The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) has been accused of breaking the law by failing to maintain a public register of over 175,000 pollution permits for sites across Scotland.

The Ferret

Environmental regulator accused of law breaking over pollution

Six Portuguese young people claim inadequate policies to tackle global heating breach their human rights

The Guardian

UK one of 32 countries facing European court action over climate stance

A new study indicates that forest projects in the state’s cap-and-trade system provide little additional benefit for the climate

Bloomberg

Carbon offsets undercut California’s climate progress, researchers find

Global pressure has also spurred an investigation by the Forest Stewardship Council into Samling's alleged illegal logging and human rights violations.

Eco-Business

In a win for forest protection groups, timber giant Samling withdraws defamation suit

Over the last decade, nearly 2,000 land and environment defenders have been killed around the world, and in 2022, a land defender was killed every other day, according to a report released last week. 

Mother Jones

Defending one’s land can be deadly, especially in South America

MAGA Republicans would forcibly implement the radical policy blueprint, Project 2025, in the first 180 days of the new administration. The plan is an all-out assault on democracy, the environment, the role of government, and unionized federal workers. It autocratically concentrates presidential powers and obliterates traditional constitutional checks and balances.

People's World

‘Project 2025’: The Republican blueprint to wage war on the environment

In 2022 the US EPA opened a civil rights investigation into whether the State of Louisiana overburdens Black communities along “Cancer Alley” with toxic industries. But EPA and the Department of Justice abruptly closed the inquiry when the Louisiana attorney general filed a suit charging reverse discrimination. Monique Harden of the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice joins Host Steve Curwood to discuss the role of industry in the suit and the progress towards environmental justice that could have been made.

Living on Earth 

EPA charged with reverse discrimination 

The disproportionate use of criminal law is one of the main threats facing the right to protest peacefully in defense of land, territory and environment in Mexico, Amnesty International said today upon publishing a new report. Mexico: Land and Freedom? Criminalizing defenders of land, territory and environment documents the disproportionate use of the justice system to deter, punish and prevent defenders from protesting in demand of their rights.

Amnesty International

Mexico: Land, territory and environmental defenders are being criminalized for exercising their right to protest

 For the 10th consecutive year, the Philippines remains the deadliest country in Asia for individuals defending their land and the environment, according to new research, raising concerns among advocates who fear that the current administration’s promotion of mining and infrastructure projects will exacerbate the threats to their lives.

Philstar

For 10th straight year, Philippines remains Asia’s deadliest place to defend the environment

UN-developed Marine Sand Watch estimates 6bn tonnes dug up a day, well beyond rate at which it is replenished. One million lorries of sand per day are being extracted from the world’s oceans, posing a “significant” threat to marine life and coastal communities facing rising sea levels and storms, according to the first-ever global data platform to monitor the industry. 

‘Alarming’ scale of marine sand dredging laid bare by new data platform

London-based mining and oil giant Vedanta ran a “covert” lobbying campaign in India to weaken environmental regulations during the pandemic, according to a new report by the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).  

Mining Technology

Vedanta ran “covert” lobbying campaign in India to weaken environment regulations: report 

Mylene Vialard, 54, found guilty after Minnesota trial beset by legal irregularities after effort to block fossil fuel pumping station

US pipeline protester has ‘no regrets’ after conviction for felony obstruction

South Africa prioritises chemically intensive agriculture despite a huge impact on poor communities. This is one of the findings of the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and toxins.

UN official raps SA for continued use of banned toxic pesticides

In early August, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sent document requests and subpoenas to fund managers seeking information on their environmental, social, and governance marketing. While final intent of the investigations is unclear, it points to a potential crackdown on greenwashing.

Forbes

Greenwashing may be the next legal challenge for businesses

The United Nations has recently made a significant announcement that could have far-reaching implications in the fight against climate change. The UN’s Committee on the Rights of the Child, a body that interprets international human rights law, has issued a 20-page document recognizing the rights of children to take legal action against governments regarding climate change issues. While this announcement doesn’t carry the force of law, it holds notable significance due to its basis in one of the most widely accepted international treaties.

Impakter

UN’s Landmark Decision: Children’s Right to Sue Over Climate

Climate change is not just an environmental crisis, it’s a human rights crisis. And the humans to be most affected by climate catastrophe are the youngest ones: children.

The Conversation

Climate change threatens the rights of children. The UN just outlined the obligations states have to protect them

For the first time, the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child has explicitly affirmed the children’s right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment, issuing a comprehensive interpretation of Member States’ obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

unicef

UN Committee on the Rights of the Child calls on states to take action in first guidance on children's rights and the environment, with a focus on climate change

Legal action that could profoundly impact the future regulation of mining in South Africa, in particular environmental approvals and public participation, is scheduled to start in the Western Cape high court this week.

