politics

L: Threatened: The red squirrel will be lost within the next 20-30 years unless effective action is taken. This poor fella's just heard the news. R: Threatened: The pine marten. One of England’s rarest, and cutest, mammals.

A pair of giraffes nuzzle as they stand in the bush near Koure, Niger. The IUCN lists west African giraffes as an endangered species. Conservationists say the rate of new species is slower than diversity loss.

A giraffe from Africa's most endangered giraffe subspecies. By all accounts, they should be extinct. Instead, their numbers have quadrupled to 200 since 1996, an unlikely boon experts credit to the concurrence of an impoverished government keen for revenue that has enacted laws to protect them, a conservation program that encourages people to support them, and a rare harmony with humans who have accepted their presence.

Scientific consensus says that climate change is robbing polar bears of their habitats, and is the greatest threat to their survival.

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Former “comfort woman” Lee Yong-Soo (L) stands beside her supporters holding portraits of Philippine, South Korean and Chinese comfort women who were sex slaves for Japanese soldiers during World War II, at a protest held in front of the Japanese parliament in Tokyo. Japan on 27 June 2007 brushed aside calls from US lawmakers for a fresh apology to wartime sex slaves, even as the former “comfort women” renewed their demands for Tokyo to acknowledge their plight. Japan said the US move to pass a resolution calling for an “unambiguous” apology from Japan for the coercion of women into army brothels during World War II would not damage relations between the two allies. Inset: Recruitment advertisements for comfort women in the Japanese Imperial Army.

Top: Former comfort women want Japan to do more to apologize. Bottom right: Rangoon, Burma. August 8, 1945. A woman who was in one of the Imperial Japanese Army’s “comfort battalions” is interviewed by an Allied officer.

Former Filipino “comfort woman” Piedad Nobleza, 86, at a demonstration outside the Japanese Embassy in suburban Manila. Elderly Filipino women and their supporters demanded Tokyo’s clear-cut apology and compensation for wartime sexual slavery by Japanese troops.  read more »

"Every action, it is above all essential to protect and value the human person in their integrity". "For you this reality represents an ever more task of complex organization and it is a labour that if often discreet and barely known, not always noted but which does not escape the eyes of God, who sees all of Man's works even those that are hidden."

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Pope Benedict XVI criticises airport body scanners. Pope Benedict XVI has spoken out against the use of body scanners at airports insisting that "human dignity must be preserved".

The Pope made his comments during an audience with airport workers held at the Vatican. Although the Pontiff did not mention the words body scanner it was clear what he meant as he told the 1,200 strong crowd: "Every action, it is above all essential to protect and value the human person in their integrity.

"Respecting these principles can seem particularly complex and difficult in the present context.

"The economic crisis has had problematic effects on the civil aviation sector, the international terrorist threat which, precisely, has in its line of fire airports and aircraft to realise its destructive schemes.  read more »

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Responses to 'Is the Anti-Whaling Activist Who Boarded a Japanese Whaling Ship a Pirate?' Jim Says: The Japanese are trespassing and poaching within a known whale sanctuary. What type of research results in the SALE of WHALEMEAT to consumers - this is profiteering by the Japanese and they are the actual pirates? AnimuX Says: If Japan prosecutes Pete Bethune, he will become the political prisoner of a tyrannical government that has even violated the basic human rights of its own citizens (remember the Tokyo Two?) in order to support the whaling industry. Not to mention the fact that the captain of the ship that Pete boarded, Shonan Maru 2, is the same man who rammed and destroyed his vessel, Ady Gil, nearly killing Bethune and 5 members of his crew. If anything, the captain and crew of the Shonan Maru 2 should be apprehended and charged by New Zealand authorities for attempted murder.

As for the flawed concept that Japan is doing “legal” research in the Southern Ocean:  read more »

Craziness is not rare, neither is Crime. Else, there would be no need for law, law enforcement, etc. etc.. Does Fear lead to solutions, or to panic, shutting out common sense and wisdom? EU Justice Chief has the answer: "We have to have a very clear line on this. We must never be driven by fear but by our values."
MEPs not yet convinced about body scanners, await impact analysis: "legitimate questions"... "Technology has become the new religion in counter-terrorism"... "Violation of dignity"... "no matter how much technology you have, terrorists will manage to circumvent it"... "great cost implications" of using body scanners, and advised against "putting burdens on airport companies" (also tax payers?) without the certainty that such scanners would be useful.

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Arizona decides to close most state parks
Facing a multibillion-dollar shortfall, the state will shut 13 parks by June. Several had already been closed. Wrestling with a multibillion-dollar budget deficit, Arizona decided Friday to close nearly all of its state parks, including the famed Tombstone Courthouse and Yuma Territorial Prison. The State Parks Board unanimously voted to close 13 parks by June 3. Eight others had already been closed, and the decision would leave nine open -- but only if the board can raise $3 million this year. The action represents the largest closure of state parks in the nation, although several other states are considering similar moves.

21 of 30 state parks will be closed: The Arizona State Parks Board voted unanimously Friday to begin shuttering state parks, a move that will leave the parks system with fewer than one third of its properties open by June 3  read more »

Shall we protect Nature as it is,
reserve some land, ocean, resources
for coming generations, for our children’s children?
Shall we, or shall we not? In words, or in action?

(quote) Approval of oil drilling in Chukchi Sea fails to include recent science and violates laws that protect clean air, water, and ocean resources. Oceana, together with Arctic communities and other conservation groups filed a legal challenge in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to the Minerals Management Service’s (MMS) approval of Shell Offshore Inc.’s proposed exploration drilling in the Chukchi Sea. The groups argue that MMS and Shell have not complied with federal laws that require thorough analysis of potential impacts and protections for clean air, water, and marine life.  read more »