http://www.unep.org/geo/geo4/media/

The fourth Global Environment Outlook: environment for development (GEO-4) assessment is a comprehensive and authoritative UN report on environment, development and human well-being, providing incisive analysis and information for decision making.

Released October 25th, 2007

Human Dimensions of Environmental Change
Chapter 7: Vulnerability of People and the Environment: Challenges and Opportunities
Chapter 8: Interlinkages: Governance for Sustainability

SUMMARY:
"GEO-4 underlines the choices available to policy makers across the range of environmental, social, and economic challneges- both known and emerging. It underlines not only the enormous, trillion-dollar value of the Earth's ecoysystems and the goods-and-services they provdie, but also underscores the central role the environment has for development and human well-being."

"The difference between this GEO and the third report, which was released in 2002, is that claims and counter claims over climate change are in many ways over. The IPCC has put a full stop behind the science of whether human actions are impacting the atmosphere and clarified the likely impacts- impacts not in a far away future but within the lifetime of our generation."

From Achim Steiner Under-Secretary General and Executive Director, United Nations Environment Programme

International Alert Media Advisory (We will post this report when it comes available)
November 5, 2007
http://www.international-alert.org/press/IA_Climate%20of%20Conflict_Media%20Advisory.pdf?id=146

A new report released ahead of the IPCC (12-17 November) lists 102 countries at risk of climate change related violent conflict and instability and calls for an immediate investment in adaptation. "A climate of conflict" is written by International Alert, an organisation with expertise in the causes of conflict and in building sustainable peace.

Story by Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent 

WASHINGTON - If the people of Congo save the mountain gorilla, might the gorilla return the favor?
That is the hope of environmental activists, who realize that wildlife conservation and tourism could be the key to survival for people as well as animals in a part of Africa where conflict has been the norm. Mountain gorillas are gentle giants that range across the borders of Uganda, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo in Africa. These primates are considered extremely endangered, with fewer than 720 in existence.

After a decade of relative calm for these animals -- the same cannot be said of the humans around them -- wildlife officials report at least 10 have been killed this year.

...

JEALOUSY AND VIOLENCE

No one really knows why mountain gorillas are being killed now, though jealousy may play a role, according to Craig Sholley of the African Wildlife Foundation.

In this area of rich biodiversity, Uganda and Rwanda have been able to capitalize on gorilla tourism, Sholley said, with tourist permits alone accounting for some US$15 million in annual revenue. Democratic Republic of Congo's unstable government has been unable to do the same.

...

A trans-boundary strategy to protect mountain gorillas has been supported by the political powers in Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda and Rwanda, he said. It lets wildlife organizations like Mugisha's take a neutral stance to warfare while trying to preserve gorilla populations.

It also aims to save the forests where the gorillas live, rather than clearing the trees for cropland.

For those whose fields lie just outside the forest, the gorillas can be a nuisance. So Mugisha and others have set up Human Gorilla Conflict Organizations -- like neighborhood watch groups, except instead of keeping the area clear of crime, they aim to keep it clear of crop-raiding mountain gorillas.

http://www.enn.com/top_stories/article/24351

 From: Reuters
Published November 9, 2007 08:39 AM

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Foreign nations share the blame for the destruction of Indonesian forests and should pitch in to help restore them, Vice President Jusuf Kalla said on Friday.
 Indonesia, host of a U.N. climate change conference in December, has been a driving force behind calls for rich countries to compensate poor states that preserve their rainforests to
soak up greenhouse gases.

... 

 Kala said developed countries such as Japan and the United States had been major consumers of Indonesian timber, much of which was logged illegally. "It means they have to pay," he said.

According to global environmental group Greenpeace, Indonesia had the fastest pace of deforestation in the world between 2000-2005, destroying an area of forest the size of 300 soccer pitches every hour. The Indonesian government says it must be given incentives, including a payout of $5-$20 per hectare, to preserve its forests. It also wants to negotiate a fixed price for other forms of biodiversity, including coral reefs.

Indonesia has a total forest area of more than 225 million acres, or about 10 percent of the world's remaining tropical forests. But the Southeast Asian country -- whose forests are a treasure trove of plant and animal species including the endangered orang-utan -- has already lost an estimated 72 percent of its original frontier forest.

09 Nov 2007 13:20:00 GMT

Blogged by: Emma Batha
http://www.alertnet.org/db/blogs/19216/2007/10/9-132020-1.htm

Cravero, who heads the U.N. Development Programme's Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery, is spearheading a major new campaign to help women and girls affected by conflicts and natural disasters. The UNDP launched an appeal this week for $10 million to set the ball rolling.

Among other things, the initiative aims to increase women's security in crises, ensure they have access to justice and boost their participation in all stages of the peace and recovery process.
 ...

Cravero believes one reason why brutality against women during and after conflicts has got so much worse is because the nature of war has changed. Most conflicts today are not between countries; they are within countries. It may sound strange to say but to some extent armies observe rules of conduct that militias and rebel groups do not.

Sexual and physical violence against women also increases after natural disasters, says Cravero.

This is partly because social mores collapse with the destruction of traditional communities and partly because of the high levels of frustration in camps. With no means to support their family, men take their anger out on women.

Another often overlooked fact is that natural disasters often kill many more women than men. For example, three times as many women died in the Pakistan earthquake as men. Why? Because women were more likely to be indoors and died when their homes collapsed on top of them. In the Indian Ocean tsunami, many women didn't survive simply because they didn't know how to swim.

Women's livelihoods tend to be more vulnerable too. Cravero points to the example of some Caribbean countries where women depend entirely on a single crop. When a hurricane strikes their income is wiped out until they can sow and harvest again. "Men are more able to stick a hammer in their back pocket and get one of the construction jobs for rebuilding," Cravero says. And at the end of the day women are responsible for their children. If they can't put food on the table they may get pushed into selling sex, which in turn increases their vulnerability to HIV/AIDS.

Disaster risk assessments must address women's different needs and skills, the UNDP says in its eight-point plan.

 http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/274984 

Nov 09, 2007 04:30 AM
Surging palm-oil demand from the food and biofuel industries threatens to ignite a "climate bomb" as developing countries strip forests and swamps to make way for plantations, Greenpeace said yesterday.

Indonesia, the biggest producer of the oil, releases 1.8 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases or 4 per cent of the world total a year by burning its peatlands to grow palms, said John Sauven, executive director of Greenpeace U.K.

Nestle SA and Unilever PLC are among those "turning a blind eye" to the destruction by using cheap oil in their products, Greenpeace said. Commodity traders "blend palm oil from deforestation and conversion of peatlands into an undifferentiated supply for the global market, leaving little trace of their sources."

Greenpeace "exaggerates Nestle's role," a spokesperson said, while Unilever said it is "looking for a sustainable solution."

This report is a preliminary exploration of forced migration and internal displacement in Burma, organised in two main sections.

The first section considers the status of displaced people in terms of international standards, specifically those embodied in the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement. It includes people who leave home not because of conflict or relocation orders, but as a result of a range of coercive measures which drive down incomes to the point that the household economy collapses and people have no choice but to leave home. Some analysts describe this form of population movement as "economic migration" since it has an economic dimension. The report argues that the coercive nature of the pressures which contribute to the collapse of the household economy brings population movement squarely into the field of forced migration. Information on the actual numbers or patterns of movement of such migrants is beyond the scope of this report, though expert individuals and organisations have stated that they think that these "livelihood migrants" constitute most of the migrants in Burma. This report limits itself to describing the coercive measures practiced country-wide and discussing the status of those who have been subject to such measures.

