China’s capital woke up to orange-tinted skies Saturday as the strongest sandstorm so far this year hit the country’s north, delaying some flights at Beijing’s airport and prompting a dust warning for Seoul.
The sky glowed and a thin film of sand covered Beijing, causing workers to muffle their faces in vast Tiananmen Square.
The city’s weather bureau gave the air quality a rare hazardous ranking.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Air quality is “very bad for the health,” China’s national weather bureau warned. It said people should cover their mouths when outside and keep doors and windows closed.
China’s expanding deserts now cover one-third of the country as a result of overgrazing, deforestation, urban sprawl and drought. The shifting sands have led to a sharp increase in sandstorms, the grit from which can travel as far as the western US.
The Chinese Academy of Sciences has estimated that the number of sandstorms has jumped six-fold in the past 50 years to around two dozen a year.
The latest sandstorm has also affected the regions of Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia and the provinces of Shanxi, Shaanxi and Hebei.
As the sandstorm moved southeast, South Korea’s national weather agency issued a yellow dust advisory for Seoul and other parts of the country. Chun Youngsin, a researcher at the Korea Meteorological Administration, said the yellow dust was expected to hit the Korean peninsula beginning yesterday afternoon and it would be “the worst yellow dust” this year.
Some flights at Beijing’s international airport were delayed but eventually took off, said a woman answering inquiries from concerned passengers on the airport hot line.
China has planted thousands of acres of vegetation in recent years in an effort to stop the spread of deserts in its north and west, but experts have said the work will take decades. China’s dust storms were at their worst in the 1950s and 1960s after campaigns to raise farm and factory output following the 1949 communist revolution stripped the soil of vegetation.
“I think this kind of natural disaster is caused by human activity, but I don’t know the exact reason, and I don’t know exactly what we can do to prevent this,” Shi Chunyan, a Beijing resident, said of yesterday’s storm.
Yemen’s separatist leader has vowed to keep working for an independent state in the country’s south, in his first social media post since he disappeared earlier this month after his group briefly seized swathes of territory. Aidarous al-Zubaidi’s United Arab Emirates (UAE)-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) forces last month captured two Yemeni provinces in an offensive that was rolled back by Saudi strikes and Riyadh’s allied forces on the ground. Al-Zubaidi then disappeared after he failed to board a flight to Riyadh for talks earlier this month, with Saudi Arabia accusing him of fleeing to Abu Dhabi, while supporters insisted he was
‘SHOCK TACTIC’: The dismissal of Yang mirrors past cases such as Jang Song-thaek, Kim’s uncle, who was executed after being accused of plotting to overthrow his nephew North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has fired his vice premier, compared him to a goat and railed against “incompetent” officials, state media reported yesterday, in a rare and very public broadside against apparatchiks at the opening of a critical factory. Vice Premier Yang Sung-ho was sacked “on the spot,” the state-run Korean Central News Agency said, in a speech in which Kim attacked “irresponsible, rude and incompetent leading officials.” “Please, comrade vice premier, resign by yourself when you can do it on your own before it is too late,” Kim reportedly said. “He is ineligible for an important duty. Put simply, it was
The Chinese Embassy in Manila yesterday said it has filed a diplomatic protest against a Philippine Coast Guard spokesman over a social media post that included cartoonish images of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Jay Tarriela and an embassy official had been trading barbs since last week over issues concerning the disputed South China Sea. The crucial waterway, which Beijing claims historic rights to despite an international ruling that its assertion has no legal basis, has been the site of repeated clashes between Chinese and Philippine vessels. Tarriela’s Facebook post on Wednesday included a photo of him giving a
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa on Sunday announced a deal with the chief of Kurdish-led forces that includes a ceasefire, after government troops advanced across Kurdish-held areas of the country’s north and east. Syrian Kurdish leader Mazloum Abdi said he had agreed to the deal to avoid a broader war. He made the decision after deadly clashes in the Syrian city of Raqa on Sunday between Kurdish-led forces and local fighters loyal to Damascus, and fighting this month between the Kurds and government forces. The agreement would also see the Kurdish administration and forces integrate into the state after months of stalled negotiations on
RSS