Daily Maverick

Environmental activists challenge 30-year extension of West Coast diamond mining rights in court

Once, long ago, I was street homeless. I did have a family home I could have probably gone back to, but at the time I didn’t feel able to. I’ve also stayed in short-term housing and a refuge. I’ve also, strangely enough, considered being a landlord. 


The Big Issue

Capitalism is the root of all our problems. We need to stop focusing on profit and listen to nature

The blistering heat threatening lives and fueling wildfires across Southern Europe and North America this July would have been “virtually impossible” without man-made global warming, scientists said on Tuesday. 

Politico

This summer is what climate change looks like, scientists say

Human Rights | Environmental Rights

Farmers battling drought in India's southern state of Karnataka state began a day-long strike on Friday to protest against the sharing of water from a river that also runs through the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu

Reuters

Drought-hit Indian farmers protest against sharing of river water

Towards the end of 1936, autoworkers in Flint, Michigan marched into the nerve centre of General Motors and sparked a match that lit a collective organising flame.

Al Jazeera

Can autoworkers fuel a labour renaissance?

Donald Trump wants to put climate change squarely at the center of the Republican primary—just not in the way those concerned about climate change might want. As his GOP primary opponents debated in California on Wednesday, Trump hosted counterprogramming by way of a rally for non-union auto parts workers in Michigan.


TIME

Why Trump is talking about electric vehicles

The green transition will be hard and involve trade-offs policymakers would rather not talk about

Financial Times

Net zero was never going to be an easy win for workers

I once heard an elderly Friedrich von Hayek begin a tirade against socialist planning with a charming personal tale. “The other day,” he said playfully, “I went into a shop. I left with an item that, previously, I had no idea I wanted!” Like all the smartest defenders of capitalism, he thought of the market as a benevolent creator whose job no human-made system could replicate. 



Unherd

Capitalism is dead: long live Technofeudalism

Workers at Apple stores across France went on strike Friday and Saturday, demanding more pay. The nationwide strike by some 200 workers was timed to coincide with the Friday release of Apple's latest phone, the iPhone 15, in France

CBS News

Apple workers launch nationwide strike in France — right as the iPhone 15 hits stores

An Australian union alliance on Friday called off strikes at Chevron's two major local liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects, agreeing to resolve disputes that had threatened to disrupt around 7% of global LNG supplies

Strikes end at Chevron's Australian LNG facilities

Workers at Apple stores in France began a nationwide strike over pay and working conditions on Friday in a protest designed to coincide with the launch of the iPhone 15

Apple workers in France stage strike on iPhone 15 launch day

the United Auto Workers (UAW) strike after he suggested that striking workers should be fired. UAW President Shawn Fain filed a complaint against the presidential candidate with the National Labor Relations Board on Thursday, alleging that Scott violated the rights of his campaign staff by threatening their federally-protected right to strike.

The Hill

UAW files complaint against Tim Scott over threats to fire workers if they strike

The United Nations Human Rights Regional Office for Europe and the International Labour Organization’s Office for the EU and the Benelux countries are pleased to invite you to the upcoming Human Rights Talk on “Ensuring adequate minimum income, a matter of human rights”.



United Nations

Ensuring adequate minimum income, a matter of human rights

resident Biden and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will launch the U.S.-Brazil Partnership for Workers’ Rights on Wednesday, with the goals of advancing workers’ rights and stopping worker exploitation.

Biden, Lula to launch partnership on workers’ rights amid labor strikes in U.S.

Tesla boasts that its electric vehicles are a marvel not just of innovation but also ethics, pledging in annual reports that it will “not knowingly accept products or services from suppliers that include forced labour or human trafficking in any form.”

The Washington Post

EV makers’ use of Chinese suppliers raises concerns about forced labor

The union representing Canadian autoworkers at Ford has reached a tentative deal with the US automaker, keeping more than 5,000 union members on the job and providing some good news for an industry dealing with unprecedented labor disruptions.

Canadian autoworkers union reaches tentative labor deal with Ford, averting strike

The past 40 years have seen massive expansion of the dominance of large corporations in the global economy. A wave of neoliberal reforms spread internationally from the 1980s with the promise that deregulated markets would unleash the animal spirits of private enterprise, bringing a new era of growth and prosperity.



Global corporate power is ‘out of control’, but reports of democracy’s death are greatly exaggerated

Over the last few years a “just transition” to electronic vehicles has become a buzzword among the corporate elite and UAW bureaucracy.