The second section is geographically organised. The report looks at those parts of Burma not covered by the Thailand Burma Border Consortium and concentrates on the conflict and post-conflict areas of Eastern Burma. It hardly touches on conflict-induced displacement since most parts of Burma covered in these pages, including the major cities, are government-controlled, and there is little overt military conflict. It looks at the coercive measures referred to above, essentially through a collection of documents from various sources.

11 Nov 2007 15:14:05 GMTSource: IRIN
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IRIN/95c8505079fda6c647d40d1805ec7042.htm

BADAKHSHAN, 11 November 2007 (IRIN) - Over 1,000 poor people living on the steep slopes of a mountain in Badakhshan province in northeast Afghanistan are being urged by aid agencies and authorities to move as they are at risk of being killed in landslides and avalanches.
 
A joint survey conducted by the Afghan Red Crescent Society (ARCS), the UN and the provincial government found that seismic activity is creating widening gaps in the middle of Sia Shakh mountain in the Batash area of Faizabad city, the provincial capital of Badakhshan. Concerns are that this movement could dislodge large boulders which would cause severe damage to settlements below.

...

One solution Shams offered is the distribution of land in neighbouring provinces, such as Kunduz and Takhar, for vulnerable Badakhshi families.

Any decision on relocation and land distribution in other provinces, however, can only be taken in Kabul, the capital, and would require strong political backing in the Afghan government and National Assembly. An assessment team from Kabul is expected to visit Badakhshan province in the near future to recommend solutions after consultation with concerned community and provincial authorities, Mohammad Aslam Fayaz, deputy head of the Afghanistan Disaster Management Authority (ANDMA), told IRIN. "There needs to be a long-term solution to the problem of vulnerable families in Badakhshan," said Abdul Karim, deputy head of the UN Assistance Mission (UNAMA) in Badakhshan province, adding that any solution should entail the right to housing and livelihoods.

By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent OSLO, Nov 12 (Reuters) -

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L05671126.htm 

Moving on from the risk of global warming, scientists are now looking for ways to pinpoint the areas set to be affected by climate change, to help countries plan everything from new crops to hydropower dams.

Billion-dollar investments, ranging from irrigation and flood defences to the site of wind farms or ski resorts, could hinge on assessments about how much drier, wetter, windier or warmer a particular area will become.

But scientists warn precision may never be possible. Climate is so chaotic and the variables so difficult to compute that even the best model will be far from perfect in estimating what the future holds.

Randeep Ramesh in New Delhi

Tuesday November 13, 2007
The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/india/story/0,,2210017,00.html

A bloody standoff between Communists committed to emulating China's economic success and farmers opposed to the establishment of a vast industrial zone in eastern India ended yesterday after leftwing activists stormed a series of villages - leading to accusations of murder and rape.

...

Since the beginning of the year villagers have blocked roads and built barricades to keep out the local administration, which, they complained, had been determined to sell off farmland at cheap rates so that a petrochemical hub could be set up. West Bengal has been run for three decades by the Communist party, which has become increasingly business friendly. Returned to power for a seventh term last year on a programme of industrial expansion, Communist leaders have taken their cue from China to attract foreign corporations.

13 Nov 2007 15:09:10 GMT
Source: Reuters
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L13281026.htm
 
By Aweys Yusuf
MOGADISHU, Nov 13 (Reuters) - Somali government forces battling Islamist-led insurgents ordered two more radio stations off the air on Tuesday, as a U.N. envoy said the latest fighting made the country's humanitarian crisis the worst in Africa.
...
"WORST IN AFRICA" Nearly half-a-million civilians have been forced out of the city since February by repeated rounds of violence, and Abdallah said the country's humanitarian crisis was now "the worst in Africa", including Darfur. "It has been like that since the start of the year, and the fighting of recent days has only made it worse," he said. Nearly 90,000 of the recently uprooted have fled to Afgoye, a town on the southwestern outskirts of the capital. A UNHCR spokesman in Geneva said the needs in Afgoye were immense: "People can no longer find space for shelter around the town itself. Many families are simply living under trees." 

13 Nov 2007 16:01:01 GMT
Source: Reuters
 By Peter Apps
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L13170507.htm
 
LONDON, Nov 13 (Reuters) - Climate change will put half the world's countries at risk of conflict or serious political instability, a report said on Tuesday, making the world more unstable unless nations and communities consider problems now. International Alert, a London-based conflict resolution group, identified 46 countries -- home to 2.7 billion people -- where it said the effects of climate change would create a high risk of violent conflict. It identified another 56 states where there was a risk of political instability.
...
GETTING MESSY FAST Unless communities and governments begin discussing the issues in advance, he said, there is a risk climate shift could be the spark that relights wars such as those in Liberia and Sierra Leone in west Africa or the Caucasus on Russia's borders. Current economic growth in developing states could also be hit. "Our experience shows it can be an exacerbating factor of conflict," Smith said. "The question is how well communities and governments handle the risk." Smith said was difficult to isolate current climate-related wars, although climate shift and farming disputes are a factor in fighting in Sudan's Darfur region. He said climate-related open fighting was likely to be limited to the world's poorer regions, but that richer nations in northern Europe or North America would suffer from greater global instability. The good news, he said, was that if groups and officials were able to discuss the issues to help prevent conflict, that would in itself help them deal with the actual problems. "If there are not the institutions and organisations to handle it, people start looking out for themselves and then they start organising for fighting and you can get a very messy situation very quickly," Smith said. "There are literally hundreds of millions of people at risk from conflict from climate change and we have to start talking about these issues." (Editing by Catherine Evans)

What the Netherlands has done - and is urgently planning to do - in the face of climate-driven sea-level rise holds important lessons for the rest of the world.

By Peter N. Spotts| Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

from the November 15, 2007 edition

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1115/p13s02-wogi.html

Dordrecht, Netherlands - The Dutch enjoy a hard-earned reputation for building river dikes and sea barriers. Over centuries, they have transformed a flood-prone river delta into a wealthy nation roughly twice the size of New Jersey.

If scientific projections for global warming are right, however, that success will be sorely tested. Globally, sea levels may rise up to a foot during the early part of this century, and up to nearly three feet by century's end. This would bring higher tidal surges from the more-intense coastal storms that scientists also project, along with the risk of more frequent and more severe river floods from intense rainfall inland.

Nowhere does this aquatic vise squeeze more tightly than on the world's densely populated river deltas.

...

The work here represent a keystone in the country's ­climate-adaptation plans, Mr. van Winden says. Indeed, nowhere are adaptation planning efforts to address rising sea levels and flooding more advanced than in the Netherlands.

To be sure, the country's economic wealth and long experience dealing with threats from seas and rivers give it an advantage over other low countries that face rising waters, such as Bangladesh, Vietnam, and the tiny tropical island nation of Tuvalu in the South Pacific. But many of the approaches the Netherlands is taking can and are being slowly adopted even in countries far poorer, specialists say.

The excavation work here is one example of what van Winden calls "soft approaches" to flooding in this small nation where competing interests jostle for every square foot of land. By buying out the few farmers remaining in this region, breaching the dikes they built to protect their land, and digging additional water channels, the Dutch government aims to reduce peak flood flows at Dordrecht and other cities downstream. No longer will tightly constricted river and canal channels hold high water captive. Big floods will overspread the Biesbosch, reducing the threat of water spilling over the top of levees that guard densely populated cities to the west.

