29/03/2010   Brazilian Ranchers breach UN's Global Compact

AyoreoAyoreoThe greatest current threat to the Ayoreo-Totobiegosode indigenous people is a Brazilian firm, Yaguarete Porá. It owns a 78,000 hectare plot in the heart of their territory, very near where uncontacted Ayoreo were recently sighted. Yaguarete plans to bulldoze most of it to create a cattle ranch – this will have a devastating effect on the Indians’ ability to continue living there. Survival International is calling on Ban Ki-moon to remove them from the UN’s ‘Global Compact’.

 26/03/2010   UK Pension schemes fund climate chaos

Photography Jiri Rezac/WWF UKPhotography Jiri Rezac/WWF UKTar sands make up the world’s second largest oil reserves (173 billion barrels) and the damage they can cause to the climate is even worse than conventional oil. Greenhouse gas emissions of converting tar sands into fuel are three times higher than conventional oil and roughly three barrels of natural gas are consumed to create one barrel of oil. Tar sands also have human rights costs.

 23/03/2010   Damn the Dam

Gibe-Omo natural river bedGibe-Omo natural river bedGilgel Gibe 3 Hydropower Dam is the largest investment project ever implemented in Ethiopia. At 240m high and with a capacity of 1,870MW, the dam will block the south western part of the Omo River, creating a 150km long basin which will damage the river’s fragile ecosystem indefinitely and jeopardise the lives of half a million people in southwest Ethiopia and northern Kenya.
21/03/2010   BBC bows to Tory pressure on Ashcroft

The BBC has shelved a Panorama investigation on the Michael Ashcroft affair following letters and personal interventions by senior Conservatives. There is now little prospect of the investigation being broadcast before the general election, although it was due to appear in March. It would have shown interviews with businessmen and politicians in Belize and the Caribbean and on Ashcroft’s business empire and offshore entities.

 18/03/2010   No light; but rather darkness visible

Switch it off!Switch it off!Switch off and support WWF’s Earth Hour. On Saturday 27 March 2010 at 8.30pm, WWF want a billion people around the world to switch off their lights for one hour – WWF’s Earth Hour. Show you care about climate change.

 16/03/2010   Save the Sustainable Communities Act Amendment

C:\Documents and Settings\deepak\My Documents\My Pictures\ALL Districts – thumb.gifC:\Documents and Settings\deepak\My Documents\My Pictures\ALL Districts – thumb.gifThere are only hours left to get the Sustainable Communities Act (Amendment) Bill through the Commons. It has cleared the Committee Stage and has the support of all parties and the Government. You can email Harriet Harman and John Denham urging them to ensure it receives the time it needs to become law before the General Election.
14/03/2010   Sectarian violence in Nigeria can be beaten

Women of JosWomen of JosKAFANCHAN, NIGERIA Thursday March 11 (John Dada, Fantsuam Foundation for APC) – Since January, sectarian strife and reprisal killings have ripped through our communities in Jos, Plateau State. A mass burial took place on Tuesday with body counts close to three hundred, over 80% of them women and children. The Fantsuam Foundation’s Gender Evaluation Methodolgy has become a lifeline, a distant ray at the end of the tunnel, to get our communities out of this quagmire.

 06/03/2010   Piracy Law - Gov proposes, Lords opposes

The Government wants to amend the Digital Economy Bill, now at the report stage, to counter advances in online piracy in the future. But the House of Lords, lobbied by the ISPA, has objected to the “blanket nature” of the amendment on copyright law, and the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights has argued that the proposals in clause 17 are too wide to be proportionate.

 03/03/2010   Save Auntie Beeb from Murdoch's minions

The BBC is on the brink of surrendering to pressure from commercial rivals, who are lobbying politicians hard to impose even deeper cuts. The BBC may not have many friends in the rest of the media, but public pressure has saved it before, and can save it again. 38 Degrees will be delivering their petition to the BBC Trust later this week.