uh
[Music]
hello and welcome my name is janinta
vacadasa i'm an activist from bolivia
and i also work at the human rights
foundation
it's an honor for us to hold this panel
in partnership with the city of oslo as
part of our program called defending
debt offenders
through this program href is able to
support the work of brave environmental
activists across the world
who are facing up to authoritarian
regimes in order to protect
the world's flora and fauna defending
the defenders was
first launched in 2019 at the australian
forum
the global human rights event that the
human rights foundation holds annually
in oslo norway we are excited to bring
this conversation to rightscon because
the killing of
indigenous leaders and environmental
activists across the world
in order to cover up environmental
crimes and silence
whistleblowers is very commonplace at
this point in history
and something must be done in order to
stop this personally as a young bolivian
activist i've experienced
the risk of working for defending the
environment
in authoritarian regimes last year when
bolivia faced an environmental crisis
many of us activists were heavily
persecuted by the bolivian government
because we dare to speak up
in defense of our forest the bolivian
government had just legalized the use of
fires in forest areas in order to expand
agricultural territory
since my government had made a deal with
the chinese government that we were
going to be exporting high amounts of
beef
in the quantity that bolivia had never
produced before
as a result over 5 million hectares of
forests were lost
as well as the lives of many firemen
this is why we must understand that
human rights and environmental issues
are not separate issues and they are
both
meant to be protected by the
international community today to lead
this discussion we have melissa matani
who is a member of the of the also
freedom forum
she's a wonderful journalist and a
social tv producer for cnn
and she will be leading us today as we
speak to brave environmental activists
who are currently protecting the
humanities most
important source of life mother earth
herself
thank you melissa thank you so much
janiece it really is a pleasure for me
to be a part of this
really important conversation
environmental activists
environmental journalists and the work
they do is more important than ever
and unfortunately we are seeing less of
it because it's increasingly dangerous
as authoritarian governments feel more
emboldened around the world
it was dangerous before the coronavirus
pandemic hit and in many cases is even
more dangerous now
we're going to have a really interesting
conversation about the intersection of
digital rights
and climate activism shortly but first i
want to introduce you
to mark owner he's a goldman prize
winner and he's the founder of the
environmental ngo brain forest
he led efforts to publicly expose the
illegal agreements behind a huge mining
product
project in his country and he joins us
now for a keynote speech
mark
ladies and gentlemen it's with uh
great pleasure for me to speak today on
this
occasion i'm proud to be
a member of the oslo freedom from
community
which connect me to a vast network
of followers activists technologists and
journalists
it was part of the first defending
the defenders panel discretion at the
oslo freedom forum
in 2019 and i am happy to see
that our community of environmental
activists
is expanding i have
absolutely engaged in environmental
activist
activism for a very simple reason
almost 90 percent of my country
gabon is covered with forest
protecting and sustainably managing
this rich natural treasure should be the
responsibility
of our government but we don't have
democracy
or the role of law in gabon
for nearly 60 years
gabon has been ruled by a single family
from father to son
those who criticize the environment are
arrests
are thrown in jail the internet
and social media services are sometimes
sensors
protecting the environment by taking
the stand again this authoritarian
regime
is difficult and dangerous for example
i myself was put in prison for
taking a stain with my ngo brain forest
again
mining project for one of the largest rn
deposits
in africa a chinese company
in partnership with the government of my
country
initiated the project with promises
of economics growth and the creation of
3 000 jobs however
this project induces a natural reserve
which includes congo and mingoli falls
these falls are classified among the
most beautiful in
central africa for taking
a stand again this project i was
subjected
to a lot of harassment the police
read my my ngos office
i was accused of waiting to
overthrow the government and sabotaging
the development of my country
the government came after my family
to combat illegal logging in other
environmental crimes
my organization brian forest gabon
does independent forest monitoring
before the occurrence of covet 19 in
march
we did this monitoring through bath
fields
visit and communicating with people in
the forest
despite the power state of roads and the
digital
gates between the capital and the
countryside
since the lockdown restriction imposed
by government
the internet and digital tools have
become
essential for us to continue our
activities
we are gradually adapting to the new
situation
with to help of our partners such as
the environmental investigation agency
which is training us to use innovative
digital tools to call reachtime
information on illegal activist
activities in the forest
the tip of partnership is crucial for us
in this period especially because
it integrates the classic elements
of our way of working with the
innovative system and will also allow a
better
flow in information in order to continue
defending
the environment we need our support to
defend
our digital rights and access to a free
and open internet we also need
technology partnership to use innovative
digital
tools to expose environmental crimes
thank you
thank you so much mark and thank you for
the tireless work that you continue to
do
so we're very lucky to be joined today
by activists from all different regions
of the world
who i hope are going to be joining us
now
we have evgenia cherikova she is also a
goldman prize winner
uh let's see if hopefully she can come
up on your screens
she is uh originally from russia but she
is now
living in exile
in estonia i'm told that she's not with
us yet but hopefully she will be with us
in a moment
i do know that we have peter
schwartzstein with us he's an
environmental journalist and
non-resident fellow at the center for
climate security
he has worked extensively in the middle
east with a deep focus on water security
which is uh there he is
a very important topic facing the world
right now and he recently spoke to
dozens of activists for a piece he wrote
about the authoritarian war
on environmental journalism a very very
