International

UN climate negotiations yesterday offered a sliver of hope and “solidarity” for developing countries battered by increasingly costly impacts of global warming, in agreeing to discuss the thorny issue of money for “loss and damage”. Countries least responsible for planet-heating emissions — but hardest hit by an onslaught of weather extremes — have been ramping up the pressure on wealthy polluting nations to provide financial help for accelerating damages. But in a sign of how contentious the issue is among richer nations fearful of open-ended climate liability, the issue was only added to the formal agenda to the UN’s COP27 climate summit in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh after two days of last-ditch negotiations. This “reflects a sense of solidarity and empathy for the suffering of the victims of climate induced disasters,” Egypt’s Sameh Shoukry, the COP27 president, said to applause. At last year’s UN summit in Glasgow, the European Union and the United States rejected calls for a separate financial mechanism. Instead, negotiators agreed to start a “dialogue” extending through 2024 on financial compensation. The issue has grown ever more urgent in recent months as nations were slammed by a crescendo of disasters, such as the massive flooding that put a third of Pakistan under water in August. Senegal’s Madeleine Diouf Sarr, who represents the Least Developed Countries negotiating bloc, said climate action across the board had been far too slow. “Lives are being lost. Climate change is causing irreversible loss and damage, and our people carry the greatest cost,” she said, adding that an agreement on funding arrangements must be reached in Egypt. Appeals for more money are bolstered by a field known as event attribution science, which now makes it possible to measure how much global warming increases the likelihood or intensity of an individual cyclone, heat wave, drought or heavy rain event. “Today, countries cleared an historic first hurdle toward acknowledging and answering the call for financing to address increasingly severe losses and damages,” said Ani Dasgupta, head of the World Resources Institute, a climate policy think tank. But he said that getting negotiators to agree to discuss the issue was only an initial step. “We still have a marathon ahead of us before countries iron out a formal decision on this central issue for CO27,” he said. Wrangling over loss and damage has unfolded against the backdrop of an unmet promise by rich nations to provide $100bn a year starting in 2020 to help the developing world green their economies and anticipate future impacts, called “adaptation” in UN climate lingo. That funding goal is still $17bn short. Rich nations have vowed to hit the target by the end of 2023, but observers say the issue has severely undermined trust. The UN Environment Programme has said the goal – first set in 2009  – has not kept up with reality, and estimates that funding to build resilience to future climate threats should be up to 10 times higher. Meanwhile, countries are far off track to reach the Paris deal goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. The UN says the world is currently heading to 2.8C of warming, or a still-catastrophic 2.4C even if all national pledges under the Paris treaty are fulfilled. Depending on how deeply the world slashes carbon pollution, loss and damage from climate change could cost developing countries $290-580bn a year by 2030, reaching $1-1.8tn in 2050, according to the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment in London. The World Bank has estimated the Pakistan floods alone caused $30bn in damages and economic loss. Millions of people were displaced and two million homes destroyed. Simon Stiell, the UN’s climate change executive secretary, said vulnerable countries are “tired” and “frustrated”. “Here in Sharm el-Sheikh we have a duty to speed up our international efforts and turn words into action to catch up with their lived experience,” he said. Up to now, poor countries have had scant leverage in the UN wrangle over money. But as climate damages multiply, patience is wearing thin. The AOSIS negotiating block of small island nations told AFP that they would like to see the details for a dedicated loss-and-damage fund worked out within a year. “There’s not enough support for us to even to begin to prepare for the loss and damage that we are expected to face,” said AOSIS lead negotiator on climate finance Michai Robertson.

Andrea Bambino with Frankie Taggart in Washington US President Joe Biden and his two predecessors converged on the state of Pennsylvania on Saturday, making closing pitches in a key battleground state for next week’s midterm election. Biden was set to rally alongside his old boss Barack Obama as the Democrats deployed their big guns to build the energy they hope will spread nationwide and reverse the late rightward-shift in polling. And in a split-screen preview of a potential rematch of the 2020 presidential contest, the midwestern state is also playing host to Biden’s predecessor and bitter political rival Donald Trump. Obama was the first to appear yesterday, lashing out before a crowd in Pittsburgh at what he said were Republican plans to cut government spending. “They want to gut social security. They want to gut medicare. They want to give rich folks and big corporations more tax cuts,” Obama said. Obama — still the party’s most bankable star six years after leaving the White House — threw his support behind Democratic candidate John Fetterman, who is in a dead heat against Republican TV physician Mehmet Oz in their crucial Senate race. Biden and Obama were to appear later in the day in Philadelphia, the historic cradle of US independence where the 44th and 46th presidents will woo voters from the suburbs that make for a crucial base of Democratic support. Hours before the rally was scheduled to begin, hundreds of people lined up to enter the Liacouras Center to attend the event. “It’s very important that democrats stay in the position they’re already in,” said Jennifer Hahn, 57, a clinical psychologist from the town of Audubon, outside Philadelphia. “The biggest issues facing us are climate change, gun violence and our rights being stripped away.” The Keystone State backed Trump over Hillary Clinton for president in 2016 but preferred Biden to Trump in 2020. Strategists from both parties believe the side that wins the post vacated by retiring Republican Pat Toomey will hold the majority in the upper chamber of Congress next year. Fetterman and Oz sparred for an hour in state capital Harrisburg 10 days ago, with Fetterman still struggling with communication issues after a stroke in May upended his campaign. “The month-to-month shifts in support for Oz are not statistically significant,” said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute. “The overall trend suggests he has been chipping away with some voters who have not been completely comfortable with him, but that mainly happened prior to the debate.” Just a few miles east of Pittsburgh in Latrobe, Trump — the one-term 45th president with ambitions to return as the 47th — will seek to firm up support in a region that delivered him big margins in 2016 and 2020. Pennsylvania is seen as a must-win not just for control of the Senate, but also for the balance of power among the country’s 50 state governors, influential officials that weigh in on most aspects of voters’ lives, from education and health care to voting rights. Democratic gubernatorial nominee Josh Shapiro has been spotlighting the fringe views of state senator Doug Mastriano, his far-right opponent who was involved in Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election. A victory for Trump-backed Mastriano would give the prominent election denier oversight of the state’s voting system for the 2024 presidential race. Like Biden, Trump has visited Pennsylvania twice this year, rallying for Oz and Mastriano most recently in Wilkes-Barre in early September. The 76-year-old tycoon has already claimed baselessly that the state’s elections have been “rigged,” echoing his false claims that his own 2020 defeat was the result of widespread fraud. “As Biden’s approval rating plummets, Pennsylvania crime spikes, and Pennsylvanians grapple with a 74% hike in heating oil, coupled with record inflation, just weeks away from winter,” Trump’s office said in a statement. “The America First Movement offers the Keystone State an alternative vision for America: safe streets, cheap gas, low inflation, and a thriving American economy.”

