Explore Publications

WASHINGTON, DC -- A coalition of development and environmental advocates today said a new report by a Congressionally appointed commission is a welcome acknowledgement that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank Group are largely failing in their mission to address world poverty and economic stability, and need major overhaul.

Warren M. Anderson, chairman of the Union Carbide Corporation during the 1984 chemical disaster at Bhopal, India, has apparently gone into hiding to avoid a summons to appear in a Manhattan federal court as part of civil proceedings against him and the company, say lawyers who have hired a private investigator to locate Mr. Anderson.

Escalating a campaign questioning Vice President Al Gore's environmental commitment, environmental organizations today placed a full-page ad in the west coast edition of the New York Times. The ad, whose headline reads ''Who is Al Gore?Environmental Champion or Petroleum Politician? The U'wa people need to know'' substantiates Gore's connections to Occidental Petroleum and argues that the Vice President has a specific responsibility to act on behalf of the U'wa people.

A non-governmental organisation has cautioned the new mine investors not to willfully pollute the environment despite a bill which indemnifies them from litigation against environmental degradation. Citizens for a better environment, a Kitwe based NGO, warned that should the new mines violate the rights of the people to a clean environment, they would face the wrath of the public.

The Biosafety Protocol has finally been adopted in the hope that it will bring some transparency into the trade in genetically-modified products. But some say it is weak and watered down to suit US interests.

Genetically-modified foods face a consumer revolt if biotech corporations, scientists and policy-makers fail to overhaul the way they vet the safety of these novel products, consumer watchdogs said Tuesday.

California Attorney General Bill Lockyer plunged into a crowd of 45 protesters on Saturday, debating them on whether he should revoke the corporate charter of the Unocal Corporation as they demanded. The group had gathered in front of Loyola Law School in Los Angeles where Lockyer was scheduled to deliver a speech.

A senior scientist at Greenpeace issued a report today criticizing serious flaws in an Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry report on dioxin contamination in the predominantly African American town of Mossville, La.

Rallying behind the struggle of the U'wa people of Colombia, at least 2,500 people have arrived during the past week in the small community of Gibraltar, in the department of North Santander, resuming the blockade of the main road to Oxy's well site.

Whether Big Tobacco succeeds will depend in significant part on whether tobacco control groups and their many new allies of various stripes refuse to succumb to Big Tobacco's combined intimidation and charm offensive.