Hard Numbers: Endangered penguins, Chinese bots strike again, Athens choking, Nigeria targets Biafran separatists

Hard Numbers: Endangered penguins, Chinese bots strike again, Athens choking, Nigeria targets Biafran separatists

80: If polar ice caps continue to melt at their current pace due to climate change, 80 percent of all emperor penguins will be wiped out by the end of the century because they need the ice for breeding and keeping their offspring safe. American authorities want to list emperor penguins, which only live in Antarctica, as an endangered species so that US fishing vessels will be required to protect them when operating in their habitat.

350: A network of over 350 fake accounts is amplifying pro-China propaganda on Western social media, according to a new study. Although there's no concrete evidence that the Chinese government is behind it, the matrix resembles previous ones taken down by Facebook and Twitter, and its bots have posted cartoons mocking enemies of Beijing like exiled tycoon Guo Wengui and whistleblower virologist Li-Meng Yan.

465: Clouded in smoke as multiple fires rage across Greece, Athens is reporting 465 micrograms of fine dust per cubic meter (35 cubic feet) in the city center, almost 10 times the level deemed safe by the EU. Thousands of residents have been evacuated due to the blazes, the worst seen in decades, amid a blistering heatwave that has also hit neighboring countries Turkey, North Macedonia, Albania, and Italy.

115: Amnesty International says Nigerian security forces have killed at least 115 people in the year leading up to June 2021 in their campaign against Biafran separatists in the country's southeast. Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the pro-independence Indigenous People of Biafra movement, was extradited last month from Kenya to face trial for treason, which carries the death penalty.

More from GZERO Media

Listen: In 2019, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin met at a summit and described their “friendship without limits.” But how close is that friendship, really? Should the US be worried about their growing military and economic cooperation? On the GZERO World Podcast, Ian Bremmer sits down with Pulitzer prize-winning national security correspondent for The New York Times David Sanger to talk about China, Russia, the US, and the 21st century struggle for global dominance.

Members of the armed wing of Nelson Mandela's African National Congress line up waiting to vote in a military base north of Pretoria, on April 26, 1994.
REUTERS/Corinne Dufka

On April 27, 1994, Black South Africans went to the polls, marking an end to years of white minority rule and the institutionalized racial segregation known as apartheid. But the “rainbow nation” still faces many challenges, with racial equality and economic development remaining out of reach.

"Patriots" on Broadway: The story of Putin's rise to power | GZERO Reports

Putin was my mistake. Getting rid of him is my responsibility.” It’s clear by the time the character Boris Berezovsky utters that chilling line in the new Broadway play “Patriots” that any attempt to stop Russian President Vladimir Putin’s rise would be futile, perhaps even fatal. The show opened for a limited run in New York on April 22.

TITLE PLACEHOLDER | GZERO US Politics

Campus protests are a major story this week over the Israeli operation in Gaza and the Biden administration's support for it. These are leading to accusations of anti-Semitism on college campuses, and things like canceling college graduation ceremonies at several schools. Will this be an issue of the November elections?

The view Thursday night from inside the Columbia University campus gate at 116th Street and Amsterdam in New York City.
Alex Kliment

An agreement late Thursday night to continue talking, disagreeing, and protesting – without divesting or policing – came in stark contrast to the images of hundreds of students and professors being arrested on several other US college campuses on Thursday.

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with Judge Amy Coney Barrett after she was sworn in as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, U.S. October 26, 2020.
REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Some of the conservative justices (three of whom were appointed by Trump) expressed concern that allowing former presidents to be criminally prosecuted could present a burden to future commanders-in-chief.

A Palestinian woman inspects a house that was destroyed after an Israeli airstrike in Rafah, April 24, 2024.
Abed Rahim Khatib/Reuters

“We are afraid of what will happen in Rafah. The level of alert is very high,” Ibrahim Khraishi, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations, said Thursday.

Haiti's new interim Prime Minister Michel Patrick Boisvert holds a glass with a drink after a transitional council took power with the aim of returning stability to the country, where gang violence has caused chaos and misery, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti April 25, 2024.
REUTERS/Pedro Valtierra

Haiti’s Prime Minister Ariel Henry formally resigned on Thursday as a new transitional body charged with forming the country’s next government was sworn in.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrives at the Beijing Capital International Airport, in Beijing, China, April 25, 2024.
Mark Schiefelbein/Pool via REUTERS

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken brought up concerns over China's support for Russia with his counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing on Friday, before meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.