timely article
and i will let you know when we are
going to be joined by hopefully evgenia
and also ariel ruiz who's a cuban
biologist who might be joining us
but for the moment peter since i have
you um i want to talk to you a little
bit just about
coronavirus i was saying before that the
work that journalists do
is so important and increasingly
dangerous
it was hard to do before the pandemic in
terms of getting access to sites
actually trying to get access to data to
find out what the government is doing
and in many cases that's ten thousand
times harder
with all of your experience in the
middle east what's been your experience
during this pandemic
uh peter just hang on a second we can't
hear you
sorry all right i'm back now um
wonderful for having me
um uh no i mean as um
uh kind of much of the world has of
course found in in the last few months
covert has
uh turned everything upside down and
environmental journalism is
unfortunately very far from an exception
uh on a purely practical level
um kind of an inability for for
journalists and particularly
environmental journalists
to actually access many of the places
that we're writing about has been
an absolute nightmare and this is not
just a kind of a problem for those who
who sort of fly around the place
um such as the severity that many of the
lockdowns that have been
implemented over the course of the last
few months that even journalists based
in capitals or regional centers across
the middle east and north and east
africa
have been unable to kind of reach many
of these often isolated
distant um uh areas in which a lot of
the worst abuses are taking place
so on that kind of logistical um basis
this has been
uh an absolute nightmare and on
a practical uh kind of a
perhaps a sort of more um it's a
journalistic level
the very fact that the pandemic has just
come to completely consume
the world and by extension journalism
over the last five months has sort of
pushed
climate change and other environmental
problems off
the front pages at a point when it kind
of for those of us
in the in the kind of environmental
journalism community
it really felt like we were beginning to
establish some real momentum
um it's not that there's ever a good
time for a for a global pandemic but
this was a particularly bad one
and then just one one final little point
i mean
the nature of of kind of many of the
worst environmental abuses
um is such that kind of a
pandemic style um lockdown is
an absolute boon uh for kind of a lot of
these
um sort of repressive government and uh
irresponsible uh corporate folks who are
presiding over
a lot of the worst um uh damage um
so again for for journalism and media
and and conservationism at large this
has been a disaster
uh but for those of us on on on this
beat in particular it's
it's been extremely difficult to work
around
and you know what you were just saying
is
is so interesting i also feel like there
was a
moving momentum in terms of climate
journalism we saw
last year for example that were the
global climate strikes this year before
the pandemic hit the rise of greta
tunberg which was getting lots of young
people interested and it just felt that
even online there was just this momentum
behind uh
behind the climate in people's awareness
and i feel
that that has completely waned partly
because
people are so concerned about other
things you know their health
obviously sometimes especially in some
of the poorer countries
people just struggling to make ends meet
so the climate has shifted but you know
we have to be quite honest this is also
a very uh
strategic attack by authoritarian
governments to get the climate out of
the limelight would you agree
i i certainly would and i mean
unfortunately as we've seen in the last
few months it's not
just purely sort of recognizable
authoritarian governments
um the trump administration bolsonaros
brazil
and an array of other countries that we
wouldn't necessarily automatically
associate with authoritarianism
also appear to have sort of taken
advantage of uh
the kind of all-encompassing distraction
is the pandemic to kind of loosen
uh environmental regulations to force
through um
various um measures that in the us's
case
have impeded uh folks looking to
um uh protest against um
fossil fuel pipelines um so this
is this has been um exceedingly
difficult and it's just a kind of um
an extension of uh
kind of a problem that the
environmentalists and
everybody throughout the kind of
environment related world has has been
dealing with in recent years there's the
idea that the
development and growth and environmental
protection
are kind of um sort of almost opposing
forces
and so if one has a country in which
there's like a
particular clamor for um for new jobs in
which
authorities are often extremely fearful
of the possibility of kind of fun or
underemployed youth
those are the instances in which states
and governments
and and regimes often kind of go out of
their way to kind of crush
um those who might look to defend the
environment so
what the pandemic has done in crushing
kind of economic growth to an even
greater extent than we've seen
previously
um it is most likely to kind of fuel
an even kind of more accelerated
government bid
to to kick-start economies once once uh
once the the the disease has waned
somewhat
and you know so we have seen also i i
suppose
one of the trying to be positive here
with everybody stuck at home you are
seeing more people search out uh
you know articles on the internet or
trying to to
look i mean it's it's kind of one of the
things that you said obviously people
are looking for jobs and people are
looking for food
but then on the other hand they have
actually seen like what can happen to
the
to nature around them you know when
you're inside you're longing to be
outside and you're kind of appreciating
those things more
um have you seen like a difference in in
in how the climate is perceived in some
of the different countries that you've
worked in because
you've written extensively about like
egypt for example and north africa but
equally you know your work extends to
other areas in the world
have you seen any similarities or
differences that you would point out
through regions or specific countries in
the way that they handle this
one of the things that's most um perhaps
arresting about
um talking to farmers and fishermen and
regular urbanites um throughout much of
kind of north and east africa and middle
east my kind of
usual areas of work and and occasionally
further afield
is that you don't get people um
republican party style
climate change denialists like the the
fact that something is going horribly
wrong
with uh the climate and with the
environment at large
is rather kind of blatantly obvious to
to everyone
even if they can't necessarily
articulate the concept of climate change