World Socialist Web Site

The lie of a “just transition” under capitalism: EVs, critical minerals and the exploitation of the working class

Australia's Offshore Alliance union said on Sunday that workers had begun a second 24-hour strike at Chevron's liquefied natural gas (LNG) plants in Western Australia

Union starts further 24-hour stoppage at Chevron's Australian LNG facilities

A section of a coal mine collapsed in northern Turkey on Wednesday, leaving one miner dead and injuring three others, officials said

Manufacturing Business Technology 

Multiple injuries in coal mine collapse

The United Auto Workers made history this week by going on strike at all three of Detroit’s big automakers simultaneously for the first time. But autoworkers have been striking for nearly a century at Ford, General Motors and Jeep parent company Stellantis

The autoworker strikes that changed America

Deaths of people harvesting grapes could be connected to unusually hot weather, growers say

France investigates deaths of four Champagne workers in heatwave

A UAW strike involving thousands of workers could send tremors through the president's hopes for reelection, and his efforts to cut U.S. carbon emissions.

Auto strike could threaten Biden’s blue wall

Human Rights | Labour Rights

The Swedish government is concerned about national security following several incidents involving the burning of the Quran that have provoked demonstrations and outrage from Muslim-majority countries.

Quran burning in Sweden prompts debate on the fine line between freedom of expression and incitement of hatred

The French government announced this week that a traditional clothing item, the abaya - a loose dress which some Muslim students wear on top of their clothes - will be banned in schools, in the name of secularism. 

Euronews

What are the rules around Europe for wearing religions clothing in classrooms?

An 18-year-old Nigerian Christian convert has been granted a court order protecting her from her father and brothers, who have been threatening to kill her for leaving the Islamic religion.

Catholic News Agency

Nigerian teen whose Christian conversion triggered death threats granted restraining order

Last year, 2022, was the deadliest year for Palestinian children in the West Bank in 15 years, and 2023 is on track to meet or exceed 2022 levels. Israeli forces had killed at least 34 Palestinian children in the West Bank as of August 22. Human Rights Watch investigated four fatal shootings of Palestinian children by Israeli forces between November 2022 and March 2023.

Human Rights Watch

West Bank: Spike in Israeli killings of Palestinian children

Hamtramck, Mich., a Detroit enclave with 28,000 people, has the first all-Muslim City Council in American history. When it was inaugurated in January 2022, no one expected it to get crosswise with local Democrats. Yet local liberals have erupted against the council in a clash that is a microcosm of the national battle over religious freedom, tolerance, and the future of the Democratic Party.

The Wall Street Journal

Muslims vs. Democrats: A story of betrayal

The European Parliament adopted an urgency resolution calling for the government of India to address the ongoing chaos and violence in Manipur.  

ADF International 

European Parliament calls for an end to violence in Manipur/India

Marriage equality and LGBTQ+ rights have become widely discussed in Japan following the G7 summit in Hiroshima and a recent decision in favour of same-sex marriage by the Nagoya District Court. The movement for marriage equality is experiencing popular support not seen before, with numbers in favour of reform in popular polls far surpassing those against, especially with younger generations.

East Asia Forum

Japan’s religious right resists marriage equality

In a rare moment of international accord, dozens of nations attending a debate at the U.N. Human Rights Council on the alarming rise of religious hatred condemned the lack of tolerance for the beliefs of others, which they said has led to the incitement of discrimination, hostility and violence.

UN Council condemns alarming rise in religious hatred 

If the majority of people come to care about peace, we may indeed see a more humane, more peaceful 21st century. But what is the reality of religious freedom in the 21st century?

The Washington Times

Religious freedom requires vigilance

The Supreme Court’s recent judgment in Groff v. DeJoy was another victory for religious freedom, reflective of a change in direction in a variety of its recent cases. In Groff, a postal worker who is a professed Evangelical Christian quit his job and sued the United States Postal Service, alleging its officials failed to accommodate his religious obligation not to work on Sundays.

Catholic World Report

Another victory for religious freedom

The United Nations Human Rights Council will hold an urgent meeting on the burning of a Quran outside a mosque in Sweden, following a request from Pakistan. The debate on the rise of religious hatred will likely take place later this week, a spokesperson for the Geneva-based UN council told a press briefing on Tuesday.

UN to meet on Sweden Quran-burning stunt decried by Muslim world

The Supreme Court on Thursday used the case of a Christian mail carrier who did not want to work Sundays to solidify protections for workers who ask for religious accommodations. In a unanimous decision the justices made clear that workers who ask for accommodations, such as taking the Sabbath off, should have their requests honored unless employers show that doing so would result in “substantial increased costs” to the business.

