(Toronto) Over 60 health, labour, and environmental organizations from across Canada urge Prime Minister Trudeau to take the necessary steps to achieve a comprehensive ban on asbestos, beginning with regulatory actions banning asbestos use in the country. These organizations also call on the Prime Minister to establish an expert review panel to address ongoing challenges associated with asbestos management and disposal across Canada.

Failures to report on methylmercury, a neurotoxin, prompt legal action

(Toronto) Wildlands League, assisted by Ecojustice lawyers, has filed a private prosecution against De Beers Canada Inc. for failing to report levels of mercury and methylmercury at its Victor Diamond Mine site in northern Ontario. Methylmercury, a neurotoxin, can threaten the health of human and aquatic life.

MiningWatch Canada says the industry is operating on an outdated, weak corporate social responsibility strategy and needs an ombudsman paired with government commitment to enforce sanctions against offending extractive companies.

By DENIS CALNAN

Canada may soon have an extractive resources ombudsman who would ensure that Canada’s mining companies act ethically, according to the Liberal MP who has been championing the cause.

(Toronto) In the wake of yesterday’s damning report by Ontario Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk in which she directed harsh criticism at the province’s environmental assessment (EA) program, environmental organizations are encouraged by Environmental Minister Glenn Murray’s commitment for ‘substantive reforms’ to modernize Ontario’s environmental asses

(Quebec) Quebec Coalition Meilleure Mine, Algonquins of Barriere Lake, and citizens from the Malartic Committee are inviting the public & media to attend a Peaceful Solidarity Rally in parallel to the formal opening of the 2016 Quebec Mines Conference organized by the Quebec government on Tuesday morning, Novembre 22 from 9:00am at the Congress Centre in Quebec City (1000 Rue René-Lévesque Est).

Tired of waiting for fair compensation from mining giant Barrick Gold for gross sexual violence, 119 indigenous women from Papua New Guinea call for United Nations intervention. They sent this video message to the 5th annual UN Forum on Business and Human Rights taking place this week in Geneva.

Tired of waiting for fair compensation from mining giant for gross sexual violence, 119 indigenous women from Papua New Guinea call for UN intervention

(Geneva, Switzerland/Porgera, Papua New Guinea) Today, in an open letter to the United Nations, 119 indigenous women who were sexually assaulted by security guards at Barrick Gold’s mine in Porgera, Papua New Guinea appealed for UN intervention in their fight to obtain fair remedies from the company.

(Ottawa/Toronto/Vancouver/Reno/Washington/Guatemala) North American organizations are dismayed and deeply troubled by the execution-style murder of 22 year-old Jeremy Abraham Barrios Lima, assistant to the director of the Guatemalan Centre for Legal, Environmental and Social Action (CALAS), on Saturday in Guatemala City.

(Ottawa/Amsterdam) A government process established in 2000 to advance responsible multinational business conduct is failing to prevent or remedy human rights abuse by Canadian companies operating overseas, according to a report released today by Above Ground, MiningWatch Canada and OECD Watch.

By: Grahame Russell

Social organizations organized several protests against OceanaGold ahead of the final ruling by the international court. | Photo: Facebook CRIPDES