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&cat=19&pid=14353&cache=true " alt="Sudan leader predicts fair vote" class="alignleft" />
Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir has insisted that the forthcoming elections will be “free and fair”. In a speech on the campaign trail, Mr Bashir said the poll would be clean as it was “a religious duty”. Sudan’s elections were intended to be the first multi-party polls since 1986, and pave the way for real democracy in Africa’s largest country. But several major opposition parties have announced they will boycott the polls, in protest at alleged rigging. Only minor opposition parties are now taking part in northern areas, and the main party of South Sudan, the SPLM, is only contesting in the south. A serious blow The electoral process has been heavily criticised by international and local rights groups, as well as by parties opposed to the president. The BBC’s James Copnall in Khartoum says Mr Bashir dismissed these criticisms, much as he swept aside the opposition’s demand that the polls, scheduled for Sunday to Tuesday, be postponed. The president has been very active during the campaign, announcing new development projects in every town he has visited, our correspondent says. “The elections will be fair and free and clean and exemplary,” Mr Bashir told a gathering in northern Sudan. “They will be clean because elections are a religious duty,” he said in a speech broadcast on state television. In contrast, the opposition parties have spent more time recently debating whether to run in the elections than in trying to convince the voters, our correspondent says. Both of President Bashir’s main rivals, Sadiq al-Mahdi of Umma and Yassir Arman of the former southern rebels, the SPLM, are boycotting the presidential election. President Bashir’s National Congress Party will perhaps face more of a challenge in the parliamentary and state elections. But our reporter says the withdrawal of so many parties has dealt a serious blow to the credibility of these elections. Some Sudanese activists believe the international community is pushing for these polls to take place, even if they are not fair, as the real priority is next January’s referendum on possible southern independence. The north-south civil war ended in 2005, with a deal for the SPLM to share power with Mr Bashir’s party at the national level, while enjoying considerable autonomy in the south. Some 1.5 million people died in the conflict between the mainly Muslim north and the south, where most people are Christian or follow traditional beliefs. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 8, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=14084&cache=true " alt="ANC stops singing struggle song" class="alignleft" />
South Africa’s ruling African National Congress (ANC) has told its members to refrain from singing the anti-apartheid struggle song “Shoot the Boer”. It comes amid rising racial tensions following the weekend murder of white supremacist leader Eugene Terreblanche. His supporters have blamed ANC youth leader Julius Malema for inflaming the situation by singing the song. The ANC’s Gwede Mantashe said the death had no political motive but the song had contributed to racial polarisation. Boer is an Afrikaans word for farmer, which has become a derogatory term for all white people. Scuffles “The restraint will remove excuses… to whip up racial hatred,” the South African Press Association quotes Mr Mantashe, the ANC’s secretary-general, as saying. On Tuesday, black and white South Africans scuffled outside court when two farm workers were charged with Terreblanche’s murder on his farm last Saturday. Mr Mantashe said the ANC had not banned the song, which the party has said is part of the country’s history and the fight against white minority rule. But the BBC’s Jonah Fisher in Johannesburg says asking ANC supporters not to sing it is the closest thing to it. All parts of the ANC have been informed of the decision, but it is aimed at just one man – Mr Malema, he says. The controversial ANC Youth League leader has insisted on exercising what he says is his right to sing “Shoot the Boer” at rallies. Opposition politicians have complained that the song incites racial hatred and have gone to court to try to get Mr Malema to stop singing it. Police have said two farm workers admitted beating Terreblanche to death in a dispute over unpaid wages. Terreblanche, 69, was fiercely opposed to the end of apartheid in South Africa, which led to the ANC winning the country’s first democratic elections in 1994 and Nelson Mandela becoming the country’s first black president. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 7, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=13898&cache=true " alt="Racial divide" class="alignleft" />
