Latest News
RFUK CONDEMNS ARREST OF CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS & JOURNALISTS IN GABON AND CALLS FOR THEIR RELEASE
RFUK demands the immediate release of the detained civil rights activists and journalists, arrested without charge by the Gabonese judicial police last Wednesday, five days ago today. On December 31, the Gabonese judicial police arrested the environmental and civil rights activist Marc Ona Essangui, president of Rainforest Foundation UK's partner organisation, Brainforest, and coordinator of the Publish What You Pay Coalition in Gabon. Also arrested was Georges Mpaga, president of the Network of Free Civil Society Organisations for Good Governance in Gabon, (ROLBG), Grégoire Ngbwa Mintsa, a party to a complaint made by Transparency International and the French NGO Sherpa against, among others, the President of Gabon, and Gaston Asseko, technical director of the radio station Sainte Marie. All four are still being held in custody as of today. No reason has been given for their arrests and they have not been permitted to see a lawyer. In addition to these civil society activists, two journalists were arrested on December 30. One of those was released the next day, but the other, chief editor of the newspaper ‘Tendance', is still being held without charge. RFUK condemns the arbitrary arrest of these environmental and civil rights campaigners and calls for their immediate release.
RAINFOREST FOUNDATION STATEMENT ON OUTCOMES OF UN CLIMATE TALKS
Governments fail to deliver on rainforest protection.
As the UN Climate talks draw to a close in Poznan, the Rainforest Foundation today expresses its deep disappointment at the Parties' failure to lay the foundations for lasting forest protection in a future global deal on climate change. Unless the issues of indigenous peoples and local community rights, forest law enforcement and governance, and the underlying drivers of deforestation are at the heart of any mechanism to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD), it will fail.
OVER FIFTY INTERNATIONAL NGOS, INDIGENOUS PEOPLES & LOCAL COMMUNITIES OUTRAGED AT THE REMOVAL OF RIGHTS
A demand today from the United States, New Zealand, Canada, and Australia to oppose the recognition of the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities in REDD (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) has caused a wave of outrage across many groups including the Rainforest Foundation (UK & Norway), CARE International, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Christian Aid, Earthjustice, Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, ICCO, Tebtebba Foundation, and members of the Accra Caucus on Forests and Climate Change at the Poznan UNFCCC climate summit.
Do Trees Grow on Money?
Rainforests are back on the global agenda in a big way. Governments now recognise the importance of protecting tropical forests in order to avoid dangerous climate change, and there is now much debate. As governments try to thrash out the details of a new international agreement, expected to be signed at the end of 2009, they are discussing how best to include measures to save rainforests, and thereby address one of the major causes of climate change. Worldwide, forest destruction generates more greenhouse gas emissions each year than do all the trains, planes and cars on the planet. So if we are to tackle global warming, there is an urgent need to find ways to reduce the 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions caused by forest destruction each year, and to keep the remaining forests standing.
Blogs
Sam's been back to Central African Republic (CAR) one of the most inaccessible countries in the Congo Basin. Read about his experiences here.