They have been shadowboxing at separate campaign stops across the United States for weeks but the Democratic and Republican leaders find themselves on the same battlefield Saturday as they make closing pitches in Pennsylvania for next week's midterm election. President Joe Biden will rally alongside his old boss Barack Obama as the Democrats deploy their big guns to build the energy they hope will spread nationwide and reverse the late rightward-shift in polling. And in a split-screen preview of a potential rematch of the 2020 presidential contest, the midwestern state is also playing host to Biden's predecessor and bitter political rival Donald Trump. Obama - still the party's most bankable star six years after leaving the White House - begins the day in Pittsburgh with Democratic candidate John Fetterman, who is in a dead heat against Republican TV medic Mehmet Oz in their crucial Senate race. Biden and Obama then appear in Philadelphia, the historic cradle of US independence where the 44th and 46th presidents will woo voters from the suburbs that make for a crucial base of Democratic support. The Keystone State backed Trump over Hillary Clinton for president in 2016 but preferred Biden to Trump in 2020. Strategists from both parties believe the side that wins the post vacated by retiring Republican Pat Toomey will hold the majority in the upper chamber of Congress next year. Fetterman and Oz sparred for an hour in state capital Harrisburg 10 days ago, with Fetterman still struggling with communication issues after a stroke in May upended his campaign. 'Chipping away' "The month-to-month shifts in support for Oz are not statistically significant," said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute. "The overall trend suggests he has been chipping away with some voters who have not been completely comfortable with him, but that mainly happened prior to the debate." Just a few miles east of Pittsburgh in Latrobe, Trump - the one-term 45th president with ambitions to return as the 47th - will seek to firm up support in a region that delivered him big margins in 2016 and 2020. Pennsylvania is seen as a must-win not just for control of the Senate, but also for the balance of power among the country's 50 state governors, influential officials that weigh in on most aspects of voters' lives, from education and health care to voting rights. Democratic gubernatorial nominee Josh Shapiro has been spotlighting the fringe views of state senator Doug Mastriano, his far-right opponent who was involved in Trump's attempts to overturn the 2020 election. A victory for Trump-backed Mastriano would give the prominent election denier oversight of the state's voting system for the 2024 presidential race. Like Biden, Trump has visited Pennsylvania twice this year, rallying for Oz and Mastriano most recently in Wilkes-Barre in early September. The 76-year-old tycoon has already claimed baselessly that the state's elections have been "rigged," echoing his false claims that his own 2020 defeat was the result of widespread fraud. "As Biden's approval rating plummets, Pennsylvania crime spikes, and Pennsylvanians grapple with a 74 percent hike in heating oil, coupled with record inflation, just weeks away from winter," Trump's office said in a statement. "The America First Movement offers the Keystone State an alternative vision for America: safe streets, cheap gas, low inflation, and a thriving American economy."

Donald Trump is planning to ride a wave of Republican victories in next week’s midterm elections by announcing a run for the presidency, US media reported on Friday, as Democrats braced for a punishing night even in the most liberal corners of America. The one-term president has hinted for almost two years a potential third tilt at the White House after losing to Joe Biden, but aides are firming up plans for an announcement on November 14, according to Axios. Trump sent his clearest signal yet that he intends to announce his 2024 candidacy soon, as he addressed a rally on Thursday in Iowa, the first state to hold its Republican nominating contest in presidential elections. “In order to make our country successful and safe and glorious, I will very, very, very probably do it again, OK? Very, very, very probably,” Trump teased to rapt applause at the event in Sioux City. “Get ready. That’s all I’m telling you. Very soon. Get ready. Get ready.” His remarks came with polling pointing to a re-emerging “red wave” that will likely see the tycoon’s party dismantling the Democrats’ razor-thin majority in the House and possibly retaking the Senate. Republicans are confident they can flip the one state they need for the upper chamber and are expecting gains in the House of 12 to 25 seats, easily enough to overcome the Democrats’ eight-member advantage. The final weeks of the campaign have seen bullish Republicans even looking beyond the country’s swing states to Democratic bastions that once looked out of reach. Strategists from both parties are seeing districts across New York, Oregon and Connecticut that went for Biden by double digits in 2020 coming back into play. Hillary Clinton campaigned on Thursday in New York to boost the faltering fortunes of Governor Kathy Hochul, while former president Barack Obama speaks in Pennsylvania today. With Democrats being dragged down by Biden’s underwater approval ratings, particularly on inflation, the president was due to pitch his party as the choice for growth and innovation at a tour of a San Diego communications company. Ahead of the visit, Biden hailed new figures for October showing the economy adding 261,000 jobs and unemployment at low levels. “I’ve got a plan to bring costs down, especially for health care, energy, and other everyday expenses ... the Republican plan is very different,” he said in a statement. “They want to increase prescription drug costs, health insurance costs, and energy costs, while giving more tax breaks to big corporations and the very wealthy.” Trump had initially considered announcing before next Tuesday to get ahead of the field in the Republican primary. However, he was persuaded by close ally Kellyanne Conway that the move would leave him open to blame in the event of a bad night for Republicans.

