Newswire

On the eve of the PR Week Awards, human rights organization Survival International has presented its 'PR Disaster of the Year’ Award to Finsbury PR and its founder Roland Rudd for their work with FTSE-100 mining company Vedanta Resources.

Finsbury is the retained PR agency for Vedanta Resources, which has been the target of a worldwide campaign to stop it building a bauxite mine in the hills of Niyamgiri, Orissa, India. The mine would have had a devastating effect on the Dongria Kondh tribal people who live there.

On Wednesday 20th October Gurindji workers and residents from the remote Aboriginal communities of Kalkaringi and Dagaragu will stop work and stage a protest against the NT Intervention.

By ray jackson, president, indigenous social justice association

(My response to an article in The Australian by Gary Johns http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/left-and-right-converging-o... in which he suggests “INCOME control deserves a broader trial, despite risks”.)

One of the world’s clean energy heroes, the German Herrmann Scheer, has died of a torn aorta in Berlin, aged 66.

The Social Democrat member of parliament played a large part in writing Germany’s green energy promotion legislation, which has made the country a world leader in the field and has been copied by dozens of countries.

Once called by Time magazine a ‘Hero for the Green Century,’ Scheer wrote several books on renewable energy, including A Solar Manifesto and The Solar Economy. He made a film, The Fourth Revolution – Energy Autonomy.

9/11 was a day which shook our country (America) to its core. People who would use religion as an excuse for war attacked our great nation on the grounds of its greatest city and two other locations. In doing so we lost roughly 2988 American citizens, but their memory and the spirit of what that memory means will live with us forever. Years have passed but it is still something all Americans carry in their hearts as a tragedy and there will never be a shortage of tears for the victims of that day.

Survival International is warning the United Nations of massive oil operations in the northern Peruvian Amazon that could decimate uncontacted tribal people.

Media statement by the Pro-Choice Action Collective

Abortion rights campaigners vow to intensify campaign

Pro-Choice Action Collective activist, Kathy Newnam said:
“Today’s acquittal of a young Cairns couple in the abortion case in Cairns is a victory for abortion rights. The fact is that the couple never had a case to answer – a woman has the right to control her own body.

"The verdict was met with prolonged applause and cheering from abortion rights supporters in the public gallery.

Hundreds of activists travelled to the Hazelwood brown coal fired power station, 180 km east of Melbourne, for the 101010 global work party on Sunday.

Environmental groups in Victoria are behind a campaign to replace the aging Hazelwood power station with renewable energy. Premier John Brumby wants to close the power station down in stages and wants Federal Government financial assistance in doing so. But the new Federal climate change minister Greg Combet is decidedly cool on the idea.

The Switch Off Hazelwood organisers are calling for: