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Photo: Alejandro Balaguer / Fundación Albatros MediaVictory: Panama Bay is Legally Protected
Panama Bay, one of the world’s most important nesting and roosting sites for migratory birds, is now permanently protected, thanks in part to AIDA’s expertise in international law.
The bay supports endangered species, including jaguars and loggerhead turtles, as well as the vast majority of the country’s fishing industry. Its coastal mangroves capture 50 times more carbon pollution than a tropical forest of similar size. Mangroves also protect coastal communities from storm surges that grow in severity as the climate warms. Panama has already lost 75 percent of its mangroves.
In 2012 tourism developers had secured a Supreme Court decision overturning the National Environmental Authority’s decision to protect the bay as a wildlife refuge.
AIDA worked with the Environmental Advocacy Center (CIAM), a Panamanian environmental law organization, to defend Panama Bay’s protected status. We submitted a brief containing arguments based on international law. We made analogies between Panama Bay and Las Baulas National Marine Park in Costa Rica. In a legal case about Las Baulas, a balancing test found that the public right to a healthy environment outweighed the interests of tourism developers.
Then, on February 2, 2015—World Wetlands Day—Panama passed a law creating Panama Bay Wetland Wildlife Refuge. The law emphasizes the importance of an ecosystem approach to management and the rational use of wetlands, as described in the Ramsar Convention.
AIDA and CIAM will continue working to see that the law is implemented properly and to ensure the protection of Panama Bay wetlands.
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Organizations denounce the incident to the Ramsar Convention, an international treaty for the protection of wetlands. By modifying the boundaries of the coral reef national park, the federal government is seeking to expand the Port of Veracruz. Mexico City, Mexico. Civil society organizations have denounced to international bodies that Mexico’s government intends to modify the boundaries of the Veracruz Coral Reef System National Park, known as PNSAV in its Spanish acronym, in order to expand the Port of Veracruz. This violates the government’s commitment to preserve and protect a wetland of global importance. Mexico’s Secretariat of Environment and Natural Resources (Semarnat) authorized the port expansion project on December 19, 2013. In response, the Interamerican Association for Environmental Defense (AIDA) and the Mexican Center for Environmental Law (CEMDA) – with support from the Veracruz Assembly of Environmental Initiatives and Defense (LAVIDA), Pobladores A.C., Paths and Meetings for Sustainable Development (SENDAS), Litiga OLE, Pronatura Veracruz and the doctor and researcher Leonardo Ortíz Lozano – filed with the Ramsar Secretariat a report on the federal government’s failure to comply with that international treaty. The Veracruz Reef System was declared a Protected Natural Area (PNA) in 1992 with the aim of protecting the human right to a healthy environment. In 2004, it was registered as a wetland of international importance on the Ramsar List. While Mexico can modify the boundaries of sites on the Ramsar List, this must be done in accordance with the grounds and procedures identified in the Ramsar Convention. However, the federal government intends to modify the area of the PNSAV, contradicting to its own actions and acting in breach of the principle of law. [1] According to public information secured from the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas (Conanp) [2], the Mexican government based its decision to amend the boundaries of the PNSAV on a so-called error clause contained in Resolution VIII.22. This clause can only be invoked when there are changes in the ecological characteristics stemming from the degradation of part of a wetland. The federal government has yet to scientifically prove that there have been any ecological changes to the detriment of the wetland. Of note, it is questionable that the Conanp decided to notify the Ramsar Convention Secretariat of the alleged error on the eve of the Semarnat’s authorization of the Port of Veracruz expansion. Another legal way to change the boundaries of Ramsar sites is if there is "urgent national interest," as contained in Resolution VIII.20. This requires a prior environmental assessment and a consultation with all stakeholders, something that has not yet happened. "The federal government is determined to illegally change the polygonal of the PNSAV every time that it is not legally possible to proceed according to the procedures established by the Ramsar Convention," said Sandra Moguel, an AIDA legal adviser. "The polygonal change and the environmental impact authorization of the proposed expansion of the Port of Veracruz are unilateral decisions by the federal government in which the arguments of the affected peoples were not taken into account," she added. The Mexican government is violating the Ramsar Convention, and hence its international obligations on the conservation of a wetland of international importance. If the amendment to the PNSAV goes through, the government will hurt the right of Mexicans – and the people of Veracruz, in particular – to a healthy environment. Because of this, AIDA and the other civil society organizations requested the Ramsar Convention Secretariat to consider as unacceptable the proposed reduction of the PNSAV’s boundaries. We also requested that these proposed changes be discussed at Ramsar’s next Conference of the Contracting Parties to be held in Uruguay in 2015. Editor's notes: 1. According to this general principle of law, the authority can only do what is expressly mandated by law. 2. Information request 1615100033713.
