Category: climate change/deniers

urgent if not too late campaign

Artic: resource grabbing sparks war fears

Scramble for Arctic oil and gas puts pristine ecosystem at risk

Mark Jansen

6th June, 2011

The Arctic is becoming a battleground as Russia, Norway, Canada and the US vie for access to oil, gas and minerals – campaigners fear safety and the environment will be the losers

one cannot exclude that in the future there will be…armed intervention

The Arctic covers 30 million square km, has 24 time zones and is home to just four million people. It also has vast reserves of oil and gas, not to mention diamonds, platinum, nickel and iron.

Those reserves have been known about for centuries, yet a combination of new extraction technology and rising demand means that the human race is ready to start ripping them out – raising the threat of devastating pollution to a uniquely clean environment and worsening the problem of global warming, even as the ice caps are melting.

Greenpeace claims they could even cause a war in the region, with releases this month by Wikileaks, the whistle-blowing website, showing how the scramble for oil and gas in the Arctic is sparking military tension. Norway’s foreign minister is quoted as saying regular military flights by the Russians up and down Norway’s coast had helped to justify the purchase of four new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter combat aircraft to the Norwegian public. Meanwhile, the head of the Russian navy is quoted as saying ‘one cannot exclude that in the future there will be a redistribution of power [in the region], up to armed intervention.’

Instead of seeing the melting of the Arctic ice cap as a spur to action on climate change, point out campaigners, Arctic nations are preferring to invest in military hardware to fight for the oil beneath it.

Read more HERE

Change the rules. Subvert the System. Save the Planet.

Change the rules, subvert the system, save the planet


The recent figures on CO2 emissions are sobering. Despite the fact that the world has suffered a terrible recession, emissions are still rising.

In essence all the efforts to tackle climate change have simply slowed the rise a little rather than reversing it.
The problem is that the solutions to climate change put forward at international conferences like Copenhagen and Cancun dare not deal with the real root cause of climate change – our current economic system.
Simply put, our economic system is based on the accumulation of money. There is a constant race to throw money into the system and to get more money out at the other end.
That’s what modern life is about.
From Fifa to the current conflict in Libya, the desire to accumulate cash sets the objectives for society. If something makes cash it is holy in the eyes of the economists, the media and virtually all political parties.
So climate change is tackled internationally by “market-based” methods. These fail time and time again, but more effective action would require a change in our priorities.
Our economic system is based on resource extraction. Minerals, metals and fossil fuels are taken out of the ground, made into goods and then thrown away.The faster the cycle the more profit is made.
If you think about it for more than a minute or two, there is something rather mad about this methodology. The cost to the natural environment is immense. Right across the planet fragile ecosystems are under enormous threat.

The human cost is also huge. The value of good is….

CONTINUE HERE              another-green-world.

Danny Chivers on climate change denial

This is an episode in the Radio NI podcast series, which features regular interviews with contributors to New Internationalist’s magazine and books. You can subscribe to this podcast for free in iTunes, or via the RSS feed, or by visiting the Radio NI blog to check for new interviews. To listen, click the play symbol below, or download the MP3:Mag

Play:Download: Click here to download the MP3, or right click and choose to save it

Danny Chivers is the author of The No-Nonsense Guide to Climate Change: The Science, The Solutions, The Way Forward, recently published by New Internationalist. He is also the author of a guide to debunking the myths of climate change deniers, the keynote article in our May issue, the main feature of which covers this issue. Here, he discusses climate change’s connection to other problems, what a zero carbon future would look like, and more.

Chivers on climate change denial — New Internationalist.

Brazil: LAST STAND FOR THE XINGU

Amazon Watch has organized a “Cause” at Facebook:

“This has been a time of tragedy in the Amazon. This week the Brazilian government green-lighted construction on the monstrous Belo Monte Dam despite searing local, national and international opposition.

Yet despite the initiation of this criminal operation, I can assure you that the battle to defend the Xingu River and its people is far from over. “I have just returned from the Brazilian Amazon, where Chief Raoni gathered with hundreds of Kayapo warriors, indigenous leaders from 18 ethnicities, and leaders from the Xingu Alive Forever Movement (MXVPS).

“This is the last chance we have to paralyze Belo Monte’s construction,” Renata Pinheiro told the indigenous assembly. “The future of the Xingu is in your hands, indigenous peoples and social movements. You succeeded in stopping Belo Monte for 30 years – now more than ever we need to strengthen our resolve, joining forces to stop the beginning of construction.”

“It’s now more important than ever that we take this campaign to the next level. “Take a stand, stop this monstrous project by joining the Cause on Facebook “Stop the Monster Dam: Protect the Xingu River and its People”.