Sixteen years after the end of white minority rule in South Africa, the court appearance of two young men accused of the murder of white supremacist Eugene Terreblanche has highlighted the level of racial intolerance and hatred still felt by many South Africans – black and white. Outside court in Ventersdorp, North West province, hundreds of white farmers, many dressed in camouflage, staged a protest, with many saying Terreblanche’s killing was the last straw and vowing to “protect” themselves at all costs. “The gun was loaded, it has been so for years, but the trigger has now been pulled. South Africa is not safe at the moment,” said Shaun Labuschagne, an Afrikaner who had travelled from Johannesburg for the court hearing. “For the past seven years, our people have been wiped out. We are here to plan our next move,” he says to me before walking off. He is referring to the fact that some 3,000 white farmers have been killed since the end of apartheid. But then about 50 people – mostly black – are murdered each day in this country. Next to Mr Labuschagne is a man in his mid-20s, Dirkie Cronwright, dressed in full army camouflage. At first he is reluctant to speak to me, worried that he will say something he might regret, he says. But then he lets loose, screaming: “There is going to be war here – it is only a matter of time. “The blacks want everything – they have the country what more do they want?” “They don’t care about us – about the white guys – and that makes me very angry. “This means war,” he says, as if oblivious to the fact that he is speaking to a black person. ‘He deserved it’ On the other side of the colour bar, some black people have hailed the two men who killed Terreblanche as heroes. “God gave them power to kill that man. They did what no-one else could do,” says Maria Gantane. “When [anti-apartheid fighter] Chris Hani died, no white people cried, only us blacks cried” “Terreblanche should have died a long time ago. He has been abusing black workers for years, he deserved to die. We can now live in peace,” says a man outside court. “If Terreblanche was to show up now, we would kill him,” says another man, a farm worker. No rainbow nation Members of Terreblanche’s paramilitary group AWB (Afrikaner Resistance Movement) waved flags, carried placards and distributed badges with Afrikaner nationalist symbolism, in a show of unity against what they term “a siege by blacks”. Time has stood still here, monuments celebrating the lives of Afrikaners dating back to the 1800s still stand in many parts of the predominantly white town. The streets all bear Afrikaans names and many of the shops also have Afrikaans names – there is a silent message that this is no place for blacks. But a crowd of about 150 black people from surrounding communities did venture into the town for the court appearance. When the larger crowd of Afrikaners started singing the former national anthem – Die Stem, they retaliated by singing the new post-apartheid anthem Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrica (God Bless Africa). A white woman then splashed water on a young black woman, causing a scuffle to break out and forcing police to use razor wire to separate the two groups. The Afrikaners hurled racial slurs – calling the blacks “baboons” and “kaffirs” – both derogatory names used to refer to black people. This was far removed from Nelson Mandela’s vision of a new South Africa – a rainbow nation. In the days of apartheid, the Afrikaners used to dominate South Africa and some still yearn for those days. Many agree that Saturday’s brutal murder has turned a town which had learned to cope with its racism into one which now calls for drastic action including taking up arms, if only for protection. This has caused a wave of fear in black residents of South Africa’s farming areas, where racism remains rife. In the rest of the country, open signs of racism are rare but black and white South Africans largely lead separate lives. “I live in the township a few kilometres from town and we don’t feel safe as blacks, especially now Terreblanche has been killed,” said university student Lesego Tsui. “I don’t even want to go out at night any more because you don’t know if the Boers [whites] will come after us.” This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 6, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=13523&cache=true " alt="Parallel lives" class="alignleft" />
The murder of white supremacist leader Eugene Terreblanche has reopened many old wounds in South Africa. As clips of his speeches are played and replayed on news channels, it is chilling to hear the fantasy world he inhabited and his vision of a racially-segregated South Africa destined to fight to its own death. Seeing him on those TV screens again reminds me of how far South Africa has travelled since those days 20 years ago when he was threatening, in his own words, to take South Africa down into the bowels of hell if blacks were given equal rights. But let us not forget Mr Terreblanche lost his war. He even failed to gain the majority support of his own Afrikaner people – he lost in the ballot when FW de Klerk gained majority backing to dismantle apartheid; and he lost in the bullet when his ramshackle army withdrew from Mafikeng in 1994, bewildered and disorientated. Psychological divisions A few days after that defeat, then-President FW de Klerk told me: “The races of this country cannot go on hiding from each other. We need to forge a new future together.” But the scale of achieving Mr de Klerk’s vision was enormous. “Believe me, apartheid worked,” said Mamphele Rampele, the widow of Steve Biko, the black consciousness activist who had been tortured to death while in police custody in 1977. “It was a tremendously successful system which achieved its aim to completely divide the races of South Africa – racially, economically and