NIRSNEt FAX to Babbit Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit source - nirsnet@nirs.org Thu May 20 11:34:26 1999 John Hallam Friends of the Earth Sydney, Suite 15, 1st Floor, 104 Bathurst Street, Sydney, NSW, 2000. Fax(61)(2)9283-2005 ph(61)(2)9283-2006. nonukes@foesyd.org.au http://homepages.tig.com.au/~foesyd Dear US Antinuclear Groups and People, A short while back, we asked you all to fax the US Secretary for the Interior, Bruce Babbitt, over the placing of Kakadu National Park, in the NT of Australia, on the 'World Heritage In Danger' list. Many of you were extremely helpful, and managed to get faxes into Babbitt, in time for Jacqui Katona of the Gundjehmi Aboriginal Corporation, representing the Jabiluka Traditional owners, in a remarkably short time. Thanks to all who faxed back then! Unfortunately, we understand that Babbitt is still a bit wobbly in his committment to push for an 'In Danger' listing for Kakadu. HE NEEDS TO HEAR FROM YOU ALL AGAIN! Babbitt is the bosses boss of the US deputation to the World Heritage Committee of UNESCO, which makes this decision. Although the US has only one vote, and as of December last year (Kyoto meeting of the WHC) is no longer on the Bureau, it is by far the most influential member of the Committee. The US delegate voted with the rest of the Committee last year, to place Kakadu on the 'in Danger' list, pending yet another decision which will take place in July 12 at an extraordinary meeting of the WHC in Paris. However, there are indications that the position of the US delegation may be at best wobbly, and they have been far too inclined to listen to the Australian delegation, who want to mine uranium in Kakadu without it being listed as' in Danger'. We are therefore asking you to fax Babbitt, asking him to formally instruct the US delegation to both vote for and to actively lobby for, an 'in Danger' listing. Fax him something like the letter below, sent yesterday as a letter from Friends of the Earth Australia. You can simplify and customise as you feel, but keep the essential points, that the US delegation to the WHC must not only vote for an 'in Danger' listing, but actively lobby for one, that this will be consistent with the way the US government acted with respect to Yellowstone, and that if Kakadu is not listed, the entire World Heritage Convention will be compromised. Note that this will all come to a seething, lobbying crescndo in July! But it is important to act NOW because it is at this time that the US attitude will be decided. ATTN US SECRETARY FOR THE INTERIOR BRUCE BABBITT +1-202-208-5048 cc John C. Reynolds, US WHC Delegate, +1-202-208-7889. Dear Bruce Babbitt, I am writing to you to urge the US delegation to the World Heritage Committee to adopt a clear and unequivocal position in defence of the World Heritage Convention, when it meets in Paris on July 12 1999, to discuss the question of whether to place Kakadu National Park on the list of properties that are 'World Heritage in Danger'. We would like the US delegation not only to vote for but to actively lobby for, an 'In Danger' listing for Kakadu National Park. The listing of Kakadu as 'World Heritage in Danger' was strongly recommended at the Kyoto meeting of the World Heritage Committee, and concerns were raised at that time by the IUCN and others that if Kakadu was not so listed, damage would be done to the credibility of the entire World Heritage Convention and Regime. This is in our view a key consideration. Should development of the Jabiluka uranium mine in Kakadu (which is surrounded on all sides by World Heritage National Park and is therefore in every meaningful sense 'inside' the National Park) take place, there will obviously be extremely adverse site-specific impacts. However, if this is allowed to occur without Kakadu being placed immediately and unequivocally on the 'in Danger' list, the World Heritage Convention as a whole will be undermined, which will leave us all, -all over the planet- poorer. Your government did what was clearly the right and only reasonable thing, in having Yellowstone National Park listed as 'in Danger, in the light not only of large impacts as a result of mass tourism and other problems, but of a major gold mining development two km outside the external boundary of the park. The Jabiluka, Ranger, and Koongarra uranium deposits are within the external boundaries of Kakadu and surrounded by it on all sides. Much of the World Heritage values that caused Kakadu to be listed in the first place are actually on the mining lease. The environmental leadership that your administration showed in listing Yellowstone as 'in Danger' should be reflected in the position you take on matters overseas. I trust that you will be able to respond positively to the many requests you are likely to recieve on this matter, both from US and other NGOs, as your administration did in the case of Yellowstone. (Signed) (name of person and organisation) ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytact-05.22.99-03:47:37-25030