Wednesday, August 5, 2020

Inquirer Newsletter. August 06, 2020

SHOCK WAVE This shock wave followed a powerful blast that was heard dozens of kilometers away from the port of Beirut on Tuesday night. The explosion caused by the detonation of 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate shook the ground like an earthquake, destroying nearby buildings, tossing cars like toys and shattering glass windows in homes and apartments in the Lebanese capital.—REUTERS

News

Study links pangolin traffic rise to Pogos

Between 2018 and 2019, there was an increased demand for the meat and scales of Philippine pangolin, driven primarily by the influx of foreign workers, mainly Chinese nationals employed in Philippine offshore gaming operators (Pogos), according to a wildlife monitoring network. The Philippine pangolin, one of the eight species of the nocturnal animal, can be found only in the jungles of Palawan. —STORY BY JHESSET O. ENANO

Regions

As Cebu cases drop, commandos set exit

CEBU CITY—As coronavirus cases here and in Cebu province drop, Special Action Force commandos who arrived in June to help enforce the lockdown are preparing to leave for Metro Manila, where their services are needed. Environment Secretary Roy Cimatu, who oversees the government’s COVID-19 response in Cebu, says his team will stay until the local quarantine status is further downgraded. —STORY BY NESTLE SEMILLA

News

DOTr makes face shields a must

The Department of Transportation (DOTr) has made the wearing of face shields a must for commuters starting Aug. 15. Without face shields—visors or full-face shields—commuters will not be allowed to board public vehicles, the DOTr says. Face shields, it says, will further protect commuters from coronavirus infection. The new rule applies not only to land travel, but also to air and sea trips. —STORY BY KRIXIA SUBINGSUBING

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‘Like an A-bomb’: Scores dead in Beirut port blast

BEIRUT, LEBANON—Residents of Beirut awoke to a scene of utter devastation on Wednesday, a day after two massive explosions at the port sent shock waves across the Lebanese capital, killing scores of people and wounding thousands.

Smoke was still rising from the port, where a towering grain silo had been shattered. Major downtown streets were littered with debris and damaged vehicles, and building facades were blown out. At hospitals across the city, people had been waiting all night for news of loved ones who had gone missing or were wounded. Others posted requests for help online.

The Lebanese Red Cross said more than 100 people were killed and over 4,000 injured. Beirut’s governor said 300,000 people were left homeless and damage was estimated at up to $5 billion.

‘There could be more’
The second of the two blasts sent shock waves that shattered windows, smashed masonry and shook the ground across the Lebanese capital.

Officials said they expected the death toll to rise further as emergency workers dug through rubble to rescue people and remove the dead.

The Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said two Filipinos were among the dead and eight others were injured, including one in critical condition. All of them were inside their employers’ home when the massive explosions occurred around 6 p.m. on Tuesday.

Missing Pinoys
It said 12 others were reported missing, 11 of them seafarers who jumped into the water from their ship, the MV Orient Queen, which was docked at the port.
The Philippine Embassy, a 20-minute drive away from the Beirut port, was damaged but all its staff were safe.

“Even we in the embassy outside Beirut felt the shock wave, so it is possible that there could be more who were injured from collapsed buildings,” Ajeet-Victor Panemanglor, charge d’affaires of the Philippine Embassy in Beirut, told ABS-CBN’s Teleradyo on Wednesday.

According to the Department of Labor and Employment, there are more than 33,000 Filipinos in Lebanon, including nearly 12,000 who are undocumented.

Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said the DFA was instructed to assist all Filipinos affected.

Prime Minister Hassan Diab said that 2,750 tons of the agricultural fertilizer ammonium nitrate that had been stored for years in a portside warehouse had blown up, sparking “a disaster in every sense of the word.”

“What happened today will not pass without accountability,” said Diab. “Those responsible for this catastrophe will pay the price.”