 ...

Zuidplaspolder is a case in point. As the lowest real estate in one of the Netherlands' most vulnerable provinces, it has become a test bed for factoring water and climate change into zoning and development plans. In the next 20 years, 15,000 to 30,000 new housing units will be built here. Anticipating this growth, in 2004, officials from provincial and local governments joined with nongovernmental organizations to develop a master plan for the polder. (A polder is a large tract of land containing farms and villages encircled by dikes. The dikes offer flood protection, but they also turn the polders into enormous bathtubs with bottoms that slowly, inexorably sink.)

The new homes that rise in the polder may look nothing like those in the villages the Dutch are used to, Mr. Bloemen says. To deal with floods, homes on this higher ground could be designed to float in place or built on stilts. They may sport tall ground floors, with living space and utilities placed on higher floors. Entire villages might be built to float in place, linked by buoyant sidewalks and roads.

In addition, he adds, officials may ask developers to use a technique that dates back centuries: building houses, even whole villages, on mounds. That low-tech approach is appearing in other parts of the world, too. Oxfam International is working with villages in Bangladesh to build individual homes and even small villages on flood-resistant mounds.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/science/11/15/carbon.map.ap/index.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- There's growing worry about global warming, but how much of it is the work of that power plant just outside town? And if Congress limits heat-trapping greenhouse gases, will it affect utility and electric bills? And who's the biggest corporate culprit when it comes to climate change?

Answers to these questions may be only a couple of computer clicks away.

A new interactive online database unveiled Wednesday provides maps, color-coded categories and detailed information about who is putting 10 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually from power plants around the world -- about a fourth of it from the United States.

The Web site, which includes information from 4,000 utilities and 50,000 plants, shows not only the biggest CO2 emitters, but also the facilities and companies that are most green, releasing little if any carbon.

"We're trying to provide complete, balanced information. It's an open site," said David Wheeler, a senior researcher at the Center for Global Development, where he directed the creation of the massive database.

Using an array of information filters, a user can find out how much CO2 comes from electricity plants in a particular city or county, in a congressional district, from a specific company, or an individual plant.

Dubbed the Carbon Monitoring for Action database, or CARMA (www.carma.org), it proclaims itself as "the world's best place for power-plant voyeurism."

UN News Service (New York)

15 November 2007
Posted to the web 16 November 2007

http://allafrica.com/stories/200711160005.html 

Dakar

Africa's rural poor are facing a "perfect storm" of rising food prices, climate change and population growth, the head of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) warned today, urging the international community to take more concerted action to help the continent's most vulnerable people. Wrapping up a four-day visit to Senegal and Mali, WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran told reporters in Dakar that time was running out to build resilience among the millions of rural Africans who often have to go hungry.

UN Integrated Regional Information Networks

16 November 2007
Posted to the web 16 November 2007

http://allafrica.com/stories/200711160876.html  

Johannesburg

Lack of information is the main obstacle to paying African farmers as an incentive to protect the environment, according to a UN Food and Agriculture Organisation official.

Payment for environmental services (PES) has been applied in parts of the world since the 1980s, and could help to address growing concerns about climate change, biodiversity loss and water supply, suggested The State of Food and Agriculture, a UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's (FAO) report released on 15 November.

From: John Rondy -Reuters
Published November 16, 2007 08:53 AM

http://www.enn.com/top_stories/article/25134 

MILWAUKEE (Reuters) - Midwest U.S. states signed agreements on Thursday designed to cut greenhouse gases, promote energy conservation and fight global warming.

The third such pact between U.S. states means that nearly half of Americans will be living in areas covered by agreements designed to combat global warming, according to the Washington-based World Resources Institute.

The area involved in Thursday's agreement runs from Ohio west to Kansas. If the region were its own country, the World Resources group estimates, it would be the globe's fifth-biggest producer of greenhouse gas emissions behind the United States as a whole, Russia, China and India.

...

The governors also agreed that wind power, water and other renewable sources should eventually provide up to 30 percent of the region's electricity.

The region could "become the Saudi Arabia of renewable energy," said Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle.
Iowa Governor Chet Culver called the move "a great opportunity for our country to come together and put partisan politics aside, and become an international leader on this issue."

By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
Published: November 17, 2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/17/science/earth/17cnd-climate.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin 

See Full Report 

VALENCIA, Spain, Nov. 17 — Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, describing climate change as "the defining challenge of our age," released the final report of a United Nations panel on climate change here Saturday and called on the United States and China to play "a more constructive role."

...

"Many of my colleagues would consider that kind of melt a catastrophe" so rapid that mankind would not be able to adapt, said Michael Oppenheimer, a climate scientist at Princeton University who contributed to the IPCC.

"It's extremely clear and is very explicit that the cost of inaction will be huge compared to the cost of action," said Jeffrey D. Sachs, head of Columbia University's Earth Institute. "We can't afford to wait for some perfect accord to replace Kyoto, for some grand agreement. We can afford to spend year bickering about it. We need to start acting now."

He said that delegates in Bali should take action immediately where they do agree, for example, by public funding for demonstration projects on new technologies like "carbon capture," a "promising but not proved" system that pumps emission underground instead of releasing them into the sky. He said the energy ministers should start a global fund to help poor countries avoid deforestation, which causes emissions to increase because growing plants absorb carbon in the atmosphere.

...

The European Union already has such a carbon trading system in place for many industries, and is fighting to bring airlines into the scheme.

"Stabilization of emissions can be achieved by deployment of a portfolio of technologies that exist or are already under development," said Achim Steiner, head of the United Nations Environment Program.

But he noted that developed countries would have to help poorer ones in implementing such plans, which are often expensive.

Still recovering from its summer floods, Bangladesh faces another grim struggle after a storm that killed at least 1,700 people

Amelia Gentleman in New Delhi
Sunday November 18, 2007
The Observer

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2212901,00.html

Aid agencies have called for urgent international assistance to help survivors of the cyclone which has devastated parts of Bangladesh, ripping up roads, tearing down buildings and damaging as many as two million homes.The government said around 1,700 people had died, but that toll might rise as aid workers, helped by ships and military helicopters, battle to reach hundreds of villages cut off by the damage. Power and phone lines were knocked out by heavy rains, slowing down relief efforts and making the full scale of the disaster difficult to estimate.a

...

Villagers made their way back to their homes in the south-west of the country yesterday, visibly distressed by the destruction. Homes here, typically made from straw, bamboo, corrugated iron and flimsy timber, were unable to withstand winds of up to 100mph. Many of those buildings which did remain standing were washed away in the tidal wave that followed Cyclone Sidr.

Survivors whose shacks were destroyed sought refuge with neighbours, as volunteers began constructing more permanent shelters. 'We survived, but what we need now is help to rebuild our homes,' said Chand Miah, a resident of Maran Char, an island off the coast.

With as much of 80 per cent of the main annual rice crop ruined by the winds, aid agencies were looking beyond the rescue operation, and warned that the cyclone's longer-term consequences would be severe, further impoverishing a nation already suffering from the effects of this summer's catastrophic flooding in the north of the country.

'We will need to build long-term solutions for those who have lost their homes,' said Ali Asgar, of the Red Cross, estimating that as many as two million homes had been damaged. He said help from the international community was needed urgently. 'These people are very poor and have lost everything. Their need will be very high, and we don't believe the Bangladesh government can help all of them,' he said.

