 |
| INDIA: Camera Obscura and the manufacture of happiness
by Aman Sethi & Priscilla Jebaraj, The Hindu
March 6th, 2012
An advertisement flooding airwaves across India would have you believe that a company called Vedanta is a creating a product called happiness. But London-based Vedanta Resources has attracted the ire of environmental activists and human rights groups like Amnesty International who have accused the company of exploiting indigenous communities — such as the Dongria Kondhs of Niyamgiri in Odisha — without due process. |
| ARCTIC: Shell Launches Preemptive Legal Strike For Ocean Drilling
by Kim Murphy, Los Angeles Times
February 29th, 2012
Royal Dutch Shell launched an extraordinary preemptive legal strike Wednesday against opponents of offshore oil drilling in the Arctic Ocean, filing suit against more than a dozen environmental organizations likely to challenge its plan for drilling exploratory wells in the Chukchi Sea this summer. |
| U.S.: TransCanada Pipeline Foes See U.S. Bias in E-Mails
by Elisabeth Rosenthal, New York Times
October 3rd, 2011
E-mails obtained by Friends of the Earth paint a picture of a collaborative relationship between lobbyists for TransCanada and the U.S. State department, the agency that has final say over a 1,661 mile pipeline that will transport tar sands crude from Alberta to Texas. Embassy officials in Ottawa procured invitations to Fourth of July parties for TransCanada officials and shared information with the company about Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s meetings. |
| LIBERIA: Hunting for Liberia’s Missing Millions
by Doreen Carvjal, New York Times
May 30th, 2010
How much money did Charles G. Taylor, the deposed president of Liberia, siphon out of his war-shattered country, and where is it? Investigators are developing a new strategy involving filing civil damage claims against companies, governments and international banks that they contend aided Mr. Taylor in illegal transactions. |
| US: Nature Conservancy faces potential backlash from ties with BP
by Joe Stephens, Washington Post
May 24th, 2010
The Nature Conservancy faces a problem: a potential backlash as its supporters learn that BP and the world's largest environmental organization long ago forged a relationship that has lent BP an Earth-friendly image and helped fund the Conservancy. The crude emanating from BP's well threatens to befoul a number of alliances between energy conglomerates and environmental nonprofits. |
| US: Oil Hits Home, Spreading Arc of Frustration
by Campbell Robertson, Clifford Krauss and John M. Broder, New York Times
May 24th, 2010
More than a month has passed since the Deepwater Horizon rig blew up, spewing oil into the Gulf of Mexico and frustrating all efforts to contain it. The disaster underscores the enduring laxity of federal regulation of offshore operations and has shown the government to be almost wholly at the mercy of BP and of Transocean, the company leasing the rig. |
| WORLD: Disaster Plans Lacking at Deep Rigs
by Ben Casselman and Guy Chazen, Wall Street Journal
May 17th, 2010
Dealing with a deep-sea spill is a a problem that spans the industry, whose major players include Chevron Corp, Royal Dutch Shell and Petróleo Brasileiro SA. Without adequately planning for trouble, the oil business has focused on developing experimental equipment and techniques to drill in ever deeper waters, according to a Wall Street Journal examination. |
| US: U.S. Said to Allow Drilling Without Needed Permits
by Ian Urbina, New York Times
May 13th, 2010
The federal Minerals Management Service gave permission to BP and dozens of other oil companies to drill in the Gulf of Mexico without first getting required permits from another agency that assesses threats to endangered species — and despite strong warnings from that agency about the impact the drilling was likely to have on the gulf. |
| UK/CANADA: Tar sands crude is reaching British petrol stations, Greenpeace says
by Terry Macalister, The Guardian (UK)
May 9th, 2010
While City investors have begun to question the role of companies such as BP and Shell in the tar sands business, a new report by Greenpeace claims British motorists are unwitting users of diesel and petrol derived from the tar sands of Alberta, Canada. The carbon-heavy production methods involved make tar sands extraction particularly damaging to the environment. |
| US: BP touts itself as 'green,' but faces PR disaster with 'BP oil spill'
by Paul Farhi, Washington Post
May 6th, 2010
Ever careful of its public image, BP has been careful not to invoke its name in regard to the massive ongoing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. "We refer to it as Gulf of Mexico response," said Andrew Gowers, the company's spokesman. The name of a disaster can be critical, both as a historic matter and the more immediate matters of image, public relations and legal liability. |
| US: FBI Probes Explosion in West Virginia Mine
by Kris Maher and Siobhan Hughes, Wall Street Journal
April 30th, 2010
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is conducting a criminal probe of the deadly explosion at a Massey Energy Co. mine in West Virginia in early April that killed 29 miners, according to people familiar with the matter. In a statement on Friday Massey Energy said, "Massey has no knowledge of criminal wrongdoing." |
| US: BP Is Criticized Over Oil Spill, but U.S. Missed Chances to Act
by Campbell Robertson and Eric Lipton, New York Times
April 30th, 2010
The Obama administration began Friday to publicly chastise BP America for its handling of the spreading oil gusher in the Gulf of Mexico. Officials initially seemed to underestimate the threat of a leak, just as BP did last year when it told the government such an event was highly unlikely. |
| US: Oil Spill’s Blow to BP’s Image May Eclipse Costs
by Clifford Krauss , New York Times
April 29th, 2010
BP says that the offshore drilling accident that is spewing thousands of barrels of oil a day into the Gulf of Mexico could cost the company several hundred million dollars. Nobody really knows whether the oil giant is being too conservative about the cost for the April 20 accident, which some experts say could end up as the biggest oil spill in history. |
| CANADA: Munk takes on mine protesters, defends capitalism
by John Spears, The Star
April 28th, 2010
Mark Ekepa journeyed from Papua New Guinea to tell the shareholders of Barrick Gold Corp. how police had burned down his house near the Barrick’s Porgera mine. Idolia Bornones travelled from Chile to say that Barrick operations are damaging local glaciers and rivers. But Barrick chairman Peter Munk was unrepentant as he faced the company’s annual meeting. |
| AFRICA: E Guinea ejected from industry clean-up body
by Tom Burgis, Financial Times
April 16th, 2010
A pioneering initiative aimed at cleaning up the oil and mining industries has ejected Equatorial Guinea from its ranks. The board of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, a voluntary coalition of companies, governments, donors and civil society groups, had been under pressure from activists on granting extensions to 17 states that had missed a deadline to have audits of their industries independently verified. |
| US: Deaths at West Virginia Mine Raise Issues About Safety
by Ian Urbina and Michael Cooper, New York Times
April 6th, 2010
Rescue workers began the precarious task Tuesday of removing explosive methane gas from the coal mine where at least 25 miners died the day before. The mine owner’s -- Massey Energy Company -- dismal safety record, along with several recent evacuations of the mine, left federal officials and miners suggesting that Monday’s explosion might have been preventable. |
| CANADA/CHINA: Canada looks to China to exploit oil sands rejected by US
by Suzanne Goldenberg, The Guardian (UK)
February 14th, 2010
Canada, faced with growing political pressure over the extraction of oil from its highly polluting tar sands, has begun courting China and other Asian countries to exploit the resource.
