作者：王海海安 来源：原创 发布日期：08-22
A | 美国加州南部山火已经持续肆虐一周，目前灭火工作仍然进展有限。 Dozens of businesses, government offices, vehicles, and at least three police stations went up in flames in Freetown, Makeni, Kamakwie, and other cities across Sierra Leone from August 10 through 12, with over 113 people arrested and police introducing an emergency nationwide curfew and deploying tear gas and live ammunition to disperse crowds.,The curfew was lifted on August 13, with banks, businesses, government offices, and most stores reopened and communal services beginning to clear the damage. However, ramped-up security measures, including federal troop deployments to assist police, have been left in place.,What Happened?,Sierra Leone is one of the poorest nations in the world, ranking 186 out of 198 in a recent GDP purchasing power parity ranking. An estimated 80 percent of the population lives in poverty, many of them in the country’s rural areas. Like other nations in Africa, the country has faced special difficulties amid the global economic calamity brought on by COVID, and exacerbated by Western restrictions on Russian exports of agricultural goods and fertilizers amid the security crisis in Ukraine, which has caused a major jump in food prices.,AfricaAnti-Russia Sanctions Left Africa Without Access to Grain and Fertilisers, African Union Chief Says3 June, 11:13 GMT,As a net importer of both energy and food, Sierra Leone is especially vulnerable to global economic conditions, and along with food and fertilizers, fuel and electricity costs have also soared. Food prices alone have jumped by over 40 percent over the past few months, with a bag of rice once costing 350 leones now going for over 500. The country’s Central Bank recently removed three zeros from the national currency in a bid to restore confidence. The country has also been overcome by weeks of strikes by government workers, including doctors and teachers, and by small traders protesting poor conditions.,Coup Plot?,However, President Julius Maada Bio has also accused protesters of having ulterior motives beyond the cost of living crisis.,“This was not a protest against the high cost of living occasioned by the ongoing global economic crisis. The chant of the insurrectionists was for a violent overthrow of the democratically-elected government,” Bio said in an address on August 12 after returning to the country from a holiday in London.,Local media pointed to the chants of “Bio must go” among protesters as they gathered in the capital, and the president accused some of the demonstrators of consisting of “APC Warriors,” a reference to the opposition All People’s Congress party, which governed the country from 2007 until 2018, when Bio’s Sierra Leone People’s Party won national elections.,No doubt mindful of the violent civil war which shook the country between 1991 and 2002, claiming as many as 70,000 lives and displacing over 2.5 million people, Bio vowed that “in the coming weeks and months, [the] government will undertake necessary security actions meant to guarantee the peace and security of all citizens.”,“The security forces will, and must, act with great restraint and within their professional codes of service. But be assured that my government will crack down hard on violent insurrectionists, their collaborators, their sponsors and their supporters. My government will relentlessly fight those who would rather use terror and gruesome violence to achieve political goals,” the president said.,As a government, we will continue our engagement with Civil Society as we strive to promote sustainable peace, national cohesion and socio-economic development in Sierra Leone. #newdirectionagenda— President Julius Maada Bio (@PresidentBio) August 18, 2022,Bio did not elaborate on who these “sponsors” and “supporters” were, or whether they included any foreign actors.,Geopolitical Context,Like other African nations, Sierra Leone recently rejected calls by Washington and Brussels to show solidarity with the West and Ukraine and impose