psychologically,” she said. Just 16 years on, Mrs Rampele’s analysis is still a very good starting point to look at race relations in South Africa today. In those 16 years, we have moved on from a system where I couldn’t even go to a restaurant with my black co-workers, where the races were divided into separate suburbs. As I write this, I am sitting in a cafe in Rosebank, one of South Africa’s middle-class shopping malls. I remember when only whites were allowed here, today it is thoroughly multi-racial. Everywhere I look there are whites, blacks, Indians, increasingly Chinese. To be frank, mixed couples are still rare but these different groups rub along together in a way that feels pretty normal. Certainly normal compared to the apartheid days. Parallel lives Let us not restore the myth of the Rainbow Nation though – race is still the hottest of hot potatoes here. It permeates all aspects of life. The reality seems to be that people tend to bump along leading relatively parallel lives. According to a survey released by the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation last year, social divisions still exist. The survey discovered that 46% of South Africans never socialised with people of other races in their own homes, and only 28% said they would like to talk to members of other races more if they could. The survey revealed that on an average day, one in four South Africans never spoke to people from other racial groups, and almost 40% generally found other races to be “untrustworthy”. However the survey discovered that the jury is out on which way race relations are heading: Forty-nine per cent believed that race relations in the country have improved since the election which brought Nelson Mandela to power in 1994, while 51% thought they had got worse. A columnist here wrote recently: “How can we claim to have good relations between the races when the first thing a white man does when he sees a black man is to remember to lock his car door?” And how can we claim good relations when thousands of white young people emigrate every year because they claim they can’t get jobs because black economic empowerment means only black people are getting the work placements? This is officially the most unequal society on earth, a UN study recently said. Millions of black people were thrown off their lands into the barren homelands under apartheid, while land reform has barely begun to address that injustice which permeates through the generations. South Africa is also among the most violent society outside warzones with 18,000 murders a year – all of that makes for an edgy society and fuels racial tensions. So race permeates all aspects of life here. That was exploited by the likes of Mr Terreblanche when he stoked up white fears. Just as it is exploited by the ANC Youth League’s Julius Malema when he tells his constituency that white people have stolen all the minerals and need to be thrown off the land and the mines must be taken off them and nationalised. But for every Terreblanche and Malema, there are millions of South Africans who just want to get on with their lives. There are many shades of opinion between these black and white extremes. South Africa has achieved so much in its 16 brief years of freedom after 300 years of racial oppression. However we cannot be complacent as the beguiling voices of racial hatred still ring across the margins of this land. There is a Zulu saying here – Isangla sihlamda esinye – it means that a single hand cannot wash itself – it means people need each other and cannot succeed separately. For the sake of this fragile country, let us hope that is true. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 5, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=13498&cache=true " alt="Leaders pay respects to Terreblanche" class="alignleft" />
South African leaders have visited the family of white supremacist Eugene Terreblanche to pay their respects after he was killed on Saturday. North West province premier Maureen Modiselle passed on the government’s sympathies, while an opposition leader also travelled to the family farm. There was heavy security for the visit, amid fears of rising racial tensions. President Jacob Zuma has appealed for calm, while some of Mr Terreblanche’s supporters have vowed revenge. Police say that two of Mr Terreblanche’s farm workers have admitted killing the leader of the AWB party in a pay dispute. Some members of his party have blamed ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema for inflaming the situation, after he recently sang a song about killing white farmers. Mr Terreblanche, 69, was fiercely opposed to the end of apartheid in South Africa. It led to the ANC winning the country’s first democratic elections in 1994 and Nelson Mandela becoming the country’s first black president. Hate speech Mr Terreblanche is to be buried on Friday, his family reportedly told Ms Modiselle. “As government we are calling for calm and respect of the law, especially here in this region,” her spokesman, David Sengiwe, quoted her as telling the family. “We are encouraging people not to take the law into their own hands.” A crowd of mourners gathered at the farm near the town of Ventersdorp. Mosiuoa Lekota, leader of the opposition Cope party, also visited the Terreblanche home. A veteran of the fight against