The move comes as US firms are turning away from tar sands because of its heavy carbon footprint and damage to the landscape. |
| US/IRAQ: U.S. Companies Join Race on Iraqi Oil Bonanza
by TIMOTHY WILLIAMS, New York Times
January 13th, 2010
American companies have been arriving in Iraq to pursue an expected multibillion-dollar bonanza of projects to revive the country’s petroleum industry. But there are questions about the Iraqi government’s capacity to police the companies. “These are for-profit concerns and they are trying to make as much money as they can,” said Pratap Chatterjee of CorpWatch. |
| NIGERIA: Ex-militant leader heads SPDC’s patrol team
by Chris Ejim, Nigerian Compass
January 8th, 2010
Authorities of Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) have unveiled a new security strategy for securing oil pipelines and platforms within the Niger Delta region. Shell has appointed former MEND militant commander, Eris Paul, and his company, Eristex Pipeline Patrol, to secure oil facilities in the Southern Ijaw area of the Delta. |
| GHANA: Corruption probe into sale of Ghana oil block
by William Wallis, Martin Arnold and Brooke Masters, Financial Times
January 7th, 2010
US and Ghanaian authorities are investigating corruption allegations involving a Texas oil company and the local partner that helped it secure control of the Ghanaian oil block that yielded one of Africa’s biggest recent discoveries. The case risks complicating efforts by Texas company Kosmos to sell its stake in the Jubilee oil field to ExxonMobil in a deal valued at $4bn. |
| EUROPE: Europe’s Vast Farm Subsidies Face Challenges
by STEPHEN CASTLE and DOREEN CARVAJAL, New York Times
December 29th, 2009
The last time the European Union decided the future of its 50 billion euro agricultural aid program, in 2005, the deal was cut behind closed doors in a luxury suite at the five-star Conrad Brussels hotel. Now, 2013 is closer at hand and a new round of maneuvering has begun to reshape the richest system of agricultural handouts in the world. |
| CHINA: Earth-Friendly Elements, Mined Destructively
by Keith Bradsher, New York Times
December 26th, 2009
Some of the greenest technologies of the age, from electric cars to efficient light bulbs to very large wind turbines, are made possible by an unusual group of elements called rare earths. Most of these come from China. “In many places, the mining is abused,” said Wang Caifeng, the top rare-earths industry regulator at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in China. |
| US: Monsanto's dominance draws antitrust inquiry
by Peter Whoriskey, Washington Post
November 29th, 2009
For plants designed in a lab a little more than a decade ago, they've come a long way: Today, the vast majority of the nation's two primary crops grow from seeds genetically altered according to Monsanto company patents. Now Monsanto -- like IBM and Google -- has drawn scrutiny from U.S. antitrust investigators. |
| US/ECUADOR: New nonprofit uses Web to pressure Chevron
by David A. Baker, San Francisco Chronicle
November 16th, 2009
Retired retail executive Richard Goldman was astonished when he heard about the $27 billion pollution lawsuit against Chevron Corp. in Ecuador. SO he has created a nonprofit group, Ethos Alliance, that will use social-networking tools to spread word of the case and put pressure on Chevron. |
| SOUTHEAST ASIA: Sizing up palm oil
by David Grant, Christian Science Monitor
November 2nd, 2009
While it doesn’t sound (and need not be) nefarious, activist groups worldwide like the Rainforest Action Network argue that the production of palm oil is currently harming rain forests in Southeast Asia, orangutans, and the environment. |
| BRAZIL: Giants in Cattle Industry Agree to Help Fight Deforestation
by Alexei Barrionuevo, New York Times
October 7th, 2009
Environmental groups hailed a decision this week by four of the world’s largest meat producers to ban the purchase of cattle from newly deforested areas of Brazil’s Amazon rain forest. Brazil has the world’s largest cattle herd and is the world’s largest beef exporter. It is also the fourth largest producer of greenhouse gas emissions. |
| SOUTH AFRICA: Arcelor Mittal South Africa dismisses pollution claims
by Sapa-AP, Sunday Independent (South Africa)
September 25th, 2009
On Friday, ArcelorMittal SA, the world's largest steel marker, dismissed allegations of severe environmental damage and unethical business practices at its Steel Valley mill. In 2002, the company took over the 67-year-old plant that residents and environmental groups say has polluted their lives. Company officials acknowledge there is air and water pollution but say that emissions comply with legislation and that clean-up operations are under way. |
| ANGOLA: The dark side of doing business
by Rob Rose, Times South Africa
September 17th, 2009
As Angolan leader Jose Eduardo Dos Santos wooed President Jacob Zuma this week, some South African companies are furious at having been fleeced out of cash by doing business with the oil-rich country |
| EU: Court adviser wants De Beers ruling upheld
by REUTERS, Times Live
September 17th, 2009
An adviser to Europe’s highest court has recommended upholding a decision by EU antitrust regulators which forced diamond producer De Beers to stop buying rough diamonds from Russia’s Alrosa this year. |
| US: Clean Water Laws Are Neglected, at a Cost in Suffering
by Charles Duhigg, New York Times
September 12th, 2009
Violations of the Clean Water Act have risen steadily across the nation, an extensive review of water pollution records by The New York Times found. Polluters include small companies, like gas stations, dry cleaners, and shopping malls. They also include large operations, like chemical factories, power plants, sewage treatment centers and one of the biggest zinc smelters, the Horsehead Corporation of Pennsylvania. |
| US: Tar-sands oil standoff brews in Minnesota
by Leslie Brooks Suzukamo , TwinCities.com - Pioneer Press
September 9th, 2009
The fight over global warming and Canadian oil is heating up. A group of oil companies and big industries launched a campaign to try to snuff out rules that might raise the cost of piping Canadian tar-sands oil through the Dakotas to refineries in the Twin Cities. Meanwhile, environmentalists are trying to stop tar-sands oil, claiming it is some of the dirtiest petroleum on Earth. |
| ECUADOR: Chevron Offers Evidence in Ecuador Bribery Case
by Reuters, New York Times
September 7th, 2009
On Monday Chevron said it gave Ecuadorean authorities evidence of a bribery scheme linked to a $27 billion environmental damages lawsuit against the oil company. Last week, the judge hearing the case, Juan Núñez, recused himself. The Amazon Defense Coalition said the recusal did not “change the overwhelming evidence against Chevron.” |
| FIJI: Fiji Water: Spin the Bottle
by Anna Lenzer, Mother Jones
August 17th, 2009
Obama sips it. Paris Hilton loves it. Mary J. Blige won't sing without it. How did a plastic water bottle, imported from a military dictatorship thousands of miles away, become the epitome of cool? |
| SOUTH AMERICA: Plundering the Amazon
by Michael Smith and Adriana Brasileiro, Bloomberg.com
August 16th, 2009
Alcoa and Cargill have bypassed laws designed to prevent destruction of the world’s largest rain forest, Brazilian prosecutors say. The damage wrought by scores of companies is robbing the earth of its best shield against global warming. |
| UK: Two men and a website mount vendetta against an oil giant
by Danny Fortson, Sunday Times (UK)
July 19th, 2009
In Colchester, Essex, John and Alfred Donovan are compiling perhaps the world's largest dossier on Royal Dutch Shell, at royaldutchshellplc.com. It's an awkward position for Shell, this month crowned by Fortune magazine as the world’s largest company, as trying to shut the website down would draw even more attention to it. |
| UK: Two men and a website mount vendetta against an oil giant
by Danny Fortson, The Sunday Times (UK)
July 19th, 2009