While acknowledging that the final death toll could be much higher, there was relief among many that the disaster had not killed more. In 1970 between 300,000 and half a million people died in a cyclone and Thursday's storm was as strong as a 1991 cyclone which killed around 140,000.

Because Bangladesh is known to be so vulnerable, the government and NGOs have devised cyclone preparedness programmes, building shelters, organising simulated cyclone evacuation exercises and educating villagers in the most exposed areas on how to flee. Efficient early warning systems and the widespread use of mobile phones meant that this time even people in remote regions were aware of the impending disaster.

By ALEXEI BARRIONUEVO
Published: November 19, 2007http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/19/world/americas/19braziloil.html?ref=world 

RIO DE JANEIRO, Nov. 17 — With the price of oil hovering near $100 a barrel, the discovery of the biggest deep-water oil field off the southeastern coast has the potential to transform Brazil into a global energy powerhouse and to reshape the politics of this energy-starved continent.

While Brazil's state oil company, Petrobras, has known of the field for more than a year, it only finished assessing its full potential in recent months. It announced on Nov. 8 that the field held some five billion to eight billion barrels of crude oil and natural gas.

The announcement has everyone in the region, and beyond, taking notice. A field that size — the biggest in the world since a discovery in Kazakhstan in 2000 — is a potential political game-changer for Brazil.

...

Mr. da Silva basked in the sudden possibilities, declaring that "Brazil would obviously participate in OPEC," the global oil cartel, and already felt free enough to weigh in on its politics, saying that the organization should reduce oil prices.

He also insisted that Brazil would not "pull back even one millimeter" from its push into biofuels. Brazil is sitting on the most abundant farmland in the world, which it has been using a part of to produce sugar cane for ethanol.

By ANTHEE CARASSAVA

Published: November 19, 2007 

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/19/world/europe/19greece.html?ref=world ATHENS

Nov. 18 — Greeceand Turkey opened a $300 million pipeline on Sunday, creating an energy corridor that connects the rich natural gas fields in the Caspian Sea region to Europe, bypassing Russia and the volatile Middle East.

...

"This project will bring significant benefits both for Greece and Turkey," said Kostas Karamanlis, the Greek prime minister, who inaugurated the project with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. It shows "we can live in harmony and both gain from it," Mr. Karamanlis said, shaking hands with Mr. Erdogan in a symbolic meeting on a bridge over the Evros River, which divides the countries.

The pipeline, which will use natural gas pumped into Turkey from the Shah Deniz field in Azerbaijan, will initially carry 250 million cubic meters of gas a year to Komotini, in northeastern Greece, from Karacabey, in western Turkey. Its capacity is expected to triple by 2012, when Poseidon, a 132-mile undersea Greece-Italy pipeline begins operation, forming the Southern Europe Gas Ring project.

"The project is extremely significant — and fundamentally political," said Julian Lee, a senior analyst with the Center for Global Energy Studies, a London-based research group. "It offers diversified supplies of energy to Europe without going through Russia — an objective encouraged by the United States."

Rwanda News Agency/Agence Rwandaise d'Information (Kigali)

19 November 2007
Posted to the web 19 November 2007
Kigali

http://allafrica.com/stories/200711190450.html

Rwanda estimates that by the end of this year, it will have garnered some 60 million dollars from mineral exports which represents a 57% jump from last year, a senior official has revealed.

Last year, according to the Director General of the newly established Rwanda Geological Authority - Dr. Biryabarema Michael, $38 millions entered government coffers that had also risen from the previous years.

IRIN
November 19, 2007
http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=75383

CALABAR, 19 November 2007 (IRIN) - The government of President Umaru Yar'Adua says it is serious about tackling the root causes of violence and poverty in Nigeria's troubled Niger Delta with a 'master plan' to develop the region and provide basic services.

Yar'Adua's new budget proposal for 2008 commits 69 billion naira (US $566 million) to the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) for 2008, more than twice last year's federal budget allotment for the commission. 

By JIM YARDLEY

Published: November 19, 2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/19/world/asia/19dam.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
JIANMIN VILLAGE, China — Last year, Chinese officials celebrated the completion of the Three Gorges Dam by releasing a list of 10 world records. As in: The Three Gorges is the world's biggest dam, biggest power plant and biggest consumer of dirt, stone, concrete and steel. Ever. Even the project's official tally of 1.13 million displaced people made the list as record No. 10.

Today, the Communist Party is hoping the dam does not become China's biggest folly. In recent weeks, Chinese officials have admitted that the dam was spawning environmental problems like water pollution and landslides that could become severe. Equally startling, officials want to begin a new relocation program that would be bigger than the first.

From: Reuters
Published November 19, 2007 01:03 PM

http://www.enn.com/top_stories/article/25264

By Anis Ahmed

DHAKA (Reuters) - Four days after super cyclone Sidr killed more than 3,000 people in Bangladesh, rescuers struggled on Monday to reach isolated areas along the country's devastated coast to give aid to millions of survivors.

"The tragedy unfolds as we walk through one after another devastated village," said relief worker Mohammad Selim in Bagerhat, one of the worst-hit areas. "Often it looks like we are in a valley of death."

The confirmed death toll from the cyclone reached 3,113 by Monday, while 3,322 are injured and 1,063 missing, Lieutenant-Colonel Main Ullah Chowdhury told reporters in Dhaka.

...

Aid workers fear inadequate supplies of food, drinking water and medicine could lead to outbreaks of disease.

"Food, shelter and medicine are badly needed for the survivors," Renata Lok Dessallien, United Nations Resident Representative in Bangladesh told Reuters after visiting cyclone-hit areas.

Grieving families begged for clothes to wrap around the bodies of dead relatives for burial. In some areas, they put corpses in mass graves.

Reuters reporters said bodies were being discovered by the hour in the rivers and paddy fields and under piles of debris.

http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/45411/story.htm

KOURIS DAM, Cyprus - A small pool of water at the bottom of Cyprus's
largest reservoir is shrinking by the day: without rain, the main source
of surface water for most of the island will dry up by the end of the
year.

The sun-baked earth in the empty pit at Kouris is a sign of the
unprecedented water crisis facing the Mediterranean island. As climate
change takes effect, authorities face the dilemma of how much to use
energy-intensive desalination to beat the shortage.
"It's bad. Very bad," says Vlassis Partassides, head of water
management at Cyprus's water development department. "If the drought
continues for a fourth year, the consequences will be very severe," he
told Reuters.

Reservoirs are less than 9 percent full and residents – accustomed to
treating water as a precious commodity – are braced for another dry
winter.

Cypriots' water bills come with graphs showing monthly consumption, and
authorities are swift to alert households to abnormal spikes in use.

http://www.pushjournal.org/NewsCent/Default.cfm?eid=ecsp&article=89345

HALTING population growth in developing countries should be part of a global strategy to reduce mankind's impact on the environment, according to an eminent expatriate Australian scientist.

Immediate past president of the Royal Society, Professor Lord Robert May said that, given the threat of climate change, a declining global population was ''a prerequisite'' if humanity was to achieve a sustainable ecological footprint in the future.

Addressing the Lowy Institute in Sydney last night, Lord May said a priority was educating and empowering women, ''particularly in those cultures where this is not currently the case''.

Lord May, a former chief scientific adviser to the British government who was made a companion of the Order of Australia in 1998, said this would be assisted by achieving universal primary school education and promoting gender equality.

The United Nations estimates 700 million women, or two thirds of all those married or in stable unions, use some method of contraception.