Twitter Inc will tell employees by email on Friday about whether they have been laid off, temporarily closing its offices and preventing staff access, following a week of uncertainty about the company's future under new owner Elon Musk. The social media company said in an email to staff it would alert employees by 9 a.m. Pacific time on Friday (12 p.m. EDT/1600 GMT) about staff cuts. "In an effort to place Twitter on a healthy path, we will go through the difficult process of reducing our global workforce on Friday," said the email sent on Thursday, seen by Reuters. Musk, the world's richest person, is looking to cut around 3,700 Twitter staff, or about half the workforce, as he seeks to slash costs and impose a demanding new work ethic, according to internal plans reviewed by Reuters this week. Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Twitter said in the email that its offices would be temporarily closed and all badge access suspended in order "to help ensure the safety of each employee as well as Twitter systems and customer data." The company said employees who were not affected by the layoffs would be notified via their work email addresses. Staff who had been laid off would be notified with next steps to their personal email addresses, the memo said. Some employees tweeted their access to the company's IT system had been blocked and feared whether that suggested they had been laid off. "Looks like I’m unemployed y’all. Just got remotely logged out of my work laptop and removed from Slack," tweeted a user with the @SBkcrn account, whose profile is described as former senior community manager at Twitter. A class action lawsuit was filed on Thursday against Twitter by its employees, who argued the company was conducting mass layoffs without providing the required 60-day advance notice, in violation of federal and California law. The lawsuit also asked the San Francisco federal court to issue an order to restrict Twitter from soliciting employees being laid off to sign documents without informing them of the pendency of the case. Musk has directed Twitter's teams to find up to $1 billion in annual infrastructure cost savings, according to two sources familiar with the matter and an internal Slack message reviewed by Reuters. He had already cleared out the company's senior ranks, firing its chief executive and top finance and legal executives. Others, including those sitting atop the company's advertising, marketing and human resources divisions, departed throughout the past week. Musk's first week as Twitter's owner has been marked by chaos and uncertainty. Two company-wide meetings were scheduled, only to be canceled hours later. Employees told Reuters they were left to piece together information through media reports, private messaging groups and anonymous forums. The layoffs, which were long expected, have chilled Twitter's famously open corporate culture that has been lauded by many of its employees. "If you are in an office or on your way to an office, please return home," Twitter said in the email on Thursday. Shortly after the email landed in employee inboxes, hundreds of people flooded the company's Slack channels to say goodbye, two employees told Reuters. Someone invited Musk to join the channel, the sources said.

Taylor Swift made music history this week, becoming the first artist ever to simultaneously pinch all 10 spots on the top US song chart after the release of her album Midnights. Anti-Hero led the charge, taking the Billboard Hot 100's top spot. It's the first time in the chart's 64-year history that a single artist has claimed the entire top 10, Billboard said in a tweet. The last artist to come close was Drake, who took nine of the coveted spots in September 2021. "10 out of 10 of the Hot 100??? On my 10th album??? I AM IN SHAMBLES," tweeted Swift, with a nod to her devoted fan base's love of searching for hidden clues in her content including titles, numbers and dates. Swift released the highly anticipated Midnights -- her 10th studio album -- on October 21, which also debuted at the top of Billboard's main albums chart with the biggest week for a release since Adele's 25 in 2015. The release of Midnights crashed Spotify for hours, but it still set a record as the most-streamed album in a day, according to the platform. The album's 13 songs tell "the story of 13 sleepless nights scattered throughout my life," Swift said. Together, they form "a full picture of the intensities of that mystifying, mad hour." The three songs off Midnights not in the top 10 also charted, as did seven more tracks from the extended "3 am edition." Swift's latest album sees her returning to pop and recalling some of her earliest hits after two pandemic albums, Folklore and Evermore, leaned into folk. Swift also announced her next tour 'The Eras Tour'. "A journey through the musical eras of my career (past & present!) The first leg of the tour will be in stadiums across the US, with international dates to be announced as soon as we can!" she tweeted.  

Brazil’s far-right President Jair Bolsonaro yesterday avoided conceding defeat in his first public remarks since losing Sunday’s election, saying protests since then were the fruit of “indignation and a sense of injustice” over the vote. His chief of staff, Ciro Nogueira, speaking after Bolsonaro’s brief public address, said Bolsonaro had authorised him to begin the transition process with representatives of leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. It took Bolsonaro more than 44 hours to make his first public remarks since the election was decided by electoral authorities, making him the first Brazilian president to lose a re-election bid. He has still not spoken with Lula. Amid his silence, supporters blocked highways to protest his defeat, with some calling for a military coup to stop former president Lula from returning to power. Bolsonaro’s delay in recognising Lula’s election raised fear that he would contest the narrow result of the election. In a national address yesterday that lasted just a few minutes, Bolsonaro thanked Brazilians who voted for him and reiterated that he would follow the country’s constitution, which stipulates a transition of power on January 1. He referred to the demonstrations as a “popular movement” and said they should avoid destroying property or “impeding the right to come and go.” That may not be enough to defuse the protests across Brazil by small groups of his supporters, which have begun to cause economic disruptions draw calls from farm and retail groups for Bolsonaro to begin a transition. Close political allies, including his chief of staff and Vice President Hamilton Mourao, have begun to make contact with the Lula camp to discuss a transition. Others, including the speaker of the lower house of Congress, called on the Bolsonaro government to respect the election result. The powerful agricultural lobby CNA, representing farmers who were important campaign donors for Bolsonaro, said it was ready for conversations with the incoming government, which will take office on Jan. 1. Before Sunday’s vote, Bolsonaro repeatedly made baseless claims the electoral system was open to fraud and accused electoral authorities of favouring his leftist adversary. Lula’s victory represents a stunning comeback for the 77-year-old former metalworker, spent 19 months in jail for corruption convictions before they were annulled last year. Lula has vowed to overturn many of Bolsonaro’s policies, including pro-gun measures and weak protection of the Amazon rainforest.

