One of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded struck Russia’s sparsely populated Far East on Wednesday, causing tsunamis up to four metres (12 feet) high across the Pacific and sparking evacuations from Hawaii to Japan.The magnitude 8.8 quake struck off Petropavlovsk on Russia’s Kamchatka peninsula and was the largest since 2011 when one of magnitude 9.1 off Japan caused a tsunami that killed more than 15,000 people.Almost two million people in Japan were told to head to higher ground and tsunami warnings were issued across the region, before being rescinded or downgraded — though scientists warned of the danger of powerful aftershocks.While the immediate area around the quake seemed to have been spared, people on the other side of the Pacific were gearing up for the impact of a tsunami expected to hit overnight.Ecuador’s Galapagos Islands off the west coast of South America closed visitor sites and schools, ushering tourists to dry land as a precaution.”The boats haven’t gone out to fish,” said a fisherwoman in Puerto Ayora on the islands who did not want to be named.”We’ve been warned through the loudspeakers that it’s best not to approach the coastline.”In Russia’s far east, a tsunami flooded the port town of Severo-Kurilsk, crashing through the port area and submerging the local fishing plant, officials said. Russian state television footage showed it sweep buildings and debris into the sea.Authorities said the population of around 2,000 people had been evacuated.The waves reached as far as the town’s World War II monument about 400 metres from the shoreline, said Mayor Alexander Ovsyannikov.Several people were injured in Russia by the quake, state media reported, but none seriously.”The walls were shaking,” a Kamchatka resident told state media Zvezda.”It’s good that we packed a suitcase, there was one with water and clothes near the door. We quickly grabbed it and ran out… It was very scary,” she said.Later Wednesday, the authorities in the Kamchatka peninsula announced the tsunami warning had been lifted.- Millions advised to flee -Officials from countries with a Pacific coastline in North and South America — including the United States, Mexico, Ecuador and Colombia — issued warnings to avoid threatened beaches and low-lying areas.In Japan, nearly two million people were advised to evacuate, and many left by car or on foot to higher ground.One woman was killed as she drove her car off a cliff as she tried to escape, local media reported.A 1.3-metre high tsunami reached a port in the northern prefecture of Iwate, Japan’s weather agency said.By Wednesday evening, the agency had downgraded its tsunami alerts — issued for much of the archipelago — to advisories.In Hawaii, governor Josh Green said flights in and out of the island of Maui had been cancelled as a precaution.The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center later downgraded the alert for Hawaii to an advisory and local authorities cancelled a coastal evacuation order.Earlier, tsunami sirens blared near Hawaii’s popular Waikiki surf beach where an AFP photographer saw gridlocked traffic as Hawaiians escaped to higher ground.”STAY STRONG AND STAY SAFE!” US President Donald Trump said on social media.- Pacific alerts -Wednesday’s quake was the strongest in the Kamchatka region since 1952, the regional seismic monitoring service said, warning of aftershocks of up to 7.5 magnitude.The USGS said the quake was one of the 10 strongest tremors ever recorded.The quake was followed by at least six aftershocks that further rattled the Russian far east, including one of 6.9 magnitude.The US Tsunami Warning Centers said waves exceeding three metres above the tide level were possible along some coasts of Ecuador, northwestern Hawaiian islands and Russia.Between one- and three-metre waves were possible along some coasts of Chile, Costa Rica, French Polynesia, Hawaii, Japan and other islands in the Pacific, it added.Waves of up to one metre were possible elsewhere, including Australia, Colombia, Mexico, New Zealand, Tonga and Taiwan.- Fukushima evacuated -At Inage Beach in Chiba prefecture in Japan, officials have set up a security perimeter. One rescue worker told AFP the seaside area was off limits until further notice.The Fukushima nuclear plant in northeast Japan — destroyed by a huge quake and tsunami in 2011 — was evacuated, its operator said.In Taitung in Taiwan, hotel resort worker Wilson Wang, 31, told AFP: “We’ve advised guests to stay safe and not go out, and to avoid going to the coast.”Pacific nation Palau, about 800 kilometres (500 miles) east of the Philippines, ordered the evacuation of “all areas along the coastline”.Waves of up to four metres are expected overnight in the Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia, authorities said in a press statement.burs-jxb/cw