In Colchester, Essex, John and Alfred Donovan are compiling perhaps the world's largest dossier on Royal Dutch Shell, at royaldutchshellplc.com. It's an awkward position for Shell, this month crowned by Fortune magazine as the world’s largest company, as trying to shut the website down would draw even more attention to it. |
| US: Sued by the forest
by Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow, The Boston Globe
July 19th, 2009
Last February, the town of Shapleigh, Maine, population 2,326, passed an unusual ordinance. Like nearby towns, Shapleigh sought to protect its aquifers from the Nestle Corporation, which draws heavily on the region for its Poland Spring bottled water. Shapleigh tried something new. At a town meeting, residents voted to endow all of the town’s natural assets with legal rights. |
| ECUADOR: Chevron's Amazon 'fake cleanup' trial
United Press International
June 25th, 2009
A report submitted this week to a court in Ecuador finding dangerous levels of contamination at oil wells Chevron says it cleaned up in the 1990s is expected to reinforce a fraud indictment against two Chevron lawyers in a $27.3 billion environmental lawsuit against the oil company. |
| AFRICA: Blood diamond scheme 'is failing'
BBC News
June 24th, 2009
Officials are meeting to review the Kimberley Process, amid criticism that the scheme, set up to certify the origin of diamonds to assure consumers that by purchasing diamonds they are not financing war and human rights abuses, is failing. The Kimberley Process emerged from global outrage over conflicts in countries like Liberia and Sierra Leone, largely funded by the plundering of diamond resources. |
| IRAQ: Big Oil Ready for Big Gamble in Iraq
by Gina Chon, Wall Street Journal
June 24th, 2009
Next week, Iraqi officials will auction off oil contracts to foreign companies for the first time since Iraq nationalized its oil industry three decades ago. Some 120 companies expressed interest in bidding for the contracts, and thirty-five companies qualified. They include Exxon Mobil Corp., Royal Dutch Shell PLC, Italy's Eni SpA, Russia's Lukoil and China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., or Sinopec. |
| AFRICA: Battle to Halt Graft Scourge in Africa Ebbs
by Celia W. Dugger, New York Times
June 9th, 2009
The fight against corruption in Africa is faltering as public agencies investigating wrongdoing by powerful politicians have been undermined and officials leading the charge have been dismissed, subjected to death threats and driven into exile. The search is on for more effective ways to tackle corruption, including intensified legal efforts to prosecute multinational corporations that pay the bribes and reclaim loot that African political elites have stashed abroad. |
| GHANA: Energy groups lured by Ghana’s Kosmos
by Carola Hoyos, Financial Times
June 4th, 2009
Big international energy groups and state-owned oil companies from China and India are circling Kosmos Energy for its Ghanaian oilfield assets, which have been valued at $3bn-$6bn by analysts. The sale could open an oil corridor off the west African coast, stretching as far north-west as Sierra Leone. |
| US: 'Roadless' Forest Areas Now Under Vilsack
by David A. Fahrenthold, Washington Post
May 29th, 2009
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack issued a temporary order yesterday governing development in "roadless" areas of national forests, requiring all new projects to be approved by him personally. A USDA official said it is unclear whether projects with a strictly commercial aim, such as logging or mining, will be allowed. |
| WORLD: When Chevron Hires Ex-Reporter to Investigate Pollution, Chevron Looks Good
by Brian Stelter, New York Times
May 10th, 2009
When Chevron learned that “60 Minutes” was preparing a potentially damaging report about oil company contamination of the Amazon rain forest in Ecuador, it hired a former journalist to produce a mirror image of the report, from the corporation’s point of view. An Ecuadorean judge is expected to rule soon on whether Chevron owes up to $27 billion in damages. |
| NIGERIA: A Writer’s Violent End, and His Activist Legacy
by Patricia Cohen, New York Times
May 4th, 2009
A new novel, "Eclipse," by Richard North Patterson, is based on the case of the Nigerian writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, executed in November 1995 by the government of General Sani Abacha. The circumstances, along with related incidents of brutal attacks, are getting another hearing. This month the Wiwa family’s lawsuit against Royal Dutch Shell over its role in those events goes to trial in federal court in Manhattan. |
| US: Oil Giants Loath to Follow Obama’s Green Lead
by Jad Mouawad, New York Times
April 7th, 2009
The Obama administration seeks the most ambitious transformation of energy policy in a generation. But Big Oil is not on board. Royal Dutch Shell said last month that it would freeze research and investments in wind, solar and hydrogen power, and focus its alternative energy efforts on biofuels. BP, a company that has spent nine years saying it was moving “beyond petroleum,” has been getting back to petroleum since 2007, paring back its renewable program. The list goes on. |
| WORLD: The Jewel Trade's Fading Luster
by V. Dion Haynes and Rama Lakshmi, Washington Post
March 28th, 2009
The drop in U.S. demand for high-end jewelry in a slumping economy is having ripple effects around the globe as stores close, workers are laid off in mass in the diamond-polishing factories of Gujarat, and countries like Botswana experience a dramatic drop in diamond revenue. |
| AFRICA/CHINA: As Chinese Investment in Africa Drops, Hope Sinks
by Lydia Polgreen, New York Times
March 25th, 2009
As global commodity prices have plummeted and several of China’s partners in Africa have stumbled deeper into chaos, China has backed away from some of its riskiest and most aggressive plans. China has sought to secure minerals in Africa through agreements to build huge projects in exchange for minerals. African governments are now realizing that these deals are loans against future revenue, and falling prices could leave them saddled with debt. |
| US/CANADA: Alaskan lake’s fate could echo across continent
by Todd Wilkinson, Christian Science Monitor
March 24th, 2009
A landmark legal case now before the US Supreme Court holds huge implications for lakes across the continent. Nearly four decades the Clean Water Act was passed to protect waterways from industrial pollution, a proposal by Coeur d’Alene Mines Corp. to dispose of tons of effluent in Alaska's Lower Slate Lake has sparked an international debate. |
| CHILE: Chilean Town Withers in Free Market for Water
by Alexei Barrionuevo, New York Times
March 15th, 2009
Nowhere is the system for buying and selling water more permissive than in Chile, where water rights are private property, not a public resource, and can be traded like commodities with little government oversight or safeguards for the environment. The small town of Quillaga is being swallowed up in the country’s intensifying water wars. |
| ECUADOR/CANADA: Canadian Mining Firm Financed Violence in Ecuador: Lawsuit
by Jennifer Moore, Tyee Online
March 3rd, 2009
Three villagers from the valley of Intag in northwestern Ecuador are suing Copper Mesa Mining Corporation and the Toronto Stock Exchange. They allege not enough has been done to reduce the risk of harm being faced by farmers and community leaders who have faced violent threats and attacks for opposition to a large open-pit copper mine in their pristine cloud forests. |
| EUROPE: Europe to Allow Two Bans on Genetically Altered Crops
by James Kanter, New York Times
March 2nd, 2009
European Union governments delivered a blow Monday to the biotechnology industry, allowing Austria and Hungary to maintain national bans on growing genetically modified crops from Monsanto. The market for genetically engineered crops is worth several billion dollars worldwide. |
| CANADA: The Canadian Oil Boom: Scraping Bottom
by Robert Kunzig, National Geographic
March 1st, 2009
Once considered too expensive, as well as too damaging to the land, exploitation of Alberta's oil sands is now a gamble worth billions.