Brazilian president-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva called for "peace and unity" after narrowly winning a divisive runoff election Sunday, capping a remarkable political comeback by defeating far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro -- who has yet to accept defeat. The victory marks a stunning turnaround for the charismatic but tarnished leftist heavyweight, who left office in 2010 as the most popular president in Brazilian history, fell into disgrace when he was imprisoned for 18 months on controversial, since-quashed corruption charges, and now returns for an unprecedented third term at age 77. All eyes will now be on how Bolsonaro and his supporters react to the result after months of alleging -- without evidence -- that Brazil's electronic voting system is plagued by fraud and that the courts, media and other institutions had conspired against his far-right movement. "This country needs peace and unity," Lula said to loud cheers in a victory speech in Sao Paulo. "The challenge is immense," he said of the job ahead, citing a hunger crisis, the economy, bitter political division, and deforestation in the Amazon. He later addressed a tightly packed crowd of hundreds of thousands of supporters who flooded the city center clad in Workers' Party red, vowing: "democracy is back." 'He hasn't called yet'  Bolsonaro, 67, was silent in the hours after the result was declared. "Anywhere in the world, the losing president would already have called to admit defeat. He hasn't called yet, I don't know if he will call and concede," Lula told the massive crowd. Some Bolsonaro supporters, gathered in the capital Brasilia, refused to accept the results. "The Brazilian people aren't going to swallow a faked election and hand our nation over to a thief," said 50-year-old teacher Ruth da Silva Barbosa. Electoral officials declared the election for Lula, who had 50.9 percent of the vote to 49.1 percent for Bolsonaro with more than 99.9 percent of polling stations reporting, in the closest race since Brazil returned to democracy after its 1964-1985 dictatorship. Bolsonaro, the vitriolic hardline conservative dubbed the "Tropical Trump," becomes the first incumbent president not to win re-election in the post-dictatorship era. With no word from Bolsonaro, some of his key allies appeared in public to accept the results. They included the speaker of the lower house of Congress, Arthur Lira, who said it was time to "extend a hand to our adversaries, debate, build bridges." 'Restore peace'   Congratulations for Lula poured in from US President Joe Biden, France's Emmanuel Macron, and Russian President Vladimir Putin, as well as leaders from across Latin America. The European Union's chief diplomat, Josep Borrell, also joined the list of international well-wishers. Lula supporters around the country erupted into celebration Sunday evening. "We've had four years of a genocidal, hateful government," said Lula voter Maria Clara, a 26-year-old student, at a victory party in downtown Rio. "Today democracy won, and the possibility of dreaming of a better country again." In Brasilia, the tearful crowd of Bolsonaro supporters -- outfitted in green and yellow, the colors of Brazil's flag which the ex-army captain has adopted as his own -- fell to their knees to pray. Bolsonaro surged to victory four years ago on a wave of outrage with politics as usual, but came under fire for his disastrous handling of the Covid-19 pandemic -- which left more than 680,000 dead in Brazil -- as well as a weak economy, his polarizing style and attacks on democratic institutions. Regardless of how the incumbent reacts, Lula will face huge challenges when he is inaugurated on January 1. Bolsonaro's far-right allies scored big victories in legislative and governors' races in the first-round election on October 2, and will be the largest force in Congress. On Sunday, Bolsonaro's former infrastructure minister Tarcisio de Freitas clinched the governorship of Sao Paulo, the most populous and the wealthiest state in the country. 'Zero deforestation'   In his victory speech, Lula touched on gender and racial equality and the urgent need to deal with a hunger crisis affecting 33.1 million Brazilians. "Today we tell the world that Brazil is back," he said, adding that the country is "ready to reclaim its place in the fight against the climate crisis, especially the Amazon." He vowed to "fight for zero deforestation." Lula inherits a deeply divided country, with a hugely difficult global economic situation that looks nothing like the commodities "super-cycle" that allowed him to lead Latin America's biggest economy through a watershed boom in the 2000s. Lula's win is "one of the biggest comebacks in modern political history," tweeted Brian Winter, editor-in-chief of Americas Quarterly. But the president-elect will face a hostile Congress and have "a weak government," Winter told AFP. None of that mattered for the time being to elated Lula supporters. "Brazil is starting to stand upright again after four years of darkness. We were going through so many problems, so much fear," Larissa Meneses, a 34-year-old software developer, told AFP at a joyful victory party in Sao Paulo. "Now with Lula's victory, I really believe things will start getting better. This is a day to laugh a lot."

A polarised Brazilian electorate went to the ballots amid allegations of voter suppression yesterday in a tense runoff that pits far-right incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro against leftist former leader Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. The vote serves as a referendum on two starkly different — and vehemently opposed — visions for Brazil’s future. Bolsonaro has vowed to consolidate a sharp rightward turn in Brazilian politics after a presidency that witnessed one of the world’s deadliest Covid-19 epidemics and widespread deforestation in the Amazon basin. Lula promises more social and environmental responsibility, evoking the rising prosperity of his 2003-2010 presidency, before corruption scandals tarnished his Workers Party. Some 120mn voters are expected to punch their choices into electronic voting machines that Bolsonaro has criticised without proof as fraud-prone, raising concern he may not concede defeat, following the example of his ideological ally, former US president Donald Trump. That has added to tensions in Brazil’s most polarising election since its return to democracy in 1985 after a military dictatorship that Lula, a former union leader, rallied against and Bolsonaro, a former army captain, invokes with nostalgia. The Superior Electoral Court (TSE), which runs Brazil’s elections, played down reports that the Federal Highway Police (PRF) had conducted illegal roadblocks of buses carrying voters across the poor northeast where Lula’s support is strongest. Critics allege the PRF has become overtly pro-Bolsonaro, and that officers were seeking to hinder voting in Lula strongholds. But Alexandre de Moraes, a Supreme Court justice who is also head of the TSE, said no-one had been prevented from voting and all police operations on roads had ceased and would be investigated. “The only issue for voters was that they were delayed,” Moraes told a news conference. The PRF did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Brazil’s sharp partisan division has split its population in two. With Bolsonaro stickers on her chest, Rio de Janeiro resident Ana Maria Vieira said she was certain to vote for the president, and would never countenance picking Lula. “I saw what Lula and his criminal gang did to this country,” she said, as she arrived to vote in Rio’s Copacabana neighbourhood, adding that she thought Bolsonaro’s handling of the economy had been “fantastic.” In Sao Paulo, 31-year-old lawyer Gerardo Maiar said he was horrified by what Bolsonaro had done as president. “The last four years were an embarrassment, both nationally and internationally,” he said after voting. “I think it’s ridiculous for Brazil to be in this shameful position.” Several polls showed the race between them tightening in the final week, with Bolsonaro eroding a slight lead for Lula. Others show a small but steady advantage for Lula. Bolsonaro outperformed opinion polls in the first round on October 2 among a field of 11 candidates. Pollsters said they recalibrated their methods based on that result, but most analysts still say yesterday’s runoff could go either way. Bolsonaro voted early yesterday at a military base in Rio. “Our expectation is victory, for the good of Brazil,” he told journalists after voting. Lula voted at a school in São Bernardo do Campo, in Sao Paulo, where he arrived with his running mate Geraldo Alckmin and other members of his team. A Lula victory would mark a stunning comeback for the leftist leader, who was jailed in 2018 for 19 months on bribery convictions that the Supreme Court overturned last year, clearing the way for him to seek a third presidential term. Lula has vowed a return to state-driven economic growth and social policies that helped lift millions out of poverty during a commodity boom when he first governed Brazil. He also vows to combat destruction of the Amazon rainforest, now at a 15-year high, and make Brazil a leader in global climate talks. A second term for Bolsonaro would keep Brazil on a path of free-market reforms and looser environmental protections, while cementing a coalition of right-wing parties and powerful farm interests, which bankrolled his campaign. Brazil’s electoral authorities are preparing for a narrow result, which Bolsonaro may contest if he loses. The president has spent more than a year questioning the reliability of Brazil’s electronic voting system. Although there has been no evidence of fraud since it was implemented in 1996, many of Bolsonaro’s supporters now doubt the credibility of the country’s elections. A rising tide of political violence this year, punctuated in recent weeks by armed confrontations involving high-profile Bolsonaro allies, has added to fears that a contested result could trigger unrest. The TSE, led by justices from the Supreme Court, has devised a security plan to protect its staff and buildings in the event of demonstrations like the January 6, 2021, assault on the US Capitol. Bolsonaro’s allies were organising a “victory party” on Brasilia’s central esplanade yesterday during the vote count. The president has also asked supporters to remain at voting stations until they close, which critics say could intimidate voters and lead to clashes. Lula, who was born into poverty and led union strikes against Brazil’s military government before founding the Workers Party in the 1980s, has called on voters to defend Brazil’s democracy from Bolsonaro’s “neofascism.” Adding to the climate of uncertainty, Bolsonaro has pushed the military to endorse publicly his theory that the voting system is vulnerable to fraud. The armed forces checked some voting machines during the first-round vote to be sure paper receipts matched results transmitted digitally, but did not report their findings. Retired army generals have told Reuters they trust the armed forces would not back any unconstitutional moves by Bolsonaro.

