Three men plead guilty in Virginia eco protest

On Jan. 12 three men pleaded guilty to property destruction actions on behalf of the Earth Liberation Front.

The three, who were in high school at the time of the attacks in the Richmond, VA suburbs in 2002, face up to five years in prison at sentencing in April. Under the plea agreement they must also repay more than $200,000.

Aaron Linas, Adam Blackwell and John Wade vandalized construction equipment being used to build a mall, defaced 25 SUVs at a car dealership and several more vehicles at homes, and defaced three fast-food restaurants, prosecutors said.

They also scrawled graffiti and left notes that accused the victims of harming the environment and contributing to suburban sprawl. (AP)

GM crops linked to rise in pesticide use

Eight years of planting genetically modified (GM) maize, cotton, and soy beans in the US has significantly increased the amount of herbicides and pesticides used, according to a new report.

The comprehensive study of chemical use on GM crops draws on US government data collected since commercialization of the crops began.

Charles Benbrook, the author of the report, who is also head of the Northwest Science and Environment Policy Center, at Sandpoint, Idaho, found that when first introduced most of the crops needed up to 25% fewer chemicals for the first three years, but afterwards significantly more.

In 2001, the report states, 5% more herbicides and insecticides were sprayed compared with crops only of non-GM varieties; in 2002 7.9% more was sprayed; and in 2003 the estimated rise was 11.5%. In total, $116 million more of agrochemicals were sprayed in the US during 2001-2003 because of GM crops, says the report, which was commissioned by Iowa State University, the Consumers’ Union and others. (Guardian (UK))

Indonesian mine killing

The Australian government is under pressure to launch an inquiry into the lobbying activities of its embassy staff in Jakarta, following the killing by Indonesian security forces of a man protesting the development in a protected forest of a gold mine by an Australian mining company.

When hundreds of protesters from the Kao and Malifut communities reached the proposed Togurici minesite in eastern Halmahera island on Jan. 7, the Mobile Brigade riot police, known as Brimob, shot and killed one man.

Up to another 250 have been detained for questioning at the company security post.

The violent attacks by Brimob come after the Melbourne-based company Newcrest — which has a 82.5 percent stake in PT Nusa Halmahera Minerals — became frustrated with the growing opposition to the company’s plan to build a $12 million gold mine on remote Halmahera island in North Maluku province.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) confirmed that after the protests in October last year that shut the mine site down for five weeks, Australian embassy officials had lobbied Indonesian government ministers to clear the protesters to the satisfaction of Newcrest. (IPS)

Orang-utan has less than a decade in the wild

The orang-utan is disappearing at such a rate that it is likely to be extinct in the wild in 20 years, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) reported Jan. 12.

Deforestation and hunting are taking such a toll that the orang-utan is likely to vanish from the wild in the only two places it still lives — the island of Sumatra, which is part of Indonesia, and the island of Borneo, which is divided between Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brunei.

WWF figures show that whereas in 1987 there were between 45,000 and 60,000 orang-utans in the world, by 2001 that number had fallen to between 25,000 and 30,000. According to WWF, such a rate of decline, about 50 percent in 14 years, is likely to annihilate the animal in the wild in 20 years.

Over the past 100 years, WWF believes that Sumatra and Borneo have lost 91 percent of their orang-utans. But the decline has increased in recent decades because of the fragmentation and destruction of the animal’s natural forest habitat. This has been caused by commercial logging and the clearing of land for oil palm plantations and agriculture.

All four of the great apes - the orang-utan, the gorilla, the chimpanzee, and the pygmy chimpanzee - are increasingly endangered. (Independent (UK))

Bush administration admits to underfunding toxic cleanup

An Environmental Protection Agency Inspector General’s report released Jan. 8 admits that the Bush administration failed to adequately fund the clean up of hazardous toxic waste sites in 2003. The report, a response to inquiries from US Senators Barbara Boxer and Jim Jeffords and US Representatives John Dingell and Hilda Solis, admits to a $174.9 million shortfall in clean up funding.

America’s federal Superfund toxic waste cleanup program ran out of polluter contributed funds on Oct. 1, 2003, leaving taxpayers to shoulder the financial burden and leaving communities across the country at risk. President Bush has refused to push for the renewal of the “polluter-pays tax” that expired in 1995, becoming the first president not to support the principle that polluters should pay to clean up the messes they create since president Reagan signed the Superfund reauthorization into law in 1986.

American taxpayers are projected to pay about $1.1 billion for the Superfund program this year, an increase of about 400 percent since the fee expired in 1995. According to a Congressionally-mandated study concerning the future of the Superfund program, the cost of implementing the program between 2000-2009 ranges from $14 billion to $16.4 billion. (Sierra Club)