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 | Goa Cursed By Its Mineral Wealth
by Emily Bild, Special to CorpWatch
April 23rd, 2009
Set on India's west coast, Goa is renowned as a beach paradise popular with Indian and foreign tourists alike. Just a few miles inland from the quaint restaurants and the pristine waves lapping the silver shores of India's smallest state, iron-ore mining is destroying the environment, say activists and locals. |
 | Regulating Ramatex: Authorities Shut Out as Malaysian Investor Threatens Namibian Environment
by Moses Magadza, Special to CorpWatch
April 5th, 2009
For nearly six years Ramatex Textile and Garment Factory barred government regulators from entering industrial premises leased from the City of Windhoek. Ramatex came to Namibia in 2001, lured by the newly implemented African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA). Evidence of environmental violations finally emerged after the company absconded. |
 | Inheriting Halliburton's Army: What Will Obama Do With KBR?
by Pratap Chatterjee, TomDispatch.com
February 22nd, 2009
President Obama will almost certainly touch down in Baghdad and Kabul in Air Force One sometime in the coming year to meet his counterparts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and he will just as certainly pay a visit to a U.S. military base or two. Should he stay to eat with the troops, he will no less certainly choose from a menu prepared by migrant Asian workers under contract to Houston-based KBR, the former subsidiary of Halliburton. |
 | One Million Weapons to Iraq; Many Go Missing
by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch
September 22nd, 2008
An Alabama company controlled by a billionaire Kuwaiti family is the biggest supplier of guns to Iraq. These weapons were paid for by the Pentagon which has lost track of them. A new Amnesty international report says that such unrestrained global arms trading schemes may have catastrophic human rights consequences. |
 | Toyota: Auto Industry Race to the Bottom
by Barbara Briggs, Special to CorpWatch
September 16th, 2008
Globally, Toyota is known for its innovation and quality of products like the Prius hybrid. A closer look at operations in Japan, the Philippines, Myanmar and the U.S. reveals a story of extreme working conditions, union-busting and other corporate abuses. In Japan and elsewhere, workers are speaking out. |
 | Absolving Your Sins and CYA: Corporations Embrace Voluntary Codes of Conduct
by Anne Landman, Center for Media and Democracy, Special to CorpWatch
August 18th, 2008
Multinational industries like tobacco and alcohol have responded to increased global public pressure for accountability around corporate operations by creating Voluntary Codes of Conduct to self-regulate their behavior. But how are the results measuring up? |
 | Ducking Responsibility: Entergy Spins Its Nukes
by Shay Totten, Special to CorpWatch
August 4th, 2008
Entergy Nuclear (part of the broader Entergy energy family) is spinning off its northeastern U.S.-based nuclear power plants into a related limited liability corporation, Enexus. Stakeholders in Vermont, home of the Yankee Nuclear power plant, are less than happy, with Entergy also reneging on prior commitments to cover eventual plant decommissioning costs, potentially stranding taxpayers with much of the bill. |
 | Dark Side of the Tourist Boom: Cruise Ship Controversies Cross Borders
by Kent Paterson, Special to CorpWatch
July 9th, 2008
The Mexican Pacific resort of Zihuatanejo recently cancelled a major new cruise ship terminal, giving a victory to environmental activists and other opponents. However, Mexico remains the world’s Number One cruise ship destination; and with little regulation, allegations of onboard crime, and increasing militarization as regards security while ships are in port, the rapidly expanding industry is facing new challenges. |
 | Suing the Smelter: Oklahoma Town Takes on Freeport
by Eliza Strickland, Special to CorpWatch
May 15th, 2008
Residents of the town of Blackwell, Oklahoma have brought a class action lawsuit against mining giant Freeport McMoRan. The plaintiffs say that the company's zinc smelter, which closed in 1974, left a toxic legacy in the town, including contaminated sand from the smelter that was given away for free. |
 | Smokestack Injustice? Toxic Texas Smelter May Reopen
by Kent Paterson, Special to CorpWatch
April 2nd, 2008
The old American Smelting and Refining Company (Asarco) copper smelter in El Paso, Texas, which has spewed out toxins for over a century, has been granted a new five-year permit. This is despite the fact that it violates international laws by polluting communities on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. |
 | Ecuador's Yasuni Park: Oil Exploration or Nature Protection?
by Agneta Enström, Special to CorpWatch
March 20th, 2008
Permission for Petrobras of Brazil to drill for oil in Yasuni National Park, one of the most biologically diverse places in the world, has been suspended, but some damage has already been done by Swedish construction giant Skanska. Unless new money is found to protect the forest, exploration may resume. |
 | Playing with Children's Lives: Big Tobacco in Malawi
by Pilirani Semu-Banda, Special to CorpWatch
February 25th, 2008
Cigarettes may be damaging not only your own health, but also that of some of the world's poorest children. Much of Malawi's thriving tobacco industry rests on the backs of exploited children, some as young as five years old. |
 | Sunshine Laws to Track European Lobbyists
by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch
October 11th, 2007
Some 15,000 lobbyists work in Brussels where they meet secretly with European Union officials to try and influence the rules that govern the 27 countries that together form the world’s most powerful economic bloc. New guidelines will attempt to make this lobbying more public and reveal conflicts of interest. |
 | An Insider in Brussels: Lobbyists Reshape the European Union
by Elke Cronenberg, Special to CorpWatch
September 18th, 2006
In order to influence the new laws that encompass the 25 countries of the European Union, now the world's largest single economy, some 15,000 lobbyists have flocked to Brussels, its political heart. The public relations firm Burson-Mastellar is one of the most active among them. |
 | Intelligence in Iraq: L-3 Supplies Spy Support
by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch
August 9th, 2006
L-3 Communications, a little-known but gigantic military contractor, provides 300 contract intelligence experts to the Pentagon in Iraq to support operations ranging from interrogation to media analysis. The secretive $426.5 million operation, which is run out of Virginia, may be a recipe for disaster, say critics.
Also see related story, A Translator's Tale, by Pratap Chatterjee. |
 | Some Strings Attached: Cotton, Farm subsidies tie up global trade talks
by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch
December 13th, 2005
West African cotton farmers are among those hardest hit by government subsidized corporate agriculture. This week in Hong Kong, trade ministers from the 148 members of the World Trade Organization meet to discusss this and other global free trade issues. |
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