in in in the terms that scientists might
um so that's a kind of a really
quite um i guess in your face
illustration of how
uh fast and how dramatically things are
are changing um
i'll give you an example in parts of
sudan kind of various villages that i've
been visiting
um on and off uh kind of over the past
three or four years
the the desert sahara sands are
advancing at a speed
of up to a few hundred meters a year and
so when you already have this kind of
very thin little belt of greenery either
side of the nile
and it's getting kind of eaten away at
at a pretty fearsome
pace by the desert um you are in no way
going to be
denying that something is horribly amiss
the problem
of course is that many of these people
lack
political agency to make their their
concerns heard
um and in many countries in which uh
governments are up against a fearsome
array of
of conflicts and financial crises and
often understandably to a certain extent
these things get kind of buried uh amid
other concerns um so uh
yeah there's one of the consistent
threats however is that kind of
fairly broad um perception that the
global environmental conditions are
spiraling out of control
you know it's it's so ironic because
it's like when you talk about it in
those terms and it's
it's literally like it's almost a matter
of life and death in some countries you
know
all national security depending on what
you're talking about whether it's sudan
or whether it's food security or whether
it's water security
it just seems to me that these leaders
would benefit so much from trying to
actually
protect their country's biodiversity
protect their country's natural
resources and in some ways it would be a
hero to their own people
and the fact that they are so eager to
kind of crush
these movements or crush the information
in the people who are trying to get this
information out is just
you know crazy i mean let's just take a
step back and assess
why they're so reluctant to act and why
they're
they're so eager to crush these
movements do you think it is
money uh do you think it's power or do
you think it is
a mixture of both
well yeah i mean you've hit on on what
is perhaps the single most frustrating
thing about
the entire crackdown on on the
conservation movement globally which is
that it doesn't really make sense like
the environment
ought to be an issue that kind of cuts
across ideology that cuts across
all sorts of other other political
cleavages it ought to be
an area where kind of otherwise
controversial
politicians ought to be able to um
really set themselves apart
but i think the very fact that we're
here is a is an illustration of um
of a different reality as to why that
happens well
of course it it differs somewhat from
from region to region
to country to country um but for the
most part it's it's a kind of potent
combination of
of money of power um and of horribly
mispraised priorities from a financial
perspective
even though inordinate kind of
inordinately large numbers of people
generally majorities throughout a lot of
the kind of hardest hit countries in in
africa and south asia and southeast asia
and latin america
realized that things are going wrong
many of those are the kind of real
centers of power
have either vested financial interests
with
a lot of the kind of deeply polluting
industries like fossil fuels or mining
or logging or agribusiness and as a
consequence they're among that kind of
narrow minority that often do have a
serious financial interest in
maintaining this sort of polluting um
fossil fuel burning um status coil
and then there's yeah there's the power
element which is that a lot of kind of
authoritarian governments
are deeply distrustful of of the idea of
citizens kind of coalescing around a
particular issue
no matter what that issue is um and so
as
i mean for most of the last few decades
with plenty of exceptions here or there
the environmental movement
in the middle east and north and east
africa was seen as
as i mean like a bunch of harmless tree
huggers and as a consequence they
largely escaped
um a lot of the the kind of worst
treatment
dished out to other forms of civil
society activists
but as the environment has been kind of
deteriorating at this kind of ever more
rapid speed
as climate change is just hitting home
harder and harder
um a lot of these governments like those
of iran and egypt and elsewhere
have kind of slowly woken to the fact
that well these
supposedly harmless tree huggers from
their perspective
are actually sort of messengers or sort
of emissaries of a
potentially destabilizing political
force um
and so it's the kind of oldest trick in
the book they they shoot the messengers
um and then the final the final thing is
that i mean
as unfortunately we know um and this is
true
not just of of of countries throughout
um
developing world but but in europe and
east asia and in the us as well
a lot of politicians um just seem
like by nature perhaps of their age or
by nature of just being
slightly blinkered folks um unaware of
the extent
of the environmental damage out there um
one of the problems of course
on a global level is that a lot of um
the real kind of power brokers whether
they be in media or finance
or in politics are in cities that are
often spared some of the worst
um kinds of of environmental damage um
as opposed to the sorts of issues that
farmers and fishermen
in more rural areas experience and so in
some instances
there's just a pure ignorance on the
part of of those in power
and as jarring and and uh unlikely as
that might sound
you know it was interesting because you
you just gave a great example
of how in some of the countries that you
cover there aren't climate deniers like
you're seeing here in the gop
party but um because the evidence is
just there for all to see
but in it but you still see this rise of
uh fake news it's just meant to weaken
these people who are as you said a
destabilizing force to the people in
power
now in in certain countries that you
cover you know
these mobile networks aren't that strong
i i don't think in sudan for example
they have
it's not like every single person has a
phone like they probably do in
egypt or in dubai for example
but are you still seeing the spread of
fake fake news there
as as big of a threat as it is in some
countries like it is here in the us
for example i mean in general
yes um within the sort of environmental
sphere
it's it's harder to say i mean as as
concerned as
so much of the public is about kind of
deteriorating urban air quality or kind
of
extreme new kind of summer highs in
rural areas
when you have so many other issues in
front of you um
kind of environment understandably
perhaps hasn't yet
assumed quite the sort of rhetorical
importance that it ought to
so as a consequence of that sort of
diminished rhetorical significance
um it's not yet as polarizing a topic as
it