apartheid, he condemned Mr Malema’s singing of the “Shoot the Boer” song. Following complaints by Afrikaner groups, this was recently banned as hate speech by a South African court, although the ANC says it will appeal. Boer is Afrikaans for a farmer, but is sometimes used as a disparaging term for any white person in South Africa. Mr Malema is due to return from Zimbabwe later in the day, and correspondents say his response to calls for calm is keenly awaited. Mr Zuma was quick to condemn the attack amid criticism that he had failed to rein in the ANC Youth League. The president went on television on Sunday to condemn what he said was a “cowardly” murder. He said he had spoken to Mr Terreblanche’s daughter. “This is one of the sad moments for our country that a leader of his standing should be murdered,” said Mr Zuma. The AWB (Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging, or Afrikaner Resistance Movement) echoed Mr Zuma’s call for calm. Violent country But the far-right movement’s secretary general, Andre Visagie, said Mr Terreblanche’s killing had political overtones. “The next step for the AWB will be to bury their leader in peace, but thereafter we shall avenge the death of our leader,” he told the BBC. “The death of Mr Terreblanche is a declaration of war by the black community of South Africa to the white community that has been killed for 10 years on end.” More than 3,000 white farmers are estimated to have been murdered since the end of apartheid in 1994. A committee of inquiry found in 2003 that only 2% of farm attacks had a political or racial motive, although critics said this figure was far too low. Others point out that some 50 people, mostly black, are killed every day in South Africa – a country with one of the world’s highest rates of violent crime. Mr Terreblanche had founded the white supremacist AWB in 1973, to oppose what he regarded as the liberal policies of the then-South African government. His party threatened civil war in the run-up to South Africa’s first democratic elections, before sliding into relative obscurity. Mr Terreblanche served three years in jail after being convicted in 2001 of the attempted murder of a farm worker. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 5, 2010 | Posted in
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South Africa’s ruling ANC condemns a court decision to ban the singing of a song with the words “Shoot the Boer”.
March 31, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=11807&cache=true " alt="Semenya vows to race this season" class="alignleft" />
World 800m champion Caster Semenya insisted she will race this season, hours after being told to wait for gender-test results to be revealed. The 19-year-old has not raced since winning in Berlin, but was reportedly due to run in a meeting at Stellenbosch in South Africa on Tuesday. However, Athletics South Africa (ASA) said she must wait for governing body the IAAF to reveal the test results. Semenya said a delay hit her “athletic capabilities and earning potential”. Semenya had the gender-verification tests after winning gold at the World Athletics Championships in Berlin in August 2009. The teenager has not run competitively since then, but it is believed she wants to return to the track for domestic races. However, an ASA statement said: “The IAAF has given the assurance of completing the medical process speedily and has requested that ASA abides by the world body’s decision not to allow Semenya to participate in track-and-field events until the process has run its course.” In January the IAAF had said Semenya was free to run competitively despite its ongoing investigation into her gender, but that was quickly contradicted by South African Olympic Committee president Gideon Sam who said she would not be eligible until the IAAF had made its ruling. Semenya stormed to victory in the 800m final in a time of one minute, 55.45 seconds – 2.45 seconds faster than defending champion Janeth Jepkosgei, from Kenya, who finished second with Britain’s Jenny Meadows winning the bronze. In November, the South African sports ministry said Semenya was entitled to keep her gold. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
March 30, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=11713&cache=true " alt="Sven who?" class="alignleft" />
Sven-Goran Eriksson may be a celebrity figure in England after leading the national side to two quarter-finals in the last two World Cups but he is something of an unknown quantity in Ivory Coast, where he has just been appointed national coach. Ivorian newspapers on Monday rushed to publish accounts of Eriksson’s career. Ivorians tend to follow European clubs featuring their own players, especially Chelsea (Didier Drogba and Salomon Kalou), Arsenal (Emmanuel Eboue) and Barcelona (Yaya Toure). They did not really pay much attention to his mediocre season at Manchester City, or his previous success at Lazio in Italy. “I can’t say I know too much about him”, said one fan Jean-Paul, while another, Guy Borgon could only say that he had “seen him once on television coaching England”. Among workers queuing up for a shared taxi in Abidjan’s administrative district, there was a noticeable lack of enthusiasm about the new coach. “I’ve never seen the man. I don’t even know where he comes from! I don’t know where the federation