By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD
Published: November 21, 2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/21/us/21fence.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 20 — The Department of Homeland Security is ahead of schedule in building some 700 miles of fencing along the Mexican border, but some environmental groups, elected officials and local Indian tribes say too little attention is being paid to the environmental consequences of the barriers.

In the latest flash point, Homeland Security Department officials took possession of land last week in the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge in southern Arizona by brokering a land swap with another federal agency, the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Opponents say the 12-to-15-foot-tall steel fence and its construction will disrupt the habitat of jaguars, pygmy owls and other sensitive fauna in the wildlife refuge, and encourage illegal immigrants to use more remote, ecologically delicate terrain.

The Inquirer (Monrovia)

21 November 2007
Posted to the web 21 November 2007

Monrovia

http://allafrica.com/stories/200711210510.html 

The Government of Liberia has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Diamond Institute of Israel geared towards fostering cooperation to develop Liberia's diamond sector.

The agreement was signed today in Tel-Aviv, Israel, by Liberia's Lands, Mines and Energy Minister, Dr. Eugene Shannon and Dr. Morti Gantz, President of the Israel's Diamond Institute. As a result of this, a conference is scheduled to be held in Tel-Aviv, Israel, from February 11th -12th, 2008, in which specific aspects of cooperation will be worked out.

By Tristan McConnell | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1123/p06s01-woaf.html
from the November 23, 2007 edition

Accra, Ghana - Two British high-school girls now face three years in a juvenile detention center in the West African country of Ghana after being convicted Wednesday of trying to smuggle more than $600,000 of cocaine to England.

The conviction highlights what observers say is a troubling trend for West Africa, as the region becomes a key staging post for illegal drugs heading to Europe from South America.

While cocaine use has leveled off in the United States in recent years, Europe is in the throes of a boom comparable to the one that hit America in the 1980s: According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) there are 4 million users in Europe, triple the number a decade ago. A crackdown on the transatlantic cocaine trafficking route from South America via the Caribbean has led the drug cartels to West Africa, where they take advantage of weak law enforcement and rampant corruption.

"Africa is under attack ... [and facing] a crisis of epic proportions, by and large fueled by Europe's cocaine users," said UNODC chief Antonio Maria Costa at a conference in Madrid last week. "A sniff here and a sniff there in Europe is causing another disaster in Africa, to add to its poverty, its mass unemployment, and its pandemics."

The global police body Interpol estimates that as much as two-thirds of all cocaine headed for Europe is now shipped there via West Africa.

...

The cartels are interested in West Africa because the weak governance and oversight make it far less risky to traffic illegal drugs, says Mr. Mazitelli. "West Africa has important advantages in terms of risk reduction [for drug traders], both the economic risk of seizure and the criminal risk of prosecution," he says. "There is permeability of judicial systems and corruptability of institutions in West Africa."

Ghana has become a key drug-trade hub within West Africa because cartels find it more livable and stable than many of the other countries in the region.

http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/45499/story.htm

NDIA: November 23, 2007

Story by Krittivas Mukherje

MUMBAI - Most firms in India, one of the world's worst polluters, are yet to plan for the impact of climate change on their businesses, do not measure emissions or have deadlines to curb them, a study said on Thursday.

However, many Indian companies are aware of the commercial opportunities presented by global warming, according to the survey by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), a global agency working towards a low-carbon economy.

...

In contrast, more and more global corporations were providing for risks and opportunities presented by climate change and were factoring them while planning projects, he said.

Booming economies such as China and India have been criticised by the West for refusing to commit to emissions targets, despite being among the world's top polluters.

http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/45504/story.htm

CHINA: November 23, 2007

Reporting by Tan Ee Lyn; Editing by Bill Tarrant

HONG KONG - Global warming is one of the most significant threats facing humankind, researchers warned, as they unveiled a study showing how climate changes in the past led to famine, wars and population declines.

The world's growing population may be unable to adequately adapt to ecological changes brought about by the expected rise in global temperatures, scientists in China, Hong Kong, the United States and Britain wrote in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
...
Trawling through history and working out correlative patterns, the team found that temperature declines were followed by wars, famines and population reductions.

The researchers examined the time period between 1400 and 1900, or the Little Ice Age, which recorded the lowest average global temperatures around 1450, 1650 and 1820, each separated by slight warming intervals.

"When such ecological situations occur, people tend to move to another place. Such mass movement leads to war, like in the 13th century, when the Mongolians suffered a drought and they invaded China," David Zhang, geography professor at the University of Hong Kong, said in an interview on Thursday.

"Or the Manchurians who moved into central China in 17th century because conditions in the northeast were terrible during the cooling period," he said.

"Epidemics may not be directly linked to temperature (change), but it is a consequence of migration, which creates chances for disease to spread."

HALF THE WORLD AT RISK

Although the study cited only periods of temperature decline to social disruptions, the researchers said the same prediction could be made of global warming.

A report last week said climate change will put half the world's countries at risk of conflict or serious political instability.

International Alert, a London-based conflict resolution group, identified 46 countries – home to 2.7 billion people – where it said the effects of climate change would create a high risk of violent conflict. It identified another 56 states where there was a risk of political instability.

By JONNY HOGG
Associated Press Writer

19 November 2007
ILAKAKA, Madagascar (AP) - Everyone plays for high stakes in Ilakaka. You can get rich or you can die. Even for experienced gamblers, the odds of getting killed are high.

This city at the heart of Madagascar's sapphire mining industry is estimated to produce at least 30 percent of the world's sapphires -- worth at least $30 million a year. And in the Wild West lifestyle of shady casinos and banditry that swaggered into town on the tail of the fabulous mining wealth, speculators are dropping dead at an alarming rate -- with up to 30 murders a year in a town of 20,000.

One of this year's victims was Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law. Muhammad Jamal Khalifa was gunned down in January, presumably because of his sapphire business.

The latest victim was a Madagascar businessman shot dead in September whom police identified only by his first name Ernest. He had just bought a sapphire worth $30,000.

"He was in his hotel room at seven in the evening when the bandits attacked. Bang, bang, bang and it was finished," said mine owner Jean Noel Andrianasolo.

Madagascar, a former French colony set in the Indian ocean far off Africa's southeast coast, is one of the world's poorest countries -- but Ilakaka is booming due to its famous pink and blue sapphires.

Mining consultant Tom Cushman said it's difficult to know exactly how much money Ilakaka's sapphire industry generates because some of the best stones leave the island "in people's pockets."

Big business has driven development. Ten years ago, Ilakaka was no more than a collection of huts. Now, since the discovery of major sapphire deposits in 1998, it is a thriving town with a riot of makeshift homes and ramshackle casinos, bars and shops which spill onto the road and jostle against gleaming new offices where the gems are bought and sold.

"People are going to Ilakaka with a suitcase full of money and leaving with a briefcase full of stones," said Cushman, who consults for the World Bank.

"All of the money goes straight back into the community and gets circulated again and again. It's maybe a better development opportunity than all the aid projects in the country put together."

But banditry, corruption and insecurity are a major obstacle to further development.

"Of course we have a big problem with insecurity," said Andrianasolo, who was among a handful of people willing to speak on the record to a reporter, noting that even that could get him killed.

People are reluctant to say who the bandits could be. Some insist police are helping them or committing banditry themselves.

"There are lots of policemen here, lots of army too. It's full. So why haven't they captured the bandits? That is the question," said Andrianasolo.

