France confirms two MERS cases in international tour group

December 4, 2025

France detects two MERS virus cases among tour group — MERS is a more deadly but less contagious variation of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome

Two Tourists, One Virus: A Quiet MERS Scare and What It Reveals About a Connected World

There is a peculiar hush that falls over a city hospital at night: fluorescent lights hum, footsteps echo on linoleum, and conversations are measured as if sound itself might spread something unseen. That hush returned to a Paris ward this week when health authorities confirmed two people from a single tour group had been infected with the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus — MERS, a pathogen with a reputation that makes even seasoned public health officials sit up and take notice.

“We’re not panicking, but we are very vigilant,” said a ministry spokesperson in Paris, leaning on the language of reassurance that officials use when the public’s anxiety threatens to outpace the facts. “Those two patients are stable. Contact tracing is underway. We are taking every measure to prevent onward transmission.”

A travel story that turned clinical

The two patients had recently returned from what they expected to be a postcard-perfect circuit through the Arabian Peninsula — a mixed group of retirees and mid-career travelers drawn by bazaars, mosques, and the hush of desert dunes at sunrise. Instead, part of their souvenir collection now includes hospital wristbands and weeks of monitoring for fellow travelers.

“We were supposed to be tasting dates and drinking tea in a small courtyard,” said Sophie, a 58-year-old who asked to be identified only by her first name. “The trip turned into masks, thermometers, and waiting. It’s surreal.”

MERS is not a household name for many, but it carries a history that demands respect. Discovered in 2012, the virus has caused around 2,600 reported human infections and nearly 1,000 deaths worldwide — a mortality rate that hovers around 35–40% in reported cases. For comparison, SARS in 2002–2003 caused around 800 deaths. MERS is deadlier, even if it has proven less willing to race around the planet in the way SARS-CoV-2 did.

How does MERS spread — and why does that matter?

Researchers believe the virus originated in bats, but camels are the usual bridge to people. Most human infections have been linked to direct or indirect contact with camels or to close contact with infected patients, especially in healthcare settings. Human-to-human transmission is possible, but it typically requires prolonged, close exposure — the kind you get in a crowded ward or a family home, not from a hurried interaction at a market stall.

“MERS behaves differently from the new coronavirus that caused the pandemic,” said Dr. Marie Laurent, an infectious disease specialist at a major Paris hospital. “It doesn’t spread as easily in the community, but when it does take hold — especially in hospitals — the consequences can be severe.”

That pattern was painfully visible in 2015, when a single traveler returning to South Korea ignited an outbreak that led to 186 cases and dozens of deaths and sent the country into a brief but intense public health emergency. The Korea experience remains a cautionary tale: one infected traveler, a crowded emergency room, and the virus found fertile ground.

Response and reassurance

French authorities say the two patients are stable, isolated, and receiving appropriate care. Contact tracing — the painstaking detective work of identifying and monitoring anyone who may have been exposed — is in full swing. The measures include symptomatic screening, instructions for self-isolation, and stringent infection prevention steps for hospital staff and household contacts.

“We are implementing barrier gestures: masks, hand hygiene, and limited contact for anyone exposed,” the ministry official explained. “We are also advising health professionals to be alert for respiratory symptoms even if mild.”

For travelers, the advice is straightforward: if you are visiting regions where MERS is known to circulate, avoid close contact with camels, do not consume raw camel products, and seek medical attention promptly for fever or respiratory symptoms.

Between fear and facts: the social dimension

Fear is an old companion to any outbreak. In the café near the hospital, a nurse named Ahmed commented over a cup of coffee: “People are always frightened of what they cannot see. But when you talk to them, when you explain testing and exposure, it calms them. It’s education that wins here.”

That education has a global role. In an era where flights knit continents together and packaged tours promise curated experiences from Marrakech souks to Riyadh skylines, infectious diseases have fewer borders. A virus that prefers hospital transmission still arrives in far-off places on the backs of travelers who share souvenirs and stories — and sometimes, infection.

How we react matters as much as what the pathogen does. Heavy-handed travel bans tend to do more social and economic harm than good, while clear communication, prompt case finding, and supportive isolation can prevent a local scare from becoming an international crisis. The World Health Organization recommends ongoing vigilance without knee-jerk alarm: a balanced approach that protects public health and preserves the dignity of travelers, patients, and healthcare workers.

Local color: markets, camels, and a recipe for risk

Picture an early morning camel market on the Arabian Peninsula: men bargaining over livestock, children darting between stalls, the air scented with spices and the dust of a thousand footsteps. Camels are woven into local economies, cuisine, and culture. Yet they are also the reservoirs for a virus that spilled into humans. That cultural complexity makes public health messaging tricky. You cannot simply ask people to abandon heritage or livelihood; effective interventions must respect life as it is lived.

