Wealthy Nations Fail to Fund
Clean Water, Health
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The world's leaders need to wake up to a few stark realities if the international community is going to tackle the global health and environmental issues that plague humanity's poor - this message
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rang loud and clear at the 30th annual conference of the Global Health Council, expressed with passion and anger by many attendees and speakers. full story
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Critical Habitat Endangered
by Bush Policies
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The Bush administration believes the Endangered Species Act is broken and in need of a major overhaul. The provision for designating lands essential to the survival of a species - known as "critical habitat" - does
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little to protect endangered or threatened species, says a top Interior Department official, and has caused a slew of lawsuits that is draining the scarce funds available to enact the law. full story
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How to Halve U.S. Transport
Emissions by 2050
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By using a set of existing technologies and policies and building on them, it is possible to reduce U.S. carbon emissions from transportation 20 percent by 2015, and almost 50 percent by 2030, says a new report
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by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. Noting that transportation sources account for nearly a third of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, the report, released today, identifies a number of policies and technologies that could achieve those goals. full story
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Exploring the Link Between
Health and Environment
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The global environment is changing - with far reaching and complex consequences for human health - and the world's efforts to address global health issues will fall short unless policymakers embrace this link, say
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global health experts gathered in Washington for the 30th annual conference of the Global Health Council. The conference theme, said the council's president and CEO Nils Daulaire, is to bring the voice of the global health community "to the front lines of the ongoing dialogue about international environmental policy." full story
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EPA's Whitman Leaves a Toxic Legacy
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Just two days after the Sept. 11 attacks, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator Christie Todd Whitman told New York's downtown residents and workers that their air was safe. "I'm glad to
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reassure the people of New York that their air is safe to breathe and their water is safe to drink," she said. Whistleblowers inside Whitman's department would later reveal that Ground Zero was one of the most toxic environmental disasters in U.S. history. full story
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Red Cross Denied Access to PoWs
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Up to 3,000 Iraqis - some of them civilians - believed to be gagged, bound, hooded and beaten at US camps close to Baghdad airport
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The United States is illegally holding thousands of Iraqi prisoners of war and other captives without access to human rights officials at compounds close to Baghdad airport, The Observer has learnt.
There have also been reports of a mutiny last week by prisoners at an airport compound, in protest against conditions. The uprising was 'dealt with' by the Americans, according to a
US military source. full story
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Congress Split Over Pentagon's
Duty to Wildlife
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When the Bush administration submitted its 2004 military spending bill, it asked Congress to exempt the Department of Defense from five major environmental laws. Congress has fully rejected three of its five
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requests - the exemptions from two hazardous waste laws and the Clean Air Act. But the House bill, passed Thursday along with the Senate version, still offers the military broad exemptions from the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act. full story
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Brazilian Endangered Species
Now Number 395
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Using Brasilia National Park in the nation's capital as a backdrop, the Brazilian government today released a new endangered species assessment with 395 animals listed as endangered to some degree. The previous list,
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from 1989, counted 219 endangered species. Some of the animals on the previous list such as the black caiman, the wild cat and the harpy eagle, are not on the new one, because their populations have recovered over the past 14 years. full story
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House Passes Controversial Wildfire Bill
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House of Representatives passed a controversial bill Tuesday to increase forest thinning on 20 million acres of federal lands. Critics say the bill, which passed by a vote of 256 to 170, is a million dollar giveaway to the timber
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industry and has no chance of passing the U.S. Senate. But supporters believe it is a critical step towards better management of federal lands and say the nation must move quickly to reduce the threat from wildfires.
full story
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Park Service Struggles
with Unfunded Mandates
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Environmentalists say the Bush administration is forcing the National Park Service to cut millions of dollars in needed repair and rehabilitation projects in order to pay for homeland security and to pay for studying the
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privatization of some 1,700 agency jobs. A memo from the budget officer of the park service's Pacific West Region details that 28 percent of funds earmarked for rehabilitation of facilities in the region's six states is being diverted for "anti-terrorism activities and competitive sourcing studies." full story
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Three States Aim to Outlaw Eco-Protests
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A bill pending in the Texas state legislature that outlines penalties against criminal behavior by animal rights protestors has critics concerned that it would outlaw all environmental advocacy. Similar bills are pending
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in New York and Pennsylvania. "We could be considered an eco-terrorist organization under this bill because what we do is try to advocate for positive change at state levels," says Julian Zelazny, director of the State Environment Resource Center in Madison, Wisconsin. full story
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Great Fish Going the Way of the Dinosaurs
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Ninety percent of all large fish in the world's oceans are gone, and just 10 percent remain after commercial fishing vessels have taken their toll over the past 50 years, according to a long term study conducted by
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Canadian and German scientists and released today. "From giant blue marlin to mighty bluefin tuna, and from tropical groupers to Antarctic cod, industrial fishing has scoured the global ocean. There is no blue frontier left," says lead author
Ransom Myers. full story
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Rumsfeld Agenda Would Gut US Democracy
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WASHINGTON, D.C. -- A legislative proposal from the office of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld would, if enacted, grant the military nearly unlimited freedom from civilian oversight, and, in combination with other recent laws and policies, bring the U.S. to the brink of a military-dominated state, say members of the Green Party of the United States. full story
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Green Scissors Shows Congress
$58 Billion In Cuts
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The House Agriculture Committee passed controversial legislation Thursday intended to protect the nation's forests from wildfire by speeding up the removal of underbrush and limiting legal
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legal challenges to federal forest thinning projects. The bill's supporters say it will promote the use of "sound science" in the nation's efforts to limit wildfires, yet critics insist the legislation will do little to address the threat of wildfires and is nothing more than another hand out to the timber industry. full story
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North America Trading Songbirds
for Junk Mail
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One in every three of North America's songbirds is born in Canada's northern boreal forest, according to new research released to mark International Migratory Bird Day on May 10. The boreal forest
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is the breeding grounds of up to five billion land birds each year according to the new study by Dr. Peter Blancher of Bird Studies Canada. But about a third of the boreal has already been designated for logging, energy and other development, much of it within the past 10 years.
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full story
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US Troops Fire on Unarmed Iraqis
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It started when a young boy hurled a sandal at a US jeep - it ended with two Iraqis dead and 16 seriously injured. I watched in horror as American troops opened fire on a crowd of 1,000 unarmed people here yesterday. Many, including children, were cut down by a 20-second burst of automatic gunfire during a demonstration against the killing of 13 protesters at the Al-Kaahd school on Monday.
They had been whipped into a frenzy by religious leaders. The crowd were facing down a military compound of tanks and machine-gun posts. The youngster had apparently lobbed his shoe at the jeep - with a M2 heavy machine gun post on the back - as it drove past in a convoy of other vehicles. A soldier operating the weapon suddenly ducked, raised it on its pivot then pressed his thumb on the trigger. full story
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Bush Wages Legal Battle Against Environmental Law
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An empirical study released today shows that the Bush administration has repeatedly used the federal courts to try and undermine the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), a law environmentalists describe as the
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"Magna Carta" of U.S. environmental policy. The report covers all 172 NEPA cases decided by federal courts in the first two years of the Bush administration and finds that in more than half of these cases, it has presented arguments to weaken the application of the statute. full story
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