THE 18th All India People's Science Congress (AIPSC) which is the bi-annual meeting of the All India People's Science Network (AIPSN) was held from December 27-30, 2024, at Kolkata in the West Bengal University of Animal and Fishery Sciences. Activists and intellectuals, along with those in academia, together deliberated on the issues at the intersection of science, technology, and society. More than 500 delegates from 43 member organisations which are part of AIPSN attended, representing states and union territories spread across the country.

THE Vietnam War was from 1955 to 1975. But it is an unacknowledged and unrepented catastrophic chapter in history. It left upon the human and environment worlds a deep scar. This was not just any other war – but like many wars – it was a constant and merciless imperialistic attack against a country, its people, and their world. Its sheer extent of destruction and pain cannot be paralleled and resonates through decades.

THE COP29 ended with not even a whimper. After the declaration of COP28 to end the fossil fuel era, and the rich countries promise to provide funds for those facing the dual threat of climate change and poverty, in COP29 they reneged on all those promises. They not only made no commitments to phasing out their own fossil fuel use – particularly natural gas and oil but committed a measly $300 billion yearly as a core target through commercial and other flows against the $1.3 trillion that the developing countries were asking; that too by 2035.

THE climate summit COP29 at Baku, Azerbaijan, once again demonstrated the dominance of global capitalism led by the US over the international negotiations process under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to regulate greenhouse gas (GHG), especially carbon dioxide, emissions and bring under control resultant climate changes. These are already posing large-scale threats to people and ecosystems and are now on the brink of possibly irreversible changes and even greater dangers ahead.

COP 29, the UN Climate Change Conference, started on November 11 in Baku, Azerbaijan, and is slated to finish on the 22nd. It is taking place under the shadow of significant temperature rises this summer across the globe, and the clear warning of what it means for us. It is also taking place at a time in which the US has elected a president, Donald Trump, who, among other things, is also a climate change denier and unlikely to accept any global consensus in COP 29.Global warming, even for the countries in the freezing north, is no longer in the realm of scientific debates.