Nigeria's oil pollution stark example of resource curse: Amnesty

The pollution caused by half a century of oil extraction in Nigeria is one of the world's most disturbing examples of the curse of natural resources, a global rights lobby group said Tuesday.
Amnesty International said environmental pollution in Nigeria's southern oil region, the Niger Delta, had deprived tens of millions of people of their basic rights to safe food, clean water and good health.
In a damning report released Tuesday, Amnesty described the situation in the Niger Delta, home to 31 million people, as a "human rights tragedy" which had fuelled anger and conflict.
"People living in the Niger Delta have to drink, cook with, and wash in polluted water; they eat fish contaminated with oil and other toxins -- if they are lucky enough to still be able to find fish," said the report.
Farmland in the region, one of the most important wetlands on earth, is being destroyed by oil spills.
"After oil spills the air they breathe reeks of oil, gas and other pollutants; they complain of breathing problems... but their concerns are not taken seriously," the report added.
Amnesty blames both the government and multi-national oil giants for the rights abuses in the south of Africa's most populous country.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090630/wl_africa_afp/nigeriaoilenvironmentrights3rd

CLIMATE CHANGE: 'We Have Run Out of Time'

New scientific research suggests that climate change is taking place faster than foreseen in studies considered so far, according to environmental experts at a forum on climate change called by the Global Legislators Organisation for a Balanced Environment (GLOBE)."We have run out of time," Ashok Khosla, president of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the world's largest environmental association, told IPS. "Climate change is happening at a swifter speed than we thought so far."
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47215

Green Energy for All by 2030?

While industrialised countries struggle to switch from climate-damaging, carbon-based energy to greener energy sources, much of the world is desperately energy poor, with 1.6 billion people having no access to electricity and 2.4 billion relying on wood and dung for heat and cooking."Over 1.6 million deaths a year are attributed to indoor use of biomass for cooking and heating," Kandeh Yumkella, director-general of the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO), told more than 600 participants from 80 countries at the Vienna Energy Conference this week in Austria's capital city. The conference concluded with a recommendation to create a 20-year plan to end energy poverty by 2030
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47378