Unas 20 personas de la isla de Annobón se concentran ante la embajada de Guinea Ecuatorial en Madrid para denunciar las brutales agresiones a embarazas y niñas
Unas20 mujeres naturales de la isla de Annobón,enGuinea Ecuatorial,se han manifestado este viernes frente a la embajada de Guinea en Madrid. Denuncian lasviolaciones que sufren por parte de los militaresque Teodoro Obiang, quien preside el país desde 1979 tras un golpe de estado, tiene desplegados por la isla.“Queremos justicia”,“Todo se queda impune” o “No más militares en Annobón” han sido algunos de los lemas que se han podido leer. Las manifestantes han entregado al embajador unmanifiestodenunciando la grave vulneración de derechos humanos en la isla y prevén volverse a manifestar en octubre.
On Tuesday, June 28, in the UK, the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act came into force, the biggest blow to protest rights in a generation.
There are those who know only too well what it is like to live under a government that sets as a goal the removal of your rights.
Several thousands Hong Kongers live in Bristol, having fled their city following the uprising of 2019 and 2020, in which protesters battled police on the streets of Hong Kong for freedom and self-governance against the imposition of new laws by China.
On July 23, around 150 of those Hong Kongers gathered on College Green to remember the uprising, and the particularly brutal events of July 21, 2019 in which protesters were attacked whilst waiting for trains. The attackers are thought to have been acting in collusion with the local police.
Many of those in the crowd fled Hong Kong when China passed the National Security Law, a law that limited free speech, curtailed protest and banned political dissent.
Whilst it would surely be an overreach to compare the National Security Law with our own Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, it is worth noting the parallels.
Both rely on vaguely defined offences and cover-all terms that could potentially apply to anyone and any act the government deems offensive.
A recent report by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found more than 80 percent of urine samples from children and adults in the U.S. contained the herbicide glyphosate. A study by Florida Atlantic University and Nova Southeastern University takes this research one step further and is the first to link the use of […]
Over half of all food samples tested by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) contain the residues of at least one pesticide, and one in ten samples have levels that violate legal limits established by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Beyond Pesticides reported Monday. Source: Beyond Pesticides These findings, published by the FDA […]
In a new study, Arizona State University (ASU) and the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGEN) have explored the effects of glyphosate exposure on the brains of mice. The research demonstrates, for the first time, that glyphosate successfully crosses the blood-brain barrier and infiltrates the brain. Once there, it acts to enhance levels of a critical factor […]
Public finance has a key role to play in agriculture. Instead of propping up corporate interests, it should learn from local producers
In 2017, the people of Zagora, Morocco, took to the streets in what became known as the ‘thirst revolution’.
They were demanding safe drinking water and an end to the excessive use of water by big agricultural companies.
In an already arid area, experiencing frequent droughts and heatwaves due to climate change, much of the available water supply was being used to grow watermelons for export to Europe. Residents had been left with an insufficient, unreliable and undrinkable supply. Twenty-three of the demonstrators were arrested.
In Morocco, irrigation for agriculture consumes almost 90% of the annual available fresh water. This intense extraction dates back to the colonial period, when the French authorities replaced the khettara – a traditional irrigation system developed and managed by local communities – with water-intensive structures that allow production to fulfil the demand of European markets.
Agriculture now constitutes almost 15% of Morocco’s GDP. The industry receives substantial support from public development banks such as the African Development Bank and the World Bank. Both banks supported the 2008 Green Morocco Plan, which aimed to “fully exploit the agricultural potential of the country”.
The plan favoured export-oriented crops with high water requirements, such as watermelons, tomatoes and citrus fruits.
Morocco’s water crisis is not an isolated case. All around the world, water scarcity and food crises are being caused by the man-made disasters of climate change, colonialism, and an extractive economic model – pushed by governments, private companies and development finance institutions – that boosts productivity at any cost and disregards the rights of local communities.
Escalated by the pandemic and the subsequent global economic crisis, water and food shortages have reached unprecedented levels in dozens of countries, with small-scale producers – especially women – disproportionately affected.
Retrato del activismo y resistencia de colectivas de jóvenes lesbianas y bisexualas, trans incluyentes en Brasil/Colombia/México, ante un contexto de resurgimiento de la ultra derecha.
Este documental fue grabado durante el estallido en América Latina y realizado por mujeres lesbianas, bisexuales y personas no binaries.
Duración: 41 minutos. Dirección: Al Vallejo Producción: México, Chile, Colombia y Brasil (2021)
*Después de la proyección conversaremos con las realizadoras.
By Ron Paul Source: Ron Paul Institute There is a video clip making the rounds showing President Biden speaking at a recent NATO summit about the seven billion dollars the US government had – at that time – provided to Ukraine. Attached to that is another clip showing the horrific state of several US major […]
PFAS, a group of manufactured chemicals commonly used since the 1940s, are called “forever chemicals” for a reason. Bacteria can’t eat them; fire can’t incinerate them; and water can’t dilute them.
And, if these toxic chemicals are buried, they leach into surrounding soil, becoming a persistent problem for generations to come.
Forever chemicals are everywhere, even in our blood, and are incredibly toxic and almost indestructible.. until now. The new simple way to destroy at least a few of them opens the way for a long control campaign, but can only work if twinned by total and enforced production bans
Now, Northwestern University chemists have done the seemingly impossible. Using low temperatures and inexpensive, common reagents, the research team developed a process that causes two major classes of PFAS compounds to fall apart — leaving behind only benign end products.
The simple technique potentially could be a powerful solution for finally disposing of these harmful chemicals, which are linked to many dangerous health effects in humans, livestock and the environment.
“PFAS has become a major societal problem,” said Northwestern’s William Dichtel, who led the study. “Even just a tiny, tiny amount of PFAS causes negative health effects, and it does not break down.
We can’t just wait out this problem. We wanted to use chemistry to address this problem and create a solution that the world can use. It’s exciting because of how simple — yet unrecognized — our solution is.”
Dichtel is the Robert L. Letsinger Professor of Chemistry in Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. Brittany Trang, who conducted the project as a part of her recently completed doctoral thesis in Dichtel’s laboratory, is the paper’s co-first author.
‘The same category as lead’
Short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, PFAS has been in use for 70 years as nonstick and waterproofing agents. They are commonly found in nonstick cookware, waterproof cosmetics, firefighting foams, water-repellent fabrics and products that resist grease and oil.
Over the years, however, PFAS has made its way out of consumer goods and into our drinking water and even into the blood of 97% of the U.S. population.
Although the health effects are not yet fully understood, PFAS exposure is strongly associated with decreased fertility, developmental effects in children, increased risks of various types of cancer, reduced immunity to fight infections and increased cholesterol levels.
With these adverse health effects in mind, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently declared several PFAS as unsafe — even at trace levels.
“Recently, the EPA revised its recommendations for PFOA essentially down to zero,” Dichtel said. “That puts several PFAS into the same category as lead.”
Unbreakable bonds
Although community efforts to filter PFAS from water have been successful, there are few solutions for how to dispose of PFAS once it is removed. The few option that are now emerging generally involved PFAS destruction at high temperatures and pressures or other methods that require large energy inputs.
The Free 