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Why is the Democratic Republic of the Congo
important to the United States?
1. Africa matters. Africa is a continent of boundless
potential, and we will continue to do everything in our power to help Americans
realize that potential, to help Africans realize that potential and together
create a more hopeful future.
Secretary of State Powell, June 2003.
2. Americans care about human rights and an end to needless suffering
around the world. Our actions can make a difference. The
United Nations needs our help in ending the fighting.
3. There are rich natural resources in the DRC and the
extraordinary human resource potential that can make the country one of our most
valuable trading partners.
4. The DRC is working to protect the environment and preserve its
extraordinary resources. The current fighting in the eastern part of the country
is threatening Virunga National Park’s unique and endangered wildlife including
the critically endangered mountain gorilla. This amazing creature is important
to future ecotourism in the DRC and current ecotourism revenues in both Rwanda
and Uganda. Ecotourism is an important part of the economies of these countries
which helps to maintain overall political stability in the Great Lakes Region.
5. Ending the conflict in the DRC will help to insure the overall protection of
one of the world’s most important rainforests. Rainforests are important to
Carbon offsetting, the act of mitigating ("offsetting")
greenhouse gas
emissions. Rainforests are also important to protecting the world’s
biodiversity where over 40% of compounds come from for the pharmaceutical
industry including 70% of the world’s cancer fighting drugs.
6. A stable government in the DRC is important to the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention in monitoring potentially catastrophic disease
outbreaks including pandemics.
7. A stable government in the DRC is important to the global war
on terrorism. The United States is working closely with African nations to
improve intelligence gathering and monitoring the flow of money and people to
combat terrorism. The DRC is a key player for the US in Sub-Saharan Africa.
8. People from around the world are calling on the United States and the rest of
the Western World to do more to help Africa. If we do not play a larger role in
helping to stabilize the continent, other world powers like China will move in
and have a greater influence on Africa’s future.
9. Africa is becoming a larger player in the world oil market. What happens to
this market and other natural resources has important implications for the
United States.
Become a Virunga Guardian and
personally protect a 30-acre area of Virunga National Park
Every day around the world park rangers dedicate their lives to help protect
our world’s natural and cultural treasures. Few places on earth are as
endangered as the rainforests of Virunga National Park, home to about 200 of
the world’s 700 remaining mountain gorillas, a critically endangered species
that has survived the war in this conflict-ridden part of the world.
The Gorilla Sector – also known as the Mikeno Sector - is 250km2 of
Virunga and lies in the south-east corner of the park, bordering Rwanda and
Uganda. The sector is Congo’s Rangers patrol the Gorilla Sector daily. By
becoming a Virunga Guardian and sponsoring a plot of the sector for
$25/month you will be contributing toward clearing the Gorilla Sector of
snares laid by poachers.
By donating $25 monthly you will
be financing Congo’s Rangers to keep this Gorilla Sector plot free from
snares and protect the mountain gorillas. You will be able to track what
happens in your area and we will email you new photos and video links!
How To Help
Choose an area in the Gorilla Sector by clicking on an
empty plot. Click on Donate and assure that the selected area will
remain snare-free with your $25/month donation.
How many areas are protected?
58 areas are currently protected by Virunga
Guardians and are kept snare-free by Rangers. This is a total of 1755.66
acres (each plot is 30.27 acres).
Sign up to help protect the park. You can sponsor a plot for
one month or for as many months as you wish.
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Defenders of Wildlife Alert: December 20,
2009.
Right now, a poison made by a U.S. company -- a
product that the Environmental Protection Agency says is too toxic to be used in
America -- is threatening the extinction of the majestic African lion.
Lions in Africa's parks threatened
with extinction by a poison made in the US
Just a handful of carbofuran -- a deadly neurotoxin that Defenders
helped to ban in the U.S. -- can kill an entire pride of lions. Sadly,
this awful poison is still sold in stores (and widely used) across Kenya and
East Africa.
If we don’t do something soon, these great cats could vanish from one of their
last remaining homes in the wild.
Take
action now. Sign our petition urging Kenya’s Prime Minister, Raila Odinga, to
enact a ban on the sale and use of carbofuran in Kenya and support new
protections for the country’s endangered lions.
Just 50 years ago,
it is estimated that nearly a half a million lions could be found in Africa. Now
lion experts say that as few as 16,000 remain a staggering decline of more than
95%. [1] In Kenya, home to world-famous wild lions, the story is especially sad.
