SciDevNet: A string of high-altitude research stations across Asia could shed light on how climate change is affecting one of the world’s largest ice masses. Spearheaded by the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the initiative is building state-of-the-art research facilities across South Asia, including in Nepal, Pakistan and

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Bhutan Times: The formation of a group of mountain countries, as proposed by Ecuador, would have helped the group easily represent a common interest at the negotiation of the Convention of Parties (CoP) 17 meeting at Durban, South Africa, but it has left numerous such countries in a lurch following back off by some member

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Chinadialogue: Shelving a vital project to monitor melting Himalayan ice will impede our ability to understand these changes and prepare for the consequences, argues Athar Parvaiz. “The news comes in spite of a consensus among climate scientists that, for reliable information to be gathered, Himalayan glaciers need to be monitored for at least two decades.”

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Guardian: Holding separate talks on development co-operation and climate makes no sense; the two agendas should be integrated. The Durban conference on climate change ended with a much better deal than most experts expected, but so much remains to be worked out that it is hard to say how much real progress has been made.

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BBC News SA: Stunning images from high in the Himalayas – showing the extent by which many glaciers have shrunk in the past 80 years or so – have gone on display at the Royal Geographical Society in central London. Between 2007 and 2010, David Breashears retraced the steps of early photographic pioneers such as

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NASA: By 2100, global climate change will modify plant communities covering almost half of Earth’s land surface and will drive the conversion of nearly 40 percent of land-based ecosystems from one major ecological community type – such as forest, grassland or tundra – toward another, according to a new NASA and university computer modeling study.

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