“We have to work with communities, not against them,” said Dr. Aisha Al-Salem, a public health specialist who has worked with camel herding communities. “Simple measures — safe handling, boiling milk, wearing gloves when dealing with sick animals — can reduce risk without erasing culture.”

What should you take away?

If you find yourself planning a trip, consider a few practical steps: stay informed about local advisories, avoid direct contact with camels and their raw products, and seek medical attention for fever or cough after travel. If you work in healthcare, use protective equipment diligently and report unusual respiratory illnesses promptly.

And there is an invitation here, too — an invitation to reflect on how our shrinking world alters the calculus of risk. MERS has not sparked a pandemic. Yet its very existence reminds us of the fragility and resilience braided together in public health: a fragile moment of infection, a resilient system of detection and response.

“Outbreaks tell us as much about people as they do about microbes,” Dr. Laurent reflected. “They show our vulnerabilities and the strengths of our institutions: how quickly we act, how openly we share, how carefully we care.”

In the quiet of the ward and the bustle of the market, those choices are being made every day. What would you do if you were on that tour? How would you weigh the warmth of a new experience against the caution of a public health alert? The answers are personal, but the responsibility is shared — across borders, duties, and generations.

‘Japa’ trend fuels mass exodus as millions emigrate from Nigeria

hanad

December 4, 2025

'Japa' - Cultural phenomenon sees millions leave Nigeria — Sylvia decided to try and leave Nigeria after her parents died in 2007

Japa: The Great Nigerian Exodus — Stories from the Road North

There is a word on the lips of Lagos motorcyclists, in university halls, in the back rooms of Lagos bars and in WhatsApp groups across the country: Japa. It comes from Yoruba, literally meaning “to split” or “to run away,” but it has grown into something larger — a movement, a mood, a cultural pulse that tells you more about Nigeria than any statistic alone.

Walk down Broad Street in the old commercial quarter and you’ll hear it in the music bumping out of a roadside speaker. Sit in a lecture hall at the University of Lagos and students will tell you, with a mixture of swagger and sorrow, about plans to “go Japa.” It is shorthand for the decision that keeps families awake at night, the quiet hinge on which futures turn: to stay and try to build here, or to leave and gamble everything on a perilous road that promises work, safety, or simply survival.

A young nation, restless

Nigeria is no small place in the imagination of the world. With well over 230 million people, its population is overwhelmingly young — the median age hovers around 18, and roughly two-thirds of Nigerians are under 30. That demographic energy can be an engine of innovation, or a pressure cooker.

For many, the pressure has become unbearable. Despite intermittent economic growth and bullish headlines about an emerging market, poverty remains stubbornly widespread. Conservative estimates place more than 100 million Nigerians in conditions of poverty; other measures that capture multidimensional deprivation put that number higher, often cited around 130 million. When opportunities at home feel scarce, the road away can look like the only way out.

Dr. Alabi: “You can’t measure what you can’t see”

“The official numbers are always lagging an ocean behind reality,” says Dr. Tunde Alabi, a sociologist at UniLag who has spent years studying migration. “A lot of this is irregular, moving through Sahara routes that no census counts. But what we can see — the doctors, the lecturers, the nurses leaving — tells you that emigration is increasing.”

He points to two linked phenomena: a youth bulge with limited formal employment, and the erosion of institutions — security, health, education — that push talented people to look for greener ground. “When a surgeon tells me he’s applied for licensure overseas, we should be asking why,” he says.

Lives on the Line: Two Journeys

Sylvia: “I thank God I’m still alive”

Sylvia’s story is not unique, but it is unforgettable. She lost her parents in 2007 and, suddenly adrift, decided to leave. “My friend said Norway was peaceful,” she told me, staring at her hands as if tracing the path of memory. “So I started walking toward that light.”

She flew under the radar with a borrowed passport to Madrid, then boarded buses north until the snow of Oslo and the promise of asylum. A relationship developed with a Norwegian man; they married in Lagos in the hope of regularizing her stay. When authorities suspected a marriage of convenience, progress stalled. Despair nudged her back toward the desert route.

From Lagos to Agadez to Sabha: the journey reads like a geography of fear. “We walked for days,” she said. “The heat took everything. I saw people fall and never get up.” Traffickers crammed migrants into Hilux pickups, then doors opened on a more ruthless reality: bands of kidnappers, known in the region as Asma Boys, who snatch people for ransom; long stretches without water; trucks leaving groups to test the road ahead.

“We drank our own urine,” she whispered. “If you close your eyes you can still taste the salt of the sun.” They reached Sabratah and the Mediterranean, but not into the arms of the dream. Weeks of gunfire. Chaos. United Nations workers eventually pulled her from a site of violence; the International Organization for Migration helped her get back to Lagos.