find these odd people,” said Joel. “They never ask our opinion on these things. Let them do what they want, we’ll just watch,” he said. ‘Psychological problem’ Eriksson, a Swede who arrives in Ivory Coast after leading Mexico to the World Cup finals, replaces Vahid Halilhodzic, who only lost one competitive match in two years – the one that cost him his job, against Algeria in the quarter-finals of the African Cup of Nations in January. “I don’t know why we got rid of the last coach,” said Martial Achi Gore, waiting for a taxi for the Treichville district. “The guy did his work. Our problem isn’t the coach, it’s a psychological problem. The players need to show more commitment. It’s down to the players.” Halilhodzic used to complain that he had “great players but not a great team”. The country’s European-based stars rarely live up to their potential, when playing together. Eriksson’s job will be to correct that. Hoping for a miracle At the department of English at the University of Cocody, Abidjan’s once prestigious university, there is further evidence that supporters’ morale is at rock-bottom, even though Ivory Coast boasts some of Africa’s best players going into the first World Cup finals being played on the continent. “Bluntly speaking, I expect nothing from this new coach because we just don’t have any time. Serious teams have started working since their qualification day but we are going like a snail,” said student Jean-Rene Trahie Bi. “Even if he has the abilities to do it, I expect nothing, unless there’s a miracle from God…Sven has to construct a new team for us and I think he no time, so can achieve nothing.” On the other side of town in the plush medical centre run by Dr Mohamed Lakiss – one of the Elephants’ most dedicated supporters – optimism is stronger. “I think it’s a good choice and he’s proven himself with England and several other teams. He needs to bring my cohesion to the team. I think we could even get to the semi-finals if the players give their all.” In general though, most Ivorians are disappointed that the fans’ choice, Philippe Troussier, didn’t get the job. The French-Ivorian coach, currently based in Japan, won the Ivorian national league for three successive years as coach of Asec Mimosas, and has since coached Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Burkina Faso and South Africa. Eriksson by contrast has never coached in Africa and last week said that he suspected his lack of French would lead the Ivorian federation to select someone else. ‘Proven’ The Ivorian football federation said it would been looking for a coach who had obtained “strong performances at the World Cup, a reputation as a skilled coach at the highest levels” and who corresponded to the “economic aspects”. On the latter point, officials have yet to reveal how much Eriksson will be paid for his three months’ work, but the previous favourite for the post, Guus Hiddink, is considered locally to have been ruled out due to cost. Speaking on Ivorian state television, Alex Souleymane Bamba, advisor to the head of the Ivorian FA said Eriksson “was a proven and trophy-winning technician.” His objective, said Bamba, was to achieve “an honourable participation” at the World Cup finals in June, which he admitted “will be difficult”. If Eriksson repeats his feat of getting to the World Cup quarter-finals, he would quickly be hailed a legend in Ivory Coast. In the Elephants’ first World Cup finals four years ago they drew a tough group; Holland, Argentina and Serbia and Montenegro, and managed to give a good account of themselves. This time, they have again been unfortunate – drawn in a group with Brazil, Portugal and North Korea. Brazil and Portugal will be familiar opponents to Eriksson – but not necessarily welcome ones. They were the teams which ended England’s World Cup dreams in 2002 and 2006 respectively. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
March 30, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=11514&cache=true " alt="Gaddafi wants more Nigeria splits" class="alignleft" />
Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi says Nigeria should become several states, despite Nigerian fury after he earlier said it should become two countries. He said he was wrong to have said earlier this month that Nigeria should be divided into Muslim and Christian areas to end communal clashes. Instead, he now says several different Nigerian groups want independence. Nigeria recalled its ambassador to Tripoli after his previous statement, which it branded “irresponsible”. ‘Mad man’ “His theatrics and grandstanding at every auspicious occasion have become too numerous to recount,” said a foreign ministry statement. A Nigerian senator called Col Gaddafi, until recently head of the African Union, a “mad man”. The BBC’s Rana Jawad in Tripoli says the dispute appears to have become a tit-for-tat game. Col Gaddafi initially suggested the split to prevent any more bloodshed between rival groups in central Nigeria. Hundreds have died this year in ethnic and religious violence around Jos. Nigeria is Africa’s most populous nation, with some 130 million people, and has more than 250 different ethnic groups, broadly divided into a largely Muslim north and mainly Christian south. Yugoslav example “It became clear… that Nigeria does not consist of two parts,” Col Gaddafi