Mushroom cloud
The blast appeared to have been triggered by a fire and struck with the force of an earthquake and sent up a mushroom cloud and generating a shock wave.
A security source and local media said it was started by welding work being carried out on a hole at one warehouse.

Videos showed what looked like a fire erupting nearby just before the blasts, and local TV stations reported that a fireworks warehouse was involved.

A soldier at the port told Agence France-Presse (AFP): “It’s a catastrophe inside. There are corpses on the ground. Ambulances are still lifting the dead.”
“It was like an atomic bomb,” said Makrouhie Yerganian, a retired schoolteacher in her mid-70s.

“I’ve experienced everything, but nothing like this before, even during the country’s 1975-1990 Civil War,” she said.

“We heard an explosion, then we saw the mushroom,” said a Beirut resident, who witnessed the second deafening explosion from her balcony in the city’s Mansourieh district. “The force of the blast threw us backward into the apartment.”

The explosion raises concerns about how Lebanon will continue to import nearly all of its vital goods with its main port devastated.

The port’s major grain silo is run by the Lebanese Ministry of Economy and Trade. Drone footage shot on Wednesday by The Associated Press showed that the blast tore open the silos, dumping their contents into the debris and earth thrown up by the blast. Some 80 percent of Lebanon’s wheat supply is imported, according to the US Department of Agriculture.

Estimates suggest 85 percent of the country’s grain was stored at the now-destroyed silos.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency quoted Raoul Nehme, the minister of economy and trade, as saying all the wheat stored at the facility had been “contaminated” and couldn’t be used. However, he insisted Lebanon had enough wheat for its immediate needs.

Nehme said Lebanon also would import more wheat for its needs.

Israel offers aid
The explosions hit a country already reeling from its worst economic crisis in decades which has left nearly half of the population in poverty, as well as from the coronavirus pandemic.

Lebanon’s economy collapsed in recent months, with the local currency plummeting, businesses closing en masse and poverty soaring at the same alarming rate as unemployment.

Israeli officials said Israel, which has fought several wars with Lebanon, had nothing to do with Tuesday’s blast and said their country was ready to give humanitarian and medical assistance.

Shiite Iran, the main backer of Hezbollah, also offered support, as did Tehran’s regional rival Saudi Arabia, a leading Sunni power. Qatar and Iraq said they were sending makeshift hospitals to assist the high numbers of casualties.

Philippine solidarity
The United States, Britain, France and Germany expressed shock and sympathy and said they were ready to help.

In a statement, Roque said the Philippines was “in solidarity with the people of Lebanon in this period of great grief.”

Balanga Bishop Ruperto Santos, vice chair of Episcopal Commission on Migrants and Itinerant People of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, offered prayers for the Lebanese people.

“Our hearts are with them, one with Lebanon in spirit and prayers,” Santos said. “We intercede to God’s power healing and remedy to those who are injured. May those left behind find comfort with God,” he said. —REPORTS FROM AFP, AP, REUTERS, LEILA B. SALAVERRIA, TINA G. SANTOS AND JOVIC YEE

Editorial

Strongest—but unused—weapon

As former Supreme Court senior associate justice Antonio Carpio and many others have pointed out, the Philippines has the strongest diplomatic weapon available against China—the hard-fought arbitral ruling awarded in July 2016 by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague that invalidated China’s sweeping claim over nearly the entire South China Sea and upheld the Philippines’ exclusive rights in the West Philippine Sea. But Mr. Duterte has refused to wield that award in any significant way, preferring to cozy up to Beijing instead.

Other countries have taken it upon themselves to cite the landmark ruling to stand up against Chinese actions and ensure freedom of navigation in the vital sea lane: the United States, Australia, Indonesia, Vietnam, etc. These countries think the Philippines’ award is not an inutile, useless position, but in fact an indispensable marker for containing China’s expansionism and resolving territorial disputes in the area according to an internationally recognized rules-based order. Alas, the government of the very country that won it does not seem to share the enthusiasm for it.

Read full story: opinion.inquirer.net