Western High Speed Diameter: Time to look for feasible alternatives – EBRD AGM Issue Paper
Publication | 16 May, 2009While St. Petersburgs road maintenance budget as a reaction to the economic crisis has been cut by 75%, federal and city officials are determined to realise the Western High Speed Diameter (WHSD), despite more than quadruplet production costs since 2006. But apart from the unjustified routing of the diameter through residential and important natural areas, it is also still unclear whether there are cheaper and more effective alternatives.
Read moreNabucco: a short sighted answer to the energy security challenge – EBRD AGM Issue Paper
Publication | 15 May, 2009Both EBRD and EIB consider support for the construction of the Nabucco gas pipeline. But proponents of the project successfully avoid several important issues. Among them are the human rights records of the potential partners Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan, both ranked among the most authoritarian regimes in the world.
Read moreChelopech gold and copper mine Bulgaria – EBRD AGM Issue Paper
Publication | 15 May, 2009After visiting Chelopech TMF in October 2008, members of the Petition Committee of the European Parliament report an ‘immediate threat to public health, water, soil and agricultural production, and the climate conditions in the region’ posed by the Mining project. Their report recommends further investigations by EC and Bulgarian Government and calls for implementation of EU environmental law and basic rights and principles.
Read moreD1 Motorway, Slovakia – EBRD AGM Issue Paper
Publication | 15 May, 2009The D1 motorway is one of the key priorities of the Slovak government and in line for EBRD and EIB support. The government as repeatedly declared its intention to finish the project by 2010, but the currently planned route was not subject to an Environmental Impact Assessment and represents a serious impact on the NATURA 2000 network. Apart from the disregard of EIA recommendations which favoured a variant that bypasses almost all important natural habitats, several crucial questions have to be asked at the EBRD London AGM on May 15-16.
Read moreBubbling under the surface: The role of western public finance in the crisis hitting central and eastern Europe
Publication | 14 May, 2009The financial and economic crisis unravelling across the world economy has fundamentally changed economic policy imperatives for states and international financial institutions, including those operating at the European level. This situation offers the opportunity to articulate policies favourable to progressive social and environmental aims as integral parts of effective and transformative plans for economic recovery. While todays policy makers are unlikely to be moved by such arguments at this point, broader layers of social actors engaged in debates about the crisis most definitely will. This report seeks to provide guidance for their mobilisation by considering the context, formulation and delivery of crisis response policies by the EC, the EIB and the EBRD in relation to the CEE economies.
Read moreBankwatch Mail 40
Publication | 14 May, 2009In this issue: Nabucco spells energy securitisation not security * Crisis puts the EBRD back in the same old business * EBRD complaint mechanism gets a personality * EBRD drawing more power lines in Ukraine’s unsustainable energy sands * An end to energy efficiency excuses in Ukraine * Flagship PPP road project to be built with state money * ArcelorMittal – Going nowhere slowly * Hopeless in Gazela * New Gazela documentary * More dirty energy development for Albania * Smoke on Georgian water privatisation * Faster, smarter but more destructive crisis money for CEE?
Read moreArcelorMittal continues to pollute and uproot peoples lives
Press release | 12 May, 2009ArcelorMittal needs to move beyond good intentions on environmental and social improvements and turn words into deeds. Despite its rhetoric on social responsibility, the company continues to destroy the environment, risk peoples lives and displace local communities, according to a new report launched today by the Global Action on ArcelorMittal coalition to coincide with the company’s annual shareholder meeting in Luxembourg.
Read moreArcelorMittal: Going nowhere slowly. A review of the global steel giant’s environmental and social impacts in 2008-2009.
Publication | 12 May, 2009This new report reviews the company’s environmental and social impacts during the years 2008-2009 since the coalition Global Action on ArcelorMittal published its first report on the company in May 2008. The new report includes case studies from Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Czech Republic, India, Kazakhstan, Liberia, Romania and South Africa.
Read moreChelopech gold and copper mine Bulgaria
Publication | 9 April, 2009Only four months after the Board of Directors at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) had approved an increase to the original loan for the Canadian Dundee Precious Metals Development for its Chelopech gold and copper mine in Bulgaria, the Petitions Committee at the European Parliament deemed the situation at the mines tailings dam as alarming during the site visit on 29 October 2008. The questions to be asked are what is happening on the ground and on the basis of what information the EBRD decided to extend the financing for the Chelopech mine.
Read moreBankwatch Mail 39
Publication | 1 April, 2009In this issue: Earth calling the IFIs – Take me to your added value * Countdown to Copenhagen finds the EU stuck in limbo * Wind frozen and trees cut in Latvian crisis measures * The penny starts to drop on PPPs * Oil, gas and the IFIs: Sketching some lines on the horizon * Landmark legal victory compels Ex-Im Bank and OPIC to get real on their fossil fuel lending * Transparency fever gripping the World Bank?
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