The European Union has scaled back plans to give billions of euros to poor countries to persuade them to address climate change, Reuters reported, citing a draft document. Funding from rich nations to the developing world has emerged as a major stumbling block to progress in climate negotiations.

DNA “identity tags” of the African red river hog and 13 other animal species illegally traded as bush meat have been added to an online database, New Scientist said, making it easier for conservationists to check the provenance of meat at markets.

Large-scale farming projects can erode the earth’s surface at rates comparable to those of the largest rivers and glaciers, according to a study cited by ScienceDaily.

Advances in neuroscience and genetics may eventually mean that “pain-free” animals could take the suffering out of factory farming, according to New Scientist. Ethical dilemmas would remain, however.

Indigenous tribal girls on the island of Borneo have been sexually abused by loggers in remote jungles, the Associated Press quoted a Malaysian government report as saying, in the first official verification of rape accusations involving Malaysian timber companies.

BP announced a “giant” oil discovery in the Gulf of Mexico after drilling one of the industry’s deepest wells, Agence France-Presse said.

The United States has no alternative to oil and should recognise its energy interdependence with the Middle East, Saudi prince Turki al-Faisal wrote in an article for an Italian newspaper, according to Reuters.

Car-dependent Dubai opened the Arabian peninsula’s first rapid-transit train line, the Associated Press said.

Six South Korean campers were swept to their deaths when North Korea unexpectedly opened a new dam that sent water surging down the Imjin River, the Associated Press said, quoting a South Korean official.

The European Commission has provisionally backed a ban on catching Atlantic bluefin tuna, a fish prized in Asia but pushed to the brink of extinction by industrial fishing, according to Reuters.

A “lost world” populated by at least 40 previously unidentified animal species has been discovered in the pristine jungle of a volcanic crater in Papua New Guinea, the BBC reported.

Aquaculture now accounts for 50% of the fish consumed globally, according to a report by an international research team, said ScienceDaily.