Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL)

Dec 23 at 9:23 PM

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Yusuf Olayinka, It has been an incredible year. Your energy and advocacy sparked a global momentum shift in 2015, and we are on the cusp of transformative change. On all fronts, you have defended the right to a healthy planet. With your support, you helped CIEL… 1. Advance Climate Justice We highlighted the growing legal and financial risks facing fossil fuel producers and their investors for their role in creating the climate crisis and undermining climate action. In the Philippines, CIEL supported a petition to hold corporate actors accountable for human rights violations resulting from climate change. We also worked with partners to investigate what ExxonMobil and other oil companies knew, and when, about climate change and to establish whether the companies misled the public and investors for decades about its risks. Read more. 2. Limit the Trade of Toxic Chemicals All year, we exposed the latest, most outrageous ways that the US-EU trade agreement (called TTIP) threatens people and the planet. Our efforts created greater transparency in the negotiations. In June, the European Parliament passed a resolution recommending that TTIP exclude toxic chemicals, which if adopted, would protect people and the planet from increased toxic exposure on both sides of the Atlantic. Read more. 3. Halt Illegal Logging and Protect Wildlife In the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), we have focused on halting the illegal logging and export of African teak, a beautiful hardwood tree in the Congo rainforest. This year, the EU, a lead importer, blocked African teak imports from DRC for close to a year until it could verify that the timber originated from a permitted area. Read more. 4. Inject Human Rights into Global Treaties and Policies For the first time ever in an environmental treaty, the Paris Climate Agreement acknowledges that countries should respect and promote human rights in addressing climate change. Read more. At the World Bank, CIEL advocated for the strongest possible human rights and environmental protections in its safeguard policies. The current draft of the Bank’s revised safeguard policies references human rights and recognizes the right to free, prior, and informed consent for indigenous peoples. Read more. 5. Expose Legal Ramifications of Miscalculating Climate Risk In May, our research warned that the world’s largest credit rating agencies may be ignoring the reality of climate change when they rate fossil fuel investments, leading them to understate risks and overstate value – potentially repeating the mistakes of the 2008 credit crisis and exposing them to significant legal risk. Read more. 6. Defend Communities Against Destructive Mining Projects In Cajamarca, Peru, communities have mobilized against the massive Conga gold mine project for years, even in the face of violent persecution. CIEL submitted a friend of the court brief, and the court is poised to rule on a lawsuit that could provide the legal basis for stopping the project once and for all. Read more. 7. Stop the Keystone XL Pipeline “President Obama rejected the Keystone XL pipeline, joining millions of people across the country and around the world who have long since recognized that massive investments in fossil fuels are, and must be, a thing of the past. It is those millions who have won this victory for people and the planet, and to whom all of us owe a debt of gratitude.” -CIEL President & CEO Read more. 8. Empower Families to Control Local Development This year, our Early Warning System identified a $400 million World Bank project in Chennai, India, that threatened to harm people and the environment. We brought civil society and the World Bank together and, as a result, the Indian government released its resettlement plans in the local Tamil language and announced it would hold a public hearing to give communities a say in how the project will be developed. Read more. 9. End Pesticide Spraying in Colombia Last year, CIEL submitted a friend of the court brief to support a legal case seeking to end Colombia’s aerial fumigations practice, which sprays glyphosate (known as Roundup in the United States) as part of the “War on Drugs.” In May, the Colombian government announced it would halt the fumigations program. Read more. 2015 was a momentous year, but we have much more work ahead. Please make a donation to CIEL today because defending the right to a healthy planet is an effort we must make together. Donate before December 31st and your tax-deductible gift will be matched, doubling your impact. P.S. We get it. You receive a LOT of email in December. If you want to take a break from receiving our emails until January, let us know here! 1350 Connecticut Ave NW Suite 1100 • Washington D.C. 20036-1739 USA Phone: 202-785-8700 • Fax: 202-785-8701 15 rue des Savoises, 1205 Geneva, Switzerland Phone: 41-22-789-0500 • Fax: 41-22-789-0739 www.ciel.org Got this as a forwarded email?  Learn more by signing up to our monthly newsletter. You may unsubscribe at any time by clicking unsubscribe.