UN whitewashes the ecocide and genocide of Shell in Niger Delta

If BP is insulting and harming the US people and clearly manipulating the US government, go figure what can happen in a much poorer country like Nigeria!

But what about the United Nations? It seems that Royal Dutch Shell, the second largest company of the world and one with a very murky past (specially remembered for its support of the Apartheid regime in South Africa), is also perfectly able to buy its favors.

This is what Black Agenda Report denounced a few days ago: that the study by the UN Environmental Program, paid by Shell, blames locals and the guerrilla for 90% of polution and spills in the Delta Region, once known as Biafra. However it seems that it has backtracked and claims now that no official report is due until next year.

Whatever the case the situation in the Niger Delta, denounced by AI, may be even worse than that of the Gulf of Mexico, at least in many aspects.


The true scope of Niger River Delta pollution is catastrophic, with the equivalent of 9 to 13 million barrels of oil fouling the waterways, farmlands and mangrove forests of Africa's largest wetland. That's at least twice as much oil as escaped in the recent Gulf of Mexico disaster, thus ranking Nigeria and Shell as the number one oil polluters in the world (Glenn Ford at Black Agenda Report).

Indian Megalithic wares and other Archaeonews

Stone Pages' weekly newsletter Archaeonews has arrived again at my mailbox bringing some interesting informations:


Tamil Nadu Iron Age findings

Sengalur village (Puddukotari district, Tamil Nadu, India) hosts some 300 Iron Age burials of Megalithic style, described as stone circles with or without cairn packing, stone circle with cist burial of different types, cist burial with an extension in the front, urn burials, urn burials with capstone, menhir and rectangular shaped structure.

They are being excavated by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), reaching also to the nearby villages of Sittanavasal, Melapatti and Nathakadu, producing a large catalog of material culture from that period, that includes terracotta figurines, beads made of glass, semi-precious stones and terracotta, broken bangles (glass bracelets) and potsherds inscribed with graffiti.

Source: The Hindu


Other news

The newsletter also includes other archaeological news such as:

• Looting seems to have destroyed more than half of ancestor stones at Cross Rivers State (Nigeria). More at The Sun.
• Teotihuacan dwellers used the bones of their relatives for buttons and other quotidian objects. More at National Geographic.
• Most ancient known house of Britain found at Scarborough, dated to 8500 years ago (Epipaleolithic). More at BBC and many other news sites.
  

Ignorance is daring... specially when it claims itself holy

What follows would be quite funny, wouldn't it be because it's directly linked to the deaths of hundreds of people in what seems to be a somewhat serious threat to the secular system in Nigeria.

The "Taliban", as they are known in Nigeria, have raised in arms in order to suppress "Western" (secular) education that dares to claim such dangerous and erroneous things like that Earth is not flat and that rain is created by evaporation in the water cycle. The Nigerian "Taliban" leader, Mohammed Yusuf states it clear:

Like rain: we believe it is a creation of God rather than an evaporation caused by the sun that condenses and becomes rain. Like saying the world is a sphere. If it runs contrary to the teachings of Allah, we reject it. We also reject the theory of Darwinism.

Having a feeling of deja-vu... in Wacko, Texas... you know.

The Nigerian "Taliban" are right now being shelled by the army in their stronghold of Maiduguri, after they initiated a violent campaign that has claimed the lives of at least 140 people in just three days.

Source: BBC.
.