Ecology and Environment

Four people dead, many injured and a priest battered by the police following massive protests in Cajamarca, Peru, are just the tip of the iceberg. Conga gold mine threatens the water of four lakes. The same story repeats throughout several Latin American countries. Multinationals (surprise, surprise!) are involved. Financial crisis fuels Gold (and other minerals) Rush

The UN Conference on Sustainable Development, known as Rio+20 to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 1992 Earth Summit with expressions of deep disappointment from broad sections of members of the media and the environmental NGOs, who saw little new commitments to action in the final text that was adopted by the heads of states and governments and their senior officials.

Luc Gnacadja has rock-solid reason to be upbeat: some 100 heads of state agreed at the Rio+20 – to strive for “a land-degradation neutral world”, characterised by zero growth in desertification.
In doing so they were responding to the UNCCD’s clarion call in a “policy brief” for ‘A Sustainable Development Goal for Rio+20: Zero Net Land Degradation’.

The final document of the Summit of the peoples summarizes the main points discussed during plenary sessions and meetings, as well as express the intense mobilization that occurred during this period that point of convergence around the structural causes and false solutions, solutions to the crises facing the people, as well as the main axes of struggle for the next period.

At the Global Media Forum, organised by Deutsche Welle and currently underway in Bonn, Germany, Pressenza director, Pia Figueroa was invited to participate on a panel on the theme of sustainability education. “We are convinced that until development is from all and for all human beings, violent conditions that put at risk social as well as personal life will persist.”

We publish here the official document, in its final version that was worked and agreed by the delegations present at the Rio+20 Summit and that only the Heads of State could modify directly. As our correspondents in Brazil reported, it only remains the act of formalization of its approval during the official summit meeting.

Two weeks before the start of the Rio+20 Summit Mr. Kazumi Matsui, Mayor of Hiroshima and President of Mayors for Peace has added his signature to the [Rio+20 Appeal](http://www.inesglobal.com/Disarmament-for-Sustainable-Development.phtml) calling on governments to cut military spending in favor of sustainable development.

In run-up to the UN Conference on Sustainable Development, the Government of Brazil is organizing, with support of the UN, Sustainable Development Dialogues – a forum for civil society – in Riocentro from June 16 to 19.
In the 4 days top representatives from civil society, private sector, NGOs, scientific community, etc.. will convene at the venue of the Rio+20 Conference

The indefinite hunger strike has been going on since May 1 against the Koodankulam nuclear power project (KKNPP). By May 5, 25 men had been on the fast since May 1 and 302 women and 10 more men joined the strike on May 4. More and more women are eager to join the indefinite hunger strike but the organisers are not able to accommodate them.

The Annual General Meeting of Abolition 2000 Global Network for the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons unanimously adopted a statement: “Welcoming the Shut-Down of All of Japan’s Nuclear Reactors. The news that the last of country’s 54 nuclear reactors went offline for maintenance also sparked celebrations among Japan’s anti-nuclear protesters.