Violent crackdown on villagers peacefully opposing British company’s coal mine
On the afternoon of May 5th, a peaceful anti-coal demonstration by local villagers in Bangladesh suddenly turned bloody. The resort to violence is the latest in a series of events that have made the Phulbari Coal Project, proposed by London-listed GCM Resources, one of the most fiercely contested coal projects in the world.
See http://www.accountabilityproject.org/article.php?id=640.
See also Phulbari blockaded after Barapukuria attack http://www.bdnews24.com/details.php?id=194920&cid=2 and National committee lifts siege of coalmine http://newagebd.com/newspaper1/national/17691.html.
Many people will be displaced by the mine. See Another Time: Another Occasion to Displace People,
http://refugeewatchonline.blogspot.com/2011/04/another-time-coming-up-another-occasion.html.
Bangladesh is more threatened than many countries by the rises in sea levels caused by climate change. See Bangladesh’s climate displacement nightmare, http://www.theecologist.org/blogs_and_comments/commentators/other_comments/854868/bangladeshs_climate_displacement_nightmare.html.
Much background information about Phulbari and other issues in Bangladesh is at http://www.netvibes.com/archive100.