Now she is back in the city she tried to escape. “I am grateful,” she says simply. “But am I happy? No. I bury my friends in my head. I cannot go through that again.”

Chiutu: “Don’t let them deport me”

Then there’s Chiutu, who took a different route and for a while tasted a more ordinary immigrant life. He flew to Frankfurt on a tourist visa in 2014, applied for asylum and learned German. He qualified as a carer and found work in a nursing home during a brief period when Germany was opening doors to migrants under the banner of “Wir schaffen das.”

“I was one week from residency,” he said, the frustration in his voice still raw. A workplace dispute — a patient left in soiled sheets — led to his dismissal. He fell into casual, exhausting labor and, after five years away from his children, made the decision to return voluntarily.

“I told my wife, ‘If I die there, I die alone.’ I missed my children too much. But sometimes I look back and think, maybe I left too soon.” He is both relieved and regretful, a tidy portrait of the dilemmas that haunt returnees.

Voices from the Lecture Hall

At UniLag, students give a kaleidoscope of reasons for wanting to go. Florence said, “Lots of people Japa because they’re scared — insecurity is everywhere.” Jaqueline spoke of education and skills; Benjamin wants a stint in the UK so he can bring knowledge home afterward. Wuraola said plainly: “If you go and learn, come back. Build.”

These contradictory attitudes — leave versus return, escape versus investment — are important. Migration is not only a loss. Diasporas send remittances, open networks, and sometimes return with capital and ideas. But the flip side is clear: when doctors and professors leave en masse, the institutions that nurture a nation get hollowed out.

Why it matters beyond Nigeria

What’s happening in Nigeria is part of a larger global narrative: the movement of people shaped by inequality, climate stress, insecurity and changing labor markets. Europe, North America and parts of Asia are destinations; smugglers and perilous routes are the corridors. The policy challenges are enormous. How do destination countries balance humanitarian obligations and border control? How do origin countries create enough opportunity to keep their best people?

As you read this, ask yourself: if you were 22 and promising, with few chances to build a life where you were born, what would you do? Would you risk dunes and desert, or the uncertainty of asylum courts? Would you leave a child behind for five years in search of a future?

Paths forward

The answers will not be simple. Economists point to investments in education, healthcare and security. Experts urge better legal migration pathways and faster recognition of foreign qualifications. Diasporas can be bridges, not drains. “Policy that harnesses migration instead of just trying to stop it wins twice,” Dr. Alabi told me. “You keep the human potential connected to the homeland.”

And on the ground? Lagos keeps humming. In the markets, traders haggle over peppers and suya, young entrepreneurs hack on laptops beneath buzzing fans, and mothers whisper prayers against another empty seat in a family home. Japa is as much a symptom as a story of stubborn resilience — people trying, in whatever way they can, to carve dignity out of hardship.

So the next time you hear the word — on a bus, in a song, in a student grad speech — remember this: Japa is not just about leaving. It’s about longing, about the cost of staying, and about the kind of societies we are building. How we answer those questions will shape the next chapter of a nation that refuses to be defined only by the headlines.

Macron urges Xi that France and China must bridge their differences

hanad

December 4, 2025

Macron tells Xi China, France must overcome 'differences' — French President Emmanuel Macron and Chinese President Xi Jinping walk during a state visit at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing

Under the flags: a Parisian handshake in the heart of Beijing

It was cold enough in Beijing that the ceremony planned on Tian’anmen Square moved indoors, from sun-bright symbolism to the cavernous, gold-paneled intimacy of the Great Hall of the People. Still, nothing about diplomacy is ever entirely about temperature. It is about timing, theatre and the stubbornly human rituals that sit behind headline-grabbing policy.

Emmanuel Macron arrived with his trademark composure—scarf tucked against the wind, Brigitte at his side—walking a narrow diplomatic tightrope between concerted engagement and pointed pressure. Opposite him, President Xi Jinping and First Lady Peng Liyuan offered the reserves of a host who knows how capitals look when they want to be taken seriously. A military band played, bouquets were presented, and for a brief, almost incongruous instant on a day heavy with strategy, Mr Macron blew kisses to children who stood with flowers.

“We cannot pretend differences do not exist,” Mr Macron told Mr Xi later in the day, his words carrying the double weight of a leader trying to coax action from a partner and ally in international stability. “But the real promise of statecraft is to square them, for the sake of peace and global stability.”

What was on the table

The talks blended the ceremonial and the urgent. At the centre of Mr Macron’s agenda was Ukraine—now entering a fourth winter of conflict after Russia’s 2022 invasion—a crisis that has remade alliances and tested the limits of global diplomacy.

