STEVEN GRATTAN

Cut down trees lie within view of the Cordillera Azul National Park, seen in the background near Chambira community, in Peru's Amazon, Oct. 3, 2022. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia, File)
Amendment to Peru law raises fears of Amazon rainforest destruction
A recent amendment to Peru’s Forestry and Wildlife Law has sparked intense backlash from environmental groups and Indigenous organizations. They warn the amendment could pave the way for large-scale legal deforestation in Peru’s Amazon.
 
Residents carry a bucket of water to their home after filling it at a water distribution truck while water is rationed in La Calera, on the outskirts of Bogota, Colombia, April 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara, File)
Colombia’s capital ends drought-related water rationing. Its case is a warning to other cities
Colombia’s capital has always seemed immune to water scarcity, nestled among cloud-kissed Andean peaks and known for steady rainfall.
 
Tourists walk in front of the Tuco glacier in Huascaran National Park during a tour called the "Route of climate change" in Huaraz, Peru, Aug. 12, 2016. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia, File)
Peruvian farmer’s case against German energy giant RWE could reshape global climate accountability
A groundbreaking climate lawsuit is heading to trial in Germany next week, with Peruvian farmer Saúl Luciano Lliuya challenging German energy giant RWE.
 
Peru passes law critics claim will hamper the ability of NGOs to defend human rights
Peru’s Congress has passed a controversial reform expanding the powers of a government agency which oversees international aid.
 
Part of the Amazon jungle destroyed by illegal miners is visible in the Tambopata province, Peru's Madre de Dios region on March 28, 2019. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
Peru’s Indigenous leaders raise concerns over oil and gas projects at a human rights hearing
Indigenous leaders from the Peruvian Amazon have urged the government to halt oil and gas projects that threaten their lands, presenting their case before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).
 
A child fills a bucket of water transported by donkeys in the La Voz que Clama neighborhood on the outskirts of Maicao, Colombia, Wednesday, Feb. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)
Indigenous migrants in northern Colombia battle worsening droughts and floods
In La Guajira, Colombia, the Wayuu people face worsening climate impacts, with droughts and intense rains causing food insecurity, flooding, and displacement.
 
A group of men and a woman carry bananas and fish from the port, in Leticia, Colombia, Oct. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia, File)
UN talks end in Rome with nations backing $200 billion a year plan to protect nature
Global negotiators concluded an extended session of the United Nations biodiversity conference, COP16, with key commitments on funds needed and the institutions through which the funds will be channeled to protect the world’s biodiversity.
 
Climate demonstrators take part in a protest holding a sign that reads "tax fossils, protect biodiversity" as the COP16 biodiversity conference continues on Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2025, in Rome. (Cecilia Fabiano/LaPresse via AP)
In Rome, talks to protect Earth’s biodiversity resume with money topping the agenda
An annual United Nations conference on biodiversity that ran out of time last year will resume its work Tuesday in Rome with money at the top of the agenda.
 
Droughts, floods and economic uncertainty: Portraits of the Wayuu people in northern Colombia
Prolonged droughts, intensified by climate change, have worsened water scarcity, straining the Wayuu’s already limited access to drinking water and resources for livestock and agriculture. As rainfall becomes more erratic, food insecurity rises, with crops failing and livestock struggling to survive
 
Members of the Indigenous Wayuu community, Zoyla Velasquez, left, and her family, visit the graves of their ancestors near a wind farm on the outskirts of Cabo de la Vela, Colombia, Friday, Feb. 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)
Renewable energy ambitions in northern Colombia collide with Indigenous worries
The La Guajira region in northern Colombia, home to the Indigenous Wayuu community, holds vast potential for renewable energy, especially wind power, but projects have faced resistance.
 
Residents look out at the Madeira River, a tributary of the Amazon River amid a drought in Humaita, Amazonas state, Brazil, Sept. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Edmar Barros, File)
Amazon’s advocates fear Trump’s return means little US help to protect rainforest
With Donald Trump settling back into the White House, advocates for the Amazon worry about what his second term will mean for the rainforest.
 