Syncrude and Suncor are two of the largest producers of bitumen; Canada is now the largest importer of oil to the United States, with tar sands exploitation slated to increase rapidly over the next five years. |
| US: Mr. Whipple Left It Out: Soft Is Rough on Forests
by Leslie Kaufman, New York Times
February 25th, 2009
The U.S. obsession with soft toilet paper has driven the growth of brands like Cottonelle Ultra, Quilted Northern Ultra and Charmin Ultra. But fluffiness comes at a price: millions of trees harvested in North America and in Latin American countries, including some percentage of trees from rare old-growth forests in Canada. |
| US: Plant That Spilled Coal Ash Had Earlier Leak Problems
by John M. Broder, New York Times
January 8th, 2009
The chief executive of the Tennessee Valley Authority, which operates the coal-burning power plant responsible for an enormous flood of coal ash in East Tennessee late last month, acknowledged Thursday that the plant’s containment ponds had leaked two other times in the last five years but had not been adequately repaired. |
| CANADA/IRAQ: Drill, Garner, Drill
by Anthony Fenton, Mother Jones
November 24th, 2008
In the history of the Iraq War, one name is perhaps synonymous with the collapse of the Bush administration's hopes for a post-Saddam world: Retired Lt. General Jay M. Garner, who served as the first post-war administrator. This year, he and a small group of former US military leaders, officials, and lobbyists have quietly used their Kurdistan connections to help Canadian companies access some of the region's richest oil fields. |
| US: Court Says Shell Can’t Drill Near Alaska
by JAD MOUAWAD, The New York Times
November 20th, 2008
A federal appeals court on Thursday blocked Royal Dutch Shell from drilling oil wells off Alaska’s North Slope after finding that the Interior Department had failed to conduct an environmental study before issuing the company’s drilling permit. |
| US: PacifiCorp Agrees To Remove Dams
by Jim Carlton, The Wall Street Journal
November 13th, 2008
Electric utility PacifiCorp has tentatively agreed to remove four dams from the Klamath River, in a deal that would end one of the West's most rancorous water disputes and could serve as a settlement model for similar fights. |
| US: Mosaic threatens $618 million lawsuit
by Frank Gluck, Herald Tribune
September 30th, 2008
Florida mining giant Mosaic Fertilizer said Monday it will file a $618 million lawsuit against Manatee County unless commissioners reverse a Sept. 16 vote that denied permission for Mosaic to mine phosphate on a property in Duette. |
| CONGO: Candidates Silent On Resource War In Congo
by Georgianne Nienaber, Huffington Post
September 25th, 2008
All politics is local, to paraphrase the venerable Bostonian and Democratic, Tip O'Neill. To human rights workers, journalists, writers, and humanitarians who have intimate knowledge of the Great Lakes Region of Equatorial Africa, this short email conjures a place, people, and tragedy that has been met with a wall of silence on the campaign trail. Neither John McCain nor Barack Obama has addressed this great humanitarian breakdown, except in the context of political squabbling. |
| US: Federal Oil Officials Accused
In Sex and Drugs Scandal
by STEPHEN POWER, Wall Street Journal
September 11th, 2008
Employees of the federal agency that last year collected more than $11 billion in royalties from oil and gas companies broke government rules and created a "culture of ethical failure" by allegedly accepting gifts from and having sex with industry representatives, the Interior Department's top watchdog said Wednesday. |
| US: Halliburton Ex-Official
Pleads Guilty in Bribe Case
by RUSSELL GOLD, The Wall Street Journal
September 4th, 2008
In a wide-ranging foreign-corruption investigation, fired former Halliburton Co. executive Albert J. "Jack" Stanley pleaded guilty to orchestrating more than $180 million in bribes to senior Nigerian government officials. The bribes were used to win a contract to build a liquefied-natural-gas plant in Nigeria. |
| FRANCE: Areva mishandled uranium leak: safety body
by Joseph Tandy and Muriel Boselli, Reuters
July 11th, 2008
France's nuclear safety authority (ASN) said on Friday that Areva-subsidiary Socatri had poorly managed a leak of liquid containing uranium that occurred in southeastern France this week. |
| Iraq: U.S. Advised Iraqi Ministry on Oil Deals
by Andrew E. Kramer, New York Times
June 30th, 2008
The Bush administration has disclosed that U.S. advisors in Iraq played a key role in drawing up contracts between the Iraqi government and five major Western oil companies. The no-bid contracts are expected to be awarded Monday to Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP, Total and Chevron, as well as to several smaller oil companies. |
| US: Put oil firm chiefs on trial, says leading climate change scientist
by Ed Pilkington, Guardian (UK)
June 23rd, 2008
On June 23, James Hansen, a leading world climate scientist, called for the executives of major fossil fuel companies, including ExxonMobil and Peabody Energy, to be put on trial for crimes against humanity and nature through actions like funding climate skeptics to undermine global consensus around combating climate change. |
| US: Exxon investors reject green initiatives
by Andrew Clark, The Guardian
May 29th, 2008
The world's biggest oil company emerged bruised but victorious from a bust-up with the billionaire Rockefeller family yesterday as an effort to foist green initiatives on ExxonMobil failed to capture wholehearted support from shareholders. |
| US: Rockefellers Seek Change at Exxon
by CLIFFORD KRAUSS, The New York Times
May 27th, 2008
The family members have thrown their support behind a shareholder rebellion that is ruffling feathers at Exxon Mobil, the giant oil company descended from John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Trust. |
| UK: Shell 'selling suicide' by preferring tar sands to wind
by Terry Macalister, The Guardian
May 21st, 2008
Shell was accused yesterday of "selling suicide on the forecourt" by pressing ahead with tar sands operations in Canada and continuing to flare off excess gas in Nigeria while pulling out of renewable schemes such as the London Array - the world's largest offshore wind scheme. |
| US: Congress grills oil execs on record pump prices
by Chris Baltimore, Reuters
May 21st, 2008
Executives from the five biggest international oil companies on Wednesday claimed that they were victims of high oil prices along with U.S. consumers, but U.S. Senate lawmakers showed little sympathy. |
| RUSSIA: As Gazprom Goes, So Goes Russia
by Andrew E. Kramer, New York Times
May 11th, 2008
Gazprom and the Russian government have long had a close relationship, but the revolving door between them is spinning especially fast this year. But Gazprom also epitomizes the risks of state capitalism: waste and inefficiency. |
| NIGERIA: Ex-Halliburton unit in bribery probe
by Michael Peel in London and Matthew Green in Lagos, The Financial Times
May 9th, 2008
US anti-bribery investigators are targeting a former Halliburton subsidiary over its work on a key Royal Dutch Shell project in Nigeria, widening a corruption probe into the country’s troubled oil industry. |
| MEXICO: Pemex Oozes Corruption
by Diego Cevallos , IPS
May 7th, 2008
Funds belonging to the Mexican state oil monopoly, Pemex, have paid in recent years for liposuction treatment for the wife of the company's chief executive, a presidential candidate's campaign, contracts with firms facing legal action, and the whims of trade union leaders who are not required to account for their expenses. |
| INDONESIA: Indonesia's Commodity Boom Is a Mixed Bag
by Tom Wright, Wall Street Journal
March 24th, 2008
Indonesia's economy is riding the recent wave of high global commodity prices. But local pressure is arising towards steel makers and power producers in China and India who have diverted coal supplies abroad by locking in 20-year supply contracts with Indonesian miners. |
| US: Pollution Is Called a Byproduct of a 'Clean' Fuel
by BRENDA GOODMAN, The New York Times
March 11th, 2008
The spills, at the Alabama Biodiesel Corporation plant outside this city about 17 miles from Tuscaloosa, are similar to others that have come from biofuel plants in the Midwest. The discharges, which can be hazardous to birds and fish, have many people scratching their heads over the seeming incongruity of pollution from an industry that sells products with the promise of blue skies and clear streams. |
| CHINA: Solar Energy Firms Leave Waste Behind in China
by Ariana Eunjung Cha, Washington Post
March 9th, 2008
The Luoyang Zhonggui High-Technology Co. of Henan, China, is a green energy company, producing polysilicon for solar energy panels. But the byproduct -- silicon tetrachloride -- is a highly toxic substance that poses environmental hazards. |