For months, Paris and other Western capitals have quietly hoped Beijing will do more than advocate “peace talks” in principle. The French president pushed for Beijing to use its influence with Moscow to dial down the violence, to move beyond rhetoric and nudge the warring parties toward a ceasefire.

“China can play a decisive role,” said Élise Laurent, a former French diplomat now advising on Eurasian security. “Even if Beijing won’t publicly chastise Moscow, Beijing can use channels—economic, diplomatic, backdoor—to encourage de-escalation. Macron’s job was to make that ask clearly and humbly.”

President Xi, in carefully measured language, returned the sentiment of stability without conceding lines he won’t cross. “We seek a more stable relationship with France,” he said, adding that China would work to “exclude interference” and fortify the “comprehensive strategic partnership” between the two countries. It was both a reassurance and a reminder of where Beijing draws its red lines.

Between words and deeds: the question of Russia

China’s blanket call for dialogue on Ukraine faces skepticism in Europe and the United States, particularly because Beijing has not condemned Russia’s 2022 invasion. Western governments, citing intelligence assessments and trade patterns, argue that China—through commerce and technology transfers—has eased some of the economic pressure on Moscow.

“We are not naïve about the gap between rhetoric and effect,” said Dr. Li Mei, an international relations scholar at a Beijing university. “The question France asked is whether China will move from words to practical steps that reduce the capacity for conflict.”

Trade, tech and the taste of panda diplomacy

High politics gave way, at times, to the everyday business of nations: trade. Europe runs a yawning trade deficit with China—recent figures put the imbalance at roughly $350 billion—and Macron used the visit to press for a rebalancing of that relationship.

“Europeans cannot be reduced to passive consumers of the world,” said one advisor travelling with the president. “We want China to consume more and export less; we must also make Europe produce more and save less.” It was blunt, economically framed advice: a call for Beijing to open domestic markets while allowing European industry room to breathe and innovate.

The tech sector sat in the margins of the talks but loomed large. Macron has been vocal about European tech sovereignty—arguing that the continent should not become a “vassal” to Silicon Valley or to major Chinese platforms. It is a debate about data, investment, standards and the future architecture of the digital economy.

And then, lighter and yet telling, there was Chengdu: the final stop on Mr Macron’s short visit. The city was the destination for a softer kind of diplomacy—two giant pandas that had been loaned to France were returned to their homeland, and Beijing, not wanting to lose the public-relations heartbeat of panda diplomacy, promised new animals would soon be sent in their stead.

“It may sound trivial, but cultural ties like these matter,” said Sophie Martin, a Paris-based China analyst. “They sustain public goodwill and remind people—on both sides—that the relationship is not just about geopolitics. It is about shared curiosity.”

Voices from the street

Near the entrance to the Great Hall, a tea vendor named Zhao, 62, who sells small porcelain cups to passing tourists and officials, had a simple take. “Politicians speak big, but for us it is about trade and jobs,” he said with a shrug. “If two countries get along, maybe I sell more cups.”

A university student who watched Macron’s earlier visit to Guangzhou years ago remembered the energy. “Students love Macron because he listens,” she said. “When leaders talk about big ideas—technology, climate, war—we feel the impact in internships and classrooms.”

What to watch next

Whether Beijing takes concrete steps—sanctions, trade curbs, or private pressure—to change Moscow’s calculus in Ukraine.
Any new trade or investment commitments that aim to shrink the EU-China deficit of roughly $350 billion.
Moves on technology governance that could tilt the balance toward European regulators and platform rules.
Soft-power exchanges—like the panda arrangement—that keep channels of goodwill open even amid strategic competition.

Looking beyond the handshake

If diplomacy were a film, this Beijing meeting would not be the climactic finale; it would be a tense midpoint—a scene that sets up the hard work ahead. Macron’s trip was less about immediate breakthroughs and more about laying groundwork: reminding Beijing of shared interests, pressing on red lines, and testing where China might be willing to bend.

So what does success look like? Not necessarily a sudden ceasefire, nor a vanishing of strategic rivalry. Success might be incremental: clearer channels through which Beijing nudges Moscow, more balanced trade flows, and a framework for cooperation on global challenges from climate to cyber governance.

And for the everyday people whose lives these high-flown words ripple through—vendors like Zhao, students, and office workers—the hope is simple. “We want stability,” a Chengdu teacher told me. “Stability means planning for the future; it means not having to decide if our children will leave to find work. That is what leaders should be working toward.”

In the end, the photograph of the two presidents—flags behind them, an ornate ceiling overhead—will travel the world. But the real story is quieter, slower, and harder to capture: the months of diplomacy, the back-channel conversations, the economic adjustments and the cultural exchanges that stitch one country’s fate to another’s.