The United States will give Pakistan a further $30 million in aid to help millions of people whose lives were disrupted by severe flooding in recent months, the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad said on Thursday. "The new funding will expand efforts to address immediate needs, scaling up assistance to the most affected communities and enabling USAID to reach more than 4 million people," said a statement from the U.S. Embassy, referring to the U.S. government aid agency. The funding would take the total in disaster-related assistance from the U.S. to Pakistan this year to $97 million. Pakistani officials have estimated damage from torrential monsoon rains that killed over 1,000 people and displaced tens of millions at more than $40 billion. Some Pakistani leaders have said the world needs to do more to provide financial support to the South Asian nation, which is highly vulnerable to climate-related disasters despite having produced a tiny fraction of global greenhouse case emissions. U.S. Ambassador Donald Blome said during a visit to flood-hit areas in the southern province of Sindh that the new assistance would help with food and medical support as well as providing shelter supplies for homeless citizens in the lead up to winter. This month, the United Nations revised up its humanitarian aid appeal for Pakistan five-fold to $816 million from $160 million, as a surge of water-borne diseases and fear of growing hunger posed new dangers after weeks of unprecedented flooding.

International climate pledges remain far off track to limit temperature rises to 1.5 degrees Celsius, according to a UN report released Wednesday, less than two weeks ahead of high-stakes negotiations to tackle global warming. The combined climate pledges of more than 190 nations that signed up to the 2015 Paris climate deal put Earth on track to warm around 2.5C (36 degrees Fahrenheit) compared to pre-industrial levels by the century's end, the UN said. With the planet already battered by climate-enhanced heatwaves, storms and floods after just 1.2C of warming, experts say the world is still failing to act with sufficient urgency to curb greenhouse gas emissions. "We are still nowhere near the scale and pace of emission reductions required to put us on track toward a 1.5 degrees Celsius world," said Simon Stiell, Executive Secretary of UN Climate Change. "To keep this goal alive, national governments need to strengthen their climate action plans now and implement them in the next eight years." The UN's climate experts have said emissions -- compared to 2010 levels -- need to fall 45 percent by 2030 in order to meet the Paris deal's more ambitious goal. In this latest report, the UN said that current commitments from governments around the world will in fact increase emissions by 10.6 percent by 2030. When nations met in Glasgow last year for a previous round of climate negotiations, they agreed to speed up their climate pledges to cut carbon pollution and increase financial flows to vulnerable developing nations. But only 24 countries, of 193, had updated their plans at the time of the report, which Stiell said was "disappointing". "Government decisions and actions must reflect the level of urgency, the gravity of the threats we are facing, and the shortness of the time we have remaining to avoid the devastating consequences of runaway climate change," he said. He called on governments to revisit and strengthen their carbon cutting plans in line with the Paris temperature goals before the UN climate meeting, which will be held from November 6 to 18 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. Nations are meeting in the shadow of Russia's invasion of Ukraine and cascading global crises of hunger, energy prices and living costs, exacerbated by extreme weather. Scientists have warned that any rise above 1.5C risks the collapse of ecosystems and the triggering of irreversible shifts in the climate system. In the last year alone, the world has seen unprecedented floods, crop-withering heatwaves and wildfires across four continents. With the impacts slamming hardest into countries least responsible for fossil fuel emissions, calls have grown louder for richer polluters to pay "loss and damage" to vulnerable nations. In a landmark report this year on climate impacts and vulnerabilities, the UN's 195-nation Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that time had nearly run out to ensure a "liveable future" for all. That report was signed off by the same governments that will return to negotiations in Egypt.

Communities along the west coast of Mexico prepared for Hurricane Roslyn, a Category 3 storm, to make landfall Sunday as the US National Hurricane Center warned of potentially damaging winds, a dangerous storm surge and flash flooding. The major storm was about 130 kilometers southwest of the city of Tepic, with maximum sustained winds of 125 miles per hour and moving north at about 16 mph, the NHC said in its 0900 GMT update. It is forecast to slam into the coast of Nayarit state on Sunday morning at or near major hurricane strength, the NHC said. "Little change in strength is anticipated before landfall later this morning, and rapid weakening is expected after landfall," the NHC said. "On the forecast track, the center of Roslyn will approach the coast of west-central Mexico, likely making landfall along the coast of the Mexican state of Nayarit Sunday morning." Both the NHC and the Meteorological Service of Mexico warned of flash flooding and landslides caused by the storm. "Roslyn is expected to produce a life-threatening storm surge with significant coastal flooding near and to the east of where the center makes landfall," the NHC said. "Near the coast, the surge will be accompanied by large and destructive waves." Authorities have declared a precautionary alert in the Pacific coast states of Jalisco, Colima, Nayarit and Sinaloa. Victor Hugo Roldan, director of civil protection in Jalisco state, told reporters on Saturday that several hundred people had been evacuated from the town of La Huerta, close to the hurricane's expected path. Most went to relatives' homes, while some went to shelters, he said. Jalisco, which is slated to get up to 25 centimeters of rain in some spots, has set up shelters in the cities of Cabo Corrientes, La Huerta and the tourist resort of Puerto Vallarta. Businesses in the resort town began to close Saturday afternoon on officials' recommendations. Residents rushed to make last-minute preparations, though by late Saturday afternoon some tourists were still lounging on the beach or unsuccessfully searching for open bars and restaurants. For 59-year-old shopping mall manager Graciano Pena, the memory of 2002's Hurricane Kenna, which made landfall as a damaging Category 4 and left four dead, is still fresh. "After that experience, we heed every warning and make preparations ahead of time," he said. Other coastal states were also preparing shelters. Forecasts suggest Roslyn could make landfall near San Blas, a town of about 40,000 with several fishing communities. Tropical cyclones hit Mexico every year on both its Pacific and Atlantic coasts, usually between May and November. At the end of May, Agatha, the first Pacific storm of the season, hit the coast of the state of Oaxaca (south), where heavy rain in mountainous towns killed 11 people. In October 1997, Hurricane Pauline struck Mexico's Pacific coast as a Category 4 storm, leaving more than 200 dead.