Fishermen push a boat in the Aleixo Lake amid a drought in Manaus, Amazonas state, Brazil, Sept. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Edmar Barros, File)
Drought, fires and deforestation battered Amazon rainforest in 2024
The Amazon rainforest staggered through another difficult year in 2024. A second year of record drought contributed to wildfires that worsened deforestation across the massive forest, which spans Brazil, Peru, Colombia and other Latin American nations and is a critical counterweight to climate chang
 
Trucks wait in line on Friendship Bridge over the Parana River, the border between Foz do Iguazu, Brazil, top, and Ciudad del Este, Paraguay, June 23, 2020. (AP Photo/Jorge Saenz, File)
26 people arrested in crackdown on illegal deforestation along Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina border
Interpol says a crackdown on suspected illegal deforestation in South America has netted 26 arrests. The agency says the operation in mid-October relied on Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina sharing key information in what’s called the Tri-Border area.
 
Indigenous leaders from the Wampis Nation in Peru, Tsanim Evaristo Wajai Asamat, left, and Pamuk Teofilo Kukush Pati, pose inside the Westminster Hall in London, Thursday, Nov. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Indigenous leaders travel to UK from Peru to draw attention to oil damage and banking
Indigenous leaders from the Wampis Nation in Peru are urging lawmakers at the House of Commons in London to ban international banks’ support for Amazon oil activities they say harm their ancestral rainforests.
 
Susana Muhamad, environment minister of Colombia, speaks to The Associated press at the COP29 U.N. Climate Summit, Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2024, in Baku, Azerbaijan. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)
Colombia’s government is eager for a post-fossil fuels economy. But costs are a barrier
The main goal of this year’s United Nations climate talks in Azerbaijan is to establish just how much wealthy nations will contribute to help the developing world cope with climate change and transform their energy systems.
 
Members of Brazil's Indigenous delegation arrive to the opening ceremony of COP16, a United Nations' biodiversity conference, in Cali, Colombia, Sunday, Oct. 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)
At U.N. summit, historic agreement to give Indigenous groups voice on nature conservation decisions
After two weeks of negotiations, delegates agreed at the United Nations conference on biodiversity to establish a subsidiary body that will include Indigenous peoples in future decisions on nature conservation.
 
Police stand guard in front of a hotel a day ahead of the COP16 United Nations biodiversity conference, in host city Cali, Colombia, Saturday, Oct. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)
Negotiations stall over some crucial issues on final day of UN biodiversity summit in Colombia
At the United Nations biodiversity summit in Colombia, negotiators struggle to find common ground on key issues, such as how to finance protections for 30% of the Earth’s wild species by 2023 and how to make payments for nature’s genetic data.
 
FILE - Bleached coral is visible at the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary, off the coast of Galveston, Texas, in the Gulf of Mexico, Sept. 16, 2023. (AP Photo/LM Otero, File)
Fourth mass coral bleaching prompts UN emergency session at Colombia biodiversity summit
Coral reefs are in the midst of an ecological crisis and are at risk of extinction, according to the United Nations Capital Development Fund. Research this year shows that 77% of the world’s reefs are affected by bleaching.
 
FILE - Fog drifts over the woods of the Taunus forest near Frankfurt, Germany, Oct. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst, File)
UN chief calls for more pledges, private sector input to save global biodiversity at Colombia summit
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged delegates at a major biodiversity summit to follow through on pledges to help save global biodiversity and for the private sector to come on board.
 
FILE - McCain Maximo runs back into the trees filled with bridled tern nests on the northern end of the sand bar on Helen Island, Palau, on July 17, 2024. (AP Photo/Yannick Peterhans, File)
Slight progress in global biodiversity protection efforts but some species decline, new reports find
Two reports on protecting biodiversity were released at a major UN summit on global biodiversity underway in Cali, Colombia.
 
People walk through a part of the Amazon River that shows signs of drought in Santa Sofia, on the outskirts of Leticia, Colombia, Sunday, Oct. 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)
In Colombia, Amazon River’s extreme drought falls hard on Indigenous communities
The severe drought of the Amazon River has caused Indigenous communities who live beside it to struggle for food, water and simply getting from one place to another.
 
