A major Canadian oil company was sued for one billion dollars in a New York federal court Thursday for its part in serious human rights abuses committed against the southern population of Sudan where it has been exploring and drilling for oil.

ENO-Environment Online is a global virtual school for environmental awareness. 73 schools in 43 different countries are studying four different environmental themes within a schoolyear, on weekly basis. Every second week we have organised and
moderated chat learning sessions. Students share information on their local environment. Material is summarized and available for everybody as pdf files. Our ongoing theme is Forests. We have organised special sessions and possibilities for everybody.

World population and consumption is rising at a rate that is threatening the wellbeing of people and the planet, a report published last week by the United Nations Population Fund said.

As the pace of decentralisation in Africa quickens, how can external agencies help communities fulfill new management responsibilities? A study from Niger has implications for other parts of Africa where commitment to decentralised natural resource management is offering scope for radical new approaches to transferring power to local people.

More than 1000 community members from Valhalla Park, Cape Town, will protest
outside the High Court in Keerom Street, Cape Town, on Thursday. The protest takes place in support of 700 community members who have been charged with illegally occupying a piece of land in the centre of Valhalla
Park that the Unicity had already set aside for housing.

I would like to subscribe to your newsletter. I am interested in perspectives on socio-economic development in Africa today. I am an international graduate student at Oregon State University. I am working on a PhD thesis entitled "Integrating indigenous knowledge into the community development process: The Zimbabwean experience".

The odds of a new round of world trade negotiations including substantive talks on environmental issues have lengthened following the emergence of a new draft text for ministerial agreement at the Doha summit, due to start on November 9. Despite strong pressure from the European Union, the draft proposes no new environmental negotiations.

A battle has erupted in Kenya over a government decision to cut 10 percent of its forest cover despite vehement protests from the public and cases pending before the courts.

Landmines are a dangerous legacy of war that continue to claim victims - often children - long after the conflict is over. The United Nations Development Programme, in partnership with Cranfield University in the UK, has developed training materials on ways to deal with landmine threats.

The ruthlessness of the September attacks against the United States has alerted the world to the potential of nuclear terrorism, making it "far more likely" that terrorists could target nuclear facilities, nuclear material and radioactive sources worldwide, the chief of the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency said Thursday.

Consider one particularly vulnerable link in our food chain: the modern meat processing plant. In comparison to a bioterrorism target like a water treatment plant, meat processing plants have virtually no security, and their workforces are wide open to infiltration.

Sierra Leone's transport and communications minister was arrested with his wife Thursday on accusations of diamond smuggling in the war-ruined West African nation, officials said.

The NBI is the hope for real development in Nile Basin countries (NBCs). The 10 countries of the Nile Basin include 6 of the 10 poorest nations of the world. But, is the NBI taking the right way to development? Most probably it is, in view of the sensitive political issues it has to address.

Closing date: 28 November 2001

Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network has collected millions of dollars in the past three years from the illicit sale of diamonds mined by rebels in Sierra Leone, The Washington Post reported on Friday.

Climate talks have resumed to finalize the procedures and institutions that will make the Kyoto Protocol fully operational. The world’s governments are meeting here from today through November 9 to work out exactly how to reduce the emissions of six greenhouse gases that are linked to global warming.

The Kenyan government has announced that it will go ahead and collect more than 170,000 acres of public forest for private use. Among the targeted forests is the one inhabited by the Ogiek indigenous community who may finally lose their cultural land.

The Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) said on Tuesday that it aimed to shut down all the oilfields run with government backing in southern Sudan.

Reducing emissions of manmade greenhouse gases, using "sinks" to soak up excess carbon in the atmosphere, and transferring energy efficient technologies to developing nations have all had to take a back seat to what is widely seen as more pressing concerns. One of the biggest tasks facing the delegates in Marrakesh at the upcoming UN Conference on Global Warming is convincing the rest of the world that what they are doing is relevant. Indeed, just getting the international media's attention for anything longer than a sound bite would be a small triumph.

An international team of psychologists has demonstrated that baboons are capable of abstract thought - making them the first non-human, non-ape animal shown to share a central aspect of human intelligence. The findings have profound implications for the evolution of human intelligence and the stuff that separates homo sapiens from other animals.