A smart buoy that can “hear” the ocean and monitor climate change is part of a new effort to help endangered whales avoid ship collisions on their journey from Antarctica to the equator. The buoy was installed in the Gulf of Corcovado, 1,100km south of Chile’s capital, in early October and is the first of many planned by the Blue Boat Initiative, a project designed to protect whales and monitor marine ecosystems. The area is teeming with marine life and has a large number of blue whales as well as Sei and Southern right whales during the summer season in the Southern Hemisphere. “This is the beginning of a longer road,” said Sonia Espanol, director of the Blue Boat Initiative, adding their hope is to cover the gulf with at least six buoys. “From there, there are no limits, the idea is to be able to cover the entire migratory route of the whales from Antarctica to the equator.” The area, brimming with fjords and islands, deals with a large volume of marine traffic responsible for sound pollution and a threat to sea mammals that depend on sound for navigation and hunting. The buoy works by using software called Listening to the Deep Ocean Environment (LIDO), which monitors sounds and uses artificial intelligence to identify sea mammals, their type and location in real time. It then alerts nearby vessels so they can reduce noise and avoid collisions. The device also contains sensors for water temperature, oxygen levels and more to monitor ocean health and the impact of climate change, which is expected to help guide public policy.

Astronomers have observed the brightest flash of light ever seen, from an event that occurred 2.4bn light years from Earth and was likely triggered by the formation of a black hole. The burst of gamma-rays – the most intense form of electromagnetic radiation – was first detected by orbiting telescopes on October 9, and its afterglow is still being watched by scientists across the world. Astrophysicist Brendan O’Connor told AFP that gamma-ray bursts that last hundreds of seconds, as occurred that Sunday, are thought to be caused by dying massive stars, greater than 30 times bigger than our Sun. The star explodes in a supernova, collapses into a black hole, then matter forms in a disk around the black hole, falls inside, and is spewed out in a jet of energy that travels at 99.99 percent the speed of light. The flash released photons carrying a record 18 teraelectronvolts of energy – that’s 18 with 12 zeros behind it – and it has impacted long wave radio communications in Earth’s ionosphere. “It’s really breaking records, both in the amount of photons, and the energy of the photons that are reaching us,” said O’Connor, who used infrared instruments on the Gemini South telescope in Chile to take fresh observations early on Friday. “Something this bright, this nearby, is really a once-in-a-century event,” he added. Gamma-ray research first began in the 1960s when US satellites designed to detect whether the Soviet Union was detonating bombs in space ending up finding such bursts originating from outside the Milky Way. “Gamma-ray bursts in general release the same amount of energy that our Sun produces over its entire lifetime in the span of a few seconds – and this event is the brightest gamma ray burst,” said O’Connor. This gamma-ray burst, known as GRB 221009A, was first spotted by telescopes including the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa)’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, and Wind spacecraft last Sunday morning. It originated from the direction of the constellation Sagitta, and travelled 1.9bn years to reach Earth – less than the current distance of its starting point, because the universe is expanding. Observing the event now is like watching a 1.9bn-year-old recording of those events unfold before us, giving astronomers a rare opportunity to glean new insights into things like black hole formation. “That’s what makes this sort of science so addictive – you get this adrenaline rush when these things happen,” said O’Connor, who is affiliated with the University of Maryland and George Washington University. Over the coming weeks, he and others will continue watching for the signatures of supernovas at optical and infrared wavelengths, to confirm that their hypothesis about the origins of the flash are correct, and that the event conforms to known physics. Unfortunately, while the initial burst may have been visible to amateur astronomers, it has since faded out of their view. Supernova explosions are also predicted to be responsible for producing heavy elements – such as gold, platinum, uranium – and astronomers will also be on the hunt for their signatures.