Your donation today will support the travel of indigenous leaders to Brasilia and Altamira to make their voices heard.” Xingu Alive Forever! Xingu Vivo Para Sempre! Please join the cause. Also, please note that the avaaz.org petition is still active. If you have not signed it you can do it now here. Posted by Lou Gold at 4:22 PM

Free Bus Launch Day !!!

category bristol | transport | event notice author Wednesday June 01, 2011 16:50author by Jack Phillipsauthor email freebus at live dot co dot uk Report this post to the editors

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After nearly a year of campaigning and fundraising, FreeBus launches its initial service on June 11th. The first bus leaves Temple Meads at 10am.

Come down for music, merriment and (of course) free bus rides for all!

Route and timetable info at www.freebus.org.uk

Support the FreeBus!

Final go ahead for Belo Monte. Amazon Tragedy.

Brazil Green Lights Controversial Amazon Dam

June 1, 2011

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

IBAMA authorizes installation of Belo Monte Dam Complex despite escalating local, national and international opposition

Brasília, Brazil – The Brazilian government has issued the full installation license allowing the Belo Monte Dam Complex to break ground on the Amazon’s Xingu River despite egregious disregard for human rights and environmental legislation, the unwavering protests of civil society, condemnations by its Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office (MPF) and the request for precautionary measures by the OAS Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR). The license was granted by Brazil’s environmental agency IBAMA despite overwhelming evidence that the dam-building consortium Norte Energia (NESA) has failed to comply with dozens of social and environmental conditions required for an installation license.

The risky $17 billion Belo Monte Dam Complex will divert nearly the entire flow of the Xingu River along a 62-mile stretch. Its reservoirs will flood more than 120,000 acres of rainforest and local settlements, displace more than 40,000 people and generate vast quantities of methane – a greenhouse gas at least 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

The installation license will allow for NESA to open access roads, initiate forest clearing at dam construction sites encompassing some 2,118 acres, and begin construction on the complex immediately. It also instigates publically subsidized funding from Brazil’s National Development Bank (BNDES) to finance 80 percent of the project’s spiraling costs. The bank has come under increasing scrutiny from the Public Prosecutor’s office and civil society due to alarming evidence that approval is based on political grounds, often downplaying problems of economic viability and compliance with social and environmental safeguards.

“This is a tragic day for the Amazon,” said Atossa Soltani, Executive Director at Amazon Watch. “By turning a blind eye toward the tragic consequences of this dam, President Dilma Rouseff is undermining the positive environmental and social advances Brazil has made in recent years and miring its image on the global stage just as it prepares to host the UN Rio+20 Earth Summit next year.”

Amazonia: Dinho, Claudio and Maria murdered!.Forest criminals to be amnestied!

SLAUGHTERING THE AMAZON.. With the new Forest Law and amnesty for Forest crimes the ranchers and loggers are taking their opportunity by terrorist murders. Their business is the destruction of the Amazon, now with more impunity, to satisfy the demands of criminal capitalist transnationals like Burger King and MacDonalds.
Adelino  Ramos was killed for openly confronting the beef and timber mafia. Shot to death by cowardly bastards at his street stall while selling his forest produce.

He was a famous ex leader of the  Movimiento Campesino Corumbiara and had survived a fascist massacre a decade ago. Un motociclista lo mató a tiros en Rondonia, norte del país.

Just 3 days before they got José Claudio Ribeiro da Silva and his wife, Maria do Espírito Santo da Silva, shooting her first and cutting off her ears. Claudio and Maria were outspoken forest defenders and cultivated Amazon produce.

At the time of murder Adelino, or ‘Dinho’,  was busy setting up a camp for people displaced by the wholesale massacre of the forest. He had been repeatedly threatened and recently denounced the escalating forest destruction in Acre, Amazonas y Rondonia states.

El debate sobre la explotación del Amazonas ha tomado gran vuelo en Brasil después de que en una semana se siguieran dos noticias contradictorias: la publicación de un alarmante aumento de los niveles de deforestación, y la aprobación en la noche del martes, por aplastante mayoría en el parlamento, de una reforma del Código Forestal brasileño que establece una amnistía general para todos aquellos que incurrieron en delitos contra la vegetación hasta 2008.

In just a few days we have the news of a seven fold increase in deforestation, the disgraceful passing of the new Forest Law (see other posts) by fascist landlords allied with greedy corrupt politicians, companies, and media, the go ahead and 1st contracts for the Belo Monte dam, and the signing of deals to let BP, of all companies, exploit the ultra deep oil bonanza near Rio.

International resistance has failed miserably despite the best efforts of Avaaz and Greenpeace. Resistance needs to be informed and intelligent, or it plays into the hands of nationalists who argue that ‘rich parasitic 1st Worlders have no right to lecture us after decimating their own forests, etc’.


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