may very well soon be and in a way that
it sort of is in in other parts of the
world
however one of the very interesting ways
in which i say
fake news within the kind of
environmental sphere is beginning to
kind of seep into
um to the discourse is
well because kind of so much of the
developing world particularly africa
has contributed um uh to such a meager
extent
to to climate change this is as we know
a predominantly kind of western
and east asian phenomenon um
or or responsibility um because
most of these countries in africa for
example have contributed such a meager
share
to global carbon emissions um
there's sometimes a kind of temptation
to use
climate change this kind of big global
phenomenon that's beyond
the control of local politicians as a
kind of foil for their own failures
so i'll give you an example in in
nigeria within a lot of the conflict
resolution community
there's a certain unease at the extent
to which authorities
are blaming climate change for violence
in the country's northeast with boko
haram
we know it to be sort of part of the of
the um
equation we know it to be one of the key
reasons why
um farmer herder conflict and jihadism
are continuing to spiral there um
but we it's only one um and it's uh
kind of been talked up to far too great
an extent by
government and by government-affiliated
media because it's a useful way of
deflecting from
their own failures and their own uh kind
of
contributions to to that conflict um so
it's just a little a little snapshot
as to how a different form of
climate-related fake news can
can play out it's it's really
interesting and it's it's it's really
interesting just to
hear about your knowledge and your
experience in all of these different
countries which
give us such different sort of uh
case scenarios of of of how the climate
is almost being weaponized
um what about facebook i mean
you know we had mark zuckerberg here
testifying on the hill
and i'm just interested is facebook seen
uh
as a spreader of fake news or as a tool
for the environment
and some of the countries where you are
i also apologize that it's just a
doorbell this is what happens when you
go online from home
yes no no i'm waiting for all sorts of
bangs and whistles in the background in
my apartment
um again it's it's somewhat hard to say
purely because the environment doesn't
yet have
the the importance and by extension the
sort of i guess power to polarize that
that perhaps it ought to they're in a
um from an environmental perspective
perhaps a few years away from
from climate change being the um the
kind of lightning roy issue that
that unfortunately itself and is in in
europe in america
and and in a number of other parts of
the world um
however because kind of climate
and environmental activists within the
middle east are very slowly beginning to
to sort of mobilize in real numbers and
because
facebook uh within the middle east for
example is extremely popular and like a
prime
means um for mobilizing kind of large
groups in
in countries in which protest is often
deterred
um there are all sorts of kind of
mutterings about kind of
government um security service
infiltration
of uh environment civil society groups
in places like iraq
there's an excellent baghdad based
water campaigning group called save the
tigers which has done excellent work in
trying to draw attention to the
um desperately sad and depressing state
of the tigris and euphrates rivers in
iraq
um and there's certainly been a number
of instances in which
they believe i think the good reason uh
that some of their kind of
facebook organized events um have been
sort of sabotaged
from within by by security and iraqi
security affiliated folks
um so uh kind of as things stand i
i think social media hasn't yet um
from from an environmental perspective
become the
perhaps negative force that it has in in
many other domains but
i fear that that as sort of
environmental issues um
continue to gain in in some
popular interests that that scenario
might change
and so with the coronavirus pandemic
you know it's only going to get worse in
some of these countries in
africa for example in the middle east
because whereas i mean
that africa especially is poorer and
it's not as equipped with its health
facilities to deal with
this kind of outbreak how do you think
that's going to infect environmental
journalism going forward
i mean all of us are sort of flying by
the seats of our pants at the moment
aren't we um it's just extremely hard to
plan more than a few days in advance or
even
um kind of have a decent sense as to as
to what the pandemic uh
kind of state in various countries will
be even a week
in advance however one of the
unfortunate trends that that i
and many others within the kind of
environmental journalism and wider
environmental world
fear is a kind of continuing crackdown
on
perhaps that the single most vulnerable
bunch of environmental journalists and
environmental activists
and that's those who who actually
operate in
the most rural and the most distant
parts of their countries
from an environmental journalism angle
the single most um victimized and
harassed bunch of
journalists are those who work for kind
of small town newspapers or small town
tv
outlets or or blogs uh within kind of
rural parts of india and indonesia and
iran and places like that
they lack the sort of protection of the
kind of human rights community
at large that that's often centered in
uh
kind of capitals and other major urban
centers
um they often um of course live with
with their families at the mercy of
of local bosses of local political types
of of of major and powerful corporations
many which are
kind of deeply in bed with those
political players um
and so when the dust ultimately settles
once
when kind of we're finally able to sort
of
come up for air and examine the kind of
environmental fallout from
covid uh i and many others have a very
big fear that
that that kind of particularly
vulnerable subset of conservationists
uh might have been hit extra hard um
kind of in that in that sort of relative
news blackout and vacuum that that's
existed in a lot of these places
over the last five months
so as an environmental journalist who
has worked in all of these countries
what keeps you up at night
what is the biggest fear or the biggest
challenge that you think is facing the
climate
right now
i mean for well for a moment to be sort
of on a macro level to be
stunningly unoriginal it's the the speed
at which um
uh fossil fuels continue to be burnt and
will almost certainly continue to be
burnt
uh over the following years i mean i
mentioned that that brief
example of villages in sudan that are
finding their kind of relatively scarce
greenery
um disappearing at the most
extraordinary speed
that's the kind of scenario that's just
playing out um
in so many of the world's kind of
hardest hit