How do you measure the success of a visit that mixes gala and gravity? Perhaps not by the headlines alone, but by whether, months from now, the ripples born in a Beijing hall have made Europe’s streets a little steadier and the negotiating table in Kyiv a little nearer to peace. Do you think that is possible? Or are some differences simply too stubborn to overcome?

Colombia’s president issues stern warning against attacks on national sovereignty

hanad

December 4, 2025

Colombia suspends intelligence sharing with US — Gustavo Petro said the order would remain in place while the US continues to conduct missile attacks on boats in the Caribbean (file photo)

When a President’s Words Cross a Border: The Jaguar, the Missile, and the Question of Sovereignty

On a humid evening along Colombia’s Pacific coast, fishermen pull in their nets beneath a sky bruised purple by sunset. Children chase a stray dog past a church whose bell has rung for generations. It is a scene ordinary enough to belong in any travelogue. Yet beneath that ordinary life, a far more dangerous conversation hums: who has the right to strike, to patrol, to punish, or to cross a neighbor’s line in the name of stopping drugs?

Last week, a White House cabinet-room comment rippled through Latin America: “Anybody that’s doing that and selling it into our country is subject to attack,” the U.S. president told reporters, pointing to cocaine shipments as justification. The bluntness of the sentence—international policy spoken like a headline—forced an immediate response from Bogotá.

“Do not threaten our sovereignty, or you will awake the Jaguar,” Colombia’s president shot back on X, warning that any assault on Colombian territory would amount to a declaration of war. “Attacking our sovereignty is declaring war,” he added, a line that landed like a stone dropped into an already choppy regional pond.

A conflict that is both immediate and symbolic

The rhetoric is not abstract. Over recent months, U.S. forces have intensified strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific against vessels the administration says are drug-running. Some of those strikes have been devastating: a campaign that has, by official and independent tallies, been linked to scores of deaths, with one wave of attacks earlier this year followed by more than 80 fatalities. In one recent episode, two sequential strikes on the same alleged smuggling boat reportedly killed 11 people.

“We are not seeking to pick fights with our neighbors,” a U.S. official said on background. “But we face a crisis of overdose deaths at home and we will deny traffickers the safe harbor they have exploited.” The unspoken fact behind that statement is familiar to many Americans: the U.S. has suffered more than 100,000 drug-overdose deaths per year in recent statistics—numbers that shape public sentiment and policy urgency.

Yet legality remains contested. The White House said a U.S. admiral, acting under the authority of the Pentagon leadership, ordered the “double-tap” operation—the tactic of striking survivors after an initial attack. “The action was conducted in compliance with the law of armed conflict,” a senior Pentagon spokesperson claimed. But international law experts point to a stark line in the Pentagon’s own Law of War Manual: orders to fire upon the shipwrecked or the rescued would be clearly illegal. “If true, a second strike on people in the water violates the most basic protections of humanity,” said Dr. Ana Morales, a professor of international humanitarian law. “There are legal norms precisely to prevent the sort of escalation we saw.”

Local voices: fear, frustration, and fragile livelihoods

In coastal hamlets where boats are as common as buses, conversations are raw and personal. “We’ve seen drones, we’ve seen helicopters,” said Marco, a 46-year-old fisherman who asked that only his first name be used. “Sometimes we don’t know who is chasing whom. My brother was once chased. He says they shoot at anything that moves.”

Those who live amid coca fields offer a different perspective. “You think people plant coca because they love it?” asked María Torres, a farmer from a hillside village in Nariño. “There are no factories here for making clothes, no big employers. You grow a crop and feed a family. And then the planes come and say we are criminals.” Her voice was steady, the kind worn from years of explaining to strangers why choices are sometimes a matter of survival.

President Gustavo Petro—himself no stranger to confrontation with Washington and subject to his own run-ins with U.S. measures—pointed to Colombia’s anti-drug operations, declaring that Colombia destroys a drug-producing laboratory “every 40 minutes” without missiles. For Petro, the point is both practical and principled: Colombia will fight drugs, but not at the cost of its territorial sovereignty.

Beyond borders: Venezuela, politics, and regional fault lines

Complicating the geography is Venezuela. The U.S. administration has publicly accused President Nicolás Maduro of involvement in the trafficking networks that feed U.S. drug markets—an allegation Maduro vehemently denies. “There is no drug cultivation in Venezuela,” he told state media earlier this year, insisting that his country is a forced transit route for Colombian production. Tensions between Caracas and Washington have spiked, and the build-up of U.S. military assets in the Caribbean has only narrowed political breathing room.

