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Washington (CNN) — Drone strikes are a necessary evil, but one that must be used with more temperance as the United States’ security situation evolves, President Barack Obama said Thursday.

America prefers to capture, interrogate and prosecute terrorists, but there are times when this isn’t possible, Obama said in a speech at the National Defense University in Washington. Terrorists intentionally hide in hard-to-reach locales and putting boots on the ground is often out of the question, he said.

Thus, when the United States is faced with a threat from terrorists in a country where the government has only tenuous or no influence, drones strikes are the only option — and they’re legal because America “is at war with al Qaeda, the Taliban and their associated forces,” Obama said.

He added, however, “To say a military tactic is legal, or even effective, is not to say it is wise or moral in every instance. For the same progress that gives us the technology to strike half a world away also demands the discipline to constrain that power — or risk abusing it.”

Increased oversight is important, but not easy, Obama said. While he has considered a special court or independent oversight board, those options are problematic, so he plans to talk with Congress to determine how best to handle the deployment of drones, he said.

Obama speaks on anti-terror strategy

Obama defends secret drone program

Obama’s counterterrorism policy

The battle to force feed Gitmo detainees

The nation’s image was a theme throughout the speech, as Obama emphasized some actions in recent years — drone strikes and Guantanamo Bay key among them — risk creating more threats. The nature of threats against the United States have changed since he took office — they’ve become more localized — and so, too, must efforts to combat them, he said.

“From our use of drones to the detention of terror suspects, the decisions that we are making now will define the type of nation and world that we leave to our children,” he said.

Today, al Qaeda operatives in Pakistan and Afghanistan worry more about protecting their own skin than attacking America, he said, but the threat is more diffuse, extending into places such as Yemen, Iraq, Somalia and North Africa. And al Qaeda’s ideology helped fuel attacks like the ones at the Boston Marathon and U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi.

Obama said the use of lethal force extends to U.S. citizens as well.

On Wednesday, his administration disclosed for the first time that four Americans had been killed in counterterrorist drone strikes overseas, including one person who was targeted by the United States.

“When a U.S. citizen goes abroad to wage war against America — and is actively plotting to kill U.S. citizens; and when neither the United States, nor our partners are in a position to capture him before he carries out a plot — his citizenship should no more serve as a shield than a sniper shooting down on an innocent crowd should be protected from a SWAT team,” Obama said.

To stop terrorists from gaining a foothold, drones will be deployed, Obama said, but only when there is an imminent threat; no hope of capturing the targeted terrorist; “near certainty” that civilians won’t be harmed; and “there are no other governments capable of effectively addressing the threat.” Never will a strike be punitive, he said.

Those who die as collateral damage “will haunt us for as long as we live,” the president said, but he emphasized that the targeted individuals aim to exact indiscriminate violence, “and the death toll from their acts of terrorism against Muslims dwarfs any estimate of civilian casualties from drone strikes.”

It’s not always feasible to send in Special Forces, as in the Osama bin Laden raid, to stamp out terrorism, and even if it were, the introduction of troops could mean more deaths on both sides, Obama said.

“The result would be more U.S. deaths, more Blackhawks down, more confrontations with local populations and an inevitable mission creep in support of such raids that could easily escalate into new wars,” he said.

The American public is split on where and how drones should be used, according to a March poll by Gallup.

Although 65% of respondents said drones should be used against suspected terrorists abroad, only 41% said drones should be used against American citizens who are suspected terrorists in foreign countries.

Guantanamo to shut down?

Guantanamo Bay also threatens to create new enemies of the state and diminish the country’s moral standing in the world, Obama said, revisiting a campaign promise he made before his first term.

“The original premise for opening Gitmo — that detainees would not be able to challenge their detention — was found unconstitutional five years ago,” he said. “In the meantime, Gitmo has become a symbol around the world for an America that flouts the rule of law.”

Because of what Gitmo represents, some allies are reluctant to cooperate on investigations with the United States if a suspect might land at the controversial detention center, Obama said.

That’s not to mention the economic implications, the president said. The country spends $150 million annually to imprison 166 suspects, and the Defense Department estimates that keeping Gitmo open may cost another $200 million “at a time when we are cutting investments in education and research here at home,” he said.

Explaining that no prisoner has ever escaped a supermax or military facility — and noting U.S. courtshave had no issue prosecuting terrorists, some more dangerous than those at Guantanamo — Obama said he would push again to close the detention center and appoint State and Defense department envoys to make sure the detainees are transferred to other countries.

Seventy percent of respondents to a February 2012 ABC/Washington Post poll said they approve of keeping the facility open for suspected terrorists. Only 24% said it should be closed.

One of his initiatives aims to lift a moratorium on transferring prisoners to Yemen, long a volatile land but now ruled by a government regarded by the United States as a “willing and able partner.” Yemenis make up a significant portion of Guantanamo inmates.

In a statement issued through its embassy in Washington, Yemen’s government welcomed the U.S. decision and vowed to “work with the United States to take all necessary steps to ensure the safe return of its detainees and will continue working towards their gradual rehabilitation and integration back into society.”

Obama said he will insist on judicial review from every Guantanamo detainee, and when it’s appropriate, terrorists will be transferred stateside to stand trial in courts and “our military justice system.”

“Given my administration’s relentless pursuit of al Qaeda’s leadership, there is no justification beyond politics for Congress to prevent us from closing a facility that should never have been opened,” the president said.

There are 86 inmates at Guantanamo who have been cleared for transfer, 56 of them from Yemen.

While Obama worked to close Guantanamo early in his first term, Congress enacted significant restrictions on the transfer of detainees from the prison that made its closure impractical.

This year, the State Department reassigned the special envoy who had been tasked in 2009 with closing the facility and lowered the post’s profile by assigning the job to the department’s legal adviser’s office.

The problem has been exacerbated by the fact more than half the facility’s inmates engaging in various forms of hunger strike, more than 20 of them being force-fed.

New dangers have emerged

Obama made the case that the al Qaeda terror network in the Afghan and Pakistan region has been weakened but that new dangers have emerged as the U.S. winds down operations in Afghanistan after more than a decade of war triggered by the 9/11 attacks.

Threats that have emerged come from al Qaeda affiliates, localized extremist groups and homegrown terrorists, like the two men suspected of attacking the Boston Marathon last month.

The administration has been considering shifting control of lethal drone operations from the CIA to the military. One senior administration official said the “military is the appropriate agency to use force,” not to rule out the range of options needed to deal with threats.

