Ecuador: Napo goldrush begins with big mining
Chinese owned TerraEarth started mining for gold in Ecuador's Napo province. After numerous instances of pollution of water sources, encroachments and other violations, court and regulatory action eventually forced the company to withdraw -- for now.
Honduras: defending a mountain for 30 years
Pedro Pinto, 67, has spent over half his life defending the environment in the western region of Ocotepeque, Honduras. In November 2022, two of his vehicles were burned by an unknown party, he suspects that they were enemies of his work as an environmental defender.
‘Fake environmentalist’ campaign against Guapinol defenders
A Twitter campaign smearing the reputation of environmental activists in Honduras is a coordinated effort to protect mining interests.
Honduras: Deaths of environmental activists reopen wounds in Aguán Valley
In January, four social activists were murdered in Honduras within a period of 11 days. The deaths of two environmental defenders from Guapinol were followed by the murder of a peasant leader and his father-in-law.
The Assassination of Eduardo Mendua
The killing of Ecuadorean indigenous leader Eduardo Mendua provides a text-book example of how extractive projects such as oil drilling divide communities, with often fatal results. The first of a series of articles in which Linda Etchart will 'follow the money' flowing from big oil and mining.
Indigenous Comcaac serve up an oceanic grain to preserve seagrass meadows
The Indigenous Comcaac community of northwestern Mexico is working to preserve eelgrass and promote the renaissance of the grain they obtain from it.
Chico Mendes an inspiration in India
LAB's 1990 book Fight for the Forest - Chico Mendes in His Own Words is being translated into Bengali by a group in Kolkata, India, campaigning to save a historic avenue of trees. The translator outlines their experience and describes some of the historic envirionmental campaigns in India.
Crimes against Guapinol defenders reflect neglect from Honduran government
'The Government is responsible for these two murders, and Xiomara Castro must provide an explanation,’ declared ERIC-SJ researcher Joaquín Mejía Rivera, in the wake of the killing of two environmental defenders in Guapinol.
El Salvador: water defenders arrested
Five water defenders from Santa Marta, Cabañas, El Salvador have been arrested in connection with the 1989 murder of a woman in their community. However, their active membership of an organisation opposed to mining and strong signs that the government wants to subvert the country's mining ban suggest another motive for their persecution
The plunder of Bolivian gold
Chinese companies are behind rapid expansion of gold mining in the Mayaya region of Bolivia, and are invading the Madidi National Park. Bolivian journalist and LAB correspondent Sergio Mendoza travelled by canoe down the Beni and Quendeque rivers, witnessing how the illegal mining activity is hidden by Bolivian mining cooperatives and supported or permitted by the government.