“This is not merely a Colombia-U.S. issue,” said Diego Fernández, a regional security analyst. “When one neighbor’s policy is to use force offshore, it changes diplomatic calculus for all littoral states. Nations like Panama, Costa Rica and the island states of the Caribbean—many of which have limited naval capacity—are watching closely.”

Questions of law, morality, and strategy

Experts debate not just whether particular strikes were legal, but whether this approach can succeed. Military action may interrupt flows temporarily, but underlying demand—inside the United States, among other countries—remains. “We are trying to treat a public-health and economic problem with a kinetic tool,” said Dr. Lucia Valenzuela, a public policy scholar who studies drug markets. “Without reducing demand or investing in alternative livelihoods, we risk a cycle: more violence, more impunity, more displacement.”

There is also an irony: measures meant to secure domestic safety abroad can deepen insecurity at home. When foreign strikes generate civilian deaths or are perceived as overreach, they can fuel narratives used by cartels, insurgent groups, and even anti-U.S. politicians—giving them recruitment and legitimacy.

What does sovereignty mean in a hyper-connected world?

Ask yourself this: when cross-border harms are real—when drugs made in one country help tear families apart in another—what’s the right response? Do states have the moral license to pursue perpetrators across borders? Or does sovereignty retain a sacrosanct shield, even when a neighbor’s failure to control criminal networks has cascading effects?

There are no easy answers. The story unfolding off Colombia’s coasts is a messy intersection of human suffering, law, geopolitics and the everyday needs of people like Marco and María. It forces us to weigh urgency against caution, security against the sanctity of national borders.

In the end, the image that lingers is small and human: a child on a seaside stoop watching a distant light blink on the horizon, not knowing whether it signifies a patrol, a rescue, or something more ominous. That is the world policy debates are supposed to protect—but sometimes, paradoxically, they put directly at risk.

How would you weigh these competing claims? What mix of diplomacy, justice, aid, and enforcement would you trust to resolve them? The answers we choose will determine not only the fate of states, but the daily lives of those who simply want to fish, farm, and raise their children in peace.

Meta set to ban under-16s from Australian social media platforms

hanad

December 4, 2025

Meta to remove under-16s from social media in Australia — Meta said it was committed to complying with the Australian law

The Day the Platforms Began to Empty: Australia’s Youth Social Media Pause

On a slow Monday in early December, the feeds of thousands of Australian teenagers began to dim. It wasn’t a glitch. It was the beginning of a policy experiment that the world is watching: a government-mandated removal of under-16s from major social networks.

Meta—owner of Instagram, Threads and Facebook—said it was starting to block users under 16 in Australia ahead of the new law that comes into force on 10 December. The law, a first of its kind globally, requires major platforms including TikTok and YouTube to ensure children under 16 can’t sign up. Companies face fines of up to Aus$49.5 million if they fail to take “reasonable steps” to comply.

For a country that likes to think of itself as digitally savvy, the scene felt equal parts bureaucratic and intimate: parents watching account access vanish, teens scrambling to download memories, platforms racing to build verification systems. The question on many lips was simple and sharp: can you legislate childhood online?

What the New Rules Mean—Practically

By the government’s countdown, platforms must either block sign-ups by under-16s or put in place reliable age checks that don’t simply ask users to lie and move on. Meta told users younger than 16 they could save and download their data and that accounts would be restored if the user later reached 16. Across industry statements and regulatory guidance, there’s an acknowledgment that enforcement will be “multi-layered” and imperfect.

Instagram alone reported roughly 350,000 Australian users aged 13 to 15—a large cohort whose habits, friendships and creative experiments live largely on that platform. Popular services such as Roblox, Pinterest and WhatsApp are currently exempt, though the list remains under review.

How platforms are expected to act

Block new sign-ups from under-16s unless an effective age-verification system is in place.
Preserve the right for younger users to download or save their account histories before removal.
Face financial penalties if authorities judge their steps to be unreasonable.

Yet regulators concede what many parents already know: no digital fence is impenetrable. The internet rewards ingenuity. Adolescents have always found ways around rules—this moment will be no different.

Voices from the Ground: Teens, Parents, Teachers

“My daughter burst into tears,” said a parent in suburban Melbourne, describing the day her 14-year-old’s Instagram account turned into a memory. “It was like something else turned off—her creative space, her group chat. We had to sit down and explain why this was happening.”

A 15-year-old who asked to be called Jess told me, “I get why adults worry, but this is where I learned to make videos and talk to friends. If I lose it, it feels like losing a diary.” Her story is not unique. For many teens, platforms are not just distraction; they are rehearsal rooms for identity.

Teachers and school counselors report mixed feelings. “We see harm, for sure—cyberbullying, self-image issues,” said one high school counselor. “But social media also provides peer support and belonging. Removing it abruptly risks isolating kids who rely on those networks for community.”

