Infos zum Thema environment

Dr. Nick Begich is the eldest son of the late United States Congressman from Alaska, Nick Begich Sr., and political activist Pegge Begich. He is well known in Alaska for his own political activities. He was twice elected President of both the Alaska Federation of Teachers and the Anchorage Council of Education. He has been pursuing independent research in the sciences and politics for most of his adult life. Begich received Doctor of Medicine (Medicina Alternitiva), honoris causa, for independent work in health and political science, from The Open International University for Complementary Medicines, Colombo, Sri Lanka, in November 1994. He co-authored with Jeane Manning the book Angels Don't Play This HAARP; Advances in Tesla Technology. Begich has also authored Earth Rising - The Revolution: Toward a Thousand Years of Peace and and his latest book Earth Rising II- The Betrayal of Science, Society and the Soul both with the late James Roderick. His latest work is Controlling the Human Mind - The Technologies of Political Control or Tools for Peak Performance. Begich has published articles in science, politics and education and is a well known lecturer, having presented throughout the United States and in nineteen countries. He has been featured as a guest on thousands of radio broadcasts reporting on his research activities including new technologies, health and earth science related issues. He has also appeared on dozens of television documentaries and other programs throughout the world including BBC-TV, CBC-TV, TeleMundo, and others. Begich has served as an expert witness and speaker before the European Parliament. He has spoken on various issues for groups representing citizen concerns, statesmen and elected officials, scientists and others. He is the publisher and co-owner of Earthpulse Press. He served as Tribal Administrator/Village Planner for the Chickaloon Village Council, a federally recognized American Indian Tribe of the Athabascan Indian Nation for five years and served four years as the Executive Director of The Lay Institute of Technology, Inc. a Texas non-profit corporation. Currently Begich consults for tribal organizations, private corporations and others in a number of research areas. Dr. Begich is a single man after twenty-six years with his partner Shelah Slade who remains his dear friend and business partner. Dr. Begich has five adult children and two grandchildren.

A group of environmentalists from several countries in the southern hemisphere filed a lawsuit against British Petroleum (BP) in Ecuador last week for environmental damages related to the recent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. They did so before the country's Constitutional Court by citing universal jurisdiction, and in reference to Article 71 of Ecuador's new constitution that grants rights to nature. "This morning we filed this lawsuit to defend the rights of Nature, in particular the rights of the Gulf of Mexico and the sea, which were violated by the BP oil spill," said Vandana Shiva, world renowned author and environmental activist who is one of the defendants. "It's about universal jurisdiction beyond the boundaries of Ecuador because Nature has rights everywhere, and that is why a global coalition were the first signatories to say: we as citizens of the earth have a duty to protect Nature everywhere." Ecuador's new constitution, drafted in 2008, has several new provisions that focus on environmental protection. Amongst them, it prohibits the cultivation of transgenic crops and seeds, it prohibits the patenting of "collective knowledge" associated with national biodiversity, recognizes water as a human right, and makes nature a rights-bearing entity. It is the first country in the world to do so. In this lawsuit, the defendants are claiming that BP's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico this past April falls under universal jurisdiction for crimes committed outside the boundaries of a prosecuting state. That is, universal jurisdiction grants legal authorities in a country the faculty to prosecute crimes committed by nationals or foreigners in any part of the world.