The Kenya Wildlife Service estimates that fewer than 2,000 of these majestic
great cats now remain in Kenya -- down from an estimated 35,000 that made their
home in the country just 50 years ago. According to the agency, one hundred
lions are killed each year -- many by carbofuran.
If Kenya’s lions continue their precipitous decline, there will not be a
single wild lion left in the country in 20 years.
To address this crisis, Defenders of Wildlife has been asked by some of Africa’s
leading conservationists to intervene. Our first step: convince Kenya’s prime
minister to get tough on carbofuran use in his country.
Please help us save some of the planet’s last remaining African lions. Sign our
petition to Kenya’s Prime Minister Raila Odinga.
At least seventy-six lions have
been confirmed killed by carbofuran, with many more deaths left unreported. And
while it is a crime in Kenya to use this deadly poison to kill lions, but very
few have ever been arrested for poisoning a lion with carbofuran.
A quarter teaspoon of carbofuran can kill an individual lion. Less will
paralyze this mighty beast for up to a week, leaving a lion or lioness to starve
to death or be killed by other predators.
It’s
time for Kenya’s prime minister to get tough on lion poisoning. Please sign our
petition and urge him to enact a ban on carbofuran and take concrete action to
protect these great cats.
We know that we can win this fight. Over the last two decades,
tens of thousands of Defenders activists helped finally convince the
Environmental Protection Agency to ban the use of this deadly poison in America.
Now we need you help to save the lives of endangered African lions threatened by
carbofuran.
Please take action today.
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Franklin Mountains Wilderness Coalition Leads Effort
to Prevent Quarrying Next to Franklin Mountains State Park
November 17, 2009. The Franklin Mountains Wilderness Coalition is leading
efforts to prevent quarrying next to the Tom Mays Unit of the Franklin Mountains
State Park just north of Transmountain Road and west of I-10.
Jobe Materials of El Paso
recently leased land owned by the People of the State of Texas and managed by
the General Land Office. The land abuts the Tom Mays Unit of the Franklin
Mountains State Park and includes a portion of Arroyo 41A, the last unobstructed
arroyo connecting the Franklin Mountains to the Rio Grande. The City of El
Paso’s Open Space Master Plan calls for a mountain to river trail using this
same Arroyo. Mr. Stanley Jobe has stated unequivocally that he intends to mine
all 480 acres of this pristine land including this arroyo.
In order to prevent quarrying on land in or adjacent to the planned mountain to
river trail, the Franklin Mountains Wilderness Coalition has created an online
petition for people from El Paso and around the world to sign. The petition
reads: “The City of El Paso's Open Space Master Plan calls for a mountain to
river trail using Arroyo 41A, the last unobstructed arroyo connecting the
Franklin Mountains to the Rio Grande. This arroyo can provide a unique setting
for recreational activities for El Pasoans and visitors as well as maintain
important wildlife habitat. Quarrying activities planned on General Land Office
leased land adjacent to and including parts of Arroyo 41A threaten the integrity
and viability of that trail and a portion of Franklin Mountains State Park. We
the undersigned urge our political leaders to work with the quarry operator to
prevent quarrying from occurring on land in or adjacent to the planned mountain
to river trail and to maintain the original design of this valuable recreational
and wildlife corridor.”
A link to the petition is available at the FMWC web site:
www.franklinmountains.org or accessed directly at
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/3/help-save-el-pasos-franklin-mountains.
The Franklin Mountains Wilderness Coalition began in 1978 when concerned
citizens organized after a developer began bulldozing in the north Franklins –
an area that El Pasoans had long hoped would become a wilderness park. Less than
a year after the area had been scarred by bulldozing, the Texas legislature
passed, and the governor signed, a bill creating the Franklin Mountains State
Park, now the largest urban park in the United States. The Coalition was at the
center of the effort to create this beautiful park.
Once again bulldozers have scarred the area, torn up hiking and biking trails
and threaten a major riparian corridor critical to the ecology, recreation and
tourism of El Paso, Texas.
How you can help the Democratic
Republic of Congo
Senate Bill 2124
September 7, 2008
On December 22, 2006
Senate Bill 2125 sponsored by Democratic Presidential Candidate Senator
Obama was signed into law. The purpose of the bill is to promote relief,
security, and democracy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. One
of the easiest ways to help the DRC is to contact your representative in
Congress and simply ask him or her what is happening with the bill along
with your personal request that your representative get involved.
Contact your Senator
Contact
your Representative in the House of Representative by Email
Contact your Representatives in both the Senate and House by Phone
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