By law, the military is not able to act in the covert way the CIA can in this particular arena and must answer to Congress.

In his confirmation hearing for CIA director, John Brennan expressed a desire to move the agency away from paramilitary operations and back to traditional areas of espionage.

“The CIA should not be doing traditional military activities and operations,” he said.

Obama rejected the idea of a global war on terror in favor of a more focused approach that will engage on specific networks of extremists who threaten the United States.

The administration plans to avoid operations that will cause civilian casualties and wants to work with partners in its operations.

Use of force will be part of a larger strategy to deal with instability and hostility. Obama discussed strategies for promoting democratic governance and economic development and fostering U.S. engagement around the world.

Holder: Drone strikes have killed four Americans since 2009

The president also raised the unpopular topic of foreign aid, presenting it not as charity but as a means of national security. It amounts to less than 1% of the national a budget but is integral to fighting terrorism, he said.

“For what we spent in a month in Iraq at the height of the war, we could be training security forces in Libya, maintaining peace agreements between Israel and its neighbors, feeding the hungry in Yemen, building schools in Pakistan, and creating reservoirs of goodwill that marginalize extremists,” he said.

Republican: Obama speech ‘a victory’ for terrorists

Several Republicans panned Obama’s speech.

Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, criticized the idea of closing the Guantanamo Bay prison and said, “The president’s policies signal a retreat from the threat of al Qaeda.”

“The Obama administration’s return to a pre-9/11 counterterrorism mindset puts American lives at risk,” the Texas Republican said. “This war will continue whether the president acknowledges it or not.”

Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia said that announcing plans to close the facility “sends the message to … detainees that if they harass the dedicated military personnel there enough, we will give in and send them home, even to Yemen.”

“The president’s speech today will be viewed by terrorists as a victory,” Chambliss said.

But at least one Republican, Sen. John McCain, pledged that he’d work with Obama and his administration.

“In light of the president’s speech today, we will pledge our willingness to work with (Obama) to see that Guantanamo Bay is closed,” said the Arizona Republican.

The reproaches didn’t only come from the right.

The American Civil Liberties Union’s leader — even as he cheered plans to close the Guantanamo prison and allow for more oversight on drone strikes — criticized “still insufficient transparency” regarding drones, what he called “unconstitutional military commissions” and the lack of what he’d call a “clear plan” to end “indefinite detention.”

“President Obama’s efforts to repair his legacy in the eyes of future historians will require that he continue to double down if he is to fully restore this nation’s standing at home and abroad,” Anthony Romero said in a statement.

CNN’s Elise Labott, Chris Lawrence, Barbara Starr and Dan Merica contributed to this report.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/23/politics/obama-terror-speech/index.html?eref=edition

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Jim Whittaker, left, and Sherpa Nawang Gombu summited Mount Everest together in 1963. It cemented a bond for the two men. Click through our gallery to see Whittaker’s time on Everest, and how his son, Leif, has followed in his footsteps.

Whittaker summits Mount Everest on May 1, 1963, at 1 p.m.

Jim Whittaker after the climb.

Sherpas, known as high-altitude porters in 1963, carry packs on the 185-mile trek to reach Everest base camp.

Climbers work their way through the dangerous Khumbu Icefall, a shedding glacier just after Everest base camp.

The Khumbu Icefall is also where expedition member Jake Breitenbach lost his life when the ice became unstable and buried him (not pictured).

President John F. Kennedy awards Jim Whittaker the Hubbard Medal.

Whittaker, right, and his son, Leif, near Everest base camp in 2012.

Leif Whittaker captured this photo as Dave Hahn ascends the rocky Geneva Spur between Camp 3 and Camp 4 in 2010. The following images feature his stunning photographry during 2010 and 2012 on Everest.

Mount Everest base camp at night during the 2012 expedition.

Leif Whittaker stands on the summit of Mount Everest on May 26, 2012.

Camp 3, at 24,000 feet above sea level, on the Lhotse Face at sunset during the 2010 expedition.

Expedition member Dave Hahn peers out at the Himalaya from Pumori Camp I in 2012.

A Buddhist stupa on the trail to Mount Everest Base Camp in 2012.

Expedition member Melissa Arnot uses a ladder to cross in the Khumbu Icefall in 2012.

Camp 2, at 21,300 feet, in an Everest featured named the Western Cwm, in 2010.

Jim and Leif pause for a moment on the trail to Mount Everest Base Camp in 2012.

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(CNN) — When Jim Whittaker became the first American to stand on top of Mount Everest 50 years ago, he was anything but elated.

Reaching Earth’s highest point only 10 years after New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary became the first to summit, Whittaker said 50 mph winds were “blowing like hell,” compounding the already outrageous temperature of 35 below zero.

The jetstream blasted Whittaker and Sherpa Nawang Gombu as Whittaker pounded the pick of his American flag into the ice.

But when the two men looked down from their perch, 29,028 feet above sea level, they realized summiting was not their journey’s end. They still had far to go, and they’d just run out of bottled oxygen on top of the world.

Sherpas, climbers sign Everest treaty

Saudi woman makes Everest history

“Oh, boy, we’ve got to get down,” Whittaker thought. “Getting to the summit is half of the climb. You’re working so hard to get up, you don’t really think about anything else.”

Whittaker’s expedition members’ childhoods had been filled with a passion for climbing.

Richard Pownall was bitten by the mountaineering bug in 1943 when an English teacher sent students to the library to pick out a book. After reading about climbing, Pownall got a summer job working at Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming, but that stint couldn’t sate his curiosity and zeal for exploration.

Whittaker discovered his passion at 14, scaling the peaks of the Northwest U.S. and, later, while guiding people up Mount Rainier in college. After summiting Mount McKinley, the highest U.S. peak, the next natural step was “the big one,” he said.

When the Americans began scaling Everest, their journey was far different from that of today’s climbers. For one, they were the only team on the mountain at the time.

They also had to trek 185 miles through the sweltering Chitwa Jungle, their packs stuffed with cold-weather gear for when the elevation rose. That’s about the distance from Seattle, Washington, to Portland, Oregon, though the Nepalese trek involves pathways along 18,000-foot ridges, Whittaker pointed out.

Today, climbers fly 140 miles into Nepal and trek 40 miles into base camp.

80-year-old Japanese man becomes oldest to climb Mount Everest

Once at Everest, it wasn’t long before Whittaker’s expedition experienced disaster. Two days into the climb, three men were opening a route through the Khumbu Icefall — where descending glaciers break off into jagged, car- and house-sized chunks — when glacier pieces collapsed around them, burying them in ice, Pownall said.

