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FILE PHOTO: Protesters hold flags and chant slogans as they march against the Sudanese military's recent seizure of power and ousting of the civilian government, in the streets of the capital Khartoum, Sudan October 30, 2021. REUTERS/Mohamed Nureldin - 

A senior UN official discussed mediation options and possible next steps for Sudan with its ousted prime minister on Sunday (Oct 31), a day after hundreds of thousands of protesters hit the streets to demand an end to military rule.

The large outpouring of popular dissent posed the biggest challenge to General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan since he toppled Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok's cabinet on Monday and arrested key politicians. The streets were largely calm on Sunday.

"We discussed options for mediation and the way forward for Sudan. I will continue these efforts with other Sudanese stakeholders," Volker Perthes. the UN Special Representative for Sudan, said on Twitter.

Perthes said Hamdok was "at his residence where he remains well but under house arrest".

Mediation efforts by the international community and within Sudan had been announced before Saturday's protests, with no outcome reported.

Hamdok has demanded the release of detainees and a return to the pre-coup power-sharing arrangement, sources close to him said. One of several sources of tension had been a push by civilians to take over leadership of the transition from the military at a not-yet-agreed point in the coming months.

The Central Committee of Sudanese Doctors said three protesters were shot dead by security forces in Khartoum's twin city of Omdurman on Saturday. Sudanese police denied shooting protesters during the demonstrations, saying on state TV that one policeman sustained a gunshot wound.

Life returned to a near standstill in the Sudanese capital Khartoum on Sunday. Residents of central Khartoum said continued strikes and security measures were causing paralysis.

Banks and most markets were closed, with only a few small stores and stalls open.

"You can't do anything - everything is shut down. We need to work every day to make money," said a fruit and vegetable seller in the city centre.

People were unable to cross into Khartoum from Omdurman and the capital's other twin city, Khartoum North, because security forces had closed the Nile river bridges.

With Saturday's deaths, at least 14 protesters have been killed in clashes with security forces this week.

Unions of doctors, bankers, teachers and other groups have been on strike since last week and have said they will continue until demands are met, while resistance committees have barricaded neighbourhoods and created schedules of protests.

Demands range from a return to the pre-coup power-sharing arrangement to criminal charges against coup leaders.

The Sudanese Lawyers Union condemned the arrests of activists and political leaders. The union "warns that the Sudanese people are in front of an oppressive military movement paving the way for dark totalitarianism"//CNA

A French fisherman repairs a fishing net at the port of Boulogne-sur-Mer, northern France, on Friday, Oct 15, 2021. France wants more fishing licences from London, but the UK is holding back. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena) - 

The French and British leaders agreed on Sunday (Oct 31) to defuse days of sniping over post-Brexit fishing rights, according to Paris, potentially averting a full-blown trade war that would embroil the entire EU.

President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Boris Johnson met for about 25 minutes on the margins of a G20 summit in Rome, aides said, a day after Johnson complained to EU chief Ursula von der Leyen that French threats to trigger reprisals over the row were "completely unjustified".

They agreed to work on "practical and operational measures" to resolve the dispute in the coming days, Macron's office said.

They were united on the need for a "de-escalation" with concrete action to come "as soon as possible", it said.

There was no immediate comment from Downing Street.

Johnson has been stressing at the G20 that all sides must focus on the bigger picture of climate change as he prepares to host more than 120 world leaders at the COP26 summit from Monday.

But both the UK and French governments had been intensifying their angry rhetoric, and France last week detained a British trawler that was allegedly fishing illegally in its waters.

The two sides have also been at loggerheads over a nuclear submarine alliance involving Australia, Britain and the United States, dubbed AUKUS, that left France in the cold.

France is incensed that Britain and the Channel Islands of Jersey and Guernsey have not issued some French boats licences to fish in their waters since Brexit took full effect at the start of 2021.

Paris had vowed that unless more licences are approved, it would ban UK boats from unloading their catches at French ports from Tuesday, and even impose checks on all products brought to France from Britain.

On Friday, French Prime Minister Jean Castex said in a leaked letter to von der Leyen that Britain should be shown "it causes more damage to leave the EU than to stay in".

The letter drew a withering response from British officials, and Johnson warned that London could activate a Brexit dispute tool for the first time, exposing all of the EU to potential UK trade measures.

For his part, Macron warned Friday that Britain's "credibility" was on the line, accusing London of ignoring the Brexit trade deal agreed with Brussels after years of tortuous negotiations.

"When you spend years negotiating a treaty and then a few months later you do the opposite of what was decided on the aspects that suit you the least, it is not a big sign of your credibility," he told the Financial Times//CNA

A Tunisian farmer harvests wheat in the Jedaida region, some 30 kilometres (18 miles) northwest of the capital Tunis - 

Tunisian farmers are turning to the past to ensure a future by planting indigenous seeds as the North African country suffers at a time of drought, disease and climate change.