Company Pushback: Safety vs. Access

Not surprisingly, tech giants have argued that the law could have unintended safety consequences. YouTube warned that if under-16s are forced to browse without an account, they could lose access to safety filters tied to logged-in experiences—an argument regulators called “weird.” Australia’s communications minister pushed back: if YouTube is flagging that parts of its site are unsafe for certain ages, she said, that’s a problem for the platform to solve, not a reason to block legislation aimed at protecting kids.

A Meta spokesperson framed their compliance as active and ongoing. “We’re working hard to remove all users we understand to be under 16 by 10 December,” the company said, while asking that app stores should shoulder more responsibility for age verification—so teens wouldn’t have to verify their age multiple times across apps.

The Cat-and-Mouse of Verification

If you’ve ever watched a teenager puzzle their way through technology restrictions, you know what comes next: creative workarounds. Government guidance even lists likely tricks—fake IDs, AI-generated photos to appear older. The Office of the eSafety Commissioner acknowledges that no solution will be 100% effective.

That leaves companies to invent new checks: biometric scans? Government-backed ID checks? Parental consent portals? Each comes with trade-offs—privacy concerns, accessibility issues, and the risk of excluding marginalized young people who lack IDs or parental involvement.

Beyond Australia: A Global Conversation

Australia’s move has ripple effects. Malaysia has signalled plans to block under-16s next year, and New Zealand is preparing similar measures. Regulators worldwide are wrestling with the same puzzle: how to protect children from demonstrable harms—addiction, exposure to explicit material, harassment—without curtailing their freedoms, silencing young voices, or creating a shadow web of unsafe alternatives.

“This is not just about one law,” said a digital-safety advocate. “It’s a test case for how democracies will manage tech in the era of ubiquitous connectivity.” The stakes are high: the decisions made now will shape adolescence for a generation.

Questions to Sit With

Are we willing to trade some freedoms for a safer online childhood? Can governments regulate platforms without unintended collateral damage to young people’s social and creative lives? Will tech companies build age-verification that respects privacy, or will they push the cost back onto app stores and families?

These are not theoretical queries. They are practical dilemmas playing out in kitchens, school corridors, and boardrooms across Australia—and soon, perhaps, around the world.

What to Watch Next

Compliance timelines: How quickly will platforms deactivate under-16 accounts and how cleanly will they restore them at 16?
Legal challenges: An internet-rights group has taken the law to court, arguing it undermines free expression—watch for rulings that could reshape or pause enforcement.
Technical rollouts: The age-verification methods platforms choose will set precedents for privacy and access.

When laws collide with lived experience, the best outcomes come from listening as much as from legislating. As Australia opens this new chapter, it asks us all—parents, technologists, policymakers, and kids themselves—to reckon with what kind of digital childhood we value. Will we build a safer internet by taking away accounts, or will we learn to design platforms that keep children safer in place?

Take a moment and imagine your own adolescence—how different would it have felt to have your social life mediated by algorithms and app stores? Then imagine being 14 today, voice and identity in the balance. Which side would you stand on?

Israel’s handling of Gaza war called ‘fundamentally wrong’

hanad

December 4, 2025

Israel's conduct of war in Gaza 'fundamentally wrong' — Antonio Guterres made the comments in an interview at the Reuters NEXT conference in New York (file image)

When Diplomacy Frays: A Secretary-General’s Stark Warning from the Rubble

There are moments when a speech stops being a statement and becomes a tremor felt across continents. In a recent conversation in a New York conference room, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres did not mince words. He said the Gaza operation had been carried out in a way that was “fundamentally wrong” — not merely tactically flawed, but morally and legally troubling.

Those words landed like stones on a still pond. For residents of Gaza — where, according to the enclave’s health ministry, more than 70,000 lives have already been lost — the echo is both immediate and devastating. For diplomats and jurists, the remark intensified an argument about whether some actions in the war amount to war crimes. “There are strong reasons to believe that that possibility might be a reality,” Guterres said, cutting through the usual diplomatic hedging.

This is not abstract language. The conflict that began with the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023 — which killed around 1,200 people in Israel and saw 251 taken hostage — has spiraled, dragging civilians, infrastructure, and a fragile rule of law into its wake. Two years on, the landscape is a calculus of loss: demolished homes, shuttered hospitals, and families who measure time by the rattle of faraway strikes.

On the Ground: Voices with Dust in Their Lungs

Walk through any neighborhood in Gaza that remains standing and you will hear a chorus of small testimonies that together form a louder indictment. “We sleep with our shoes on because we never know when the next strike will come,” said Fatima al-Najjar, a mother of four who now makes and sells flatbread from a table perched among piles of concrete. “The children ask for stories, not rockets. They ask for school, not sirens.”