He was able to climb out, but ended his summit attempt.

Jake Breitenbach, a 27-year-old guide from Jackson, Wyoming, didn’t survive. He was buried deep in the ice. His body wouldn’t be recovered until much later.

“You’re halfway around the world,” Whittaker said. “You immediately think of your family.”

They were all shaken, but Everest’s fierce conditions forbade them from dwelling on it. They had to keep moving. They could mourn later.

Though the view from the peak is spectacular, the Himalayas and Nepal unfolding beneath them, Whittaker said his team was more amazed by the scenery on their way back down. After months of living in thin air, they noticed the air became thicker and softer as the oxygen increased.

At one point, they found themselves clustered, looking down at a little blade of grass coming up through the scree.

“This green, emerald green — God, it was just incredible,” Whittaker said. “There is nothing growing up above, no color — it’s all snow, ice and rock. We were in tears. We had lost Jake up on the mountain but now we were coming back into life, this beautiful, lush, gorgeous planet that supports life. A little blade of grass just stunned the whole team.”

Almost 49 years after summiting Everest, Whittaker, then-83, found himself back at base camp in 2012. His son, Leif, 27, wanted to reach the so-called “Head of the Sky” for a second time. Leif Whittaker had done it without his father in 2010.

Whittaker and his son had trekked to a base camp in 2003, but they had no intention of summiting.

First Saudi woman summits Mount Everest

Whittaker said he never encouraged or discouraged his son from mountaineering, but his son discovered it for himself at age 15. After being asked so many times if he’d follow in his dad’s footsteps up the face of Everest, Leif found his answer on their 2003 trip.

“It was the natural power and majesty of that place that I felt some special connection to,” Leif said. “I think we all are affected by landscapes in a different way, and for me, a boy who had grown up with that idea of Mount Everest in his head, seeing Everest for the first time made me want to climb it.”

Whittaker hoped to walk into base camp with his son in 2012, but a day from their destination, he caught an intestinal bug. The seasoned mountaineer who had once conquered Everest was within him, telling him to keep going, but he decided it was too dicey.

Meanwhile, Leif Whittaker faced a different danger: overcrowding. Ten people died on Everest in 2012, raising questions about how many people should receive permits to scale the perilous peak.

Leif waited for more than an hour at 28,700 feet, just below the summit, as 100 people slowly descended the tricky Hillary Step. If it hadn’t been for calm winds May 26, the last window of good weather, he would have been forced back down.

“Each person climbs Everest for different reasons. The reason that I climb is because I love the mountain, I love what comes with it: the view from the top, the camaraderie of good teammates, the personal challenge of the experience, pushing past your own boundaries and growing because of that experience.”

Father and son experienced the magnitude of emotion that comes with being at Everest together, and Whittaker is proud his son reached the summit twice. While the achievement continues the family legacy, Whittaker wanted his children to appreciate the life around them.

“I came back from Everest without ego because you realize how insignificant you are, just a speck in the vast universe,” Whittaker said. “You dwell in the silence of the forest and the high mountains. They are the highest cathedrals in the world.”

Childhood dream leads climber up Everest — twice in one week

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/24/us/everest-1963-expedition-whittaker/index.html?eref=edition

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/NewsRipplesWeb/~3/stlxE_d71HQ/everest-anniversary

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Jes Baker, who blogs under the name “The Militant Baker,” changed Abercrombie and Fitch’s logo to “Attractive Fat” to challenge CEO Mike Jeffries’ comments about marketing to “cool, good-looking people.” The company doesn’t carry above a size 10 or large for women.

“I was inspired by the opportunity to show that I am secure in my skin and to flaunt this by using the controversial platform that you created,” Baker wrote. Here, she poses with model John C. Shay.

Baker said Jeffries’ comments “created an incredible opportunity for social change” about body image in the fashion industry.

Baker said she was nervous about the shoot, but only because she had never modeled with another person or in a sexual manner.

“The only thing you’ve done through your comments (about thin being beautiful and only offering XL and XXL in your stores for men) is reinforce the unoriginal concept that fat women are social failures, valueless, and undesirable,” Baker wrote to Jeffries.

“Never in our culture do we see sexy photo shoots that pair short, fat, unconventional models with not short, not fat, professional models,” Baker wrote.

Baker said the shoot isn’t about larger sizes at Abercrombie, “it’s about teaching the world that everybody is equal in value.”

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(CNN) — Jes Baker is cutting retailer Abercrombie Fitch down to size.

Baker, who blogs under the name “The Militant Baker” and wears a size 22, changed the brand’s AF logo to “Attractive Fat” in a mock, black-and-white Abercrombie ad to challenge the line’s branding efforts.

The photos come as a provocative response to contentious comments Abercrombie CEO Mike Jeffries made in a 2006 Salon article about the multibillion-dollar brand’s target audience.

“In every school there are the cool and popular kids, and then there are the not-so-cool kids,” Jeffries said. “Candidly, we go after the cool kids. We go after the attractive all-American kid with a great attitude and a lot of friends. A lot of people don’t belong [in our clothes], and they can’t belong. Are we exclusionary? Absolutely.”

The divisive remarks resurfaced earlier this month after a series of protests went viral, from Greg Karber’s video of himself giving homeless people Abercrombie clothing to a Change.org petition for larger sizes by a teenage eating disorder survivor.

Video mocks Abercrombie and Fitch CEO

The plus-size community particularly took umbrage to the CEO’s business model because the retailer currently does not offer clothes above size 10 or large for women.

“I challenge the separation of attractive and fat, and I assert that they are compatible regardless of what you believe,” Baker, 26, wrote in a public letter addressed to the CEO.

Jeffries has since apologized in a statement: “While I believe this 7-year-old, resurrected quote has been taken out of context, I sincerely regret that my choice of words was interpreted in a manner that has caused offense.”

Baker spoke to CNN about Jeffries’ comments and her motivations to address them. The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

CNN: You start your letter with a preface that Jeffries’ opinion “isn’t shocking; millions share the same sentiment.” The comments are from 2006 — what motivated you to act on them?

Jes Baker: It really wasn’t upset or outrage at all. I’ve been an art major for the majority of my academic life, and so I am always trying to find opportunities to do something artistic.

I just thought we don’t see the juxtaposition of typical and atypical bodies in advertising specifically. Since I am a woman and I am fat and that’s what I have to work with, I wanted to show that contrast by finding a male model.