Traditional seeds come from a genetic heritage best suited to the environment, said Maher Medini, from Tunisia's National Gene Bank, which promotes the development of sustainable agriculture in the country.

"They are reservoirs of genes hundreds, if not thousands of years old," Medini said, adding that the seeds are more resistant to the ever-growing dangerous impacts of global warming.

Climate change is causing challenging variations in rainfall, temperature and humidity, creating disease in the crops, he said.

"The foundation of adaptation is diversity," Medini said.

Wheat varieties developed in the 1980s are being blighted by disease in Tunisia, but farmers say that traditional varieties appear to be more resistant.

In the past, using indigenous seeds, Tunisian farmers set aside a small part of the harvest to sow in the next season.

But the development of hybrid or genetically modified seeds resulted in better harvests, and native varieties largely fell out of use.

One problem is that seeds from the new varieties cannot be replanted, and farmers have to buy in more seed every year.

Now some farmers are looking at the methods used by their forebears.

Mohamed Lassad ben Saleh farms in the agricultural region of Jedaida, some 30km northwest of the capital Tunis.

Eight years ago he switched to planting a traditional variety of wheat, known as Al-Msekni. On his farm, the harvest is now in full swing.

The wheat harvested from each hectare is weighed separately, so each plot's productivity can be calculated.

"The results are good," Ben Saleh said.

The national average in recent years has been 1.4 to two tonnes a hectare, while Ben Saleh says his yield has been five tonnes.

With most farmers buying new seeds every season, the country currently imports 70 per cent to 80 per cent of its seeds each year.

"A return to local or native seeds is one of the conditions needed to reach food sovereignty," said Aymen Amayed, a researcher in agricultural policies.

The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization has warned against the increased use of hybrid seeds, and considers it a threat to indigenous varieties and to local genetic heritage.

The FAO estimates that over the past century, around three-quarters of the diversity in world crops has disappeared.

But Tunisia's gene bank is working to "reclaim its genetic heritage".

Since 2008, it has been collecting traditional seeds from farmers, and also working to recover indigenous Tunisian seeds stored in gene banks around the world.

So far, it has been able to repatriate more than 7,000 samples of seeds from fruit trees, cereals and vegetables out of over 11,000 located worldwide.

These seeds are once more being planted in Tunisian soil.

M'barek Ben Naceur, head of the national gene bank, says that more than 400 farmers have been persuaded to use these seeds, and old varieties such as Al-Msekni and Al-Mahmoudi are being sown again.

"These seeds are the descendants of this land, and they know it," said Ben Naceur.

"Our varieties have been accustomed to rises in temperature and drought for thousands of years, so they will resist climate change and temperature rises," he added.

A report last month by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change showed unequivocally that the climate is changing faster than previously feared, and because of human activity.

August saw record-breaking temperatures: in Tunis the mercury reached 48 degrees Celsius at midday (118 Fahrenheit), smashing the capital's previous record high of 46.8 degrees in 1982.

"Between now and 2050, temperatures in the world will rise between 1.8 and two degrees," Ben Naceur said.

"And 2050 is tomorrow - it's not so far away. Varieties that are not resistant will disappear."//CNA

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern. (Photo: Reuters/Fiona Goodall) - 

New Zealand pledged on Sunday (Oct 31) to reduce its net greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent by 2030, toughening at the start of the United Nations COP26 climate conference its previous ambitions to limit global warming.

Leaders of the 20 richest countries are expected to acknowledge the existential threat of climate change and take steps to limit global warning at the COP26 summit starting on Sunday evening in Glasgow, Scotland.

"While we are a small contributor to global emissions, as a country surrounded by oceans and an economy reliant on our land we are not immune to the impact of climate change, so it's critical we pull our weight," Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said in a statement.

Ardern and Climate Change Minister James Shaw said in their joint statement that the previous target was not consistent with global efforts to limit global warming to 1.5 Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels.

New Zealand's previous target was to bring emissions to 30 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030.

The 2015 Paris Agreement committed signatories to keeping global warming to "well below" 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels, and preferably to 1.5 degrees, but carbon levels in the atmosphere have since grown.

"This decade is make or break for the planet," Shaw said in the statement.

"To stand a chance of limiting global warming to 1.5 Celsius, the science shows we now have about eight years left to almost halve global greenhouse gas emissions."

The New Zealand government has introduced several policies to lower emissions during its second term including promising to make its public sector carbon-neutral by 2025 and buy only zero-emissions public transport buses from the middle of this decade//CNA