The Kanak group Rheebu Nuu has lodged complaints of corruption against the president of New Caledonia's southern province, Philippe Gomes, and the director general of the Goro Nickel company, Ron Renton.

This comes amid a conflict between Rheebu Nuu and Goro which nearly two months ago saw Rheebu Nuu activists destroy 10 million US dollars worth of vehicles and installations at the Goro construction site.

Rheebu Nuu has hired a French lawyer to draft the complaint which alleges that Mr Gomes has mixed his political post with his business interests.

The Hague, Netherlands - In the weeks running up to the May 16, 2006, Shell Annual Shareholder?s meeting in the Hague, the oil giant has embarked on a broad PR campaign to try to minimize the impacts of its massive Sakhalin II oil and gas project on the critically endangered Western Gray Whale. ?The world is watching the Gray Whales of Sakhalin. Alexander Rutenko is also listening,? the ad says, referring to that scientist?s monitoring of underwater noise impacts on the whale.

GENEVA - The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) should not make loans to Shell's giant energy project off Russia's Pacific coast without more measures to protect the environment, WWF said on Friday.

The conservation group said ice and poor weather around the proposed Sakhalin oil and gas operation would make it nearly impossible to clean up any spills for half of the year, placing marine life at risk in the case of an accident.

In a letter to Jewson Ltd., the British lumber company, 17 headmen and leaders of the Penan people of Sarawak / Malaysia have asked it to stop purchasing timber from their territories. "We would like to draw your attention to the fact that by purchasing timber from the Samling group you are making yourself part of the crimes committed against our communities", the Penan have written to Jewson?s managing director Peter Hindle in the letter published today. "Despite our repeated protests, Samling does not respect our boundaries and disregards our native customary rights.

The United Nations Voluntary Fund for Indigenous Populations is accepting applications for financial assistance for any representatives of indigenous communities who wish to participate in the 2007 deliberations of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, the Working Group on Indigenous Populations, or the Working Group on the Draft United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Applications must be submitted by October 1, and must be in English, French, or Spanish. The U.N.

Feb. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Royal Dutch Shell Plc and its partners in a billion Russian natural-gas venture are being confronted by environmentalists over the project's ecological consequences in a series of public hearings.

We received sad news from South Korea this week. The Supreme Court ruled that the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry may complete construction of a sea wall that will destroy the Saemangeum tidal flats – one of Korea’s most valuable wetlands and habitat for migratory birds.

For the last 2 years, Global Response letters have urged the World Bank to halt its program of industrial logging in the Democratic Republic of the Congo's vast tropical rainforests. The campaign's first success was the decision by the Bank’s official Inspection Panel to investigate the complaints brought by 'Pygmy' residents of the rainforest. This week the Inspection Panel issued its preliminary report which sharply criticizes the Bank for not fulfilling its own environmental 'safeguard policie' and for not consulting with affected “Pygmy” populations.

Navajo and Hopi families residing on Big Mountain and the surrounding area of the Black Mesa in northern Arizona may be forced to relocate as a new senate bill, S1003 "The Navajo Hopi Land Settlement Act Amendments of 2005," goes before Congress.

For the past three years we have been supporting the efforts of environmental organizations in South Korea to stop a project that would destroy the country’s most important wetland ecosystem, also a critical stopover for migratory birds.

The campaign has reached a critical moment as the Supreme Court begins hearings on the issue.

An agreement signed yesterday in Jakarta requires Newmont Mining Company to pay 30 million to settle a civil court case that charges the Denver-based company with polluting Buyat Bay on North Sulawesi island. The out-of-court settlement in the civil case has no bearing on the ongoing criminal trial of Newmont executives in Indonesia who are charged with not taking action to prevent pollution.

Empresa Colombiana de la Coca, a Nasa Indian cooperative in southwestern Colombia, has begun producing and selling a soft drink that uses the coca leaf as its main ingredient, Reuters reports. The drink, called Coca Sek, is being produced in the high altitude town of Calderas in the Cauca Province. This new product is intended to help build the alternative coca leaf market, thus creating a viable economic alternative to the drug trade for small local indigenous coca famers.