An aid worker who asked not to be named described convoys arriving late at night like pilgrimages. “The trucks roll in and people gather to see if the food will still be there,” she said. “Sometimes it is; sometimes it isn’t. The lines, the administrative checks, the accusations of looting — it all wears you down.”

For Israel’s diplomats, the calculus is different and raw in its own way. “We are dealing with a murderous organization that attacked our people,” said one Israeli diplomat. “But pointing at the enemy does not absolve us of responsibility for how we conduct ourselves.” Others are fiercer in their defense: “The only crime committed is the moral abomination of failing to acknowledge the 7 October massacres,” Israel’s UN ambassador responded publicly, accusing the UN of bias.

Humanitarian Access, Famine Risk, and the Machinery of Relief

Even the best-intentioned aid effort becomes a Rube Goldberg machine in a siege zone: trucks arrive, permits are negotiated, supplies are inspected, convoys rerouted. The UN and the United States have worked to pry open routes for humanitarian assistance; Guterres praised the U.S. role in improving aid access. Yet international monitors warned earlier this year that famine conditions had taken root in parts of Gaza.

According to a global hunger monitor report released in August, food insecurity reached alarmingly acute levels. The United Nations has repeatedly catalogued obstacles — roadblocks, security concerns, and an environment of lawlessness that hampers distribution. Israel counters that Hamas diverts aid and that insecurity on the ground is not solely a matter of policy but of failed local governance.

James O’Connell, a logistics coordinator for an international relief NGO, summarized the daily grind in stark terms: “We’re not just dropping pallets of food and walking away. We’re negotiating, monitoring, and sometimes watching supplies sit idle because routes are blocked. The result is that people die unnecessarily.”

The UN Under Pressure: Funding, Reform, and Fragile Credibility

Behind these headlines is another crisis: an institution operating with fewer resources as geopolitical winds shift. Under the current U.S. administration, funding cuts and a rhetoric of skepticism toward multilateral institutions have pressured the UN to reform — or to at least rethink priorities. “Do not make any concession that puts into question the fidelity of the values we defend,” Guterres said of his approach to a sometimes hostile U.S. leadership. “But we must avoid polemics that serve no purpose.”

There are consequences to this squeeze. Reduced aid budgets translate quickly into frozen projects and fewer tents, fewer medical supplies, fewer vaccinations. “A reduction in humanitarian aid makes many people die,” Guterres warned — a blunt, painful truth that brings statistics down to human terms.

Beyond Gaza: A World of Frayed Norms

The United Nations chief did not confine his concern to one theater. He warned that the erosion of international law in any corner of the globe sends a dangerous message everywhere: that borders, sovereignty, and the protections afforded to civilians can be set aside. He pointed to Ukraine, invaded by Russia in February 2022, as a stark example of how far from resolution major conflicts can drift.

“We are far from a solution,” he observed, noting that the endgame should, in principle, respect territorial integrity and international law — even if, in practice, the road to such an outcome looks rocky. That message hangs over negotiations across continents, from the Donbas to Gaza’s rubble-strewn streets.

The shadow is widening. Near Venezuela, U.S. strikes on vessels suspected of trafficking drugs have drawn criticism; at least 21 strikes in recent months and the deaths of more than 80 people have prompted questions about legality and proportionality. Guterres said clearly that such actions are “not compatible with international law,” even as he acknowledged the complex, fraught politics that drive these interventions.

What Does Accountability Look Like?

When senior officials speak of possible war crimes, the next question is not rhetorical: who investigates, and how? International criminal law is not a fairy tale of swift justice. It is a methodical, painstaking process — and one that requires evidence, access, and political will. “Accountability must be careful and credible,” said Professor Miriam Cohen, an international law scholar. “We need independent investigations, chain-of-custody standards, and impartial adjudication. Anything less risks politicising the work.”

But for survivors like Fatima, legal nuance is an abstraction. “I want the lights on, my children in school, the bakeries open,” she said. “I want someone to say our lives matter.”

How Do We Respond — As Governments, Institutions, People?

There are no simple answers. There are, however, choices. The world can invest in robust, impartial investigations and push diplomatic avenues for ceasefires that actually hold. It can shore up humanitarian funding and pressure parties to respect the laws of war. It can refuse to let crises become normalized headlines — tragedies etched into the background noise.

So I ask you as a reader: what kind of international order do you want to live in? One where the rules mean something, or one where power alone dictates outcomes? The Secretary-General’s words are not just a rebuke of tactics; they are a test of collective will. The rubble speaks. The numbers are brutal. The people are calling. Will the world listen?

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