One of Amazon Watch’s oldest allies and one of Ecuador’s longest-standing environmental NGOs, Acción Ecológica, is under attack today for speaking out against repression of indigenous activists, and those activists themselves are at risk. We need your immediate action to demand that the government of Ecuador respect the rights of its citizens and the environment.

Yesterday afternoon, the Ecuador Environment Ministry notified the pioneering environmental group Acción Ecológica of its intention to shut it down for publicly raising environmental and indigenous rights concerns over a planned copper mega mine on the lands of the Shuar indigenous people. Acción believes that pressure for the closure came from Chinese mining consortium EXSA, which is advancing the project in the southern Ecuadorian Amazon without consultation or consent of the communities.

Shuar territory and surrounding towns are currently under a state of emergency and heavily militarized after a recent clash with police at the mine site. The same night as the Acción Ecológica closure notice, the national police raided the offices of the Shuar federation and detained its president, Agustín Wachapa. And Ecuador’s president has publicly defamed indigenous Shuar and Sarayaku leaders.

This calculated reprisal from the company and government to shut down the country’s leading grassroots environmental group and repress indigenous activists is a blatant attack on their rights and is a threat to all of us around the world who stands up for the earth and its people.

Please send your message to Ecuador’s President and Ministers today.

Demand that they immediately cancel efforts to revoke Acción Ecológica’s license to operate as a non-governmental organization in Ecuador, halt the repression of indigenous leaders, and end the state of emergency. Any government with a constitutional protection for the rights of nature must protect the rights of its citizens who work to defend the environment.

Thank you for taking action today!

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Donald Trump could kill the Middle East peace process.

12/29/2016 Nativegrl77

In weeks, Donald Trump will kill the Middle East Peace process…unless Obama steps in and recognizes Palestine as a country, giving unprecedented momentum to the two-state solution.

Join the call on him to act:

He’s been clear about it. He doesn’t think Palestinians have the right to a country, he supports illegal settlement building and wants to move the US embassy from the capital in Tel Aviv to disputed land.

It’s a diplomatic bomb that will destroy any hope of a negotiated solution. We have one chance to stop him.

President Obama is laying out a plan for a two-state solution, Israel and Palestine living side-by-side in peace. It’s what most Israelis and Palestinians want. But a key way for him to protect the path to peace is by recognizing a Palestinian state before Trump takes office. The plan is already on his desk — but he needs to have the political support of the world to act. Let’s give it to him. When we reach 1 million, Israeli and Palestinian youth will deliver it to the White House.

Click here to save the peace process

In many ways this is too easy not to do. The United Nations has already recognized Palestine, it makes no difference to foreign policy nor does it affect the US’s consistent support of Israel in practically every way. It’s a gesture, one of fairness and progress and a nod to the future everyone agrees must come to pass: a free Israel next to a free and independent Palestine.

And there’s never been more momentum or more at stake.

The US just refused to veto a UN resolution condemning Israel’s settlements and Secretary of State Kerry just went on television to give a long argument for a two-state solution. Netanyahu is weakening, under investigation for fraud, and members of Israel’s government are making statements that seem to break from the radically right-wing official position.

All this, weeks before the diplomatic bomb of a Trump Presidency sets in. Let’s act before it’s too late:

Click here to save the peace process

When Palestine went to the UN to win statehood, we were there, driving the movement and at the center of the historic result. But it’s only a step towards independence, and the dream of a free and independent Palestine can’t soar without the recognition of Israel’s staunchest ally. We can be at the center of the movement again, in these last crucial weeks.

With hope,

Dalia, Emma, Fatima, Diego, Aloys and the Avaaz team

More information:

Secretary of State John Kerry: Two-state solution in ‘serious jeopardy’ (CNN)
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/12/26/politics/john-kerry-middle-east-peace-plan/index.html

US abstention allows UN to demand end to Israeli settlements (Guardian)
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/23/us-abstention-allows-un-to-demand-end-to-israeli-settlements

Will Obama Recognize A Palestinian State Before January 20? (Huffington Post)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/high-anxiety-continues-over-obama-in-the-un-until-january_us_5848327ce4b099808c198eae

Former president Jimmy Carter calls on Barack Obama to recognise Palestinian statehood before leaving office (Independent)
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/jimmy-carter-barack-obama-israel-palestine-statehood-donald-trump-a7454936.html#gallery

~ my 2cents ..., ~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

What’s going on in the water ways of Washington …sigh

12/28/2016 Nativegrl77

So, I am checking out the local news on 8/15 when a picture of the Pilchuck River with pink or rust coloured goo is on the screen. The reporter tells us that they are now attempting to “SaveTheSalmon” which might be dying along with other “aquatic life” after coming into contact with it. netfishing Apparently, this river is heating up because of a lack of oxygen that trees, scrubs and bushes create but they have been cut back far too much creating an environment to grow this harmful goo. We also learn that this river,maybe others do not meet clean-water standards at this time and flows from the Cascade Mountains east of Granite Falls to Snohomish before joining the Snohomish River.