uh landscapes um particularly the sort
of hot
uh arid or semi-arid um kind of middle
latitudes
on a perhaps a more slightly more
manageable level
the sort of continuing and um
intensely sort of problematic volumes of
kind of water and air pollution
in many of these places are are kind of
maximizing the impact of climate stress
um in iraq for example uh where
kind of reigns have failed time and
again over the past decade and a half
um the the kind of extraordinary amounts
of
agricultural and municipal and
residential filth that pour into the
euphrates and tigris rivers means that
kind of much of whatever
water is left over after those
diminished rains
is unusable for for anything even
agriculture and such as the
the kind of salinity of it that it's
sort of unusable for
perhaps all the date palms such as it's
it's filth
that that families sort of wouldn't gain
to even clean their cars with it on
occasion
um so for as long as sort of air and
water pollution
continue to sort of uh exact as as heavy
a price
um as they continue to do in in many
places
um that will just sort of add insult to
injury um as climate change bites
and then on a more sort of self
self-centered level um
the the crackdown on environmental
defenders um whether they be
in journalism like me or or across the
board um
is worrying uh year by year the number
were killed goes up year by year the
number who are pushed into exile
or uh harassed or arrested or injured in
in
perhaps failed attempts to to kill uh
kind of creeps up um and not enough is
being done about it
um i mean if one one looks at the the
cumulative total of environmental
defenders
killed last year and compares it compare
it to the sort of total number of human
rights defenders who sadly also died
over the course of their work it's a
really inordinate share
and yet it's attracted a kind of tiny
fraction of the
attention that it's severity warrants um
so if we continue like that then um
there'll be some even
even fewer folks out there looking to to
sort of keep an eye on the worst
environmental abuses
so all of that's got to go to change the
scenario that you just outlined there is
is is tragic i mean you know we
we need people like yourself to to shed
a light on what's actually happening so
we can do something about it
and you know you're certainly right that
not enough is being done about it and
more and more people are dying
what do we need to do to change
attitudes to
to get more people interested what what
can we do what can the people who are
watching this do
well there's the i guess the sort of the
proactive and the reactive responses to
that
the sort of proactive is just continuing
to sort of push back against the idea
that the environment is just sort of
birds and bees and butterflies
as it was traditionally so often
presented and this is a
rather common line now but like the
environment is the
is the water we drink it's the air we
breathe it's the the soil that grows the
food that we eat
it's it's absolutely everything um so i
mean as a matter of complete urgency we
need to sort of get across the idea that
the environment is a significantly
significantly more expansive area
um than most of us i think still still
appreciate
um the slightly more depressing
kind of answer to that and unfortunately
this is often a bit characteristic of my
responses to these sorts of issues
um is that a lot of the time i i fear it
will just take
um the kind of kind of crisis the kind
of dislocation
that we know climate change is going to
bring and that it already is bringing in
many places
to really hammer home the the stakes it
played here to many of those in
positions of power
and that's a depressing answer because
at the point at which a lot of these
crises are staring you in the face
that's the point at which they're often
too late to sort of fully address or
fully mitigate and
certainly too late to to address um
without lots of people um suffering as
as a consequence um so i mean
there is or certainly prior to the
pandemic there was kind of a whole bunch
of quite encouraging stuff like
kind of things as meager as an article
clicks on
climate change or environment related
articles we're continuing to soar
in the last few years uh environment
issues have kind of creeped their way
from from the back pages of
newspapers right to the front much of
the time
um there is kind of positive news out
there
and there are positive trends and we see
that that kind of
young people in particular and others
are significantly more
uh concerned about climate change than
than than previous generations or
or even kind of themselves several years
back
it's just a question of whether we can
force through those changes
um at the necessary speed
what do you think is the role of the
international community
now in actually taking action i mean at
to your point we were seeing some
movement we were
seeing you know for example the the
paris
climate agreement which for we don't
know whether the us
is really going to be a part of until
after the election
so i mean you know this there's
definitely been a shift i think in the
global order let's say and therefore
it's weakened a lot of these
international institutions what what is
their role now
in trying to actually bring about some
positive change
to my mind there are three big things
that that need to happen
um and they're they're big kind of at
this point seemingly unattainable things
but things that we just need to get
kind of working on uh a great rapidity
the first of which is that we just need
to show
kind of repressive states those that are
kind of cracking down on
environmental journalists and
environmentalists in general
that at the very least their actions
will come at a cost that they're noticed
that they're that they're recognized and
there's a very
understandable tendency to sort of mock
or belittle these sort of
um proverbial statements of concern
coming from the state department or the
british foreign office or the european
commission
um and while they're almost always
insufficient they're not nothing like
the very
idea the very knowledge that kind of
outside countries including donor powers
are
uh seeing and watching what's happened
can sometimes be
sufficient to offer a degree of of
safety to to those on the kind of front
lines of all of this
um the second thing is i mean one of the
perhaps particularly unsavory trends
over the last few years
is the extent to which sort of
repressive
extent to which sort of um corporations
particularly those uh
engaged in in those polluting industries
like mining and
uh kind of coal extraction and oil
refining
the extent to which they've involved
themselves in pounding or pursuing or
sometimes killing
environmental journalists or
conservationists and
given that some of these companies some
of the worst vendors are themselves
american or european or at the very