sanctions on Russia. But even before the escalation of the Ukraine crisis, relations between Freetown and Washington were tense at times. Last year, US President Joe Biden snubbed Bio by refusing to invite the African leader to the US’ so-called “Democracy Summit.” No reasons were given. However, neighboring Liberia, which faced mass civil unrest of its own between 2019 and 2020, and whose officials have been sanctioned by the US over suspected corruption, did get an invite.,While Sierra Leone maintains economic and political ties with its former British colonial masters, and remains a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, Freetown has sought to expand its partnerships with other geopolitical power centers, including Russia and China. President Bio attended the Russia-Africa Summit in Sochi in 2019, where he discussed ways to strengthen economic cooperation between the distant nations. In February 2021, Freetown signed onto Moscow’s efforts to prevent the deployment of weapons in outer space. In May 2021, Bio spoke by phone to President Xi Jinping of China, where they discussed the friendly, “brotherly” relations between the two nations, as well Chinese assistance to Freetown in measures against COVID, and agricultural and economic development.,In this context, the reactions of major foreign powers to this month’s unrest have been telling. While the United States, Britain, and the European Union collectively expressed “grave concern” over the “disturbing reports of violence” and urged the parties to “stay calm, promote accountability and ensure respect for human rights,” China’s Embassy smoothed over the protests altogether, refraining from wagging its finger at Freetown and instead trumpeting the expanding cooperation between the two countries.,We are gravely concerned by reports of violence surrounding today’s demonstrations in Sierra Leone. We urge all parties to stay calm, promote accountability, and ensure respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.— Bureau of African Affairs (@AsstSecStateAF) August 10, 2022,Similarly, while UK High Commissioner to Sierra Leone Lisa Chesney lectured President Bio about how “violence has no place in a democracy and the necessary investigation into August 10 can sit alongside de-escalation,” the Russian Embassy in the Republic of Guinea, which concurrently serves as the Embassy in Sierra Leone, only presented a bare bones report on the situation in the country, Bio’s meetings with community and tribal leaders, and indicated that an internal “debriefing” was being created “regarding the causes, course and consequences of the riots on August 10.”。山火已造成24人死亡，而接下来的不利天气条件可能将再次助长火势蔓延。山火已持续一周 灭火工作仍进展有限据加州林业与消防局当地时间12日傍晚的数据，加州各地共有105起大大小小的山火，总过火面积超过163平方公里。
B | 规模较大的伊顿山火只有27%得到控制，帕利塞德山火仅有13%得到控制。山火已造成超过12300栋建筑被烧毁。
C | 目前，洛杉矶县已疏散15万居民，其中超过700人住在临时避难所中。在洛杉矶太平洋-帕利塞德地区，一段去年5月和今年1月10日拍摄的对比画面显示，山火导致很多地方已经被夷为平地，房屋化为废墟，树木也被烧焦。受灾居民 阿维娃·科帕肯：实际上，我非常非常担心，我的房东每天都给我们更新信息，他一直说情况可能有变。我很害怕，因为如果情况真的改变了，说实话，我不知道我该去哪里。受灾居民 艾伦·弗劳尔斯：我目前住在圣克鲁斯，我在2018年搬到那里时也曾遇上大火，所以我看到过类似的情况，整个城市和社区被烧毁，即使在六年之后，他们仍然在重建。所以我有些担心，担心我们现在的房子，还有我妈妈房子的未来。强风再次来袭 或助推火势蔓延据美国媒体报道，季风“圣安娜风”13日将再次来袭，14日将是非常危险的一天。这可能将助长火势蔓延，甚至引发新的火灾，给灭火工作带来挑战。受灾居民 苏珊娜·科尔达：每天早上醒来，我不知道我们的房子是否还在。这非常痛苦，我们非常担心接下来的几天“圣安娜风”再次来袭。加州大学洛杉矶分校气象学家 丹尼尔·斯温：这些火灾已经震惊了我们，之后可能会以一些更加令人不适的方式，再次让我们感到震惊。因为在接下来的7到10天里，我们会看到更多助长火灾的极端天气条件。
D | 加州山火或为人为纵火？专家将实地勘察目前，美国调查人员正在调查洛杉矶山火的起因，调查方向包括人为纵火和电缆起火等常见起因。据美联社12日报道，调查人员已排除雷电引发山火的可能性，因为帕利塞德和伊顿两场山火涉及的区域均没有雷电报告。调查人员目前判定，帕利塞德山火的起火点位于彼德拉·莫拉达路旁的一处民宅后方，那里坐落于树木茂密的河谷之上。据美国《洛杉矶时报》12日报道，第一个打报警电话报告帕利塞德山火的人是住在彼德拉·莫拉达路附近的一位居民。
E | 这位居民说，他当时看到大火在距其房宅约三公里处升起。
F | 多名要求匿名的知情人士向《洛杉矶时报》披露，帕利塞德山火可能是人为纵火。
G | 美国酒精、烟草、火器和爆炸物管理局专家组定于13日开始实地勘察。调查人员关注的一个潜在起火区域是当地一处著名徒步景点的周边小径。那里常有游客光顾，跨年夜时曾爆发一起小型火灾，延烧数小时后被消防人员借助直升机洒水扑灭。据报道，加州公用事业委员会要求当地电力公司及时上报“可能关联野火的电力事故”，之后该委员会可介入调查事故中是否存在违法行为。不过，南加州爱迪生电力公司10日报告称，在该公司服务的帕萨迪纳附近山区，未发现迹象显示其设备与伊顿山火有关。山火爆发前12小时至爆发后一个多小时，电力未中断，也未发现电缆或操作异常。美联社称，山火也可能由烧荒用火、烟花爆竹甚至偶发事件引起。
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Published on:00:20:23