Philibert Andrianony, the young and energetic head of Ilakaka's police force, said he is determined to stamp out the violence. But he agrees with Andrianasolo that police are not preventing, but causing, some problems.

"It exists, it exists," he said. "Police salaries are very low and we cannot stop policemen who decide to work with the bandits."

He also noted that despite their visible presence, police are ill-equipped to deal with crime. They don't have radios or much needed four-wheel drive vehicles. And the bandits are more heavily armed.

Andrianasolo said the violence means people are coming to Ilakaka in smaller numbers, put off by the danger.

"People have a choice; they can stay at home and have no money or they come here and risk their lives."

But dreams of making a fortune still attract poor miners.

"I know all about the violence here and the people who do it," said Fensoa, a miner who would give only his first name for fear of retaliation. "I am afraid, but I must stay here despite my fear."

With just one lucky find, Andrianasolo said, a miner could make $10,000 in a country where most people earn less than a dollar a day. Fensoa makes two dollars a day, even if no sapphires are found at the mine where he works.

Ilakaka, which sprang up on Madagascar's rocky interior plain, exudes a ramshackle energy. Attracting gem buyers from around the world, it has a cosmopolitan feel. Sri Lankans, Thais and Indians control much of the market.

There are strange contradictions in its development.

This key business center has no airstrip, no bank and is not on the national power grid. Most of the town is powered by generators. Yet it's possible to watch French satellite TV in one of its bars.

Andrianasolo employs 60 people at his mine, a great trench 12 meters deep and 20 meters wide (40 by 66 feet), snaking through the baked orange earth. The perils of the backbreaking work under a scorching sun are compounded by the risk of bandits attacking the mine site.

It is getting more difficult to find sapphires on the surface, but even children are in on the rush. Some returned from a swim in the river clutching handfuls of precious stones scooped from the water.

"Violence is the reality here," Andrianasolo said. But "Ilakaka will continue to grow because there are still sapphires."

FT REPORT - WATCHES & JEWELLERY 2007

By MARIA DOULTON

10 November 2007
Surveys WJC1
Page 18
With a US embargo on Burmese diamonds, horror stories of "dirty gold" and the forthcoming film Blood Diamond , in which stones are the currency of war, shopping for a trinket this Christmas could be tricky for the well-intentioned.

Unlike chocolates or coffee, there is to date no "fair trade" certified jewellery.

But the good news is that the industry has been working hard to improve its social, ethical and environmental impact.

This is not easy with a product with a supply chain ranging from large-scale mining operations to "one man, one pan" outfits, often in the poorest parts of the world, and which takes in a complex web of dealers, cutters, sorters and traders.

Fair Trade announced this summer that TransFair USA, a Fair Labelling Organisation member, is undertaking a feasibility study for Fair Trade certifying jewellery and working on a pilot scheme for gold.

The single most important step is the Kimberley Process (set up by NGOs, the diamond industry and governments of diamond producing nations adopted since November 2002) that certifies that batches of diamonds are conflict-free, perhaps the most alarming issue for the jewellery industry.

There is a clear demand for jewellery with a certified seal of approval, says Martin Rapaport, founder of the Rapaport Diamond index, in his paper, Fair Trade Jewels. "The combination of jewellery and social responsibility in one product is a luxury market category killer. My thesis is that fair trade jewellery has the potential to become the ultimate luxury product of our century."

Several small operations at grass roots level are providing "green" though not yet Fair Trade certified gold and coloured gemstones.

Pioneer Greg Valerio, founder of Cred Jewellery, is working with co-operatives such as "Oro Verde" in Colombia that pan or mine gold with minimum impact on the environment and a fair divvying up of profits. Mr Valerio aims to have on the market a third party certified "green gold" by 2009. Early adopters such as Katharine Hamnett are using his gold for her jewels.

Coloured gems are a more complex issue. Marcia Lanyon, the London-based dealer explains: "Diamond mining is a higher value industry with fewer people involved, so it's easier to trace. (With coloured gems) we are dealing with so many different materials and places that it is virtually impossible to guarantee everyone in the chain is getting a fair deal."

Ms Lanyon cautions against a simplistic approach. "Low wages are probably the biggest problem for the miners," she says, "but they are probably not lower than the national average of the countries they work in."

But she says it is also not ethical, to, for example, avoid Burmese rubies: "I have been to Burma and seen how poor these people are, so not buying their rubies, even though a percentage goes to the generals, will make it worse . . ."

Eric Braunwart, based in Vancouver WA, founder of Columbia Gem House, the largest suppliers of "fair trade" coloured stones (the company is not Fair Trade certified) is working on ways to improve the supply chain.

Ohio-born Tom Cushman, adviser to the Institut de Gemmologie de Madagascar and consultant to the World Bank, has spent the past 17 years working to help the Malagasy better understand and price their resources by educating them to classify, sort and cut stones rather than simply export rough.

London-based jeweller Pippa Small encourages indigenous communities in dire straits. Her most recent project has helped the Kanu tribe in Panama create jewellery for sale in chic European boutiques.

And it is not all small-scale attempts. The Council for Responsible Jewellery Practices was founded in London two years ago with the aim of promoting responsible, ethical, social and environmental practices.

By January 2008, there will be for the first time a set of global industry standards. "It is a challenge, as the jewellery industry is so fragmented, but we are going to make it work," says CRJP spokeswoman Peggy Jo Donahue.

One notable case is Tiffany & Co, whose commitment to knowing where its materials come from is the result of good management and circumstance. When the company went public in the late 1980s, the expansion of business sense meant it to produce most of its jewellery internally. The resulting vertical integration gave more control of the process, from mining to smelting.

The overall direction towards "fair trade" seems clear, even if progress is faster among retailers than further up the supply chain.

"I see this as a mega-trend that will become mainstream in five to 10 years," says Vivien Johnston, founder of Fifi Bijoux in Edinburgh, which makes and sells "ethical" jewels.

"The retailers get blamed but they are powerless. Once the big mining companies are behind it, things will really be different."

By Saleem Ali and Michael Cohen

 http://www.policyinnovations.org/ideas/commentary/data/peace_park

We are once again at the brink of a Middle East peace conference and Syria's attendance remains unlikely. U.S. and Israeli policy makers continue to speculate about the sincerity of Syrian involvement, and consequently the Syrians have dismissed the forthcoming meeting as a "waste of time." The most significant point of contention between Syria and Israel remains the disputed mountainous region of Golan, which Israel has occupied since 1967. In order to have meaningful engagement from Syria, creative solutions to the Golan conflict must be on the agenda of the proposed Annapolis meeting that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is planning.

...

This confluence of interests makes the region an ideal case for implementing a novel dispute-resolution strategy known as environmental peace-building. The strategy involves transforming disputed border areas into transboundary conservation zones with flexible governance arrangements. Such territorial arrangements are increasingly called peace parks. To some realist commentators this term may suggest idealistic or naive notions of conflict resolution, but it is championed even by military officers, such as retired Indian Air Marshal K. C. "Nanda" Cariappa, a former POW who has called for such a strategy to resolve India and Pakistan's dispute over the Siachen glacier.

Earlier this year an old proposal for resolving the Golan conflict was resurrected by Syrian-American negotiator Ibrahim Suleiman and former director-general of Israel's foreign ministry Alon Liel. They met with the Israeli Knesset's Foreign Relations and Defense Committee to develop a plan to establish a jointly administered peace park between Syria and Israel in the Golan. The proposal was initially motivated by Robin Twite's work at the Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information during the 1990s. Now the strategic plan for the effort has been laid out in detail and the momentum is there to move forward on this solution, which is feasible in the Golan given the demographics of the region. According to the plan, Syria would be the sovereign in all of the Golan, but Israelis could visit the park freely, without visas. In addition, territory on both sides of the border would be demilitarized along a 4:1 ratio in Israel's favor.