| CANADA: Native Leader Serving Six Months for Opposing Mine
by Chris Arsenault, IPS
March 5th, 2008
Algonquin community leader Robert Lovelace had never been charged with an offence, but when a uranium company began prospecting for radioactive ore on unceded native land without engaging in consultation, he decided to take action, organising a non-violent blockade. |
| UGANDA: Privatization of Seeds Moving Apace
by Aileen Kwa, IPS
February 21st, 2008
The Ugandan parliament will soon have a hearing on the draft Plant Variety Protection Bill, approved by the cabinet early last year. According to an inside government source, seeds companies including Monsanto have been lobbying for such intellectual property protection. |
| GLOBAL: 2 Reports At Odds On Biotech Crops
by Rick Weiss, The Washington Post
February 14th, 2008
Dueling reports released yesterday -- one by a consortium largely funded by the biotech industry and the other by a pair of environmental and consumer groups -- came to those diametrically different conclusions. |
| US: U.S. jewelry retailers oppose large Alaska gold mine
by Mary Pemberton, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
February 12th, 2008
Just in time for Valentine's Day, five of the leading U.S. jewellers have sworn off gold that someday could come from the Pebble Mine, a huge deposit being scoped out by a subsidiary of a Canadian company near the world's most productive wild sockeye salmon stream in southwestern Alaska. |
| US: Uranium Exploration Near Grand Canyon
by FELICITY BARRINGER, The New York Times
February 7th, 2008
With minimal public notice and no formal environmental review, the Forest Service has approved a permit allowing a British mining company to explore for uranium just outside Grand Canyon National Park, less than three miles from a popular lookout over the canyon’s southern rim. |
| US: An Ex-President, a Mining Deal and a Big Donor
by JO BECKER and DON VAN NATTA Jr., The New York Times
January 31st, 2008
Unlike more established competitors, Mr. Giustra was a newcomer to uranium mining in Kazakhstan, a former Soviet republic. But what his fledgling company lacked in experience, it made up for in connections. Accompanying Mr. Giustra on his luxuriously appointed MD-87 jet that day was a former president of the United States, Bill Clinton. |
| CHILE: Copper Boom - Cui Bono?
by Daniela Estrada, IPS News
January 11th, 2008
According to global forecasts, the price of copper, Chile’s main export, will remain high in 2008 thanks to strong demand from China. But just who will benefit from this bonanza is up for debate. |
| NIGERIA: Inefficient Gas Flaring Remains Unchecked
by Sam Olukoya, IPS
January 10th, 2008
Some of the largest multinational oil companies in the world -- including the U.K. and Dutch owned Shell, the French company Total, and the American companies Mobil and Chevron -- are responsible for the bulk of the scores of gas flares burning in Nigeria. |
| AFGHANISTAN: Copper project tests Afghanistan’s resources
by Jon Boone, Financial Times
January 8th, 2008
The debris left over from previous attempts to extract some of Afghanistan’s colossal mineral wealth can be found just 35km south-east of Kabul. But in five years, the landscape in the Aynak exploration area may be changed into one of the world’s largest opencast mines, thanks to a $3bn (£1.5bn) investment by the China Metallurgical Group Corporation (MCC). |
| US: Cloned Livestock Poised
by Jane Zhang, John W. Miller and Lauren Etter, Wall Street Journal
January 4th, 2008
After more than six years of wrestling with the question of whether meat and milk from cloned animals and their offspring are safe to eat, the Food and Drug Administration is expected to declare as early as next week that they are. The food industry appears to be divided over the issue. |
| JAMAICA: Regulators Mull Viability of Ferti-irrigation
by Patricia Williams, IPS News
December 26th, 2007
Appleton Estates seemed to have solved the centuries old problem of what to do with distillery waste when they started a new project eight years ago. However, they are yet to convince regulators and locals that it is a viable option. |
| GLOBAL: Big Oil lets sun set on renewables
by Terry Macalister, Guardian (UK)
December 11th, 2007
Shell, the oil company that recently trumpeted its commitment to a low carbon future by signing a pre-Bali conference communique, has quietly sold off most of its solar business. Rival BP decided last week to invest in the world's dirtiest oil production in Canada's tar sands, indicating that Big Oil might be giving up its flirtation with renewables and going back to its roots. |
| CANADA: Gov't Urged to Rein in Mining Sector
by Am Johal, IPS News
December 7th, 2007
Canadian mining companies continue to come under scrutiny from civil society organisations for international human rights violations and environmental damage that critics say the Canadian government has done little to check. |
| DRC: Six arrested in Congo radioactive dumping scandal
by Joe Bavier, Reuters
November 10th, 2007
Congolese authorities arrested six people in connection with the dumping of tonnes of highly radioactive minerals into a river near the southeastern town of Likasi. A report said some 17 tons of the minerals confiscated were destined for Chinese firm Magma. |
| RUSSIA: Siberian boom threatens traditions
by Tom Esslemont, BBC News
October 8th, 2007
Russia is forging ahead with ambitious energy projects in eastern Siberia, but the indigenous Evenk people are complaining that their age-old way of life is in danger. |
| BURMA: Criticism of Total Operations Grows
by Michael Diebert, IPS
October 4th, 2007
The Yadana natural gas pipeline runs through the heart of the debate on corporate responsibility as to how foreign businesses should operate in a country ruled by a military dictatorship accused of widespread human rights abuses and violent suppression of dissent within its borders. |
| CONGO: World Bank accused of razing Congo forests
by John Vidal, The Guardian (UK)
October 4th, 2007
The World Bank encouraged foreign companies to destructively log the world's second largest forest, endangering the lives of thousands of Congolese Pygmies, according to a report on an internal investigation by senior bank staff and outside experts. |
| FRANCE: Total: No Capital Expenditures in Myanmar
Associated Press
September 27th, 2007
Total SA, reacting Thursday to comments by French President Sarkozy urging the oil and gas giant to refrain from new investment in Myanmar, said it had not made any capital expenditure there since 1998. The military junta that rules Myanmar this week escalated its efforts to repress pro-democracy demonstrations led by thousands of Buddhist monks. |
| IRAQ: Big oil’s waiting game over Iraq’s reserves
by Ed Crooks and Sheila McNulty, Financial Times
September 19th, 2007
Oil companies face a dilemma in Iraq over whether to wait for a new oil law which will give them a legal framework in which to operate or to sign agreements now with the Kurdistan Regional Government at the risk of sullying relations with Baghdad and the rest of the country. |
| INDIA: Indian Activists' Rising Clout
by Jackie Range, Wall Street Journal
August 16th, 2007
India's Supreme Court is poised to decide whether a British
company has the right to mine in a sacred tribal forest, a case that underlines the complexity of undertaking large-scale industrial projects here. The case's hearing by the court reflects the growing clout of activist groups in India. |
| WORLD: We must count the true cost of cheap China
by Richard McGregor, Financial Times
August 2nd, 2007
In the wake of the multiple scandals over tainted Chinese food and drug exports in recent months, Chinese goods now have an indelible image of being not just cheap, but life-threatening as well. But the fact that wrongly labelled foods, liquor and pharmaceuticals have routinely sickened and even killed people en masse in China has been largely overlooked. |
| US: Mattel Recalls One Million Toys
by Louise Story , New York Times
August 2nd, 2007
Mattel, the maker of Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels cars, is recalling nearly one million toys in the United States today because the products’ surfaces are covered in lead paint. According to Mattel, all the toys were made by a contract manufacturer in China. |
| COLOMBIA: Suing Multinationals Over Murder
by Ken Stier, TIME Magazine
August 1st, 2007
Organized labor often complains of its treatment at the hands of corporate America, but its accusations pale in comparison to those made recently by the widows of Colombian mine workers in an Alabama courtroom. During a two-week trial, a Birmingham jury weighed charges that the local Drummond Coal Company bore responsibility for the murders of three union leaders who represented workers at its Colombian mine - the world's largest open pit mine. |
