Plans by Trump's fascist tech bros as well as Putin and Xi to build AI-run nuclear reactors on the Moon open jurisdictional dilemmas that far outpace the modest UN efforts to put a regulation regime in place for artificial intelligence. These plans are unveiled just as the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moves the symbolic hands

Pakistan's Balochistan has just witnessed one of the province's deadliest ever episodes: a wave of attacks and clashes across several cities that left dozens of civilians, fighters, and security personnel dead, with official but unconfirmed tolls as high as 200 overall. It marked the latest escalation in decades of conflict between separatist groups and the Pakistani state in Balochistan, where the central government has long been accused of exploiting rich resources while marginalizing the local population.

Amnesty International on Feb. 3 condemned both the January attack by the US military on Venezuela and the abuses long committed by the ousted Maduro government.

The Law Society of British Columbia warned Feb. 2 that the provincial government's intention to amend the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act (DRIPA) may erode judicial independence and improperly constrain the power of the courts. The proposed amendment would limit the role of the judiciary in matters related to DRIPA's implementation.

Hundreds of Danish veterans and supporters staged a silent march on Jan. 31 from the historic Kastellet fortress to the US Embassy in Copenhagen as part of a "No Words" mobilization to protest recent US rhetoric that organizers said demeans Denmark's combat contributions alongside American forces.

The Hague District Court ruled on Jan. 28 that the Netherlands has failed to meet its international obligations on climate change. The court ordered the government to adopt adequate measures to better protect Bonaire, a Dutch Caribbean island, within 18 months.

The Science & Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on Jan. 27 moved the symbolic hands of the Doomsday Clock to an unprecedented 85 seconds to midnight. The decision came a year after the clock was set to an also unprecedented 89 seconds to midnight—and three years after it was moved to 90 seconds to midnight. Each increment since 2017, when it was set at 2.5 minutes of midnight, has brought the Clock closer to doomsday than ever before. This year's statement reads: "A year ago, we warned that the world was perilously close to global disaster and that any delay in reversing course increased the probability of catastrophe. Rather than heed this warning, Russia, China, the United States, and other major countries have instead become increasingly aggressive, adversarial, and nationalistic. Hard-won global understandings are collapsing, accelerating a winner-takes-all great power competition and undermining the international cooperation critical to reducing the risks of nuclear war, climate change, the misuse of biotechnology, the potential threat of artificial intelligence, and other apocalyptic dangers." (BAS, NYT, The Guardian)

A last-minute "permanent ceasefire" may mean that northeast Syria is back from the brink of Arab-Kurdish ethnic war. But ceasefires have repeatedly broken down since fighting resumed earlier this year, with Damascus demanding disbandment of the Rojava autonomous zone, and the integration of its institutions—including its military wing, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF)—into the central government. While the new pact sets a more "gradual" pace for this integration, the Kurdish aspiration to regional autonomy and the central government's insistence on centralization may prove a long-term obstacle to peace. In Episode 315 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg weighs the odds for avoiding a conflict that holds the potential for escalation to genocide, with the connivance of the Great Powers that so recently backed the SDF to fight ISIS.