At a time when the impact of global warming and human activities have been recognised as threats to Northeast India, a report by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) has emphasised the need for concerted action to protect the Eastern Himalayan region.

The melting of the glaciers will have an adverse impact on the entire South Asian region, said Dr Rajendra Pachauri, the Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, who came to a side event organised by Pakistan

RIYAZ WANI

While Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh believes glacier melting has little to do with climate change, expert Dr Shakeel Ramshoo has rung the alarm bells, saying the Valley

COPENHAGEN WAS going to be the big opportunity to sign on to a better environmental world order. Instead, the road to it has been marked with zero-visibility smog impairing collective human vision.

As the world braced for bruising negotiations and prayed for a deal at Copenhagen, an icon of the Internet age sang for the glaciers of Kashmir.

Two centuries ago, when the then prime minister of Kathmandu, Bhimsen Thapa, wanted to make important announcements, royal heralds clambered atop Dharahara, the 11th storey minaret he had built, to bawl out the proclamation from there.

SUDESHNA SARKAR

Kathmandu: Ignoring protests by Maoists that crippled government offices nationwide on Thursday, Nepal

There could be some reason for environmentalists to cheer. This year has seen a significant increase in snowfall in the upper region of Western Himalayas, the primary source of river water for northern India, vis-

BINAJ GURUBACHARYA

The high-altitude meeting comes on the heels of the recent underwater Cabinet meeting held in Maldives, also meant to draw attention to global warming
: A group of Nepalese ministers reached the Mount Everest region on Thursday for a Cabinet meeting being billed as the highest ever -a stunt meant to highlight the threat global warming poses to Himalayan glaciers.