Really, it just came because I wanted to not be angry about it. I wanted to not say, “This is an outrage, I’ve never heard of this before,” but say, “OK, well, look at this. Look at how awesome this is.”

And, I think when you’re talking about really serious subjects, and this is kind of serious, it’s important to be a little bit cheeky and pull in a little bit of humor so that it’s approachable — and it worked.

CNN: In your letter, you credit Jeffries with creating “an incredible opportunity for social change.” What did you mean by that?

Baker: In the body-positive world, which is still a subculture, fashion for fat people — what they call “fatshion” — is a really big political statement. So is the concept of, for example, a fat person walking around wearing cut-off shorts and not apologizing for their body being so observable.

Being positive and having confidence is a huge deal. Through a very, very large company that deals with fashion and also deals with unrealistic body images, it’s a perfect opportunity. You’re bringing in fashion, you’re bringing in body consciousness in general, you’re bringing in kids who shop at the mall — it’s all these wonderful things combined in one opportunity.

CNN: Have you always been comfortable in your own body?

Baker: No, no, no. I think of all of us, to some certain extent, feel the same things. I was crippled from shame my entire life. Only in this last year have I been so dedicated to this journey of learning how to survive bad days and find wanted days. If anyone tells you they have 100% good days, they’re probably lying.

I have 26 years to undo and rewire and I’m still working on it, but it’s definitely a very conscious decision. And writing has really helped, as well.

CNN: The response has obviously been huge.

Baker: It’s wonderful. I’m sure there are negatives, but for every negative, there are 20 positives.

The most powerful part is saying there is a reality that you can exist in where you’re OK, and it doesn’t make you gullible or delusional, it makes you strong.

For a lot of people, it’s just a light bulb. I know I had one where I said “What? I don’t have to live in self-loathing for the rest of my life?”

People are entertaining the idea that maybe there is a piece of self-worth for them out there somewhere. And once it starts, it grows.

CNN: Let’s talk about the actual photo shoot. Were you nervous?

Baker: I had never met the model until that day. I credit the majority of this to the photographer, Liora, because she really made it come to life.

He was the most genuine, down-to-earth person. It was so much fun.

In the beginning, I was nervous, but mostly because I had never modeled with other people. I have done solo fashion modeling, but never with another person and never in a sexual manner — so it was a really interesting experiment.

CNN: Have you heard from Jeffries or Abercrombie Fitch?

Baker: No, I didn’t write this letter technically for them. I like to not invest a lot of my time in people who are dedicated to misunderstanding me. What I wanted to do is reach women who look and feel like me. We never see this pairing; we never see a fat woman in a positive light. I want to empower the individual woman.

When Mike Jeffries is gone, there’s going to be another company. It’s not about the extra-large shirts at Abercrombie; it’s about teaching the world that everybody is equal in value.

Follow Sarah LeTrent on Twitter and CNN Living on Facebook

What do you think of Baker’s spoof ads and Jeffries’ comments? Share your opinion in the comments section below.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/23/living/abercrombie-attractive-and-fat/index.html?eref=edition

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(CNN) — In the battle against cancer, one video game is taking the deadly disease head-on. And some young patients are the winners.

“Re-Mission 2″ is a collection of online minigames designed to get teen and young-adult cancer patients involved in understanding more about their conditions and how the body benefits from sometimes unpleasant treatments.

Researchers at HopeLab, a nonprofit organization searching for products that positively impact health behavior, were emboldened by the success of their original 2006 title, “Re-Mission,” and were looking for a better way to help patients.

“Research on the original ‘Re-Mission’ showed that it impacted biology and behavior, primarily by energizing positive motivation circuits in the human brain and giving players a sense of power and control over cancer,” said Dr. Steve Cole, a vice president at HopeLab and professor of medicine at UCLA. “That gave us a whole new recipe for engineering the games in ‘Re-Mission 2′ by harnessing the power of positive motivation circuits in the human brain.”

The Flash-based games in “Re-Mission 2″ mimic what the patients are going through in their therapy, but in a way that gamifies the treatment and involves the patient in “destroying” their cancer.

Weapons in the game include chemotherapy, cancer drugs and cells in the body’s own immune system.

A 2008 study into the effectiveness of the “ReMission” idea found that, for patients from 13 to 29, sticking to a treatment regimen when managing chronic illness was a significant problem. Playing the game greatly improved treatment adherence and understanding of that treatment in that age group, according to the study.

“(Cancer) can be incredibly disruptive and rips you away from your identity of being a normal kid,” said HopeLab spokesman Richard Tate. “The games give them the experience of what it means to be inside the body fighting cancer, using these prescriptions as weapons in their arsenal and the fight to regain a sense of control with your life.”

Many game developers lent their talents to the project. But developers also got some inside help.

Former cancer patients worked with the design teams to help create the right mood, challenges and visual design for “ReMission’s” five games.

Brooke Jaffe, a 21-year-old English major at Barnard College in New York, and Justin Lambert, a 20-year-old nursing major at Concordia University in Portland, Oregon, are two cancer patients in remission who helped with the project.

Both worked on concept art, images and play testing. But both said that the most important aspect of the game, to them, was how it would make a patient undergoing cancer treatment feel.

“Other than feeling like crap all the time, you don’t see the results,” said Lambert, who was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia at 2. “You don’t see the impact that’s brought to the body fighting the cancer. (The game) puts it into perspective — something they can visualize and definitely get hope from that.”

Jaffe was diagnosed with papillary carcinoma in 2011 and said the cancer experience can make young people feel powerless — like their recovery is based on passively allowing doctors and others to do their work.

“You actually don’t feel like you’re doing that much because it’s all these outside forces acting upon you,” she said. “I think what’s really beneficial about a game like ‘Re-Mission 2′ is the whole concept of using games to help people get a sense of activity in a situation that can rob you of that activity.

“I think that’s a very powerful thing even on a psychological level.”

Dr. Brandon Hayes-Lattin, a cancer and blood disorders specialist at the Oregon Health Science University, has been involved in a field of cancer care called adolescent and young adult oncology. He and his colleagues have been working on understanding why patients in that age group don’t show improvement in cancer-care rates on par with young kids or older adult patients.

“Across the board, no matter what the age, it is difficult to adhere to a common cancer schedule,” he said. “The number of medications, the tracking of medications can be difficult.

