By: Anna Maria Cárcamo, Legal Policy Advisor, Amazon Program Portugues abaixo To celebrate the importance of rivers and the movement for their protection, and to recognize actions of resistance and innovation in the different biomes of Brazil, the Coalition for the Permanent Protection of Rivers in Brazil invites you to participate in “O Canto das…
Read MoreWhy Recognize a River’s Rights? Behind the scenes of the Magpie River case in Canada.
By: Pier-Olivier, SNAP Quebec; Monti Aguirre, International Rivers; Grant Wilson Earth Law Center Lire en Français Keywords: environment, conservation, rivers, protection, law, Nature, Magpie, legal personhood, First Nations, municipalities On February 23, the Muteshekau-shipu Alliance, of which SNAP Québec is a member, announced that “legal personhood” had been granted to the Magpie River – a…
Read MorePRESS RELEASE | Coalition Submits Amicus Brief in Nangaritza Case Calling for a Bold Application of the Rights of Nature in Ecuador
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: February 2, 2021 Contacts: Constanza Prieto Figelist (cpfigelist@earthlaw.org, +1-202-621-3877) Grant Wilson (gwilson@earthlaw.org, +1-510-566-1063) QUITO, ECUADOR—This week, a coalition of forest experts, river protectors, and law professors submitted an amicus brief to Ecuador’s Constitutional Court calling for a robust application of the “Rights of Nature” to protect the Upper Nangaritza River Basin Protected Forest…
Read MoreRiver Poems By Poet Laureate Robert Hass
Poet Laureate Robert Hass is joining us live on December 16 at 5pm pacific for our 2020 end of the year event “Rivers Unite Us” for a live reading. A RIVER from “The State of the Planet” The people who live in Tena, on the Napo River, Say that the black, viscous stuff that pools in…
Read MorePRESS RELEASE | “Rights of Nature: Landmarks for the construction of a General Theory” Book Launch
By: Anna Maria Cárcamo, Legal Advisor Latin America and the Brazilian National Articulation for the Rights of Nature – Mother Earth Português translation below | Tradução de português abaixo Rights of Nature is a global movement which proposes a profound change in legal frameworks and society as a whole, from an anthropocentric to an ecocentric…
Read MoreHow to Win Legal Rights for South Asia’s Rivers
By: Ayesha DSouza, South Asia Program Coordinator & guest writer Sarah Bardeen What is a river? The dictionary defines a river as “a natural stream of water of usually considerable volume” or, quite simply, a “watercourse.” But at our “Dialogue on the Rights of Rivers,” which took place in Delhi, India from March 6-7, 2020,…
Read MoreSpeaking up for a silenced river
By: Ayesha DSouza, South Asia Program Coordinator & guest writer Melanie Scaife Mayalmit Lepcha grew up listening to the sounds of the Rongyoung River, which flows past her village in Dzongu, in the Indian state of Sikkim. This tiny state lies in the heart of the Himalayas between Nepal, Bhutan and Tibet, and is a…
Read MorePRESS RELEASE | Report: Rapid gains in giving rivers rights
Rulings loom as UNGA meets on biodiversity OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA—A new report by the Cyrus R. Vance Center for International Justice, Earth Law Center, and International Rivers finds that a movement to grant legal rights to rivers and nature is rapidly gaining momentum globally. The report examines how the ancient notion that nature possesses basic rights…
Read MoreKlamath River Dam Removal Update: An Urgent Need for Action!
By: Bruce Shoemaker, Klamath Project Liaison The proposed removal of four aging dams on the Klamath River in far-northern California and southern Oregon is at a crucial juncture. Following sustained campaigning by tribal and environmental groups, what is likely the largest proposed dam removal project to date world-wide, one that has huge implications for the…
Read MoreFrom the River’s Mouth: Saving the Tigris River in Iraq
By: Toon Bijnens, Save the Tigris and Iraqi Marshes Campaign Mesopotamia is one of the regions most severely affected by water scarcity in the world. It is currently seeing an increased competition over water resources, and the construction of disruptive megaprojects continues: Iraq, in particular, faces huge challenges. Ilisu Dam in Turkey and Daryan Dam in…
Read MoreSTATEMENT | National River Protection Network to FOSPA
By: National River Protection Network (2020) On February 25 and 26 we have met at the Antonio Ruiz de Montoya University in Lima, defenders of the rivers: Nanay in Loreto, Huallaga in Ucayali, Mashcón and Jequetepeque in Cajamarca, Apurímac in Cusco, Marañón in Amazonas and Rímac in Lima to discuss the need for a policy…
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