December, 14 2009, 01:47pm EDT
Suit to Challenge Protection Delay for 144 Species
Interior Department Fails to Act as Species Spiral Toward Extinction
WASHINGTON
The Center for Biological Diversity filed a formal notice of intent to sue
the Obama administration today for failing to make required findings to
determine whether 144 species warrant protection under the Endangered
Species Act, including the cactus ferruginous pygmy owl, 32 Pacific
Northwest mollusks, Amargosa toad, giant Palouse earthworm, and many
others.
"We had hoped the Obama administration
would move far more quickly to provide protection for endangered
species than Bush did, but so far this has not been the case," said
Noah Greenwald, endangered species director at the Center for
Biological Diversity. "Continued delay of protection places these 144
species in real jeopardy."
Under the Endangered
Species Act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is required to respond
to petitions to list species within legally enforceable timelines.
Within 90 days of receiving a petition, they are required to determine
whether the petition warrants further consideration; within 12 months
they are required to determine whether petitioned species warrant
protection or not; and finally, within 12 months of finding a species
does warrant protection, they are required to issue a final rule
listing the species. For each of the 144 species, the agency has missed
one or both of these deadlines. In several cases, findings are years
overdue.
"Wholesale reform is needed at the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service to unseat a culture of delay and foot
dragging," said Greenwald. "We've yet to see comprehensive reform in
the endangered species program under the Obama administration."
These
144 petitioned species add to the backlog of 249 candidate species
recognized by the Fish and Wildlife Service as warranting protection,
but for which the agency claims it lacks the resources to actually
provide protection. The agency's claims of lack of resources are
undermined by the fact that the listing budget has increased by 275
percent between 2002 and 2009 and the fact that the agency used to list
considerably more species in past years. Under the Clinton
administration, a total of 522 species were listed for a rate of 65
species per year. Since 2001, however, only 64 species have been
listed, including two by the Obama administration, for a rate of fewer
than eight species per year.
"There are hundreds
of wildlife species facing extinction and in need of protection," said
Greenwald. "With the necessary political will and a can-do attitude,
these species could easily be protected under the Endangered Species
Act in a matter of a few years; there's just no justification for
further delay."
At the Center for Biological Diversity, we believe that the welfare of human beings is deeply linked to nature — to the existence in our world of a vast diversity of wild animals and plants. Because diversity has intrinsic value, and because its loss impoverishes society, we work to secure a future for all species, great and small, hovering on the brink of extinction. We do so through science, law and creative media, with a focus on protecting the lands, waters and climate that species need to survive.
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UN Chief Warns of Israel's Syria Invasion and Land Seizures
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United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said Thursday that he is "deeply concerned" by Israel's "recent and extensive violations of Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity," including a ground invasion and airstrikes carried out by the Israel Defense Forces in the war-torn Mideastern nation.
Guterres "is particularly concerned over the hundreds of Israeli airstrikes on several locations in Syria" and has stressed the "urgent need to de-escalate violence on all fronts throughout the country," said U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric.
Israel claims its invasion and bombardment of Syria—which come as the United States and Turkey have also violated Syrian sovereignty with air and ground attacks—are meant to create a security buffer along the countries' shared border in the wake of last week's fall of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and amid the IDF's ongoing assault on Gaza, which has killed or wounded more than 162,000 Palestinians and is the subject of an International Court of Justice genocide case.
While Israel argues that its invasion of Syria does not violate a 1974 armistice agreement between the two countries because the Assad dynasty no longer rules the neighboring nation, Dujarric said Guterres maintains that Israel must uphold its obligations under the deal, "including by ending all unauthorized presence in the area of separation and refraining from any action that would undermine the cease-fire and stability in Golan."
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Addressing the assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson and conversations it has sparked about the country's for-profit system, longtime Medicare for All advocate Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday condemned the murder and stressed that getting to universal coverage will require a movement challenging corporate money in politics.
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In addition to highlighting Sanders' interview on social media, Congressman Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) pointed out to Business Insider on Wednesday that "you've got thousands of people that are sharing their stories of frustration" in the wake of Thompson's death.
Khanna—a co-sponsor of the Medicare for All Act, led in the House of Representatives by Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.)—made the case that you can recognize those stories without accepting the assassination.
"You condemn the murder of an insurance executive who was a father of two kids," he said. "At the same time, you say there's obviously an outpouring behavior of people whose claims are being denied, and we need to reform the system."
Two other Medicare for All advocates, Reps. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), also made clear to Business Insider that they oppose Thompson's murder but understand some of the responses to it.
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Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)—a co-sponsor of Sanders' Medicare for All Act—similarly toldHuffPost in a Tuesday interview, "The visceral response from people across this country who feel cheated, ripped off, and threatened by the vile practices of their insurance companies should be a warning to everyone in the healthcare system."
"Violence is never the answer, but people can be pushed only so far," she continued. "This is a warning that if you push people hard enough, they lose faith in the ability of their government to make change, lose faith in the ability of the people who are providing the healthcare to make change, and start to take matters into their own hands in ways that will ultimately be a threat to everyone."
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Reporters Without Borders' (RSF) 2024 roundup, which was published Thursday, found that at least 54 journalists were killed on the job or in connection with their work this year, and 18 of them were killed by Israeli armed forces (16 in Palestine, and two in Lebanon).
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When counting the number of journalists killed by the Israeli army since October 2023 in both Gaza and Lebanon, the tally comes to 155—"an unprecedented massacre," according to the roundup.
Multiple journalists were also killed in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Mexico, Sudan, Myanmar, Colombia, and Ukraine, according to the report, and hundreds more were detained and are now behind bars in countries including Israel, China, and Russia.
Meanwhile, in a statement released Thursday, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) announced that at least 139 Palestinian journalists and media workers have been killed since the war in Gaza began in 2023, and in a statement released Wednesday, IFJ announced that 104 journalists had perished worldwide this year (which includes deaths from January 1 through December 10). IFJ's number for all of 2024 appears to be higher than RSF because RSF is only counting deaths that occurred "on the job or in connection with their work."
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