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Hundreds of wildfires are torching huge swaths of Siberia after an unusually hot and dry summer left forests primed to burn. The blazes, likely ignited by lightning and strengthened by strong winds, have already burned more than 320,000 square kilometres, an area as large as Belgium, with the vast majority in areas that are hard to reach and where potential damage is likely to be less than the cost of fighting them.

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A member of the Congolese environmental and human rights organisation RIAO-RDC was brutally killed by a security guard of the Canadian palm oil company Feronia Inc. on Sunday, July 21, 2019, near the company’s Boteka plantations in Bempumba, Eqauteur Province, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The killing follows months of intimidation directed by the company at members of RIAO-RDC, who are supporting local communities in filing a grievance against the company for its occupation of their lands.

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Temperatures have peaked record high in many parts of Europe this week and the consequences are directly felt also in Europe’s forests. As highlighted in a discussion document published by the EPNearlier this year, there’s an increasingly clear link between climate change, large scale industrial tree plantations and forest fires.

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In a decade big consumer brands caused forest twice size of UK destroyed, to be replaced with soy or oil palm plantations and livestock farms. According to a report released by Greenpeace, “Countdown to extincion”, these brands  had committed to eliminating deforestation by 2020. A commitment that that has remained on the paper.

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All over the Congo Basin pressure on civil society is growing, with an alarming rise in violence and other restrictions on civil society. In the Republic of Congo, repressive measures range from constraints on freedom of assembly, to excessive red tape and limitations on NGOs’ being able to freely express opinions without fear of retaliation.

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