Gloria Sofia Zapata, Hernando Duque and Eder Alexander Valencia were murdered on October 14, October 20 and November 9. They were members of the environmental organization "Hojas de Hierba" (Herb Leaves) of the municipality of Belen de Umbria in the province of Risaralda. Hector Ivan Escobar and John Jairo Lopez, of the same organization, have had to leave the country.
Bulletin articles
By means of a letter dated October 22 a group of environmental NGOs addressed Mr Henri Djombo, Minister of Forest Economy of the Republic of Congo, to express their disapproval regarding a number of actions carried out by him, believed to be aimed at undermining the Brazzaville Process.
Finnish and Indonesian NGOs have repeatedly denounced that UPM-Kymmene’s partner -the Singapore-based APRIL (Asia Pacific Resources International Holdings Ltd.)- is violating human rights and causing severe environmental problems in Indonesia. The company has converted rainforests to exotic monoculture plantations, to feed their pulp mills and NGOs demand that the project is abandoned (see WRM Bulletins nr. 6 and 8).
A policeman was rushed to hospital in Medan with a serious head injury after being beaten up in a confrontation on Monday 23rd November between security forces and local people at Porsea, North Tapanuli, North Sumatra. Another police officer suffered wounds to the back and leg. A police patrol vehicle and a government official's car were destroyed by the crowd and three other cars plus 23 homes and shops were smashed up and burnt.
In June 1998 we published a special WRM bulletin focused on the environmental and social problems affecting the lives of highland people in Northern Thailand, including a critical response regarding a previous article published in WRM bulletin 11. We are pleased to inform that a number of people, both from within and outside Thailand, got together on October 2nd in London, with the aim of clarifying the differences in analysis and approach of the wide number of actors involved directly or indirectly with this very complex situation.
APRIL (Asia Pacific Resources International Holding Ltd.) –partner of the Finnish UPM-Kymmene- is known for its permanent violations to human rights and depredatory environmental practices in Indonesia. Lately APRIL has been the cause of local conflicts between villagers and workers in Indonesia (see WRM Bulletin 17, November 1998).
The Conference of the Parties (COP4) of the Climate Change Convention will be meeting during the first two weeks of November in Buenos Aires. Much of the discussion will concentrate on the role of forests as carbon sinks and many negotiations will include deals between Northern and Southern countries on how to trade emissions and sinks: we emit, you sink.
The Kyoto Protocol, agreed in December 1997, has been criticised for its market-oriented approach, since it tends to establish a trading system to buy and sell carbon emissions. Tree plantations have gained a major role in relation to this issue because of their supposed condition of carbon sinks. The Protocol established that afforestation is one of the activities that Annex I countries can undertake to achieve their “quantified emission limitation and reduction commitments” for greenhouse effect gases (Art. 2).
Deforestation and forest degradation worldwide have been and are cause of concern. Rates of loss in tropical as well as in temperate and boreal areas are alarming. All tropical forests have suffered an increase in the rate of deforestation, while the few remaining primary temperate forests, as well as boreal forests are under severe threat.
Framework Convention on Climate Change:
Article 1.7. “Reservoir” means a component or components of the climate system where a greenhouse gas or a precursor of a greenhouse gas is stored
Article 1.8 “Sink” means any process, activity or mechanism which removes a greenhouse gas, an aerosol or a precursor of a greenhouse gas from the athmosphere
A group of 22 organizations sent a letter dated 10 November 1998 to the German Development Minister, Ms. Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, in order to express their concern over the environmental and social impacts of the European Commission's development aid programme and demanding clear actions from the forthcoming German Presidency of the European Union.
Since the 1992 Earth Summit, many trees have been felled to provide paper for the voluminous documents produced by a number of intergovernmental processes --including parallel expert meetings-- aimed at addressing the urgent problem of deforestation. Many solutions have since then been found ... on paper.