The first night was the worst, Roy Harley recalls of the 10 weeks he and other survivors of a plane crash 50 years ago managed to cling to life on an Andean glacier without food or shelter, and very little reason for hope. Of the plane's 45 occupants, 16 made it home from the 72-day ordeal that became known as the "Miracle of the Andes". The only way to survive was to eat the flesh of the dead. But for Harley, a retired engineer now aged 70, that was not the worst of the nightmare made famous by the 1993 film "Alive". Carlos Paez, one of the 16 survivors of an air plane crash poses with his dogs at his house in Viٌedos de la Tahona, Canelones department, Uruguay, on August 15, 2022. AFP After the initial shock of their plane crashing into the Andes mountains on that fateful Friday the 13th of October 1972, Harley and 31 other survivors found themselves in the pitch dark in minus 30 degrees Celsius (-22 Fahrenheit) at an altitude of some 3,500 meters. Many of them not yet 20 -- the plane was flying an amateur Uruguayan rugby team and family members to a match in Chile -- none were dressed for the cold. Several were badly injured. Those who could squeezed into what remained of the fuselage between dead bodies and the screams of the wounded. "That night, I experienced hell," Harley told AFP. "At my feet was a boy who was missing a part of his face and... choking on blood. "I didn't have the courage to reach out to him, to hold his hand, to comfort him. I was afraid. I was very afraid." By morning, four more were dead, and so started a seemingly relentless torment that would eventually whittle the number of survivors down to 16. There were too many dark moments to list. "I don't have words to describe how cold it was," said Harley's former rugby teammate, fellow survivor and friend Carlos Paez, 68. "We were so cold, it was so difficult, that I have no words to describe it." Many times they thought it was the end. On Day 10, the survivors heard on the plane radio that the search for them had been called off. "One of the most painful things was... to realize that the world was going on without us," said Paez, who today travels the world as a motivational speaker. But it was also the jolt the survivors needed to take matters into their own hands and start trying to find a way off the glacier, he recalled. Another tribulation was having to broach the topic of anthropophagy -- the eating of human flesh. There was barely any food on the plane that was to have made a short flight from Mendoza in Argentina, where it had a stopover, to Santiago, Chile. There was no sustenance to be found anywhere in the desolate, ice-covered landscape, and soon the survivors were starving. A majority voted "yes" to eating their dead friends. "We had tried to eat leather, we tried to eat cigarettes, we tried to eat toothpaste," Harley recalled at Paez's home in Montevideo. "We were dying. When you have this choice: to die or to use the only thing you have... we did what we did in order to live." On Day 16, disaster struck yet again. An avalanche buried the mangled fuselage, the survivors' only shelter, as they slept. Eight were killed, leaving only 19 of the original 32 crash survivors. Three more would die in the coming days. "The avalanche was as if God had stabbed us in the back," said Paez. Displaying incredible ingenuity and tenacity, the survivors learnt, with no tools, to use plane debris to fashion bonnets, mittens, snow shoes, quilts and dark glasses against snow blindness. They found a way to melt ice and snow for drinking water in spite of the sub-zero temperatures. And finally, help did arrive. In a last, desperate effort that almost cost them their lives, survivors Roberto Canessa and Fernando Parrado walked for 10 days into the unknown, hostile terrain, guided by nothing but instinct. Finally, they came to a river and spotted men on horseback on the other side. Over the noise of the water they could not make themselves heard, but the next day one of the men was back with a piece of paper wrapped around a stone that he threw to the pair. On it, Parrado wrote a plea for help that started with the words: "I come from a plane that fell in the mountains." The next day, the first helicopters came. When he had boarded the ill-fated Uruguay Air Force plane for Chile, Harley weighed 84 kilograms. By the time he was rescued, there were a mere 37 kilograms on his 5.9-foot frame. On average, the survivors lost 29 kilograms, according to Andes 1972 Museum records. Harley and Paez insist they are not victims; their tale is one of resilience and teamwork. "An extraordinary story starring ordinary people," said Paez. "In the end, life triumphed."

Tropical storm Julia turned into a hurricane Saturday as it swirled towards Central America, where it is expected to make landfall along Nicaragua's Caribbean coast, weather forecasters said. In Bluefields, one of the main Nicaraguan coastal towns expected to be buffeted by the storm, fishermen were busy safeguarding their boats and people rushed to buy groceries and withdraw money from ATMs. "Julia has become a hurricane with 120 kilometer-per-hour maximum sustained winds as it passes near San Andres and Providencia Islands," which belong to Colombia, the US National Hurricane Center said. An official from Colombia's environment ministry told AFP the hurricane had touched down on the Caribbean islands along with a third, Santa Catalina, at about 6pm (2300 GMT), causing rain and lightning in the country's north. While authorities have so far reported no significant damage or casualties in the islands, home to about 48,000 people, President Gustavo Petro put the area on "maximum alert" and ordered hotels to open space for use as shelters. Julia is classified as a Category One storm, on the low side of the five-tier Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale. It is expected to make landfall in Nicaragua overnight, then move across the country on Sunday before traveling near or along the Pacific coasts of Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala through Monday, the NHC said. If Julia stays on its current course, it will make landfall as a Category One hurricane between the coastal communities of Orinoco and Laguna de Perlas, north of Bluefields, said Nicaraguan Vice President Rosario Murillo, citing official reports. Nicaragua has evacuated some 6,000 people in the Laguna de Perlas area, in the Miskito keys located off the coast, and in other zones. "We have to prepare with food, plastic, a little bit of everything, because we don't know what's going to happen," Javier Duarte, a cabinetmaker in Bluefields, told AFP. The municipality of some 60,000 inhabitants has many flimsy structures. The NHC said that "life-threatening flash floods and mudslides" were possible due to heavy rain "over Central America and Southern Mexico through early next week." The storm's center was about 20 miles southwest of Colombia's San Andres Island and about 125 miles northeast of Bluefields as of 0000 GMT Sunday, the NHC said. Julia is set to strike Central America less than two weeks after deadly Hurricane Ian crashed into the southwest of the US state of Florida, in one of the deadliest US hurricanes on record. The Category 4 storm flattened whole neighborhoods on the Sunshine State's west coast. More than 100 people were killed according to US media.

The US has no new intelligence on Russia’s nuclear threats, the White House said yesterday, after President Joe Biden referenced a nuclear “Armageddon” on Thursday. The US also does not have indications that Russia is preparing to imminently use nuclear weapons, and sees no reason to change its current nuclear posture, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters. “He was reinforcing what we have been saying, which is how seriously we take these threats about nuclear weapons,” Jean-Pierre said. “We have not seen any reason to adjust our own strategic nuclear posture, nor do we have indications that Russia is preparing to imminently use nuclear weapons.” On Thursday, Biden said Russian President Vladimir Putin’s threat to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine has brought the world closer to “Armageddon” than at any time since the Cold-War Cuban Missile Crisis. French President Emmanuel Macron, in response to Biden’s comments, said: “We must speak with prudence.” Biden on Thursday also said he was keeping an eye on Putin and how he might react as Ukraine’s military makes gains against Russian invaders. “For the first time since the Cuban Missile Crisis, we have a direct threat to the use of nuclear weapons, if in fact things continue down the path they’d been going,” Biden told Democratic donors in New York. In the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, the US under President John Kennedy and the Soviet Union under Nikita Khrushchev came close to the use of nuclear weapons over the presence of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba. “If the Cuban Missile Crisis has taught us anything, it is the value of reducing nuclear risk and not brandishing it,” Jean-Pierre said yesterday. Biden also told attendees that he knows Putin “fairly well” and said the Russian president was “not joking when he talks about potential use of tactical nuclear weapons or biological or chemical weapons.” His comments came about a week after Putin staged sham referendums and illegally annexed areas of southern and eastern Ukraine. Biden spoke at the New York home of businessman James Murdoch, turning to the son of conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch to try to boost his party’s chances in the November 8 congressional elections. Democrats are fighting to maintain control of both the US Senate and the House of Representatives.