...

This understanding of the dynamic opens up possibilities for a new scenario whereby a third party is involved. In addition to the peace park proposal, it is also possible to set up a Druze Autonomous Area that is neither Israeli nor Syrian but jointly administered by a commission. Similar proposals have also been initiated by Friends of the Earth Middle East along the Jordan River, and there is, at least on paper, a marine peace park between Jordan, Israel, and Egypt in the Gulf of Aqaba (which was established as part of the first round of Oslo negotiations). The Golan proposal is geographically much more significant in terms of its joint-management potential and also as a means for instrumental conflict resolution between two states that currently do not recognize each other.

... 

Putting a Golan Heights Peace Park on the Annapolis conference agenda may help garner wider support among Arab states and also facilitate stabilization in Iraq since Syria is a significant player on that front as well. Territorial bargaining with environmental factors in mind has proved successful in other conflicts, such as between Ecuador and Peru in the Cordillera del Condor region in the 1990s. The establishment of a jointly managed conservation zone was instrumental in resolving that dispute, which was mediated by the United States twelve years ago. It is high time that we consider ecological solutions in the Golan conflict, which is demographically and spatially configured for green diplomacy.

Saleem H. Ali is associate dean for graduate education at the University of Vermont's Rubenstein School of Environment and editor of the new book Peace Parks: Conservation and Conflict Resolution (MIT Press). Rabbi Michael Cohen is the director for special projects at the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies in Israel.

16 November 2007
BBC Monitoring Africa
Text of report by Radio France Internationale on 16 November

In Madagascar, 12 peasants have been sentenced to death for not wanting to leave lands on which they had been living for years. Six others were sentenced to 12 years to hard labour.

In August 2006, about 100 residents of the village of Ankorondrano [rural commune in Antananarivo] had clashed with policemen who had come to remove them. Three were killed including two officers of the security forces.

It worth noting that the villagers were not the owners of the land they were farming. But they settled there after the French left. A wealthy real estate developer wanted to buy the land to build an amusement park. This is not an isolated occurrence, the big island is experiencing many land problems which they inherited from the colonization period.

Source: Radio France Internationale, Paris, in French 0730 gmt 16 Nov 07

James Sturcke and agencies
Monday November 26, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2217387,00.html Iraq's government is preparing to grant the US a long-term troop presence in the country and preferential treatment for American investors in return for guaranteed security, it emerged today.
Iraqi officials said that, under the proposed formula, Iraq would get full responsibility for internal security and American troops would relocate to bases outside cities. The proposals foresee a long-term presence of about 50,000 US troops, down from the current figure of more than160,000.

Lieutenant General Douglas Lute, the Bush administration's adviser on Iraq, confirmed the proposal, calling it "a set of principles from which to begin formal negotiations".

"Think of today's agreement as setting the agenda for the formal bilateral negotiations," said Lute.

Those negotiations will take place during the first half of next year. As part of the package, Iraqi authorities want an end to the UN-mandated multinational forces mission.

Preferential treatment for US investors could provide a huge windfall if Iraq can achieve enough stability to exploit its vast oil resources.

By SOMINI SENGUPTA
Published: November 26, 2007
 
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/26/world/asia/26bangladesh.html?ref=world DHAKA, Bangladesh, Nov. 24 — The political storm that preceded nature's latest assault on this country still swirls overhead.

Nearly a year into an army-backed state of emergency, basic freedoms remain suspended, a sweeping anticorruption drive has stuffed the jails with some of Bangladesh's most influential business leaders and politicians, and a fragile economy is tottering under the pressure of floods at home and rising oil prices abroad.
The soaring cost of food is potentially the most explosive challenge facing the military-backed government that has run this country since Jan. 11, when, after debilitating political protests, scheduled elections were scrapped and emergency law was imposed. Climbing inflation was compounded by an unusually harsh monsoon, which destroyed food crops along the flood plains in July.

Then, the Nov. 15 cyclone destroyed acres of rice paddy, ruined the shrimp farms that dot the southern coast, and, according to the World Food Program, left roughly 2.3 million people in need of urgent food aid.

Storm relief is now the government's most pressing test, including averting famine and disease outbreaks, and ensuring that aid distribution is perceived to be fair and without corruption. The government estimates that six million people were affected by the storm.

The Monitor (Kampala)

25 November 2007
Posted to the web 25 November 2007

http://allafrica.com/stories/200711250001.html 

Grace Matsiko & Agencies
Kampala

COMMONWEALTH leaders said yesterday that climate change threatened the survival of small island members but failed to agree on any binding commitments to combat it.

A "Climate Action Plan", issued on the second day of the Commonwealth Summit in Kampala, contained only vague language on the way forward in the battle against global warming.

The organisation's secretary-general, Mr Don McKinnon, called the agreement "quite a leap forward" but it appeared to stop short of the major statement which many members, led by Britain, had wanted ahead of a world environment summit in Bali next month.

Host President Museveni was not happy with the statement's call for increased financial flows for adaptation.

"I am not for adaptation, to adapt like the beaver adapts to winter in Australia," President Museveni said at the news briefing with Mr McKninnon. "I think climate changes can be reversed."

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1128/p01s04-woap.htmlBy Simon Montlake| Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the November 28, 2007 edition

PORONG, INDONESIA - On one side of the levee, a line of trucks waits on a clogged, two-lane road under a broiling sun. On the other, a vast lake of mud stretches to the horizon. Neither appears to be moving.

In the distance, a trail of white smoke rises from a hole in the ground where the mud flow began 18 months ago. Despite attempts to stanch the sludge, such as by dropping giant concrete balls from helicopters into the fissure, the mud continues to gush, swallowing everything in its path.

Prone to earthquakes and volcanoes, Indonesia is no stranger to natural disasters. But what befell this densely populated slice of Java Island was, by most accounts, a man-made calamity.

Last May, an Indonesian energy company drilling for natural gas accidentally opened a fissure in the ground from where hot, viscous mud began erupting. The unstoppable stinking ooze has since swallowed up 11 towns, destroying homes, factories, schools, and farms, and forcing some 16,000 people to uproot.

But its calm oily surface is deceptive. The mud, which contains heavy metals and chemicals such as benzene and sulfurdioxide, has also contaminated rivers and wells in a city-sized area that was semi-industrial farmland and a shrimp production zone. Indonesia's national planning agency has put the economic damages at $334 million a month and says the final bill could be as high as $8.6 billion.

A network of dams now holds back the mud, and engineers are trying to pump some of the sludge out to sea. Already, an estimated 1 billion cubic feet of mud has inundated an area of 2.5 square miles.

... 

The disaster has become a political liability for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, whose hesitant response was complicated by his ties to Minister of Public Welfare Aburizal Bakrie, a prominent businessman whose family-run conglomerate owns Lapindo. Political opponents say that Mr. Bakrie, formerly chief economics minister, only kept his cabinet post in an April reshuffle because he is a financial backer of President Yudhoyono, who faces reelection in 2009.

