Global News and Analysis

Source: Climate Connections

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, June 19, 2012 – Over five hundred Indigenous Peoples from Brazil and throughout the world gathered at Kari-Oca II, an encampment seated at the foot of a mountain near Rio Centro, to sign a declaration demanding respect for Indigenous Peoples’ role in maintaining a stable world environment, and condemning the dominant economic approach toward ecology, development, human rights and the rights of Mother Earth.

“We see the goals of UNCSD Rio+20, the “Green Economy”, and its premise that the world can only ‘save’ nature by commodifying its life-giving and life-sustaining capacities as a continuation of the colonialism that Indigenous Peoples and our Mother Earth have faced and resisted for 520 years”, the declaration states. read more

Source: The Guardian

Julian Assange has dramatically sought political asylum at the Ecuadorean embassy in London, days after the supreme court rejected the last of his appeals against extradition to Sweden to face sex crime accusations and after what he called a “declaration of abandonment” by his own government in Australia.

In a move that appears to have surprised even some of his closest supporters, the WikiLeaks founder walked into the country’s embassy in Knightsbridge and asked for asylum, citing the UN declaration of human rights. read more

Source: Al Jazeera

Scientists and experts are alarmed at amount of plastic debris and growing ‘dead zones’ in the world’s oceans.

A drumbeat of recent scientific studies emphasises an increasingly alarming convergence of crises for Earth’s oceans.

The amount of plastic floating in the Pacific Gyre – a massive swirling vortex of rubbish – has increased 100-fold in the past four decades, phytoplankton counts are dropping, over-fishing is causing dramatic decreases in fish populations, decreasing ocean salinity is intensifying weather extremes, and warming oceans are speeding up Antarctic melting.  read more

Source: Truthout

In the realm of prevarication, there are deceivers, fibbers, liars, politicians … and Bank of America.

For weeks, this financial behemoth has been running a nationwide PR blitz, portraying itself as a loveable bunch of public-spirited bankers — hoping that you and I have no memory of its two taxpayer bailouts, constant fee-gouging, illegal foreclosures on homeowners, firing of 36,000 employees, etc. Before you believe a word that these “truth adjusters” say, note that they’ve even been caught lying outright to BOA’s shareholders, the owners of their very own bank! read more

Source: TruthDig.com

The Rev. Daniel Berrigan, undaunted at 92 and full of the fire that makes him one of this nation’s most courageous voices for justice, stands in New York City’s Zuccotti Park. He is there, along with other clergy, to ask Trinity Church, which is the third-largest landowner in Manhattan, to drop charges against Occupy activists, including retired Episcopal Bishop George Packard, for occupying its empty lot on 6th Avenue and Canal Street on Dec. 17. The protesters, slated to go to court Monday, June 11, hoped to establish a new Liberty Squareon the lot after being evicted by New York City police from Zuccotti in November. But Trinity had the demonstrators arrested. It chose to act like a real estate company, or the corporation it has become, rather than a church. And its steadfast refusal to drop the charges means that many of those arrested, including Packard, could spend as long as three months in jail. read more

Source: Mother Jones

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) wants to expand access to abortion for servicewomen who are raped. Only a few Republicans are willing to help.

Republican Senators John McCain, Scott Brown, and Susan Collins all support an effort by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat from New Hampshire, to expand abortion access for military women who are raped. But despite bipartisan support in the Senate, Shaheen’s proposal may not make it into the final version of the 2013 defense authorization bill—because House Republicans oppose it. read more