Associated Press | Lima, Peru – Peru's government declared an environmental state of emergency on Monday in a remote Amazon jungle region it says has been affected by years of contamination at the country's most productive oil fields, which are currently operated by Argentina-based Pluspetrol.
Beijing, China – Amidst widespread international outcry, Ecuadorian government officials are slated to meet with dozens of Chinese investors and oil company executives today at the Hilton Beijing Wangfujing in an effort to auction off over three million hectares of pristine Amazon rainforest for oil activities.
AFP | "Activities on the Pimental site, where the Xingu River already has dried up, are completely stopped and the 30,000 workers have been withdrawn by management at the request of the protesters."
I just stumbled upon this poem that 13-year-old Luciano read to me by candlelight from his family's modest home on the banks of the mighty Xingu River, deep in the Brazilian Amazon, and I had to share it with you in honor of World Water Day.
Carwil Without Borders | Bolivian indigenous leaders addressed the IACHR in the culmination of a weeklong trip in what is now the third year of the high-profile campaign to prevent the Bolivian government from building a highway through TIPNIS lands.
Altamira, Brazil – Some 150 protestors from four indigenous groups and allied riverbank communities occupied a major work camp and halted construction of the controversial Belo Monte Dam on the Xingu River. This is the third protest in less than a year that has halted dam construction as tensions have mounted over human rights violations...
Stop Belo Monte | While Amazon Watch team is on the ground in Brazil heading out to another occupation in efforts to stop the Belo Monte Dam, heavy rains continue to fall in the Xingu region. The water started rising earlier this week and now Altamira is totally flooded.
Huffington Post | The United Nations' Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination is urging the Peruvian government to "suspend immediately" plans to expand the country's biggest gas project, expressing concern for indigenous peoples living in "voluntary isolation" in the Amazon.
A new report from Analytica Investments warns that the XI Oil Round in Ecuador would threaten "a biodiversity every bit as varied as that of the fabled Yasuní National Park to the North" where one hectare holds more tree species than exist in all of North America.
Stop Belo Monte | We ended an emotional day feeling positive and coming to the conclusion that the Gods of the Xingu are on our side. This fight is long and we are faced with many challenges, but our hearts remain full of love for the Xingu and its people.
Analytica Investments Weekly Report | The government and indigenous organizations led by Amazon confederation CONFENIAE continue at loggerheads over the southeast, with the latter bent on derailing the oil round.
Altamira, Brazil – Leaders of 26 Kayapó indigenous communities unanimously rejected the government funding, deeming it "dirty money" intended to placate indigenous resistance to Brazil's plans to dam the Xingu River while sowing disunity among their communities.
San Francisco Chronicle | "I've never had a case of a company playing such hardball tactics against its own shareholders this way," said Simon Billenness. "The feeling among institutional shareholders is we really have to draw a line in the sand here, because we can't have companies using these tactics against shareholders in the future."
Stop Belo Monte | Karol and her family had built a life on what has now become the Pimental Worksite of the Belo Monte Dam. They were expelled from their land and as Karol and her sister say, "they never received even a kilo of salt in compensation."
ScottWallace.com | The victims had sustained previous encounters with the elusive Taromenane, who reportedly conveyed their growing irritation over an influx of outsiders and increased industrial activity in the zone.
Quito, Ecuador – Amazon Watch reports that based on a statement from the Waorani Nationality Organization of Orellena Province on March 6 two Waorani adults were attacked and killed by members of the Taromenane, one of two Waorani clans that continue to live in voluntary isolation.
Stop Belo Monte | "The mothers of Altamira are losing their kids to prostitution and drugs. Belo Monte did not bring jobs as promised, only violence," said protestor Maria Dulce Gonçalves.
Altamira, Brazil – Brazil's Parliamentary Commission of Human Trafficking announced yesterday that it will summon the president of the Belo Monte dam-building consortium to explain its relationship to a nightclub, located within the dam's work camp, where 18 young women and an adolescent girl were held hostage and forced to prostitute...
So much attention has focused on the protection of Yasuní National Park, and yet meanwhile an area of unspoiled and highly biodiverse rainforest many times larger is greatly threatened by the XI Oil Round.
President Correa is no stranger to hyperbole, but in this he is right on the mark: "It's the end of sovereignty, the end of our independence; we have become colonies with these rulings from international courts."
As Ecuadorian ministers met with European oil executives and investors, French activists took to the streets to call attention to the disaster oil drilling represents for the forest and seven threatened indigenous communities.
Climate News Network | Sao Paulo, Brazil – The Amazon basin is now China's No.1 supplier of natural resources, replacing its Asian neighbours as their resources have become depleted. In a relatively short time, China has become Brazil's major trading partner, overtaking the US and Europe.
Stop Belo Monte | Today we thought it would be just another day of long meetings; however, we were in for a shocking surprise. Who could have imagined that among the people sitting in our circle was a traitor?
MercoPress | President Rafael Correa said he expects the regional groupings Alba and Unasur to meet urgently and address the "legal aberration" committed by a UN trade law arbitrage tribunal against Ecuador in a case involving US multinational Chevron and decades of environmental damages.
Associated Press | Sao Paulo, Brazil – Federal prosecutors are investigating allegations that the consortium building a huge dam in the heart of the Amazon rain forest spied on an environmental activist group opposed to the dam.
Altamira, Brazil – Members of the Brazilian Xingu Alive Forever Movement have discovered an informant claiming to be an activist who was caught spying on their annual strategic planning meeting with a pen-shaped video camera. Upon being exposed, the suspect immediately confessed in a video statement that the Belo Monte Construction...
Paris, France – Dozens of activists protested against the Ecuadorian government during its XI Round oil concession promotional activities in Paris today, where officials met with European investors and oil company executives seeking to auction off an enormous swath of pristine Amazon rainforest.
Today is International Mother Language Day, a day promoted by UNESCO to recognize the intrinsic value in the diversity of languages across the world and the importance of their conservation for the good of humanity.
The Cleanest Line | On February 17, 2013, this coming Sunday, our friends at Sierra Club and 350.org along with more than 120 partner organizations are planning what could be the largest climate rally in U.S. history. Here's how you can get involved.