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In January 2009, Muriel Mining Corporation moved into the department of Chocó, Colombia to launch Mandé Norte, a project for the exploration and development of copper, gold, molybdenum and other minerals. The US-based company began the project without proper consultation, and without the free, prior and informed consent of the local ethnic groups that would be directly affected by the mines. Consultation with the affected communities did not begin until 2006, a year after the company was awarded the mining contract. What's more, several of the affected communities were not invited to participate in the consultation process, and those that participated were not represented by traditional authorities. Then, despite serious objections raised by Afro-Colombian and indigenous communities, the consultation process was concluded in August 2008. This project took place during a difficult period of Colombia’s armed conflict.The Inter-Church Commission for Justice and Peace, a Colombian human rights group, filed a legal action for protection against the mining project. AIDA contributed to the action by submitting an argument (in Spanish) demonstrating that without an adequate environmental impact assessment to analyze the project's social and environmental impacts, the affected communities would have no basis to give or deny consent, as required by international law. The Colombian Constitutional Court ruled on the case in the T-769 Sentence of 2009 (in Spanish), ordering the suspension of exploration and production activities and the awarding of licenses for the project. It also ordered a new consultation to meet both national and international standards, and required the completion of accurate environmental impact studies. AIDA has prepared a summary sheet (in Spanish) to make it easier to understand the sentence. The ruling in this case set a key precedent by incorporating and recognizing, for the first time, the right of ethnic groups to free, prior and informed consent. It was a breakthrough in the recognition of the rights of ethnic groups in Colombia. Both the Ministry of the Interior and the mining company sought an annulment of the constitutional sentence. But AIDA intervened (in Spanish) to defend the sentence against the annulment requests, as did the Colombian Commission of Jurists (in Spanish), Dejusticia (in Spanish), Harvard and Diego Portales (in Spanish). These efforts paid off. On March 12, 2012, the Constitutional Court upheld its decision (in Spanish) on Mandé Norte. Without this ruling, the mining project would have had serious social and environmental impacts on the biodiverse region of Chocó, damaging crop animals, rivers and the mountain of Caraperro, long considered by indigenous peoples to be a sacred site. The project would have both physically and culturally harmed the local indigenous peoples, and would have caused the deterioration of traditional economies. At AIDA, we work to defend the right to a healthy environment and the protect human rights of communities and ethnic groups against powerful interests. Follow us on Twitter: @AIDAorg "Like" our page on Facebook: www.facebook.com/AIDAorg
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By María José Veramendi Villa, senior attorney, AIDA, @MaJoVeramendi When you start the descent by plane to the city of Altamira in Pará, Brazil, the darkness of the night is interrupted by the bright lights of worksites a few kilometers outside the city where construction of the Belo Monte dam is underway. That’s when things turn bleak. On a recent trip to the area I was able to see how the situation of thousands of residents – the indigenous, riverine and city dwellers of Altamira - continues to deteriorate. Their communities and livelihoods are being irreversibly affected and their human rights systematically violated by the construction of the hydropower plant. When night becomes day From the plane, the lights from the worksites are just momentary flashes. But for the indigenous and riverine communities closest to them, those lights have brought a radical change to their lifestyles. José Alexandre lives with his family in Arroz Cru, a waterfront community located on the left bank of the Volta Grande, or Big Bend, of the Xingu River in the municipality of Vitória do Xingu. The community is in front of the Pimental worksite. His entire life has been spent in the area, where hunting and fishing are major activities. But everything changed when construction of the dam started.
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