Law in Action

Saving the Species; Molibe Marine Protected Areas

questions — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 10:16:31 +0000

Some of the world’s most endangered marine life could be saved from extinction by establishing mobile nature reserves that would protect vulnerable species as they moved around the oceans, scientists say. The initiative could provide safe havens for endangered loggerhead and leatherback turtles, albatrosses, sharks and other travelling species, and sea life that is [...]

Regulating Greenhouse Gases; European Schemes, China, WTO and the ICAO

questions — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 10:19:10 +0000

Could a fresh row over airline emissions lead to a global trade war? That is the scariest prospect raised by China’s objections this week to the European Union’s new plan for controlling greenhouse-gas emissions from aeroplanes. The scheme, which came into effect on January 1st, forces airlines flying into the EU to buy tradable [...]

Regulating the Weapons Markets, how to weaken international legislation

questions — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 10:21:22 +0000

Negotiators on Friday (Feb. 17, 2012) narrowly averted the collapse of talks on a world arms trade treaty to regulate the $55 billion global weapons market, agreeing on ground rules for negotiations after days of procedural wrangling….Arms control campaigners say one person every minute dies as a result of armed violence and that a convention [...]

Cross-Border Pollution: implications of nuclear waste disposal, Russia, Finland

questions — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 10:34:55 +0000

Russian officials are going to use the planned nuclear waste repository on the site of the Sosnovy Bor nuclear power plant near the metropolis of St. Petersburg for storing miscellaneous radioactive waste. “There is hospital equipment there, such as X-ray machines, work clothes, and cobalt cannons used in cancer treatments”, says director Oleg Bodrov [...]

Chevron’s Amazon Rainforest Pollution, human rights and investment tribunals

questions — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 10:38:51 +0000

Indigenous rainforest communities from Ecuador who recently won an $18 billion judgment against Chevron for environmental damage have filed a petition before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights strongly criticizing Chevron’s “egregious misuse” of the U.S.-Ecuador Bilateral Investment Treaty (“BIT”) to violate human rights protections. They are seeking an order requiring Ecuador’s government to [...]

Polluting Low-Income, Minority Neighborhoods: Union Pacific Railroad, United States

questions — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 10:08:36 +0000

Union Pacific Railroad Co. will pay $1.5 million to settle alleged violations of the US Clean Water Act and US Oil Pollution Act. The settlement with the Environmental Protection Agency resolves a Clean Water Act enforcement action against Union Pacific that involves operations at 20 rail yards and spills of oil and coal in [...]

Who is Afraid of the Media; Fukushima’s nuclea waste

questions — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 10:51:37 +0000

The [Japanese] government, for the first time, has allowed the media to cover operations to move waste contaminated by radioactive substances to a baseball stadium being used for temporary storage in the Ottozawa district in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture. The contaminated waste was collected in the government-led model decontamination project conducted in the town. The bags [...]

Is India Abandoning Legal Action against Biopiracy?

questions — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 10:25:59 +0000

From the Press Release of Environmental Support Group Feb. 7, 2012

In a shocking development, the Karnataka State Biodiversity Board [India] has resolved in its 19th meeting held on 20th January 2012 that it will not prosecute institutions and companies who violate the Biological Diversity Act.This highly controversial and illegal decision was taken in the context [...]

In Syria Covert Action with an Arab-Turkish Face

questions — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 10:37:37 +0000

In Washington, the National Security Council is said to be preparing a “presidential finding”, an executive order authorising covert action [in Syria], as a policy option, but it is not clear whether the White House would take the risky step of signing it. “It would leak in an instant and it would be radioactive,” [...]

Malaria’s Unnecessary Deaths in the Developing World

questions — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 10:59:25 +0000

Worldwide malaria deaths may be almost twice as high as previously estimated, a study reports.The research, published in the British medical journal the Lancet, suggests 1.24 million people died from the mosquito-borne disease in 2010.This compares to a World Health Organisation (WHO) estimate for 2010 of 655,000 deaths. But both the new study and [...]