said in a statement. “The Yoruba people in the west and south demand independence, while the Igbo people live in the east and south. “It became clear that the Ijaw people demand independence and the [Hausa] people in the north call for the establishment of the [Hausa] state.” In his original comments, Col Gaddafi said that Nigeria should be divided – comparing it to the partition of British India into Hindu-dominated India and Muslim Pakistan, which led to at least 200,000 deaths and possibly as many as one million. But the Libyan leader now suggests Nigeria should follow in the footsteps of Yugoslavia. He says the most bloody conflict in the former-Yugoslavia – in Bosnia – arose because that was a multi-ethnic state, while the other countries seceded “peacefully”. An attempt by Nigeria’s Igbo people to gain independence in 1967 sparked a war which left more than one million people dead. What do you think of Col Gaddafi’s opinion that Nigeria should follow in the former-Yugoslavia’s footsteps? Send us your views, using the postform at the bottom of the page. A selection of your comments will be published below. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
March 29, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=11419&cache=true " alt="Gulf Stream ‘is not slowing down’" class="alignleft" />
The Gulf Stream does not appear to be slowing down, say US scientists who have used satellites to monitor tell-tale changes in the height of the sea. Confirming work by other scientists using different methodologies, they found dramatic short-term variability but no longer-term trend. A slow-down – dramatised in the movie The Day After Tomorrow – is projected by some models of climate change. The research is published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. The stream is a key process in the climate of western Europe, bringing heat northwards from the tropics and keeping countries such as the UK 4-6C warmer than they would otherwise be. It forms part of a larger movement of water, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, which is itself one component of the global thermohaline system of currents. Between 2002 and 2009, the team says, there was no trend discernible – just a lot of variability on short timescales. The satellite record going back to 1993 did suggest a small increase in flow, although the researchers cannot be sure it is significant. “The changes we’re seeing in overturning strength are probably part of a natural cycle,” said Josh Willis from Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California. “The slight increase in overturning since 1993 coincides with a decades-long natural pattern of Atlantic heating and cooling.” The first observations suggesting the circulation was slowing down emerged in 2005, in research from the UK’s National Oceanography Centre (NOC). Using an array of detectors across the Atlantic and comparing its readings against historical records, scientists suggested the volume of cold water returning southwards could have fallen by as much as 30% in half a century – a significant decline. The warm surface water sinks in the Arctic and flows back southwards at the bottom of the ocean, driving the circulation. However, later observations by the same team showed that the strength of the flow varied hugely on short timescales – from one season to the next, or even shorter. But they have not found any clear trend since 2004. Rapid relief The NOC team now has a chain of instruments in place across the Atlantic, making measurements continuously. “In four-and-a-half years of measurement, we have found there is a lot of variability, and we’re working to explain it,” said NOC’s Harry Bryden. The quantities of water involved are huge, varying between four million and 35 million tonnes of water per second. The array is part of the UK-funded Rapid project, which aims to refine understanding of potentially large climate change impacts that could happen in short periods. Professor Bryden’s team calculates that their system is good enough to detect a long-term change in flow of about 20% – but it has not happened yet. He believes the JPL approach – using satellite altimeters, instruments that can measure sea height precisely, and the Argo array of autonomous floating probes – could potentially add useful data to that coming from long-term on-site monitoring arrays. But, he points out: “The method concentrates only on the upper [northward] flow – it doesn’t give you much information on the returning flow southward.” Fantasy and reality Driven by Hollywood, a popular image of a Gulf Stream slowdown shows a sudden catastrophic event driving snowstorms across the temperate lands of western Europe and eastern North America. That has always been fantasy – as, said Josh Willis, is the idea that a slow-down would trigger another ice age. “But the Atlantic overturning circulation is still an important player in today’s climate,” he added. “Some have suggested cyclic changes in the overturning may be warming and cooling the whole North Atlantic over the course of several decades and affecting rainfall patterns across the US and Africa, and even the number of hurricanes in the Atlantic.” Richard.Black-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
March 29, 2010 | Posted in
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