Whatever the political calculations in Jakarta, disgruntled residents here blame both parties for their plight. A painted banner across an abandoned stretch of toll road in the disaster zone reads "Lapindo + Government = Madness."

http://www.enn.com/top_stories/article/26050

Published November 28, 2007 09:15 AM

Jakarta, Indonesia - The devastating impact of global warming is already evident in Indonesia and will likely worsen due to further human-induced climate change, warns WWF.

The review from the global conservation organization, Climate Change in Indonesia - Implications for Humans and Nature, highlights that annual rainfall in the world's fourth most populous nation is already down by 2 to 3 per cent, and the seasons are changing.
The combination of high population density and high levels of biodiversity, together with a staggering 80,000 kilometres of coastline and 17,500 islands, makes Indonesia one of the most vulnerable countries to the impacts of climate change.
"As rainfall decreases during critical times of the year this translates into higher drought risk, consequently a decrease in crop yields, economic instability and drastically more undernourished people," says Fitrian Ardiansyah, Director of WWF-Indonesia's Climate and Energy Programme.
"This will undo Indonesia's progress against poverty and food insecurity."

http://www.enn.com/top_stories/article/26032

From: Reuters
Published November 28, 2007 08:00 AM

By Ruma Paul

DHAKA (Reuters) - Disaster-prone Bangladesh is among the countries most vulnerable to climate change, which could worsen water scarcity and force mass displacement, the United Nations said on Tuesday.

The U.N. Development Programme in its latest report warned that climate change will hit the world's poorest countries by breaking down agricultural systems, worsening water scarcity, increasing risks of diseases and triggering mass displacement due to recurring floods and storms.

The report said more than 70 million Bangladeshis, 22 million Vietnamese, and 6 million Egyptians could be affected by global warming-related flooding.

...

Dhaka has proposed setting up of an International Centre for Adaptation to study countries most at risk from climate change, C.S.Karim, a government adviser said.

British High Commissioner Anwar Chowdury said on Wednesday his government welcomed the proposal, and plans to organize a conference in Dhaka early next year on climate change.

Bangladesh has suffered a double blow in the last few months, first from devastating floods in July and then two weeks ago when the worst cyclone since 1991 killed some 3,500 people and displaced millions.

http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/45618/story.htm

http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/45643/story.htm

http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/45629/story.htm

US: November 30, 2007

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - If nothing is done to combat global warming, two of Florida's nuclear power plants, three of its prisons and 1,362 hotels, motels and inns will be under water by 2100, a study released Wednesday said.
In all, Florida could stand to lose US$345 billion a year in projected economic activity by 2100 if nothing is done to reduce emissions that are viewed as the main human contribution to rising global temperatures, according to the Tufts University study. That equals about 5 percent of what economists project the state's gross domestic product will be by the end of the century.

...

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1688893,00.html 

By KRISTA MAHR/RIAU

Wednesday, Nov. 28, 2007
On a recent humid morning in Riau, a province on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, a young man named Suranto wakes early on a Sunday, wraps a red T shirt around his head and ambles off to the fields to work. Suranto isn't a local; he has come from northern Sumatra because there are jobs in Riau. The forests and peatlands of the area are being transformed into plantations, and workers are being paid to plant tens of thousands of young oil-palm trees in fields stripped bare of their native vegetation by burning. As Suranto stoops and digs one hole after another amid the blackened stumps of an old tropical forest, he looks like a camp follower picking through the detritus of a still-smoldering battlefield.

...

The biodiesel boom has a high environmental cost, however. Critics say it's contributing to global warming. Tropical forests help remove millions of tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere every year. Burning and clear-cutting not only eliminates one of the planet's crucial air-filtration systems, the process also releases even more carbon dioxide into the air, in smoke or as gases released during the decomposition of forest waste. Annual clearing of Indonesia's carbon-rich peatlands alone releases some 1.8 billion tons of greenhouse gases, according to a Greenpeace report. Indonesia is the world's third largest emitter of greenhouse gases behind the U.S. and China, says the World Bank. "We liken what's going on [in Indonesia] to pouring petrol on a fire," says Martin Baker, a Hong Kong-based communications officer for Greenpeace International. "It's completely ridiculous to produce green fuels from places like this."

It doesn't seem so ridiculous to poor countries like Indonesia, where leaders are torn between the need to develop the country's natural resources and increasing international pressure to preserve remaining forests. This dilemma is expected to be a hot topic this month at a U.N.-led conference on climate change in Bali, where representatives from 189 nations are gathering to negotiate a set of environmental rules to succeed the Kyoto protocols, the main provisions of which expire in 2012.

...

That may be so — but as long as there is demand for biodiesel, it seems unrealistic to expect Indonesia to stop converting forests into plantations. These days, Riau's main highway is clogged with trucks carting processed palm oil from local refineries to the Sumatran port town of Dumai. Outside one house, not far from the provincial capital of Pekanbaru, a woman weighing out heavy red palm fruit on a scale in her front yard says her family used to only sell fruit from their 200 palm trees. But with the high prices palm oil fetches these days, she says her family members have gone into business as middlemen for the industry, helping other small growers sell to larger plantations. "We were able to move up," she says.

It's success stories like this one that will bedevil those attending the Bali conference. One of the central issues will be how to justly allocate the economic burden of reducing greenhouse emissions among industrialized countries — which have grown rich fouling the air and using up natural resources — and developing countries like China, India and Indonesia. "We have to be careful about asking developing countries to lock up their forests," says Taylor of the WWF. That is, at least until the world has found a way to make locking up the forests pay.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1130/p04s01-wome.html

By Sam Dagher| Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor

November 30, 2007 edition

Al-Manathra, Iraq - Abdul-Hassan Hussein has heard that security is improving in his Baghdad neighborhood of Ghazaliya, recently a hotbed of Sunni extremists who were targeting Shiites like himself.

But Mr. Hussein is not rushing back just yet, as relatives there say it's too soon to know if the quiet will last.

While the return of some of the estimated 2.2 million refugees in Syria and neighboring countries is being heralded by Iraqi officials as a sign of progress in Baghdad, many of the Shiites in this refugee camp, who have come here because it's close to their holy city of Najaf, will stay until they are convinced the sectarian warfare in Baghdad has truly ended.

Mr. Hussein and his family - he is a father of eight who is also caring for the 10-member family of his brother, killed in Ghazaliya at the height of sectarian bloodshed last year - are among the 2.3 million Iraqis considered internally displaced as of the end of September. That number is 16 percent higher than August, according the Iraqi Red Crescent Organization (IRCO).

And as the number of the internally displaced is growing, aid workers say the conditions they are living in is growing worse. They say it is becoming especially tough for children 12 and under, who make up 65 percent of the total number of internally displaced Iraqis.

Aid agencies say the situation is getting harsher because of dwindling aid from international agencies and an overwhelmed central government in Baghdad. Hussein and his family have been living with 2,000 other people in the camp for more than a year now.

... 

Although the refugees in Al-Manathra are closely watched and guarded by Najaf authorities, they have been more fortunate than many other war refugees.

They have clean drinking water, the province is building them trailers to replace tents, and they are aided by the offices of the city's many clerics. The office of radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who controls the Mahdi Army, has even donated a generator.

But while things here may be better than in other refugee camps throughout the country, its residents say that they are particularly worried about the children living here.

"The trauma alone from the violence they have been exposed to will have huge consequences for years to come," says Mr. Mofarah.

Abu Noor, the mayor of the Al-Manathra camp, says he has 600 children age 15 and below and that many are showing signs of malnutrition. Frail, disheveled, and barefoot children running amid puddles of still and muddy water are a common sight at the camp.