Independent Catholic News

By: Ellen Teague

Religious activists have become increasingly important in challenging large-scale destructive mining practices around the world. Last week they were protesting prominently outside the annual general shareholder meetings of Rio Tinto and Anglo-American. They supported a representative of Mongolian herders who claimed that a $5bn (£3.3bn) expansion of Rio Tinto’s Oyu Tolgoi copper and gold mine in the Gobi desert threatens the fresh water supply of hundreds of nomadic people and the area’s unique ecology. They also supported Peter Bailey, representing the South African National Union of Mineworkers at Anglo-American’s AGM, who complained about the lack of company responsibility for the sickness and suffering of thousands of former mineworkers, dying a slow death from silicosis as a result of dust exposure in mines.
Continue reading Religious activists hold mining companies to account →

London Mining Network

Continue reading Launch of the Short Circuit Report →

AFJN

By Jacques Bahati

Advocates, mostly African diaspora, gathered on March 15 in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill to call attention to the tragic effects of  land grabbing in Africa by foreign investors. The discussion was moderated by Gregory Simpkins, senior advisor to Congressman Chris Smith, the Chairman of the U.S. House Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights and International Organizations.

The consequences of these massive land grabs are worse than those of colonization and slavery. A main motivator for colonizers, political interests aside,  was exporting resources from Africa to their homeland. Slavery consisted of taking people out of Africa to other parts of the world. To the contrary, land grabbers have a very local impact: they are displacing people from the land, taking away a steady livelihood for generations.
Continue reading The Epidemic of Land Grabbing is Worse than Colonization: US Companies are Part of the Rip off →

Think Progress

Tara Culp-Ressler

The total medical costs resulting from last week’s Boston Marathon attack are expected to top $9 million — and that could be a conservative estimate, since the bombings’ injury toll has just been revised up to nearly 300 people. Fortunately, however, the city’s largest health providers are stepping up to ensure that the victims won’t suffer under the full weight of those mounting costs. Continue reading Boston Hospitals And Insurers Will Help Ease The Bombing Victims’ Medical Costs →

Network

By Rachael Travis

This has been an unbelievably difficult week, feeling a bit like a nightmare that concluded with a cold bucket of water being thrown on me. That cold bucket of water was the reality that money really can speak louder than the voices of constituents. When it became apparent on Wednesday evening that the Manchin-Toomey amendment was going to fail my heart sank.

My heart didn’t sink because I necessarily thought the amendment would pass; instead it sank because I realized that those 45 Senators who voted against it weren’t representing their constituents in voting against the amendment, they were representing the NRA.

Attached is a list of the 45[1] Senators who voted against the Manchin-Toomey amendment on Wednesday April 17. Along with their picture is included the number of people from their states who have been killed due to gun violence as well as the amount of money they accepted from the National Rifle Association in their most recent election. We have also provided their office phone number and their Twitter handles, we encourage our members who are represented by these Senators to contact them and tell them that their vote was unacceptable.
Continue reading The Guys With The Guns, and The Money, Won This Round →