AP News

The Supreme Court bolsters protections for workers who ask for religious accommodations

In an unusual demonstration of unity, Muslims, Jews, and Christians gathered outside the Montgomery County Public Schools’ board meeting Tuesday afternoon in protest of parents’ inability to opt children out of the LGBTQ curriculum.

The Daily Signal

Interfaith coalition of parents protests Maryland school district’s LGBTQ curriculum opt-out policy

Most new and renewed Jewish communities are neither “illegal” nor “colonial,” considering the Jewish connection to the land.

The Jerusalem Post

There’s no such thing as ‘the’ settlements - opinion

Political experts and analysts in Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) have said that India, under fascist Modi, has become a hell for its religious minorities, especially Muslims. The political experts and analysts in their inter-views and statements in Srinagar said Modi’s government is trampling upon fundamental freedoms of religious minorities and the Biden admin’s rock-star reception to Modi, the butcher of Gujarat, is like rubbing salt in the wounds of Indian Muslims.

Pakistan Observer

India under fascist Modi has become hell for its religious minorities

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has denied that discrimination against minorities has existed under his government during a news conference with United States President Joe Biden.


No space for discrimination’ in India: Modi amid rights concerns

The ongoing war between Azerbaijan and Armenia threatens the existence of Christian communities in the near east, former ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom Sam Brownback and other Christian leaders warned in a Tuesday press briefing.

‘Religious cleansing’ threatens Armenian Christians’ existence, human rights leaders warn

Largely absent from Kirby’s comments were concerns about India’s human rights record and the Modi government’s embrace of a far-right Hindu nationalism known as Hindutva, which critics say has created a hostile environment for the country’s minorities, especially Muslims.

India’s Modi faces human rights criticism ahead of US visit

The Vatican on Tuesday released the results of a two-year canvassing of churches around the world that showed that rank-and-file Catholics want more rights for women in the clergy, justice for victims of widespread sexual abuse within the church and acceptance for previously shunned groups, including divorced and remarried and LGBTQ+ parishioners—but it’s unclear how the Vatican will act on the findings.

Catholics Want Justice For Abuse Victims And More LGBTQ Inclusion, Vatican Says

We are witnessing a unique and welcome phenomenon: Muslims in the West are at the forefront of a social movement that transcends any one faith or ethnicity. For those following the news, protests led by parents have erupted across the United States and Canada against school boards that wish to teach schoolchildren content about the acceptability of LGBTQ lifestyles.

Muslims opposed to LGBTQ curricula for their kids aren’t bigots

Human Rights | Religious Rights

The US is “deeply concerned” about the sentencing of former Obama Foundation Scholar Hoang Thi Minh Hong to three years in prison, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said in a statement

 US “deeply concerned” about jailing of Vietnam environmentalist

Akira Nishiyama shares why she fights for anti-discrimination laws to protect LGBTQ+ people

Global Citizen

I wasn’t always able to be myself growing up, so now i fight for LGBTQ+ protection in japan

The Human Rights Council this morning held an interactive dialogue with the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and started an interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples

UN OHCHR

Human Rights Council discusses issues concerning indigenous peoples

In a report issued on Wednesday by Defense for Children Palestine (DCIP), the Palestinian sector of Geneva-based Defense for Children International (DCI), Rafat Omar Ahmad Khamayseh left his grandfather’s house in the northern West Bank’s Jenin refugee camp on Tuesday, September 19, when he then “saw Israeli Special Forces exiting three Palestinian licensed cars and surround the home of the father of a Palestinian man wanted for arrest.”

MR Online

Defense for children: Israeli forces killed Palestinian child for discovering undercover operation

The situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian question

A large explosion has reportedly torn through a fuel store being used by ethnic Armenia refugees amidst their exodus from the disputed enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. Thousands of ethnic Armenians have started fleeing from Nagorno-Karabakh following Azerbaijan’s successful military offensive to retake control of the region last week.

ABC News

Large explosion rocks warehouse as thousands of ethnic Armenians start to flee disputed enclave

Hungry and exhausted ethnic Armenian families are fleeing their homes in Nagorno-Karabakh after Azerbaijan defeated separatist forces in the breakaway region last week.



Thousands of ethnic Armenians flee from Nagorno-Karabakh

Ending the AIDS pandemic – particularly in eastern and southern Africa – cannot be achieved unless more resources are channelled to meet the needs of key vulnerable populations

Young people with sexual or gender diversity are at higher risk of stopping their HIV treatment because of stigma and harsh laws

Human rights commission says atrocities in Ethiopia continue and urges Human Rights Council to renew its mandate.



Human Rights

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