“You can really engage young adults through a video game as long as the video game is cool. There is also this underlying theme of empowering patients to understand what they are going through and what their own role is in their cancer care.”

With “Re-Mission 2,” he said, the mobile aspect of the minigames allow patients to be involved even while they are waiting for, or receiving, treatment.

The free minigames are available for the iPad or online. Tate said teams are working to expand the number of platforms to get the game into as many hands as possible.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/24/tech/gaming-gadgets/cancer-video-game/index.html?eref=edition

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Editor’s note: Peter Bergen is CNN’s national security analyst, a director at the New America Foundation and the author of “Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for bin Laden — From 9/11 to Abbottabad,” the basis for the HBO documentary “Manhunt” that will be shown on CNN at 9 p.m. today.

Washington (CNN) — In the past few weeks, we’ve seen a British soldier hacked to death with a meat cleaver on the streets of London and bombers blowing up spectators at the Boston Marathon.

On the surface, terrorism is alive and well.

So how should the United States react to these continuing threats?

For the first time on Thursday, President Obama laid out the full scope of his proposed counterterrorism strategy, and it boiled down to this: George W. Bush’s endless war on terror is over.

And that’s appropriate, since the enemy Bush went to war with after September 11 has largely been defeated.

Obama’s speech at the National Defense University in Washington was designed to lay the political groundwork to wind down America’s longest war, the war that began when al Qaeda destroyed the World Trade Center and a wing of the Pentagon 12 years ago.

Thursday’s speech was the first time Obama had delivered an overarching framework for how to conceptualize the conflict that has defined U.S. national security policy since 9/11.

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Other speeches by Obama have focused on aspects of that conflict, such as Guantanamo and the Afghan war. But no speech has made such an expansive examination of the war against al Qaeda and its allies in all its manifestations, from drone strikes to detention policies to a clear-eyed assessment of the scope of the threats posed by al Qaeda and its affiliates, as well as by those “homegrown” extremists who attacked the Boston Marathon in April.

Much of the coverage of the speech has centered on the measures the president outlined to impose greater constraints on CIA drone strikes and to try to hasten the eventual closing of Guantanamo.

But the most significant aspect of the speech was the president’s case that the “perpetual wartime footing” and “boundless war on terror” that has permeated so much of American life since 9/11 should come to an end.

Obama argued that the time has come to redefine the kind of conflict that the United States is engaged in: “We must define the nature and scope of this struggle, or else it will define us.”

This is why the president focused part of his speech on a discussion of the seemingly arcane Authorization for the Use of Military Force that Congress passed days after 9/11 and that gave Bush the authority to go to war in Afghanistan against al Qaeda and its Taliban allies.

Few, if any, in Congress who voted for the authorization understood at the time that they were voting for a virtual blank check that has provided the legal basis for more than a decade of war. It is a war that has expanded in recent years to other countries in the Middle East and Africa, such as Yemen and Somalia, where the U.S. has engaged in covert military operations against al Qaeda-affiliated groups.

Theoretically, when U.S. combat troops finally withdraw from Afghanistan in December 2014, the authorization should simply expire, and the nation will no longer be at war. After all, once combat operations are over in Afghanistan, why would you want to keep in place an authorization for a permanent war?

However, there are now some in Congress who would like to expand the scope of the Authorization for the Use of Military Force beyond its present parameters to include military operations against terrorist groups that were not involved in the 9/11 attacks, which could prolong America’s wars indefinitely and add additional terrorist groups to the United States’ list of enemies it is at war with.

U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tennessee, ranking member of the influential Senate Foreign Relations Committee, for instance, last month called for an expansion of the scope of the authorization.

Obama made it quite clear in his Thursday speech that he would oppose such an expansion, saying he hopes instead to “ultimately repeal the AUMF’s mandate. And I will not sign laws designed to expand this mandate further.”

In short, Obama intends to end a seemingly endless war.

That’s because, according to Obama, “the core of al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan is on the path to defeat. Their remaining operatives spend more time thinking about their own safety than plotting against us.”

On Thursday, Obama asserted (in my view, correctly) that what remains of the terrorist threat, while significant and persistent, is nothing on the scale of the al Qaeda organization that launched the 9/11 operation and instead consists of “less capable al Qaeda affiliates, threats to diplomatic facilities and businesses abroad, homegrown extremists.”

These threats, the president further asserted, can be managed by carefully targeted drone strikes overseas and efforts to counter extremist ideology at home and do not require some kind of broader war.

Obama is also looking to his legacy and the presidents who will follow him and is trying to begin to create the public consensus and legal framework that will help to ensure that the United States isn’t “drawn into more wars we don’t need to fight, or continue to grant presidents unbound powers more suited for traditional armed conflicts between nation states.”

Obama clearly hopes to leave office in 2016 as the commander in chief who finally ended America’s longest war.

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(CNN) — European Union newcomer Croatia is looking to undiscovered oil and gas fields in the Adriatic Sea to revive its ailing economy, according to the country’s president.

Ivo Josipovic told CNN that Croatia — soon to become the 28th member of the European Union — is searching for partners in the energy sector to help reveal oil and gas “green fields” in the waters that separate the Balkan nations and Italy.

Read more: Croatia PM: We need Italy to recover

The country, which relies heavily on its sun-kissed Adriatic coast to attract tourists and boost the economy, is seeking new revenue streams to combat a high national debt and a lack of competitiveness.

In 2012, Croatia’s economy contracted by 2% and is expected to contract by 1% this year, according to Eurostat — the European Commission’s data service.

“There is one way to change the economy and that is to motivate investors to come to Croatia,” Josipovic told CNN in an exclusive interview.

Croatia — a small country of 4.3 million people — is also battling against chronic unemployment over 18%, with only Greece and Spain having a higher jobless rate. But Josipovic is adamant that Croatia’s European membership, which officially begins on July 1, will attract foreign investment and prevent a so-called “brain drain” in the country’s workforce.

“Brain drain is always connected to a bad economic situation, with the EU or without the EU,” he said. He added: “But somehow by foreign investment or companies, I expect some brains to come to Croatia as well.”

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One major obstacle to foreign investment is Croatia’s problems with endemic corruption. Since breaking away from Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, Croatia has struggled to choke off profiteering from those in positions of power.

In November last year, the country’s former prime minister, Ivo Sanader, was jailed for 10 years after being found guilty of taking pay-offs from foreign companies.

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Sanader — who was premier from 2004 to 2009 — fled the country but was arrested in Austria. He is now appealing his sentence.