least have operations within
north america and europe is sufficient
or should be sufficient
to um give the international community
uh a certain amount of leverage over
them to to kind of rein in that damage
and the final thing and perhaps single
most important thing the thing that came
up the most
as i was kind of researching uh this
most recent
uh report that i did about about the
kind of global assault on environmental
journalism
is kind of media's addressing media's
notoriously torture finances and and
well
that's something that's extremely
difficult to address um the fact that
environmental journalism is seemingly
suffering
from even greater financial problems
than than media at large
uh is is a big issue it's it's just
sometimes not seen
as the most sort of sexy or eye-catching
topics uh
environmental investigations can be
extremely expensive in a way that that
some
kind of political coverage isn't um so
i mean finding a way to address that is
is significantly more
difficult than articulating the problem
um
but yeah environmental journalists are
in many instances
willing and able and ready to uh
take on the risks that come with with
reporting this um but they can't do it
if they haven't got any money
you're so right and it's a very good
point because it's not sexy and that's
not what you see
you know on the front page of newspapers
um i i mean i have to say that
there is a lot of depressing news out
there
and it's very easy to just feel hopeless
you know when you hear about what's
going on and you hear about you know a
lot of the things that are happening to
uh climate activists climate journalists
a lot of these people are our friends
um but i will say that there's also a
reason to be
hopeful i do think that you know our
future is
uh with the next generation and it's
also very inspiring to see them be
so passionate and care so much and try
and change attitudes because that
ultimately does lead
to putting more power sorry putting more
pressure on those in power
i remember last year for example at the
um at the un
i marched with a lot of young people and
it was it was so inspiring
so just to wrap out of this pizza i mean
that's what keeps me hopeful
what keeps you hopeful
there's a little bit too much of a do
monger it is a a
risk um when you talk to someone who
covers the environment across
the middle east and in parts of africa
um but you're right
there is um some cause for optimism um
perhaps the first bit of which is is the
thing you just mentioned like
the younger generation is significantly
more interested and significantly more
motivated
to tackle uh kind of climate and wider
environmental woes than than their
predecessors
very young people listening
yes um and while it's kind of
become a little bit sort of
stereotypical to sort of bring that up a
little bit unoriginal
it is true and and if there is any kind
of
real force for change it's it's going to
come from from from
seemingly the under 40s for the most
part and the second thing is this the
i am sort of uncharacteristically
optimistic about the
perhaps long-term consequences of
of the pandemic um it's felt certainly
from a climate and environment
perspective in the in the last few years
if we've been kind of sleepwalking to
to our demise uh yes attention has been
on the up yes there's been kind of a
little more action here or there
but it's been kind of the equivalent of
applying a band-aid to the gaping wound
and so i like to think that the kind of
this shock this
this realization that that life can
change
in extraordinary ways in a very brief
period of time
will be the shock or perhaps the
opportunity that we need to sort of
radically rework
our our ways i don't think it's going to
happen in the short or medium or even
relative long term
in that period i think things will
continue there
rather unfortunate trajectory but but in
the long run um i i can
see how how this can be the spark that
we need
well peter i mean you know the work that
you do
and uh the articles that you've written
are so
insightful and we really appreciate the
work you do and
we really need more people like you um
and
i would encourage that everybody that is
watching i i just want to thank peter
because we were supposed to have a panel
of three people but peter has been our
hero and i think you know he's you've
been so interesting to speak to and it's
been interesting to actually just be
able to spend a bit more time with you
and i would encourage others out there
to to read some of your articles and to
get in touch with him and to really find
out more
and to support his work um so peter i
really want to thank you for your time
and for your
patience and ariel who is
um a cuban biologist who was going to
join us but
unfortunately couldn't i believe that he
has recorded a video
message which we will uh be able to play
out
now i believe
okay i'm told that we are we are being
joined by a virginia now who is from
russia
for a couple of minutes she made it
[Laughter]
good to hear me melissa i can hear you
thank you i'm glad that you could
finally make it i i and
your voice is so important and we wanted
to hear from you
um i but i do believe that i only have
two minutes with you
so i'm gonna have to ask you very
i'm glad you can join us anyway but very
quickly want to just ask you you know
how has this coronavirus pandemic
affected the work that you do
and what you're hearing from journalists
from russia
on my life it's really very difficult to
explain
who was the impact of coronavirus
virus on my life because it's changed
all my life
for example i cannot to speak
with my friends activists from russia
because very often
my friends from russia to move to
estonia were allocated at this moment
but unfortunately after pandemic problem
it
was impossible and i i stay alone
and it's so difficult to to observe
your friends and activists only
through computer it's really difficult
and uh but a situation with
activism on russia at this moment really
very very dangerous because
unfortunately
uh putin regime to use coronavirus
uh like
precise for new repressions
against activists and uh on russia it's
really very very difficult
to organize any campaigns
and uh to uh to protect rights
of activists and at this moment you can
found many information from russia
from independent media uh that it's
really very difficult to organize
uh environmental campaign or other types
of campaigns
uh and uh activists on russia have a
problem with pressure from
a side of officials
and we have every day we get new and new
information from russia that new and
activists were arrested and uh
it's really very very sad at this moment
we don't have much time so i just want
to hear from you quickly
you know we talk about digital rights
and these activists going online
but it's so hard in russia because putin
has so much power he can just flip a
switch