Florida, North and South Carolina faced a massive clean-up yesterday from the destruction wrought by Hurricane Ian, after one of the most powerful storms ever to hit the US mainland caused tens of billions of dollars in damage and killed dozens. New images from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) showed several beach cottages and a motel building that lined the shores of Florida’s Sanibel Island were wiped away by Ian’s storm surge. Even though most homes were still standing, they appeared to have roof damage, the images showed. Shocked Florida communities counted their dead yesterday as the full scale of the devastation came into focus, two days after Hurricane Ian tore into the coastline as one of the most powerful storms ever to hit the United States. Rescuers were still searching for survivors in flooded neighbourhoods and along the state’s southwest coast, where homes, restaurants and businesses were ripped apart as Ian roared ashore as a powerful Category 4 hurricane on Wednesday. The death toll climbed to 24 yesterday, according to the Florida Medical Examiners Commission, with some US media reporting it could be three times that. Sixteen migrants also remain missing from a boat that sank during the hurricane on Wednesday, according to the US Coast Guard. Two people were found dead and nine others rescued, including four Cubans who swam to shore in the Florida Keys. More than 1.2mn customers remained without power in Florida yesterday, hampering efforts by those who evacuated to return to their homes to take stock of what they lost. “It’s just flipped upside down, soaking wet, full of mud,” resident Pete Belinda said of the home he and his wife share on the lower floor of their daughter’s house in Fort Myers Beach, a town on the Gulf of Mexico coast which took the brunt of the storm. Rita Chambers, a 70-year-old retiree who was born in Jamaica and has lived in Fort Myers since 1998, said Ian was unlike any storm she had ever seen. “And I’ve been in hurricanes since I was a child!” said Chambers, who moved to New York as a teenager. Ian passed over Florida and into the Atlantic Ocean before making US landfall again, this time on the South Carolina coast on Friday as a Category 1 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 85mph (140kph). It was later downgraded to a post-tropical cyclone, and is set to dissipate over Virginia later in the day. More than 320,000 people remained without power across North and South Carolina and Virginia, the tracking website poweroutage.us said yesterday. “We’re just beginning to see the scale of the destruction” in Florida, US President Joe Biden said on Friday. “It’s likely to rank among the worst in the nation’s history,” he said of Ian. With damage estimates running into the tens of billions of dollars, Biden said it’s “going to take months, years to rebuild”. “It’s not just a crisis for Florida,” he said. “This is an American crisis.” CoreLogic, a firm that specialises in property analysis, said wind-related losses for residential and commercial properties in Florida could cost insurers up to $32bn, while flooding losses could reach $15bn. “This is the costliest Florida storm since Hurricane Andrew made landfall in 1992,” CoreLogic’s Tom Larsen said. On Friday, the Coast Guard said it had made 117 rescues using boats and helicopters of people trapped in flooded homes. Governor Ron DeSantis said hundreds of other rescue personnel were going door-to-door “up and down the coastline”. “Those older homes that just aren’t as strong built, they got washed into the sea,” he said on Friday. “If you are hunkering down in that, that is something that I think would be very difficult to be survivable.” Many Floridians evacuated ahead of the storm, but thousands chose to shelter in place and ride it out. Two hard-hit barrier islands near Fort Myers – Pine Island and Sanibel Island – were cut off after the storm damaged causeways to the mainland. Aerial photo and video show breathtaking destruction in Sanibel and elsewhere. In Fort Myers Beach, a recreational boat called Crackerjack sat atop a pile of debris like an abandoned toy. A trailer park was blasted away to almost nothing. A handful of restaurants and bars reopened in Fort Myers, giving an illusion of normalcy amid downed trees and shattered storefronts. Before pummelling Florida, Ian plunged all of Cuba into darkness after downing the island’s power network. Electricity was gradually returning, but many homes remain without power. Human-induced climate change is resulting in more severe weather events across the globe, scientists say. According to a rapid and preliminary analysis, human-caused climate change increased the extreme rain that Ian unleashed by over 10%, US scientists said.

At least 23 people were killed and 28 wounded in a Russian missile strike that hit a convoy of vehicles carrying civilians near the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, the regional governor said. A Reuters witness saw about 12 bodies, four of them in cars, and said a missile had left a crater in the ground near two lines of vehicles at a car market. "So far, 23 dead and 28 wounded. All civilians," Oleksandr Starukh, the Zaporizhzhia regional governor, wrote on the Telegram messaging app. The impact had thrown chunks of dirt ino the air and sprayed the vehicles with shrapnel. The windows of the vehicles - mostly cars and three vans, were blown out. The vehicles were packed with the occupants’ belongings, blankets and suitcases. A body leaned from the driver's seat into the passenger seat of a yellow car, his left hand still clutching the steering wheel. Russia, which invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24 in what it calls a special military operation, denies deliberately targeting civilians though its attacks have devastated Ukrainian towns and cities.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) told Boeing it has not completed key work needed in order to certify the 737 MAX 7 by December, according to a letter from the FAA seen by Reuters. Lirio Liu, the FAA's executive director of aviation safety, told Boeing in the Sept. 19 letter that the agency had concerns about the planemaker's submissions and sought discussion "about realistic timeframes for receiving the remaining documents." The FAA told Boeing to turn in all remaining System Safety Assessments (SSAs) by mid-September "if the company intends to meet its project plan of completing certification work (and receiving FAA approval for this airplane) by December." Liu said as of Sept. 15, "just under 10% of the SSAs have been accepted by the FAA and another 70% of these documents are in various stages of review and revision." Boeing faces a December deadline to win approval from the FAA of the 737 MAX 7 and 10 variants, or it must meet new modern cockpit-alerting requirements that could significantly delay approvals. Congress could opt to waive the requirements that were adopted as part of a certification reform bill passed after two fatal 737 MAX crashes killed 346 people and led to the best-selling plane's 20-month grounding. The FAA added in the that "most concerning, however, is that Boeing has yet to provide an initial submittal for six of the outstanding SSAs." It said it expects "many of these documents will take significant time to review due to their complexity and bearing on the overall safety of the new aircraft." "Work must be completed deliberately and in such a way that an arbitrary calendar date does not become the driving factor," Liu wrote. Boeing said it is "discussing with policymakers the time needed to complete these certifications, following established processes." "We are not seeking to rush this process, and believe safety is best served by allowing the 737-7 and 737-10 certification effort the time needed to complete this important work without introducing different systems," Boeing said. "Consistent operational experience across an airplane family is an industry best practice," Boeing said. On Sept. 15, Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun predicted the company would win approval for the smaller 737 MAX 7 this year. Calhoun said if needed, Boeing would seek "some kind of extension" and make a case based on the "safety argument to win." The Seattle Times reported the FAA letter earlier.