Last week reports were that a Gray found in Ballard Locks and a young Hump Back Whale found beached in West Seattle in bad condition … very thin, had lice, netting and while scientists were there no results as to why these Whales were so thin had lice though the weaker Whales may suffer from a lack of food…. let me say that again, whales are suffering from not finding enough food which invokes all kinds of connotations attached

I am no expert, have a lot of opinions thoughts and feelings about Whales in general living here and having spent a great deal of my youth around water. I feel that our Navy should get a cease and desist letter ordering all the sonar tests stop until they find out if this is indeed affecting our Whales or at least tell the public what the sonars are being used for or against. I also want to know what part do humans play in the deaths of Whales when they are unable to find enough food, why there are less Orca’s, why has the state sided with whale watchers when it’s obvious our water ways are not garbage or fuel free and could possibly be why some grey whales continue to be found washed up on our beaches. There should not be whales in captivity … unless it could no longer survive in its natural habitat

Sources: Q13, King5 … my2cents

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Stop Spraying Pesticides in State Marine Waters

12/28/2016 Nativegrl77

CHP Washington State Banner

Don’t let large corporate shellfish growers poison our marine waters with the pesticides Imazamox and Imidicloprid!

As Washingtonians, we all enjoy having salmon, waterfowl, diverse marine life and bees as part of our world.

Large corporate shellfish growers’ efforts to spray pesticides in our marine waters to increase unsustainable shellfish production threatens a myriad of aquatic life.

Both, protected native and non-native eelgrass will be eradicated, migratory waterfowl food sources will be eliminated, salmon smolts will lose important cover and bees will be exposed to a destructive neurotoxin that has been blamed for colony collapse disorder all over the world.

Send a message to the Washington Department of Ecology today: “Do not approve the spraying of Imazamox, Imidicloprid or any toxic chemicals in Washington marine waters.” We need to protect our marine life and human health. The proposed spraying will add to the chemical burden of years of spraying the pesticides Glyphosate, Imazapyr and Carbaryl on Willapa Bay shellfish areas. The WA State Attorney General already referred to Willapa Bay as “chemical soup” in a 2012 motion for summary judgment.

Your comments will lend a voice to prevent destruction of wildlife that cannot speak for itself. The Dept. of Ecology will take note if thousands of citizens tell them we noticed and care about their actions.

Thank you for all that you do for Washington’s environment and human health.

Dorothy Walker, Sierra Club
Washington State Marine Ecosystem Campaign

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The pallid sturgeon has plied Earth’s waterways for 78 mil years …they need our help!

12/28/2016 Nativegrl77

Your voice can make a difference for one of the planet’s last living dinosaurs.

It survived the asteroid that killed all the dinosaurs, but if we don’t act quickly, it won’t survive us.

The pallid sturgeon has plied Earth’s waterways for 78 million years. But a century of dam building has led to habitat changes that may mean the end for this amazing fish. Biologists estimate that only 125 wild-born pallid sturgeon remain in the Upper Missouri and Yellowstone rivers. What’s worse, none have successfully reproduced in decades because too many dams now block their path and destroy their habitat.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation have the chance to change that, but they have recently released a plan that, far from helping these fish, will likely doom them.

The clear way to save the pallid sturgeon and spend taxpayer dollars wisely is to restore the Yellowstone River by removing the irrigation dam that blocks the path of these fish and to deliver water to irrigators via pumps or other means.

But current government agency plans promote a different solution that Montana fish biologists – and even the government’s own scientists – say won’t work: an even larger concrete dam and two-mile long artificial fish bypass channel. This flawed alternative may have profound effects on the entire fishery of the lower Yellowstone River, not just the pallid sturgeon.

Your voice can make a difference. Tell the agencies involved that you oppose the construction of a new, more permanent dam and that you believe that federal funding for the project should be spent on restoring the Yellowstone River, not on building a bigger dam.

These fish cannot wait. They need our help now.

Thank you for all you do.

Sincerely,