and he senses everything you know he's
just changed the constitution to give
himself an effect
even more power if that were possible so
how
how are activists getting the word out
where they are
this is exactly what i'm talking about
for the audience is she's just been
silenced
evgenia has left us
if we can get a journey back then we
will again her voice and her story
is very very interesting especially
about her experience in russia but it
just goes to show
that for activists or journalists we're
trying to get the word out online it's
not easy there you are you're back with
us
i i was just saying with putin giving
himself more power
how hard is it for activists to get the
word out now
online how are they communicating
uh at this moment in russia we have we
can observe a
very horrible process because after
pandemic
would regime to use this pandemic
problem uh
for their interests and they organize
a very horrible uh process they change
constitution
and uh of course it's impact on
all russian society and of course people
organized a huge campaign
against this violation and
dozens of people were arrested and
at this moment we can observe a lot of
protest on regions
of russia for example at this moment we
have a huge prop
up a huge protest on khabarovsk on far
east
of russia and uh masses
of uh putin's socks put in
bandits uh ban defendants really
horrible because
uh putin regime to use against activists
all tools uh for example
a propaganda machine book against works
against activists and
organize a fake news about
activity of uh russian activists
and uh spread lie about activists
and of course uh it's it's impact
for ordinary life of uh activists and
it's really very dangerous for example
on russia it's really very dangerous to
publish
information through information on
internet and we have a dozens of cases
when people only publish information
through
through information and after that
they have a problem and come to prison
and i think that we live on
a fantastic time on russia at this
moment behold
because it's really very very strange
why it
happens but we have very big pressure
from
site of putin authorities but the same
time
we have increasing number of protest
group
on region i think that it's impact of
coronavirus because
people stay at home
during many months and keep energy and
at this moment uh in russia we have a
problem with economic crisis and
the putin resort has tried to get money
from people
and organize new and new uh horrible
projects against people and people
decide to answer
that and uh to organize protest and you
can absolve
protest on bashkirstan for example on
tatarstan or
far east and if you want to find more
information about
that you can uh read information from
our portal
activatico.org every day we check
information
about activism russia and spread this
information
because we think it's really very
important to give a voice for activists
absolutely and that's one of the great
things i was introducing you at the
beginning
but unfortunately you weren't there but
i was saying that
you are now in exile outside of russia
because you became a thorn in putin's
side when you challenged some of the
projects that he was doing
and now you're giving a voice to those
others inside through your website
activatica.org
um i want to just quickly ask you i know
we don't have much time but
you know what is it you've i've had
conversations with you and we've been
talking about the rise of fake news
in russia as putin tries to weaken
movements like this but it's so
encouraging to see that
people are going out and protesting and
if anything they're protesting more
which is great that's a silver lining to
the coronavirus pandemic
but the spread of fake news how much of
an issue is fake news and specifically
facebook
to what's happening with the situation
in russia it's been both a positive and
a negative what's your experience been
oh it's really really a very great
question because
we uh try to check information with fake
news about coronavirus
and uh for uh for example where i have a
lot of news from russia i mean
new fake news from propaganda machine uh
including uh fake news on facebook and
other social media
about very good condition of russian
medicine
and russian hospitals but it's not true
and ordinary activists
walk like volunteers and try to help for
ordinary hospitals and for example
a trade union uh doctor alliance
uh try to help for hospital and try
uh to attract attention of a society
for this problem on hospitals on russian
hospitals but
because unfortunately putin regime to
spend money for propaganda machine
for wars uh for example against ukraine
and for other disgusting needs but
we don't have a normal budget for
medicine needs for education
and of course result of that disgusting
policy
is a horrible situation with hospitals
and activists try to share information
about that but
fake news to publish information it's
not true it's very good condition of
hospitals and we have a
very good result of our uh
of our process uh on our hospitals
but in reality it's not true and uh
we have a lot of cases arrested of
activists who only try
uh to bring uh masks and
some equipment to hospitals and
uh and some of activists who try to
share information
about real situations hospital
hospitals uh to have a problem with
police now
and of course it's not only problem with
fake news
we have a problem with impact from sight
of
putin authorities to activists but it's
really fantastic news
that people don't stop the activity they
continue to
to help for other people's as they
continue
to uh uh to bring to hospitals masks
and other equipment and continue this
volunteers
activity it's it's really a very
inspiring trend i think
and people don't uh afraid putin's
authorities and continues their activity
and it's really very great news from
russia
that's i mean that's really inspiring
and incredible
and if jenny i mean we haven't been able
to speak to you for very long but i'm so
happy that we could have you even for
two minutes
i've said it to you before and i'll just
say it's well to the audience i mean
if jenny has so much knowledge about
russia i mean russia is a very big
country and it's it's a
it's a very complicated country too but
every time i speak to her despite
the the tremendous attacks that she
herself has faced
she always leaves me feeling so hopeful
because there really is something in
people power
and the fact that people will not be
silenced and that you know you remember
that it is our voice
so as we're very strapped for time here
i would just
encourage all of you to really visit her
website activatica.org
and hear more about her and and i know
she'd be willing to speak to all of you
but evgenia thank you so much for
joining us i do believe we are going to
uh link you now with a video from ariel
who also couldn't join us today but was
