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Last week's floods in Libya, which killed thousands of people, were made all the worse by climate change, according to a new study from World Weather Attribution. The death toll in Libya has soared into the thousands, though the United Nations has revised its confirmed totals downward as reporting from on the ground remains difficult. The researchers found that the storm, which also caused days of flooding in Greece, Spain, Bulgaria, and Turkey before hitting Libya, was made substantially more likely in the warmer world. In Libya, the difference was more stark: the storm was 50 times more likely than in a cooler climate, and it was 50% more intense. A warmer atmosphere is capable of holding more moisture, so extreme rain is becoming increasingly frequent as the climate changes.

The U.S. Embassy in Libya clarified the contents of a message delivered by U.S. Africa Command leader General Michael Langely and U.S. Special Envoy to Libya Richard Norland to Libyan political leaders. General Langley and Ambassador Norland arrived in Tripoli earlier today and met with Libyan Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah at the Ministry of Defense, alongside Chief of Staff Muhammad Al-Haddad. The meetings are part of a series the U.S. delegation will hold with military and political officials. Other topics included border security, counterterrorism, regional security developments, and their impact on Libya’s stability. The U.S. is concerned about Wagner’s growing presence in Africa, where it operates in at least six countries.

LibyaUN teams on the ground in Libya continue to deliver life-saving assistance in the most affected areas, despite access challenges. The World Food Programme is ramping up its emergency response, with local partners, reaching more than 9,000 affected people with food assistance. SudanThe deadly conflict in Sudan took centre stage today at a high-level event on the sidelines of the General Assembly in New York. Millions of people – especially in Khartoum, Darfur and Kordofan – lack access to food, water, shelter, electricity, education and health care. Children need urgent assistance.

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But they also spotted looters looking for cash and gold. “What we saw was total chaos and panic in the initial hours on Monday morning once the storm had calmed down. But I also saw looters lurking inside people’s homes trying to steal the dead’s belongings." LNA soldiers sent to help in the aftermath of the fatal flash floods in Derna take a breather. "They initially said they were there help in the rescue operations but we saw them leaving with gold and cash," he added.

AdvertisementReporters for Arabic-language channels said authorities told journalists on Monday night they must leave the city entirely by Tuesday. A reporter from al-Hurra said they were told to leave by 8 a.m. Tuesday, and Al Jazeera said it received a 1 p.m. deadline. After Morocco turned down aid offers following this month’s earthquake, analysts said that international scrutiny was a source of anxiety for the state. Derna is in the territory controlled by Khalifa Hifter, who rules the country’s east as the head of Libyan National Army. Local government officials had been calling for an evacuation for days, citing health concerns from the estimated thousands of bodies still to be retrieved.

Death tolls from the flood have ranged from 4,000 to more than 11,000, and survivors have shown concern over disorganized rescue efforts and uneven aid distribution. The burst dams had been visibly cracked since 1998, and angered flood survivors have called into question Libyan leaders’ negligence towards protecting their infrastructure. Hichem Abu Chkiouat, minister of civil aviation, told Reuters that journalist expulsions were carried out in an effort to help rescue teams. “It is an attempt to create better conditions for the rescue teams to carry out the work more smoothly and effectively,” Chkiouat said. The U.N. has sent search and rescue teams into the city which are still operating, yet an additional team from Benghazi was blocked.

Mike SzydlowskiColumbia Daily TribuneA horrible storm system, called a medicane, hit Libya recently and the associated floods killed as many as 20,000 people in a single day. Even the fiercest hurricanes traditionally only claim a very small fraction of the victims that Libya saw during this storm. It directly borders the Mediterranean Sea but, due to geographic and atmospheric patterns, receives relatively little rainfall and is considered a hot and arid climate. Far different than the 10,000-20,000 people who died in the Libya medicane. If a similar storm hit the neighboring country, Egypt, the death toll would have most certainly been far less.

The prime minister of Libyan's eastern administration says authorities have divided the flood-stricken city of Derna into four sections to create buffers in case of disease outbreaks. Tuesday's announcement comes a day after protesters demanded the city's rapid reconstruction. The United Nations has warned that a disease outbreak could create "a second devastating crisis." Government officials and aid agencies have given death tolls for the disaster ranging from about 4,000 to 11,000. The recovery operation has been poorly coordinated, and residents say aid distribution has been uneven.

The devastating storm that dumped torrential rains along the Libyan coast this month was up to 50 times more likely to occur and 50% more intense because of human-caused climate change, according to an analysis released Tuesday. The analysis was conducted by the World Weather Attribution group, which aims to quickly evaluate the possible role of climate change in extreme weather events. What’s more, the dams might not have been designed to withstand such an extreme rainfall in the first place, they say. To assess the role of climate change, researchers then combined observations of rainfall and climate models to determine if there had been changes in the likelihood and intensity of those maximum rainfalls. “For this reason, my belief is that these attribution studies actually underestimate the impact human-caused climate change is having on these events,” Mann said in an email.

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Could Derna tragedy trigger a national reconciliation in Libya? However, though divided, the governing forces of Libya have agreed to put their differences aside for now in order to deal with the calamity that has hit their country. But as in every failed state suffering from civil strife, infrastructure investment lurked at the bottom of the list of priorities. Many have said that what the world witnessed in Libya last week was an example of how a small natural disaster can dramatically impact a failed state. Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not necessarily reflect Arab News' point of view

It caused catastrophic flooding in the port city of Derna, in eastern Libya, after two nearby dams broke. First, there are the climate activists outside Libya who claim that the floods offer yet more proof of the damage humanity is supposedly doing to the planet. The dams that broke outside Derna had been left to decay for decades. The Gaddafi regime allowed oil-rich Libya to slowly decay while its members syphoned off the nation’s wealth for themselves. When it emerged that the programme of murder dated back to the Kaniyat’s prior allegiance with the Tripoli regime itself, interest tapered off.

Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister Ali Sabry deposited the instrument of accession on Tuesday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Wednesday, Xinhua news agency reported. The TPNW prohibits state parties from developing, testing, producing, manufacturing, acquiring, possessing or stockpiling nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. “Sri Lanka’s ratification of the TPNW reaffirms its long-standing commitment toward nuclear disarmament in favor of international peace and security. In this context, Sri Lanka also ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) on July 25, 2023,” the ministry said. Also Read Sri Lanka announces welfare scheme for poor families