Suspension for peat's sake!
We
have been working with local communities over the past month to
highlight the central role that deforestation plays in driving global
climate change.
Our Climate Defenders took action in the area against
APRIL on November 12. Since then, both the camp and the local
communities have been under sustained intimidation by the authorities
including threats, arrests and deportations. But
last week the
Indonesian government suspended APRIL from destroying the area further
- pending a review of the company’s permits.
Indonesia is the world's third largest climate polluter after China
and the US, mainly as a result of the ongoing destruction of its
forests and their peat soils. Globally, a million hectares of forests
are destroyed every month. That's an area the size of a football pitch
every two seconds -- emitting so much CO2 that deforestation is one of
the main causes of climate change, responsible for about a fifth of
global greenhouse gas emissions.
