Question
2006 riots over Snyder Rini’s election destroyed a Chinatown in this country’s capital, which was again burned in 2021 after it switched relations from Taiwan to China three years before Nauru. For 10 points each:
[10m] Name this Pacific country whose security pact with China leaked in 2022. Its prime minister, Manasseh Sogavare, signed a policing pact in Beijing in 2023.
ANSWER: Solomon Islands [accept the Solomons]
[10e] A Chinese state company named for this industry will redevelop the Solomons’ Gold Ridge Mine. This industry built “standard-gauge” Belt and Road projects in Laos and Kenya.
ANSWER: railways [or railroads or trains; or tiělù; accept Boten–Vientiane Railway, Lao–China Railway, Mombasa–Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway, or China Railway; prompt on transportation, shipping, cargo, freight, construction, or engineering]
[10h] The GDPC proposed that the Solomons adopt this policy to address both “exposure” from Chinese creditors and threatened biodiversity. This policy created “blue” bonds in Seychelles (“say-SHELL”) and “green” ones in Gabon.
ANSWER: debt-for-nature swaps [accept debt-for-climate swaps or debt-for-adaptation swaps; prompt on green debt swaps; prompt on debt relief, debt cancellation, debt forgiveness, or equivalents] (The GDPC is the Global Development Policy Center.)
<Current Events>
Summary
| 2024 ACF Nationals | 2024-04-21 | Y | 25 | 10.00 | 72% | 28% | 0% |
Data
| Berkeley A | Northwestern | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Columbia A | Chicago B | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Chicago C | Truman State | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Berkeley B | Chicago D | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Duke | Claremont Colleges | 10 | 0 | 0 | 10 |
| Penn | Columbia B | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Stanford | Cornell A | 10 | 0 | 0 | 10 |
| Cornell B | Harvard | 10 | 10 | 0 | 20 |
| Indiana | Waterloo | 10 | 10 | 0 | 20 |
| Iowa State | Georgia Tech | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Maryland | Brown | 10 | 0 | 0 | 10 |
| Minnesota B | McGill | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| NYU | Illinois | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Minnesota A | Purdue | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Rutgers | WUSTL B | 10 | 10 | 0 | 20 |
| South Carolina | Kentucky | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Team 1 | Team 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Texas | North Carolina A | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Michigan | Toronto A | 10 | 10 | 0 | 20 |
| Vanderbilt | North Carolina B | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Toronto B | Virginia | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Chicago A | WUSTL A | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Johns Hopkins | Yale A | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Yale B | Ottawa | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |
| Florida | Arizona State | 0 | 10 | 0 | 10 |