Good morning.
A jury has ordered the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones to pay almost $1bn to people who suffered from his relentless promotion of the lie that the 2012 Sandy Hook elementary school massacre was a hoax.
Among a number of fallacies, the Infowars host claimed the grieving families seen in news reports were in fact actors hired as part of a plot to deprive Americans of the right to carry arms.
The Connecticut suit was filed by relatives of five children and three teachers killed in the mass shooting, as well as an FBI agent who was among the first responders to the scene.
Parents and siblings told the trial how they were threatened and harassed for years by people who believed the lies told on Jones’s show. The daughter of the killed Sandy Hook principal testified that she was mailed rape threats to her home.
‘I’m done saying sorry’. While Jones acknowledged he had been wrong about Sandy Hook during testimony, he called the proceedings a “kangaroo court”, mocked the judge, called the plaintiffs’ lawyer an ambulance chaser and labeled the case an affront to free speech rights.
How much can he afford to pay? Jones has claimed he could not afford any judgment over $2m, but one economist has testified that Jones and his company were worth as much as $270m. He has vowed to fight the decision and put out a fresh call for donations on Wednesday.
Animal populations experience average decline of almost 70% since 1970, report reveals
A leading scientific assessment, the Living Planet Index, has found Earth’s wildlife populations have fallen by an average of 69% in just under half a century. Latin America and the Caribbean – including the Amazon – has experienced the most precipitous decline in average wildlife population size, with a 94% drop in 48 years.
Africa had the second largest fall at 66%, followed by Asia and the Pacific with 55% and North America at 20%. Europe and Central Asia experienced an 18% fall. Land use change is still the most important driver of biodiversity loss across the planet, according to the report.
Future declines are not inevitable, say the report’s 89 authors, who pinpoint the Himalayas, south-east Asia, the east coast of Australia, the Albertine Rift and Eastern Arc mountains in eastern Africa, and the Amazon basin among priority areas.
The report’s authors are urging world leaders to reach an ambitious agreement at the Cop15 biodiversity summit in Canada this December and to cut carbon emissions to limit global heating to below 1.5C this decade.
Migration paths blocked. The researchers stress the increased difficulty animals are having moving as they are blocked by infrastructure and farmland. Only 37% of rivers longer than 1,000km remain free-flowing along their entire length, while just 10% of the world’s protected areas on land are connected.
US faces deterring two major nuclear powers for first time
The Biden administration has warned that the US will within the next 10 years have to deter two major nuclear weapons powers for the first time, as the Chinese stockpile expands and concern grows over whether Russia would employ “all means” to defend the territory it considers its own.
“Russia’s conventional military will have been weakened, which will likely increase Moscow’s reliance on nuclear weapons in its military planning,” President Joe Biden’s new national security strategy says. “The United States will not allow Russia, or any power, to achieve its objectives through using, or threatening to use, nuclear weapons.”
In a foreword, Biden casts Russia as a rogue state “recklessly flouting the basic laws of the international order” while describing China as capable of reshaping global affairs through “economic, diplomatic, military and technological power”.
Bomb count. China has an estimated 350 nuclear warheads, compared with 5,977 in Russia’s stockpile, against the US inventory of 5,428. However, the Pentagon believes the Chinese force will grow to more than 1,000 warheads by 2030.
In other news …
A former speaker of the Iranian parliament, Ali Larijani, has called for compulsory hijab wearing to be re-examined in a sign that sections of the country’s political elite support at least some of the reforms demanded at the month-long women-led protests.
Taiwan has lifted all Covid-19 entry restrictions after more than two and a half years of border controls including mandatory quarantines and PCR tests. Now, visitors only need a negative antigen test the day they arrive. It leaves mainland China one of few places globally with closed borders.
About 40,000 people in Puerto Rico remain without power after Hurricane Fiona hit last month on the island whose electricity transmission and distribution is controlled by a US-Canadian consortium. Electricity poles are still down, cables damaged by falling vegetation.
A loophole created in the Trump administration’s final months is allowing chemical companies to dodge a federal law to track how many “forever chemicals” which do not naturally break down and accumulate in humans are being discharged into the environment by their plants.
Stat of the day: the astounding impact and reach of long Covid
Scientists still do not know what exactly causes long Covid, typically characterised by fatigue, post-exertional malaise and fatigue. A separate study of nearly 3,800 people who probably have long Covid found that the probability of having at least one symptom after 35 weeks was greater than 90%. On Wednesday, the Guardian launched its Living with long Covid series to highlight how millions are being affected.
Another argues Black Americans have not been adequately included in long Covid trials and treatment programs. A 2022 study estimates it will cost the US between $149bn and $362bn in medical expenses and lost income. Being vaccinated may reduce your chances of developing long Covid symptoms, suggests other data. We heard from three long Covid patients on how they navigated this journey.
Don’t miss this: comedians Eric André and Clayton English sue over Atlanta airport searches
Comedians Eric André and Clayton English have sued Clayton county police, alleging racial profiling at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson airport in a program supposedly aimed at finding illegal drugs but in which officers regularly confiscate passengers’ cash, writes Georgia Oladipo. André, creator and host of The Eric Andre Show, and English, a standup comedian and actor, say that in separate incidents, officers racially profiled and illegally stopped them to question if they had illegal drugs.
A federal lawsuit filed alleges that the police searches, which police describe as consensual, rely on coercion and are administered based on race. More than half of passengers searched were Black, and 68% were people of color, the lawsuit said. Lawyers for the two comedians also argue that the search program rarely uncovers drugs, but does often seize cash: more than $1m worth, which is rarely returned even if the passenger is not charged, according to the suit.
Climate check: I’m maligned as a ‘green energy sceptic’. I’m not. Dear Guardian reader, here’s what I think
Jacob Rees-Mogg, the UK secretary of state for business, energy and industrial strategy, writes that although he does not admire Extinction Rebellion, he favours a net zero future in which green energy plays the biggest role. “In 2010, renewables accounted for a mere 7% of the UK’s electricity generation,” he notes. “Programmes such as Contracts for Difference mean that renewables now meet about 40% of our needs, reducing our reliance on authoritarian regimes such as Russia and strengthening our domestic energy sector.”
He adds that the UK will accelerate the creation of onshore and offshore windfarms. “This plan will also boost the UK’s nascent hydrogen industry, which will work in harmony with the renewables and gas sectors alike.”
Last Thing: ‘Time may be running out’: chronicle of a debt crisis foretold
The managing director of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank president know that a growing number of countries are incurring problems paying their debts, and a crunch point looms, writes Larry Elliott. “Two-thirds of low and middle-income countries now have bond yields above 10% and can no longer borrow from the private sector,” Tim Jones of the campaign group Debt Justice said. “If countries can’t refinance their bonds you have a crisis.”
Some 60% of low-income countries and around 25% of emerging markets are already either in debt distress or at high risk of it. Recent developments in rich countries – especially the US, which has been raising interest rates to deal with inflation – make life a lot more difficult. “We don’t need to find new ways of dealing with the debt crisis. Three things worked in the past and would work again: political pressure and moral suasion; regulation; and tax relief for creditors who write debt off,” said Matthew Martin of campaign group Debt Relief International.
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