By Chris Lang, 20th May 2012

An new report by the Environmental Investigation Agency and Telapak reveals that indigenous landowners in Sorong, West Papua province are being ripped off by an oil palm plantation company. The company, Kayu Lapis Indonesia Group (KLI) paid Moi landowners only US$0.65 per hectare. The land is likely to be worth around US$5,000 per hectare once the forest is cleared and replaced by oil palm monocultures. EIA/Telapak also found that KLI paid landowners US$25 for a cubic metre of merbau, which KLI can then sell for US$875.

Ulma Haryanto | December 21, 2011

Abetnego said that in the few successful cases where a company gave up and returned the land to the people, a number of factors were at play. First, he said, the regional authorities were committed to justice. “Second is the company’s legal base itself. In some cases, they don’t have a strong legal base to support their arguments,” he said. The third is the people themselves. “Their demands have to be clear, and they should have an accountable way of working,” Abetnego said.

By Chris Lang, 11th December 2011

The UN climate talks in Durban finished late on Saturday night, almost 36 hours late. Negotiators agreed little more than to start talks next year on a new deal. These talks are supposed to end by 2015 and are to come into effect by 2020.

Sarah-Jayne Clifton, Climate Justice Coordinator of Friends of the Earth International said, “Led by the US, developed nations have reneged on their promises, weakened the rules on climate action and strengthened those that allow their corporations to profit from the climate crisis.”

Washington, however, is happy. “We got the kind of symmetry that we had been focused on since the beginning of the Obama administration. This had all the elements that we were looking for,” U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern told Reuters.

Here’s a great interview with Patrick Bond (on Friday night, more than 24 hours before the end of the COP);

"Climate finance should be provided in the form of grants and not loans, given that many of the potential recipient countries are not only poor but also have high external debt burdens and some have recently benefitted from international debt relief,” the expert said. “Climate loans will add to the existing external debt burdens of recipient countries, many of which simply do not have the capacity to repay further loans without undermining their already precarious development prospects. Loans also have the potential to undermine the enjoyment of human rights by those who shoulder the burden of climate change: women, rural and indigenous peoples and the poor in developing countries.”