class infrastructure. Do you know what you have? Do you appreciate it.”

I recall feeling rather proud and expressed the wish that one day the Saharawis too could  have a motorway across their desert land. 

What might the minister have said had we been traveling along the road on Sunday?

With the burning trucks, it might have reminded her of the war her people have fought to rid their country of Moroccan occupation.

Together with arterial roads closed by demonstrators in Johannesburg, Port Elizabeth and Cape Town in recent days, they are certainly not showpieces for a developing country heading for prosperity.

How do we explain this motorway mayhem to potential investors or tourists?

The authorities warned motorists on Sunday not to use the N3 at night.

Their caution is laudable, even though it sends a dire message to potential investors in and visitors to South Africa.

Such caution is invariably expressed by countries concerned about the well-being of their citizens abroad.

It invariably attracts fury from the targets of their warnings because it tends to deter tourism.

We saw this last month when Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Lindiwe Sisulu  angrily responded to a travel advisory from Australia.

She says it casts a slur on the country. 

Sisulu appears to have been responding to media  reports rather than  facts.

The Australian travel advisory was first issued in the year 2000.

True, it advises travelers to South Africa  to exercise a high degree of  caution.

Actually, it places South Africa on the second lowest degree of danger – in the same category as  countries like Belgium and France.

In much the same way as an advisory would use a health ministry warning of cholera to urge travelers take health precautions, the Australian document uses material from SAPS annual reports  to advise of the potential of murder,  rape, mugging and robbery.

The advisory has been updated to include water shortages in the Western Cape – again using language  deployed by the local authority.

I remember after contracting malaria in Zimbabwe , I asked the South Africa health authorities in high dudgeon: why did no-one warm me?

True, there were posters at the border posts. Surely I have a right to expect more from a caring government?

If you are traveling to a country where protestors make nocturnal travel hazardous, would you not expect your own people to tell you so?

It is axiomatic that there are good things and bad things about any destination: from insect-born lurgies and pickpockets to dread diseases and flat out terrorists.

The simple answer to avoiding them is stay home.

If you can’t or won’t accept this option, arm yourself with the information you need for your security. Above all: don’t shoot the messenger.

The post Travel advice: don’t shoot the messenger appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

It’s challenge will be to make the promises made at  previous summits a reality.

It’s common cause that of the poor countries most hardest his by climate change, 36 are in sub Saharan Africa.

700 million Africans don’t have light or access to electricity

Abdeladim Lhafi COP 22 commissioner believes Marrakesh offers an opportunity to deal with this.

“All countries must together with countries of the South to complete projects that will ensure the security of all Africa,” he says

The summit lasts for ten days.

The post COP22 concentrates on fighting climate change for Africa appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.