Josipovic said: “Corruption is now considered as something that is not acceptable for our society and anyone who is caught will go to jail. Of course, efficiency of investigation is needed through our judiciary.”

Read more: Europe’s new threat: Slow decay

Transparency International — an organization tackling corruption — ranked Croatia below Rwanda, Jordan and Cuba in its Corruption Perceptions Index for 2012. But the country still came in above Italy – Europe’s third largest economy.

Of the former Yugoslav states, Croatia will be only the second country behind Slovenia to join the EU, but the country also has designs to one day join Europe’s embattled single currency area, the eurozone.

Josipovic said the euro is already a de facto currency in Croatia but the country needs at least five years to meet the euro area criteria before it can think about joining.

“[There is] no special target year,” he told CNN. “But we think we already have the euro because if you ask someone the price, they tell you in euros. Our savings in banks are 80% or more in euros because our citizens believe in the euro because the buy euro and save in euro.”

Despite not being in the single currency, many small businesses in Croatia have debts denominated in euros rather than in kuna — the country’s domestic currency – exposing them to exchange rate risk.

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(CNN) — In the battle against cancer, one video game is taking the deadly disease head-on. And some young patients are the winners.

“Re-Mission 2″ is a collection of online minigames designed to get teen and young-adult cancer patients involved in understanding more about their conditions and how the body benefits from sometimes unpleasant treatments.

Researchers at HopeLab, a nonprofit organization searching for products that positively impact health behavior, were emboldened by the success of their original 2006 title, “Re-Mission,” and were looking for a better way to help patients.

“Research on the original ‘Re-Mission’ showed that it impacted biology and behavior, primarily by energizing positive motivation circuits in the human brain and giving players a sense of power and control over cancer,” said Dr. Steve Cole, a vice president at HopeLab and professor of medicine at UCLA. “That gave us a whole new recipe for engineering the games in ‘Re-Mission 2′ by harnessing the power of positive motivation circuits in the human brain.”

The Flash-based games in “Re-Mission 2″ mimic what the patients are going through in their therapy, but in a way that gamifies the treatment and involves the patient in “destroying” their cancer.

Weapons in the game include chemotherapy, cancer drugs and cells in the body’s own immune system.

A 2008 study into the effectiveness of the “ReMission” idea found that, for patients from 13 to 29, sticking to a treatment regimen when managing chronic illness was a significant problem. Playing the game greatly improved treatment adherence and understanding of that treatment in that age group, according to the study.

“(Cancer) can be incredibly disruptive and rips you away from your identity of being a normal kid,” said HopeLab spokesman Richard Tate. “The games give them the experience of what it means to be inside the body fighting cancer, using these prescriptions as weapons in their arsenal and the fight to regain a sense of control with your life.”

Many game developers lent their talents to the project. But developers also got some inside help.

Former cancer patients worked with the design teams to help create the right mood, challenges and visual design for “ReMission’s” five games.

Brooke Jaffe, a 21-year-old English major at Barnard College in New York, and Justin Lambert, a 20-year-old nursing major at Concordia University in Portland, Oregon, are two cancer patients in remission who helped with the project.

Both worked on concept art, images and play testing. But both said that the most important aspect of the game, to them, was how it would make a patient undergoing cancer treatment feel.

“Other than feeling like crap all the time, you don’t see the results,” said Lambert, who was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia at 2. “You don’t see the impact that’s brought to the body fighting the cancer. (The game) puts it into perspective — something they can visualize and definitely get hope from that.”

Jaffe was diagnosed with papillary carcinoma in 2011 and said the cancer experience can make young people feel powerless — like their recovery is based on passively allowing doctors and others to do their work.

“You actually don’t feel like you’re doing that much because it’s all these outside forces acting upon you,” she said. “I think what’s really beneficial about a game like ‘Re-Mission 2′ is the whole concept of using games to help people get a sense of activity in a situation that can rob you of that activity.

“I think that’s a very powerful thing even on a psychological level.”

Dr. Brandon Hayes-Lattin, a cancer and blood disorders specialist at the Oregon Health Science University, has been involved in a field of cancer care called adolescent and young adult oncology. He and his colleagues have been working on understanding why patients in that age group don’t show improvement in cancer-care rates on par with young kids or older adult patients.

“Across the board, no matter what the age, it is difficult to adhere to a common cancer schedule,” he said. “The number of medications, the tracking of medications can be difficult.

“You can really engage young adults through a video game as long as the video game is cool. There is also this underlying theme of empowering patients to understand what they are going through and what their own role is in their cancer care.”

With “Re-Mission 2,” he said, the mobile aspect of the minigames allow patients to be involved even while they are waiting for, or receiving, treatment.

The free minigames are available for the iPad or online. Tate said teams are working to expand the number of platforms to get the game into as many hands as possible.

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Editor’s note: ‘Funmi Olonisakin is the founding director of the African Leadership Centre, and director of the Conflict, Security and Development Group, at King’s College London.

(CNN) — President Goodluck Jonathan’s response to the Boko Haram insurgency, including his recently declared state of emergency in three northern Nigerian states, is eerily reminiscent of previous approaches to sectarian violence in that region.

The Maitatsine uprising of 1980 is perhaps the single most important precedent-setting example. In December 1980, the confrontation between the Al-Masifu Islamic sect — which advocated purity in the practice of Islam — and the people of Kano came to a head. The Nigerian army and air force mounted a campaign against the sect. In the end, more than 4,000 people were dead with double this number injured alongside massive destruction of property.

Times have certainly changed. Nigeria’s population has doubled since the Maitatsine uprising. Nigeria continues to experience the “youth bulge” — a growing youth population — that was not planned for. The resulting pressure on socio-economic systems is evident in limited education and health and dwindling economic opportunities for young people.

Poor policies and bad planning have produced youth vulnerability and exclusion from mainstream life. This is doubly so in northern Nigeria, where class divides have further created a community of people with nothing to lose.

Read this: Nigerians ask, are we at war?

The global environment has also changed amid growing transnational threats. Al Qaeda continues to lurk in the neighborhood. Excluded groups in the region with affinity for Boko Haram are potential support networks amid an ever-rising flow of illicit weapons into the region.

One thing has hardly changed: elite behavior. Nigeria’s power elite remains far removed from the realities of life experienced by ordinary citizens.

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The ruling elite’s framing of the Boko Haram challenge lends itself easily to just one set of responses — the use of force to rout Boko Haram, although more recently the federal government of Nigeria proposed an amnesty for Boko Haram.