Afro-Colombian women perform during the opening ceremony of COP16, a United Nations' biodiversity conference, in Cali, Colombia, Sunday, Oct. 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)
Environmental delegates gather in Colombia for a conference on dwindling global biodiversity
As the world grapples with plummeting levels of biodiversity, Colombia is hosting two weeks of meetings for the United Nations Biodiversity Conference.
 
A group of women, part of Asociacion Nuestra Casa Comun, or Our Community House Association, go by boat to an area destroyed by illegal mining, on the Quito River, near Paimado, Colombia, Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)
Afro-Colombians fight the effects of gold mining through biodiversity projects in a violent region
Many initiatives by ethnic communities in impoverished Choco in northwestern Colombia aim to fight back against the environmental devastation inflicted upon the Atrato, a river that weaves around some 750 kilometers (470 miles) through northern Colombian jungles.
 
FILE - Indigenous demonstrators join a protest outside Brazilian embassy to call on Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro to act to protect the Amazon rainforest, in Bogota, Colombia, Aug. 23, 2019. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia, File)
Efforts to combat deforestation in Colombia hindered because of armed groups, report finds
The International Crisis Group is reporting that Colombia’s government efforts to control deforestation in the Amazon are being hampered by the actions of left-wing dissidents who control the area.
 
Bernardino Mosquera, a river guardian, maneuvers his boat on the Quito River, near Paimado, Colombia, Monday, Sept. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)
Colombia’s river guardians battle to protect the Atrato amid threats and abandonment
Illegal gold mining along the banks of northwestern Colombia’s Atrato river is causing severe contamination and deforestation for the small, impoverished riverbank communities made up of predominantly Afro-Colombian and Indigenous peoples.
 
FILE - This June 2024 photo provided by Survival International shows members of the Mashco Piro along Las Piedras River in the Amazon near the community of Monte Salvado, in Madre de Dios province, Peru. (Survival International via AP, File)
A remote Indigenous tribe kills two loggers encroaching on their land in Peru
Two loggers have been killed by the reclusive Mashco Piro Indigenous tribe deep in Peru’s Amazon. The loggers encroached on their land, according to local rights groups, in the latest event of rising tensions between the two sides and mounting pressure for government intervention.
 
FILE - Waorani Indigenous women take part in a demonstration in Quito, Ecuador, Aug. 20, 2024, demanding authorities comply with the decision to halt oil drilling in a national park in the heart of the country's share of the Amazon where they live. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa, File)
Ecuador starts dismantling Yasuni National Park oil block two days before court deadline
Ecuador’s Ministry for Energy and Mines says it has begun to dismantle infrastructure on a controversial oil drilling block in Yasuni National Park, home to the Waorani Indigenous people.
 
FILE - Waorani Indigenous women take part in a demonstration in Quito, Ecuador, Aug. 20, 2024, demanding authorities comply with the decision to halt oil drilling in a national park in the heart of the country's share of the Amazon where they live. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa, File)
Ecuador’s citizens voted to stop oil drilling in heart of Amazon. A year later, it hasn’t happened
Voters in Ecuador last year approved a referendum to keep some 700 million barrels of crude oil in the ground in Yasuni National Park.
 
FILE - This June 2024 photo provided by Survival International shows members of the Mashco Piro along Las Piedras River in the Amazon near the community of Monte Salvado, in Madre de Dios province, Peru. (Survival International via AP, File)
Reclusive tribe attacks loggers suspected of encroaching on their land in Peru’s Amazon
A regional Indigenous organization reports that a reclusive tribe has attacked loggers suspected of operating illegally in its territory in the Peruvian Amazon.
 
This June 2024 photo provided by Survival International shows members of the Mashco Piro along the Las Piedras River in the Peruvian Amazon near the community of Monte Salvado, in Madre de Dios province, Peru. (Survival International via AP)
Group says photos of reclusive tribe on Peru beach show logging concessions are ‘dangerously close’
An advocacy group for Indigenous peoples has released photographs of a reclusive tribe’s members searching for food on a beach in the Peruvian Amazon.
 
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