| US: Navajos and Environmentalists Split on Power Plant
by Felicity Barringer, The New York Times
July 27th, 2007
A plan to build a new, large coal-fired power plant has proved divisive in the Navajo community in Nevada, with some arguing that it will bring the community millions, while others saying it is a lethal "energy monster" and harbinger of environmental destruction. |
| COLOMBIA: Drummond Union: Govt Muffles Key Witness
by Frank Bajak, Forbes.com
July 24th, 2007
The union activists suing U.S. coal company Drummond Co. Inc. in Alabama in the 2001 murders of three labor leaders say deliberate foot-dragging by Colombian authorities is preventing the jury from hearing their star witness. Concerned by the delay, 12 Democrats in the U.S. Congress wrote Colombia's vice president last week asking him to intercede. |
| ITALY: Devil's Advocate
by Daniel Fisher, Forbes
July 24th, 2007
Italian oil giant Eni has a long history of cutting deals with anyone, and of accusations of corruption and bribery. Now that its future hangs on Russia and its notorious reputation in the energy market, has Eni finally met its match? |
| CHILE: Gold rush threatens glacier
by Lucia Newman , Al Jazeera
July 8th, 2007
A new gold rush is under way as mining companies seek to supply the ever-increasing demand for the precious metal from emerging economies such as India, and with reserves dwindling all over the world they are going to extraordinary lengths to extract it. |
| INDONESIA: Palm Oil Producer Unethical, Groups Say
by Toby Sterling, The Associated Press
July 3rd, 2007
A Singapore-based company was involved in slashing and burning Indonesian forests to make way for palm oil plantations that feed the growing market for biofuels, environmental and activist groups claimed Tuesday. The company emphatically denied the allegations.
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| US: Buying Into the Green Movement
by Alex Williams, The New York Times
July 1st, 2007
Consumers have embraced living green, and for the most part the mainstream green movement has embraced green consumerism. But even at this moment of high visibility and impact for environmental activists, a splinter wing of the movement has begun to critique what it sometimes calls “light greens.” |
| CHILE: Chile Must Pay US$5.4 Million to Aricans Living Amid Toxic Waste
by Mike Hager, The Santiago Times
June 1st, 2007
In a landmark case, Chile’s Supreme Court ruled this week that the state must compensate 356 residents of two slums in the northern mining city of Arica for health problems brought on by years of exposure to open deposits of toxic waste. Promel, the Swedish company responsible for the importation of the toxic materials, cannot compensate the plaintiffs because the company no longer exists. |
| INDONESIA: Blood boils as mud volcano swallows homes
Sydney Morning Herald
May 26th, 2007
One year ago this Tuesday, a gas-exploration well part-owned by the Australian mining giant Santos blew, sending a geyser of mud and toxic gas into the air. Nearby villages and factories were flooded, then a big highway and railway were covered, and later East Java's main gas pipeline ruptured. |
| AUSTRALIA: Miner's poll cash for MPs
by Amanda O'Brien, The Australian
May 19th, 2007
MINING company Precious Metals Australia donated thousands of dollars to the election campaigns of two West Australian politicians who helped write a doctored report that commercially benefited the company.
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| CANADA: Barrick Boss Gets Served
by Amy Chung, Now (Toronto)
May 10th, 2007
Protest Barrick, a network of aboriginal communities from Australia, the U.S., Latin America and Asia, converged on Barrick Gold Corporation's shareholder meeting at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre May 2 to serve the company an eviction notice from First Nation land. |
| CONGO: New row over delay of Congo funds report
by Dino Mahtani, Financial Times
May 8th, 2007
The World Bank has withheld the findings of an inquiry into alleged
mismanagement of bank funds in the Democratic Republic of Congo, raising fresh questions about the anti-corruption strategy of Paul Wolfowitz, the bank's president |
| RUSSIA: Toxic truth of secretive Siberian city
BBC News
April 5th, 2007
A BBC team has entered a remote region of Russia normally closed to foreigners that produces almost half the world's supply of palladium - a precious metal vital for making catalytic converters. But, as the BBC's Richard Galpin reports, it is accused of being the world's largest producer of acid rain. |
| NIGERIA: Shell to raise Nigerian oil production
by Jad Mouawad, International Herald Tribune
April 4th, 2007
A year after being forced to shut down more than half of its oil output in Nigeria because of militant violence, Royal Dutch Shell said it expected to resume full production within the next "five to six months," after agreeing with local communities that it could safely return to the Niger Delta.
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| NIGERIA: Shell to raise Nigerian oil production
by Jad Mouawad, International Herald Tribune
April 4th, 2007
A year after being forced to shut down more than half of its oil output in Nigeria because of militant violence, Royal Dutch Shell said it expected to resume full production within the next "five to six months," after agreeing with local communities that it could safely return to the Niger Delta.
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| US: World Bank raps Exxon over Chad
by Lesley Wroughton, Reuters
March 22nd, 2007
The World Bank has told an Exxon Mobil-led consortium to take corrective action to fully compensate farmers in southern Chad who lost land and their livelihoods as the U.S. company expands its search for oil in the Doba basin. |
| GUATEMALA: Mining misery
by Maria Amuchastegui, This Magazine
March 21st, 2007
Guatemala is one of many countries that has attracted the investment of Canadian mining companies—but at what cost to its people? |
| PERU: Human Rights Commission May Examine Violations at La Oroya, Peru
Earthjustice Legal Fund and CIEL
March 21st, 2007
Public health and environmental organizations from throughout the Western Hemisphere today announced the filing of a petition with the human rights division of the Organization of American States in Washington, D.C. The petition accuses the Peruvian government of doing little to halt contamination from a metallurgical complex that is impacting the lives and health of the citizens of La Oroya, Peru. |
| ARGENTINA: Famatina Says NO to Barrick Gold
by David Modersbach, Mines and Communities
March 20th, 2007
In the Argentine province of La Rioja, an astonishing series of events have lead to the ouster of a corrupt pro-mining provincial governor and the apparent withdrawal of gold mining giant Barrick Gold from operations on the Famatina range. Who was responsible for these events? A small group of dedicated neighbors who are fighting tooth and nail to save their mountain range from open-pit mining exploitation. |
| US: Chevron Faces More Scrutiny in Ecuador over Pollution
by Emad Mekay , IPS News
March 15th, 2007
Leaders of indigenous communities in Ecuador are pressing their government to investigate senior executives from U.S. oil giant Chevron for an alleged environmental fraud scheme in the mid-1990s related to a long-running six-billion dollar class action suit in the South American nation. |
| US: Chevron gets part of suit dismissed
by Elizabeth Douglass, Los Angeles Times
March 15th, 2007
A federal judge on Wednesday dismissed a racketeering charge against Chevron Corp. brought by Nigerian villagers who believe the oil giant condoned human rights abuses carried out by the West African nation's militia. |
| US: Chevron wins partial dismissal in Nigeria case
Herald Tribune
March 14th, 2007
A federal judge in California threw out a racketeering claim against Chevron Corp. filed by Nigerians who claimed the oil company conspired with the military and police to gun down demonstrators protesting their operations in the African nation. |
| US: Exxon unveils 20 projects for next three years
by Sheila McNulty, Financial Times
March 7th, 2007
ExxonMobil, the world's biggest listed oil company, said on Wednesday the company will start more than 20 new global projects in the next three years that should add 1m oil equivalent barrels per day to Exxon's base volumes. |
| HONDURAS: Protests Mount Against Mining Giant
by Stephen Leahy, Mines & Communities
February 24th, 2007
Dangerous levels of lead and arsenic have been found in the blood of Honduran villagers living downstream from a controversial gold and silver mine owned by Canada's Goldcorp Inc., the world's third largest gold mining firm. |
| CONGO: All that glitters...