To be certain, a military approach is only part of the solution. It is by no means a panacea. This military campaign, coupled with amnesty, rings hollow. It does not offer much hope for dealing comprehensively with the underlying causes of the Boko Haram phenomenon.

It is no wonder Boko Haram has treated the offer of amnesty by the Jonathan-led government with disdain. For one, it may be worth holding out for a greater prize, knowing that it probably has this regime by the jugular. Besides, how could it trust that the offer of amnesty — which will unveil Boko Haram — is not a ploy by the regime to round them up and execute them? The allegedly extra-judicial killing of the sect’s late leader, Mohammed Yusuf, serves as a constant warning.

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Perhaps more importantly, this military solution and current state of emergency is potentially damaging for the military. The Nigerian military only recently managed to repair its image, winning accolades abroad for its peacekeeping role. Asking it to employ maximum force in internal operations — causing casualties in the process among the very people it is meant to protect — has repercussions. Surely, this will diminish its stature abroad and reduce citizens’ confidence in the military at home, while drawing more support to Boko Haram and weakening troops’ morale.

That said, it is also the case that Nigerians far removed from the locus of the crisis may not see the military’s role in such negative terms.

This crisis will potentially deepen religious and regional cleavages. Perhaps the country’s saving grace is that for the time being, Nigeria’s youth population mostly buys into these divides. They do not yet have a common narrative about who their “real enemy” is. Barring a small number of states, where genuine effort is being made to confront serious governance deficits, the picture of elite marginalization and widening inequality is consistent countrywide.

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Boko Haram commands the loyalty of the excluded at several levels. At this moment, Boko Haram is obviously asserting influence, and that assertion of influence is accepted by a significant number of people who see no change in their primary condition.

This factor partly attracted large crowds to the preaching of Boko Haram’s late leader, Yusuf. His narratives about the ills of Western education were enriched by evident gaps in governance. The breakdown of the education system, growing youth unemployment and insecurity amid rampant corruption swelled the ranks of Boko Haram. When the sense of “nothing to lose” is mixed with these strong narratives, the issue is not whether or not they are true but that there are no strong counter-narratives or genuine counter actions.

A lasting solution to the crisis in northern Nigeria might lie in a missing trinity: a meaningful but powerful narrative to counter Boko Haram’s narrative; an action plan akin to a “Marshal Plan” for northern Nigeria; and isolation of what Jonathan has described as Boko Haram sympathizers in the government and security forces.

Developing a powerful counter narrative will demand a measure of sincerity and consistency among the country’s ruling elite. Such a narrative must stand up to the seeming lure of Boko Haram and have the ability to hold a young population captive for the foreseeable future.

An action plan akin to a Marshal Plan for northern Nigeria must be developed to suit the context. The federal government’s investment in regeneration of northern Nigeria, with a focus on youth sensitization, education and development of social and economic entrepreneurship, will be key. This might entail deliberate forms of youth cantonment, census-based planning, community-based programs, and innovative education schemes to kick start regeneration.

To be sure, an action plan for northern Nigeria will not be sustainable in an environment where youth exclusion is a countrywide problem even if it is more chronic in the north. Expressed intention to do this nationally in due course might persuade a captive youth audience.

The question remains as to whether alleged Boko Haram sympathizers among the elite can be dislodged from this process. This might be the single most important obstacle in a situation where retaining political power in 2015 seems more valuable to the regime than the welfare of a few million disposable citizens.

In the immediate term, we can expect the Nigerian military to record successes against the Boko Haram sect. But the victory will be hollow. Without the trinity of measures earlier described, Jonathan’s government risks sacrificing the ordinary people of northern Nigeria, the military’s reputation, and innocent bloodshed.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of ‘Funmi Olonisakin.

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Beijing (CNN) — Demonstrators braved a heavy police presence and the threat of arrest by massing Thursday in the streets of Kunming, China, to protest the planned construction of a chemical plant, they said.

“It was mostly a peaceful protest,” said an activist who asked to be identified only by his family name, Young. “We were singing the national anthem, shouting ‘Get out, refinery!’ together.”

He added, “We were scattered by the heavy police force in the area. I saw locals scuffling with police, people getting arrested and pulled away.”

Read more: Can social media clear air over China?

The plant is a hot topic in the city, which is the capital of Yunnan province in southwestern China.

“Every Kunming person cares about this issue,” said another Kunming native, a 50-year-old man who said rows of police thwarted his efforts to reach the heart of the protest. “The police kept blocking off the protest, block by block.”

Local government officials did not respond to CNN phone calls for comment.

Photos posted on Chinese social media sites showed uniformed and riot police surrounding groups of demonstrators.

The five activists who spoke to CNN asked not to be named for fear of reprisals from Chinese authorities.

The oil refinery and chemical plant would be built in Anning city, about 50 kilometers (31 miles) west of Kunming, according to Xinhua, China’s state news agency.

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Opponents fear the chemical plant would produce tons of paraxylene, a carcinogenic chemical identified by the acronym PX.

Several days after a May 4 protest, the Kunming mayor joined executives from the state China National Petroleum Corp. and the Yuntianhua Group for a joint news conference.

“The government will call off the project if most of our citizens say no to it,” said Mayor Li Wenrong, according to Xinhua.

The provincial general manager of China National Petroleum Corp. has said the refinery will not use the chemical.

“The project has no PX facilities, nor will it produce PX products,” Hu Jingke said, according to Xinhua.

Kunming residents expressed deep distrust of government officials and the state-owned enterprises behind the refinery project.

Several said authorities took draconian measures in the days running up to Thursday’s protest in an attempt to prevent demonstrators from taking to the streets.

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A 25-year-old Kunming native who asked to be identified as Claire told CNN that police detained and interrogated her for more than nine hours after she was caught distributing anti-refinery fliers on a city street Tuesday.

“I understand we need oil refineries,” Claire said in a phone interview. She said she opposed this one because “it’s just so close to the city and the fact that the whole process was not transparent and we’re not allowed to ask questions.”

Claire said police accused her of staging an “illegal gathering.”

As part of the interrogation, she said, police took her to the print shop where she had made copies of her fliers. Then they escorted her to her parents’ home, where they demanded that she erase files about the refinery from her computer. Finally, she said, they threatened her and banned her from attending Thursday’s protest.

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“Basically, they’re saying if I have this on my record, I won’t get any government job or state-owned enterprise job,” Claire said.

Several other Kunming residents said students and employees of state-owned companies had been warned not to attend the demonstration.