another voice that we wanted
and at least for the audience watching
you will have heard a little snippet
from each of them
and then you know they're all available
to speak to you afterwards so thank you
evgenya and
here is arya
thank you my name is i am doctor in
biological science
but for the cuban regimen i am only one
farmer
so right now i have a corrupt my
computer so for that reason i cannot
participated
in in real time
in that kind of workshop so then i want
to speak
about one of the about one of
my main topics into the environmental
activities so
i from 1998 i started to work
with the turtle in particular with the
biological
on a conservation topic of that kind of
marine resource
as a university student so from 2001
i started to work as a professional
with that kind of market research
[Music]
trying to look in the information about
one special topic
the cuban regiment was the last country
that that feature in legal way
that kind of marine research and the
goal of that kind of feature
was to make one international trade to
japan
to sell the toilet virtual corporate
shelves so then
my goal was as a research to know the
genetic composition of the future stock
then
the idea for the cuban regime was to
justify
that the comp the generic composition of
the future stock
belong to the hawksville that born
in the cuban beaches but nevertheless
our result were totally different so the
majority of the
is a foxfield that the cuban regiment
feature in legal way
born in beaches from mexican gulf
and also in mona island puerto rico
so then when i published together with
my students all those we sold
in one international congress from
mexico
then the cuban regime decided to attack
me for the second time
and then they kept me out from havana
university and they prohibited me to
continue working with
portal but at the same time at least
they stop it for full-time the legal
featuring of that kind of marine
research in my country
although that i could not continue
working
knowing more about the biologies on the
conservation of that kind of marine
research
the illegal fishery in my country
continued so i tried to make several
efforts to control
and to know the real cause of that kind
of illegal feature
and then i knew that the majority of the
fisherman
settlement they did not have enough food
for to eat
so then one another problem came
so how i i felt at that time without
many
resources to manage that kind of problem
because how
i could say to the featuring families
you cannot fish that kind of animal
because it's in the danger of extinction
and you don't have enough food for to
eat so then
was a big problem for us and on the
other hand
the most interesting thing was that the
fishermen
they they made that kind of illegal
activity not only for to eat for
survival
the goal was to sell the meat and the
purple shell
to the tourism that visited their
country
and so then in i i knew that the real
problem was
not to to to eat it was not to take me
for to eat
or to take eggs for to eat was to obtain
money for to buy juices
for to buy dresses for to buy another
kind of food
to survive also to repay the houses
so then the problem became in more deep
deep dipped until now why because i
could not do so
much as a researcher because first the
cuban dictatorship decided to stop
my research activities and then i became
farmer and then on the other hand uh
that became one real problem for the
cuban government so the cuban
staff from the government will give
another way to survive
to that kind of people but the cuban
regiment always
plays in double phase so they try to
show
one phase about the conservation of the
environment to the tourism
and to the european countries but on the
other phase they tried
to obtain money and to preach the local
people
so that was the main topic that i that i
got it so the second topic i don't know
if i
will have time for to speak that is the
problem that i got
when i tried to make my bio farm in one
national park from the western part of
cuba that the name is vignales
and then i tried to make the bioform on
the cuban dictatorship put me in jail
for one year only because i try
to to protect the natural resource
in combination with the sustainable
management of the
animals and plants for that kind of
national park
so how i could not continue working as a
researcher in my country
in cuba i decided to become in farmer
because farmer is like the basis on the
pyramids in the social pyramid of my
country no one
want to do no one wants to become
informer
is to consider that the basic job
without any kind of
a salary or remuneration from the cuban
government and so in the socialism
system normally
the private properties does not exist so
always will depend
uh of the government for to sell for to
buy to acquire tools for the work
but anyway i decided to make the bio
farm
and i started to to to make one
smart plant nursery to preserve the
genetic background of one
spiritual a a timber tree so the name is
mahogany so the scientific name suetanya
mahavoni
is considered like the best wood in the
world
and the main wild population
were in my country but nowadays
you cannot find really so many
individual mature individual
individuals in the food because the
majority of the local farmers and also
the government
logging for to sell the food then i
tried to make that kind of bio form
and then i knew also that the
some a kind of farmer started to breed
while pig using the natural resource
from the national park
and then when i showed to the local
authority
what was happening in a real way in the
national park
they started to attack me using the
political police
against for the second time and then one
day they came to my
a farm and i was making one alive fence
so
using trunk alive strong for to
propagate it
some special of trees and they
say that i did not have a mitchell for
to do that
and they put me in prison for one year
so a sense that at that moment i have
one a handy a rustic handy
i could record the conversation in
between the political police
and myself and then thanks to that kind
of record
can use for the international
communities of environmental
activities to to present the cuban
government for to give me the
the freedom so the cuban government
already never gave me
that kind of condition so they put me
out
to the prison after one hunger and first
strike for more than 16 days and
they put me out to the prison with one
special status that was
a extravagant license so that is a
little bit crazy
but extra penalizing in the communist
system
means that you can continue in jail but
in your house so you cannot move you
cannot do nothing without any permission
and of course you cannot continue
working as a farmer of
as a real profession thanks for that
opportunity for communicating with you
and to try to explain
the situation of my country and in
particular my personal