by Jean-Roger Kaseki, Guardian (UK)
February 13th, 2007
Decades of gold mining should have given Congo a ticket to prosperity. Instead, it is trapped in a cycle of violence and poverty. |
| CHILE: Chile's divisive mountain of gold
by Luisa Baldini, BBC News
January 2nd, 2007
Tons of gold-bearing ore need to be excavated to produce a single ounce of bullion. Once the rock has been pulverised, cyanide is used in a leaching process to extract gold and silver. |
| US: Md. coal mining's toxic legacy
by Tom Pelton, Baltimore Sun
December 8th, 2006
In the woods at the fringe of this Western Maryland town, a mountain of waste 50 feet high is slouching into a creek that's tinted an eerie orange. The "gob pile" is refuse from a long-abandoned coal mine. And the stream into which it's eroding, Winebrenner Run, is devoid of life - one of the state's worst cases of sulfuric acid pollution from mines. |
| GHANA: Ghana's gold inflicts heavy price
by James Haselip, People and the Planet
December 6th, 2006
Gold mining is Ghana�s most valuable export industry: in 2005, US$1.4 billion worth of gold was shipped from the country, dwarfing the value of its other major foreign currency earners - timber and cocoa. However, very little of the gold revenues stay in the country while damage to the physical environment by both large and small-scale mining is inflicting an incalculable cost to the economy with vast tracts of farming land permanently ruined, forests destroyed and water resources diverted and polluted. |
| MALAWI: Bingu misled on uranium mining—civil society
by Juliet Chimwaga, The Nation (Malawi)
November 21st, 2006
Civil society organisations accused government Monday of misleading President Bingu wa Mutharika and the nation in its dealings with Paladin Africa Limited, saying the latter are not coming out clearly on the negative impact the multi-billion kwacha uranium mining project at Kayelekera in Karonga will have on people’s lives. |
| WORLD: Controlling the Corporate Mercenaries
by Nick Dearden, War on Want, Zmag
November 7th, 2006
While Iraq represents bloodshed and death on a massive scale to most people, to Private Military and Security Companies (PMSCs) it has brought a boom time, boosting the revenues of British-based PMSCs alone from £320 million in 2003 to more than £1.8 billion in 2004. In the same year income for the industry worldwide reached $100 billion. |
| PERU: Achuar win oil victory in Peru
by Lisa Garrigues , Indian Country Today
November 6th, 2006
On Oct. 24, after a 14-day occupation, representatives of the Federation of Native Communities of the Corrientes Rio (FECONACO), which includes the Quichua and Urarinas people, reached an agreement with PlusPetrol and the Peruvian government. The agreement gave them 98 percent of their demands. |
| PHILIPPINES: Once-idyllic island center of debate on mining
by Cyrain Cabuenas, Inquirer (PHIL)
October 19th, 2006
For many years, Manicani has served as a haven for people who wanted to commune with nature or check out World War II artifacts.
These days, Siman has no glowing account of Manicani. "The island's balding mountains and depleted marine resources no longer hold any promise," he said. |
| US: Critics attack Myanmar’s ‘blood gem’ auctions
by Charlotte McDonald-Gibson, Agence France Presse
October 18th, 2006
With up to 90 percent of the world’s rubies and many other precious gems mined in Myanmar, chances are that a vast proportion of the stones glinting in the windows of high-end jewelers worldwide originate in the military-ruled nation. |
| INDIA: 80,000 coal belt families face evacuation
Statesman News Service
October 10th, 2006
As many as 80,000 families living near the Jharia mine in Dhanbad coal belt face relocation. Officials say the coalfield area is, in effect, sitting on a “giant fireball deep inside the earth,” after they discovered at least six underground leaks of toxic fumes. Experts fear massive underground explosions followed by subsidence occuring at any moment. |
| PERU: Leaching Out the Water with the Gold
by Milagros Salazar, Inter Press Service (IPS)
September 20th, 2006
The conflict that brought operations at Yanacocha, Latin America's largest gold mine, to a halt just a month after President Alan García took office in Peru was merely the latest illustration of the tensions between mining companies and local communities in the northern province of Cajamarca. |
| US: Farmers Fear Coal Mining Will Sink Land
by Bob Secter, Chicago Tribune
September 17th, 2006
Two mining companies want to dig for coal under nearly half of Montgomery County. They plan to use a nontraditional but highly efficient process called "longwall" mining that will cause flat-as-a-dime land to sag like a burst souffle. |
| AFRICA: War, Murder, Rape... All for Your Cell
by Stan Cox, Alternet
September 14th, 2006
Cassiterite, or tin oxide, is the most important source of the metallic element tin, and the DRC is home to fully one-third of the world's reserves. Some cassiterite miners work on sites operated directly by the country's military or other armed groups. Working in the same area are "artisanal" miners who are theoretically independent, like prospectors in America's Old West. But the cassiterite they extract is heavily taxed by the soldiers -- when it's not just stolen outright. |
| US: Walking with purpose
by Edward Marshall, The Journal
September 5th, 2006
After 32 days and 380 miles of walking, Ed Wiley, a concerned grandfather of a Marsh Fork Elementary School student and grass roots activist, stopped in Shepherdstown Monday to speak with residents on his way to Washington where he hopes to meet with federal lawmakers.