“Kunming is a beautiful city, where we have cleaner air than any other cities in this country,” Young said.

“We fear the refinery will destroy the city’s natural environment, and we demanded to see the environmental impact assessment report of this project. But we were rejected by the government who told us it’s a ‘state secret.’ “

An executive from Yuntianhua, which also has a major stake in the chemical plant, told journalists that an environmental impact assessment for the project had not been completed, Xinhua said.

In March, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao promised that health safeguards would be improved and efforts would be made to control air pollution and make water supplies safer.

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“We should adopt effective measures to prevent and control pollution and change the way we work and live,” Wen said.

The emphasis on environmental and health issues comes as China’s leaders confront growing anger about choking pollution, contaminated food, and water that is unsafe to drink.

The statistics are staggering. China now burns 3.8 billion tons of coal each year, nearly as much as the rest of the world combined. In January, the smog over Beijing was so thick, it could be seen from space.

China’s CO2 emissions rose by 720 million tons in 2011 — a 9.3% increase. Pollution and dust generated in China have been found as far away as California.

Maintaining blockbuster growth has sometimes come at the expense of environmental protections.

The government has made explicit its intention to weigh environmental regulation against the cost to the economy. But analysts say the public outcry over pollution has tipped the scales.

China has already tried to boost the use of alternative sources of power, setting standards for solar energy installation and switching from coal to gas in some cities.

CNNMoney’s Charles Riley contributed to this report.

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Editor’s note: Geoff Hiscock is a former Asia business editor for CNN.com and is the author of “Earth Wars: The Battle for Global Resources,” published by Wiley.

(CNN) — The decision to grant permanent observer status to China and five other nations by the Arctic Council meeting in Sweden Wednesday reflects the heightened interest by some of the world’s most powerful economies in an area rich in oil, gas, minerals, fish and new transport possibilities.

For new observer nations China, Japan and South Korea, shorter shipping routes to Europe through Arctic waters could open up prospects of new energy supply options later this decade, such as liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Russia’s Yamal Peninsula in northwest Siberia.

It could also lessen China’s dependence on oil and gas shipped from the Middle East, which must pass through the Southeast Asian chokepoint of the Strait of Malacca. Allied to China’s interest of getting oil and gas delivered from new pipelines across Myanmar and Central Asia, the potential of the Arctic trade routes loom large in China’s strategic thinking.

Five years ago, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) described the vast Arctic continental shelf as potentially the “largest unexplored prospective area for petroleum remaining on Earth.” A new U.S. Arctic policy unveiled by the Obama administration last week cites that 2008 study, which estimated that about 13% of the world’s undiscovered oil and 30% of its undiscovered gas lies north of the Arctic Circle.

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In a 2012 update, the USGS put the mean undiscovered estimate of recoverable oil in Russia’s Arctic provinces alone at 28 billion barrels, plus about 27 trillion cubic meters of gas.

China is keen to be more than just a customer for this Russian oil and gas. In February, the heads of China’s three state-controlled oil and gas majors — China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), Sinopec and China National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC) — met one of Russia’s most influential players in the energy sector, Igor Sechin, chief executive of state-owned oil company Rosneft. The following month, Rosneft struck a deal with CNPC, giving it access to Arctic resources.

The Arctic Council, made up of the United States, Russia, Canada and the five Nordic nations — Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Iceland — was set up in 1996 to coordinate policy in a resource-rich but environmentally sensitive part of the world. Before Wednesday’s decision there were already six observer states: the UK, France, Germany, Poland, Spain and the Netherlands.

Now the permanent observers are being joined by China, Japan, India, South Korea, Singapore and Italy, meaning that all of the key Asian economies now have a seat at the Arctic table, even though they will not have a vote on the Arctic Council. The European Union, the other major body seeking observer status, had its application affirmed but “deferred,” a rebuff that is likely related to an unresolved dispute with Canada over the fur seal trade.

Both China and India already have polar research stations in the northern part of Norway, as do most of the other observer nations.

The Arctic’s importance has gained extra strategic and economic significance as melting ice in the polar region strengthens the feasibility of nations to use the Northern Sea Route (NSR) across the top of Russia and the Northwest Passage through Canada’s Arctic archipelago. Canada claims the passage, which links the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, runs through its internal waterways. The U.S. and other countries contest this, maintaining it is an international strait.

For China, the main transportation focus is the NSR, which runs along the northern coastline of Siberia from Novaya Zemlya to the Bering Strait. It is open only for about five months of the year, from late June to November or early December, and requires icebreakers to cut a path through the Arctic ice for specially strengthened oil and gas carriers.

But the route cuts as much as three weeks from shipping times between Europe and Asia. For example, Murmansk to China’s Ningbo port near Shanghai is 13,000 km via the NSR, compared with 22,000 km via the Mediterranean Sea, Suez Canal, Indian Ocean and Strait of Malacca.

In August to September last year, China sent its one and only icebreaker Xue Long (Snow Dragon) on a successful two-way test run of the NSR. It plans to add a second icebreaker to its fleet in 2014-15.

Over the past two sailing seasons, Russian oil and gas companies have tested the route for gas condensate and LNG shipments. In June 2011, Novatek, Russia’s biggest non-state gas company, sent 60,000 tons of gas condensate from Murmansk to the Chinese port of Ningbo aboard the MV Perseverance on a three-week voyage. At the end of 2012, Russian state-owned gas giant Gazprom sent a 66,000-tonne cargo of LNG from Statoil’s Hammerfest terminal in Norway to the Japanese port of Tobata between November 7 and December 5. The route was cleared by three Russian icebreakers.

For now, the NSR is still very much in a test phase. According to the Centre for High North Logistics, an Arctic-focused information center based in Kirkenes, Norway, 46 vessels used the NSR in 2012, carrying about 1.26 million tons of cargo. That was an increase of more than 50% from 2011.

China envisages exporting consumer goods aboard container ships to Europe and receiving LNG cargoes via the NSR. Novatek, for example, is building a new port at Sabetta on the Yamal peninsula to service the LNG trade to Asia, with expectations of first gas in 2016 and exports of 15 million tons a year by 2018.

The NSR’s shortcomings are considerable: a short sailing season, the cost of hiring icebreakers, the operational hazards of extreme northern waters and the environmental risks of oil spills, collisions or sinkings. Even so, this Arctic shipping route is likely to be the focus of intense interest by China over the next decade.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/16/business/china-arctic/index.html?eref=edition

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