Gloria Cuevas thought she would live forever in her pink, century-old house on Puerto Rico’s west coast — but then her landlord decided to transform the home into an Airbnb.Cuevas left her home — now purple and split in two — and her beloved city for another further south, forced out by the rising cost of living and an explosion of short-term rentals on the US Caribbean island territory.Puerto Rico — long a draw for sun-worshipping tourists — is also a hotspot for foreign investment and offers tax incentives to attract outsiders.”At first, I couldn’t come back here,” Cuevas, 68, told AFP, gazing at the home she once made her own. “It made me feel sad and angry at the same time.”Cuevas’s experience is becoming an all too familiar tale across the island, where signs promote mansions for sale, and the Airbnb logo is plastered on homes where locals once lived.Intensifying Puerto Rico’s gentrification are laws that encourage primarily wealthy mainland Americans to move there in exchange for preferential tax treatment.The program originally enacted in 2012 was meant to spur economic growth and attract investment on the island, an unincorporated territory under US control since 1898.Those relocating must acquire residency and buy property to keep the significant incentives — but many Puerto Ricans as well as some US lawmakers say this is driving up housing prices and encouraging tax evasion. “Colonialism kills us, it suffocates us,” Cuevas said. “It’s a global theme. It’s a class war.”- ‘Unfair’ -Ricki Rebeiro, 30, moved to San Juan more than a year ago, bringing his packaging and marketing business that services cannabis companies with him. He told AFP that basing his work in Puerto Rico saves his company millions of dollars annually, and that he pays zero personal income tax — what amounts to the equivalent of “a whole second income” that he says he tries to reinvest locally.”I believe that the locals are probably upset that they’re not reaping the same benefits of somebody like me,” said the entrepreneur, whose family is based in Pennsylvania and Oklahoma.The system is “unfair,” Rebeiro said, “but I also don’t believe that I should be the one to blame for that. I didn’t structure the program.”Puerto Ricans in recent years have slammed their government for what they say is a hyperfocus on outsiders at the expense of locals, as the rich — including people like the famous content creator-turned-boxer Jake Paul — move in.- ‘This is ours’ -In Cabo Rojo, a seaside city about an hour’s drive south of Rincon on the island’s western coast, some residents are taking the matter into their own hands.During a recent canvassing effort, a group of activists urged their neighbors to protest a project called Esencia, which aims to build a $2 billion luxury resort and residential development on coastal land.Dafne Javier said her family goes back generations in this area — her great-grandfather was the last mayor in the municipality under Spanish occupation, and the first under US rule.The 77-year-old told AFP the Esencia project would “totally change the landscape,” saying it would create a gated town within a town and predicting that wealthy newcomers “won’t mix with us.”Protesters noted that the planned development would be in the vicinity of protected areas. They say it would destroy the natural habitat of some endangered species, while exacerbating problems with potable water, electricity supply and trash pick-up.Roberto Ruiz Vargas — COO of Three Rules Capital, the developer behind Esencia — disputes those notions, and told AFP that “from the outset, our intention has been to develop the land responsibly and sensitively, minimizing impact.”He pointed to plans to power the development primarily with solar energy. He also said developers were working with both the water authority and the Department of Natural Resources to “address concerns about our water sources” including “independent systems that will reuse rainwater and treated wastewater for irrigation uses.”Ruiz Vargas said developers estimate the project will directly create more than 4,000 jobs, and thousands more across the island. But protestors said an influx of wealthy new residents will exacerbate inequality.Christopher Powers is married to a Puerto Rican with whom he has children, and has lived in Cabo Rojo for 20 years. He vehemently opposes the project.”They have no idea what they’re destroying, and if they do have an idea what they’re destroying, then they should be ashamed,” he told AFP of the developers.”Not only is it ecologically destructive, not only will it be an economic disaster for those of us who live here, but it’s also against the sort of spirit or values of the Caborojinos.”Cuevas is hopeful her story and others like it will crystallize for her fellow Puerto Ricans what they stand to lose.”We have to keep fighting. We have to educate our youth. Have you heard of Bad Bunny?” she said, referring to the Puerto Rican global superstar whose music and current residency in San Juan has amplified discussion of gentrification and cultural dilution, on the island and beyond.”This is ours,” Cuevas said. “We’re not going to leave.”