Wiley is on a mission to ensure the safety of the children in Sundial, W.Va., where their elementary school sits next to a coal preparation plant and just 400 yards downstream from a dam holding back over two billion gallons of toxic sludge. |
| CHAD: Chad Orders 2 Oil Companies to Leave
by Madjiasra Nako , The Associated Press
August 27th, 2006
Chad's president on Saturday ordered oil companies Chevron Corp. and Petronas to leave the country, saying neither has paid taxes and his country will take responsibility for the oil fields they have overseen. |
| INDONESIA: Newmont Exec to Defend Himself in Court
by Robin McDowell, Associated Press
August 25th, 2006
An American gold-mining executive was preparing Friday to defend himself in court for the first time against charges his company dumped millions of tons of mercury and arsenic-laced waste into an Indonesian bay, sickening villagers. |
| PERU: ‘Voluntary Payment' Instead of Taxes for Mining Firms
by Milagros Salazar, Inter Press Service (IPS)
August 25th, 2006
Peruvian Prime Minister Jorge del Castillo told Congress that private mining companies operating in Peru would make a "voluntary payment" of 757.5 million dollars over the next five years, to go towards fighting poverty. However, they will not pay the tax on windfall profits that new President Alan García had promised in his campaign. |
| PERU: Beggar on a Throne of Gold
by Milagros Salazar, Inter Press Service (IPS)
August 23rd, 2006
Mining companies operating in Peru are seeing increasing millions in profits as a result of the surge in international prices for metals, but few are contributing what is needed to alleviate the poverty of the people living in mining areas. |
| INDIA: Tribal activists carry Indian mining protest to London
by Marianne Barriaux, The Guardian
August 3rd, 2006
Vedanta Resources faced a wave of protest at yesterday's annual meeting as activists travelled to London from the Orissa region of India to challenge the mining group's chairman Anil Agarwal on his company's human and environmental rights record in the country. |
| WORLD: Requiem for the WTO
by Gustavo Capdevila , Inter Press News Service (IPS)
August 2nd, 2006
Civil society activists, who early on foretold the inevitable collapse of the Doha Round, are now predicting the beginning of the end for the World Trade Organisation (WTO) itself, which sponsored the failed negotiations. |
| INDIA: Investors fly in to tap Orissa's mineral riches
by Khozem Merchant, Financial Times
July 28th, 2006
Ratan Tata will soon become the latest of a series of top industrialists to land his private jet at Bhubaneshwar, the dusty capital of Orissa, whose vast deposits of high quality coal, iron ore and bauxite have made the eastern state the hottest investment destination in India. |
| UK: Water companies head polluters' league
by Charlotte Moore and agencies, Guardian Unlimited
July 26th, 2006
The Environment Agency said it was "disappointed" with the amount of pollution caused by water companies last year, as Thames Water topped the league table of worst polluters in England and Wales. |
| UK: SFO to investigate Southern Water
by Hans Kundnani, The Guardian
July 19th, 2006
The Serious Fraud Office today announced an investigation into whether Southern Water deliberately misled the water regulator, Ofwat, about its failure to meet customer service standards. |
| DRC: Minerals Flow Abroad, Misery Remains
by Emad Mekay, Inter Press News Service
July 5th, 2006
International companies and local elites in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are pocketing revenues from copper and cobalt production instead of sharing it with local communities or spending it to reduce poverty, a watchdog group charged Wednesday. |
| CANADA: Corporate SLAPP
by Kim Petersen, The Dominion Paper
June 22nd, 2006
The Ontario-based mineral company Platinex has slapped the Ojibwa of Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (Big Trout Lake) First Nation (KIFN) with a $10-billion damage suit for refusing the company permission to drill on territory the KIFN says is its own. |
| AUSTRALIA: Mt Isa Lead Risk For Children
by Michelle Wiese Bockmann, The Australian
June 21st, 2006
Children in the Queensland mining capital of Mount Isa have been put at risk by fallout from the city's copper and lead smelters because the state Government has failed to routinely test for lead poisoning. |
| CANADA: Miners, retailers to certify ethical production of metal
by Kelly Patterson, The Ottawa Citizen
June 14th, 2006
Some of the biggest mining companies in the world, including Newmont Mining Corp., BHP Billiton and Canada's Falconbridge Inc., as well as retail giants ranging from Wal-Mart to Tiffany & Co., met in Vancouver recently to consider creating a seal of approval for sustainably produced metals. |
| CONGO: Congo's Child Miner Shame
by Orla Guerin, BBC News
June 12th, 2006
To commemorate World Day Against Child Labour, BBC News has spent a day with child miners in the Democratic Republic of Congo, who work for about one dollar per day. At Ruashi mine, in the Eastern province of Katanga, almost 800 children dig for copper and cobalt. |
| US: Bottlers, States and the Public Slug It Out in Water War
by David Fahrenthold, Washingtom Post
June 12th, 2006
In a series of lawsuits and statehouse debates that reached critical mass in the past year, activists and lawmakers have questioned whether bottling companies have become too greedy about the water they take from the ground, and -- in some cases -- what gives them the right to take it at all. |
| CANADA: Sudden Wealth's High Price
by Doug Struck, The Washington Post
June 9th, 2006
Huge mines here turning tarry sand into cash for Canada and oil for the United States are taking an unexpectedly high environmental toll, sucking water from rivers and natural gas from wells and producing large amounts of gases linked to global warming.
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| ARGENTINA: Kolla Indians Fight to Protect Their Land
by Marcela Valente, Inter Press News Service (IPS)
June 8th, 2006
"We are here to take care of the land, because we depend on it for a living," said Andrés Sajama, cacique (chief) of Queta, a Kolla indigenous community in the northwestern Argentine province of Jujuy. "We don't want to block mining projects, but we won't allow them to take away what little we have left," he told IPS. |
| ARGENTINA: Another War Over Water
by Marcela Valente, Inter Press Service News Agency
June 7th, 2006
Fed up with poor water quality, rate hikes and a lack of investment in expanding infrastructure, residents, union members and environmentalists in the Argentine province of Córdoba have forced a multinational corporation to withdraw from the business, and are now demanding that the state play a part in a new public water company. |
| US: Critics Wary of Development Plans for Utah Land
by Julie Cart, Los Angeles Times
June 6th, 2006
The proposed Washington County Growth and Conservation Act would sell up to 40 square miles of federal land and use the proceeds to finance a multimillion-dollar water pipeline and other local projects. Utah Republican Sen.
Robert F. Bennett and Democratic Rep. Jim Matheson are expected to introduce the bill in coming weeks. Waiting in the wings are nearly a dozen similar bills for counties in Utah, Idaho, Nevada and New Mexico where population pressure is fueling the demand for more developable land. |
| US: New Hampshire Town Bans Corporate Water Withdrawals
by Kat Bundy, Susquehanna
June 1st, 2006
Across the country, corporations are privatizing the commons -- water -- so they can sell it. Now one town is fighting back in a powerful new way: Barnstead, New Hampshire, has become the first municipality in the U.S. to adopt a binding local law that bans certain corporations from withdrawing water within the town. To protect their local law, Barnstead residents have also voted to strip corporations of their claims to constitutional rights and powers. This is not your father's old "regulatory" approach. |
| VENEZUELA: For Venezuela, a Treasure in Oil Sludge
by Juan Forero, The New York Times
June 1st, 2006
This great, largely untapped treasure is pitting a leftist government aiming to use oil revenue for social programs against multinational corporations like Chevron, which were invited here a decade ago to develop the Orinoco Belt, a 54-square-mile area some 120 miles south of here. |
| LIBERIA: Firestone in Liberia Rubber Row
by Caspar Leighton, BBC
May 31st, 2006
Rubber manufacturer Firestone has been accused of buying rubber from plantations illegally occupied by ex-combatants from Liberia's civil war.
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| CANADA: Platinum Mine Sparks Lawsuits
Canadian Press
May 29th, 2006
The development of a potentially rare and lucrative platinum mine near a reserve in Northern Ontario has prompted a First Nation to sue the provincial government while it faces a $10 billion lawsuit from a Canadian exploration company. |
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