Reuters: Brazil pledged Monday to cut the rate at which it was destroying its Amazon forest in half over the next decade to help combat global warming. Setting its first such target after years of global criticism, Brazil will aim to reduce clearing of the world’s largest rain forest to an annual 5,850 sq km (2,260 sq miles), by 2018, about half the recent rate. “This plan improves Brazil’s image, we’ll have more moral authority internationally,” Environment Minister Carlos Minc told …