A meeting of United Nations member states in Bangkok on Monday to discuss climate change is the first in a series this year at which the action plan adopted at the UN Climate Change Conference in Bali, Indonesia, in December 2007, will be translated into concrete steps on the road to a new global climate change agreement. We, the president of Indonesia and the prime ministers of Poland and Denmark, have decided to join forces in a coordination group at the highest political level. Our goal is to facilitate an ambitious climate change agreement in Copenhagen in 2009.

The highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1 virus that emerged in southern China in the mid-1990s has in recent years evolved into the first HPAI panzootic.

Scientists and policy-makers will meet in Bonn this June to discuss one of the most pressing concerns to come out of December's United Nations climate meeting

NEARLY half of the world's 1.3 billion smokers live in China, India and Indonesia, the three largest consumers of tobacco products. In China alone, more people smoke than live in the United States. Those countries and others in the developing world represent promising frontiers for the big tobacco companies as they move to win over existing smokers and, according to a new report by the World Health Organization, convince teenagers and women to light up. Smoking has declined slowly in the West. But over the last four decades it has grown steadily in the developing world, in fact, during that time, the respective shares of global cigarette consumption between rich and poor nations flipped:Tobacco products already are responsible for about 5.4 million deaths a year from lung cancer, heart disease and other illnesses, according to the W.H.O., an arm of the United Nations. If trends continue, that number will rise to more than eight million annually by 2030, the agency estimated, with 80 percent of those deaths in the developing world. The eventual toll from tobacco products could be a billion deaths in this centuff, the report said - 10 times the 100 million smoking-related deaths that occurred in the 20th century. The W.H.O. tracked the vigor of tobacco controls worldwide and found them especially weak in poorer nations. One reason is that many governments are in the tobacco business and rely on it for revenue. Case in point: the world's largest cigarette maker is the state-owned China National Tobacco Corporation. BILL MARSH China Has 30 percent of the wodd's smokers. India Has 11 percent of the world's smokers. Indonesia Has 5 percent of the world s smokers Below are percentages of adult smokers in China, India and indonesia - defined by the United Nations as those 15 years and older - and nonsmokers who offer a potentially fucrative market for tobacco products

A powerful earthquake struck western Indonesia today, killing three people and injuring 25 others, officials said. A tsunami warning was briefly triggered, but no waves were detected. The US geological survey said the quake had a preliminary magnitude of 7.6 and struck under the island of Simeulue off the western coast of Sumatra - the region worst hit in the 2004 tsunami. Rustam Pakaya, the head of the Indonesian health ministry's disaster center, said "many' buildings on Simeulue were damaged and three people were killed. He said at least 25 others were seriously injured. Meanwhile, rough sea and high tide scared people of Thengaipatinam village in the coastal district of Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu today. Official sources said the boats on the seashore were swept away by the high tides and walls of the houses near the shore also collapsed. An Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS) said there was no possibility of a tsunami hitting any Indian region following the massive undersea earthquake off Sumatra that caused damage in Indonesia.

A powerful earthquake struck western Indonesia today, killing three people and injuring 25 others, officials said. A tsunami warning was briefly triggered, but no waves were detected. The US geological survey said the quake had a preliminary magnitude of 7.6 and struck under the island of Simeulue off the western coast of Sumatra - the region worst hit in the 2004 tsunami. Rustam Pakaya, the head of the Indonesian health ministry's disaster center, said "many' buildings on Simeulue were damaged and three people were killed. He said at least 25 others were seriously injured. Meanwhile, rough sea and high tide scared people of Thengaipatinam village in the coastal district of Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu today. Official sources said the boats on the seashore were swept away by the high tides and walls of the houses near the shore also collapsed. An Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS) said there was no possibility of a tsunami hitting any Indian region following the massive undersea earthquake off Sumatra that caused damage in Indonesia.

Indonesia yesterday said it would seize Asia's largest undeveloped gas block from ExxonMobil and ask Pertamina, the state-owned energy group, to prepare a feasibility study to take over the field. The latest move in a three-year dispute between Jakarta and the US energy group was made after talks with Exxon about the Natuna D-Alpha field became deadlocked over tax issues, the extension of a contract and how to split the gas, said Purnomo Yus-giantoro, Indonesia's energy minister.

The wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC issued a wake-up call to the Indonesian authorities this week: stop the illegal trade in Sumatran tiger body parts or the species will be hunted to extinction.

Laws protecting the critically endangered Sumatran Tiger have failed to prevent tiger body parts being offered on open sale in Indonesia, according to a new TRAFFIC report. Tiger body parts, including canine teeth, claws, skin pieces, whiskers and bones, were on sale in 10 percent of the 326 retail outlets surveyed during 2006 in 28 cities and towns across Sumatra. Outlets included goldsmiths, souvenir and traditional Chinese medicine shops, and shops selling antique and precious stones.

This study examines the major health, water, environmental, tourism and other welfare impacts associated with poor sanitation in Cambodia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam. The impact measurement reported in the study focuses mainly on a narrow definition of sanitation ? human excreta management and related hygiene practices. The measurement of water resource impact also includes grey water, and the measurement of environmental impact includes solid waste management.

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