Beate Beller

Power, corruption and reprisals in Philippine nickel mining How Philippine communities pay the price for Europe’s electric vehicle boom

NEW INVESTIGATION: Who pays the price of the ‘green’ transition?
Our latest report warns that nickel linked to deforestation, river pollution & attacks on land defenders in the Philippines may be entering EV supply chains — incl. Tesla, VW, Mercedes-Benz, BMW & Audi.
https://gwitness.org/4oZGkLm

European conservatives pushed it through with the far right for the first time ever in the history of the EU. Parties that don’t really believe in the EU, and some not even in human-made climate change.

EU strikes deal to weaken corporate sustainability laws The European Union reached a deal on Tuesday to scale back its corporate sustainability laws, after months of pressure from companies and governments including the United States and Qatar.

🔥🌍 Imagine the #CSDDD would have actually big corporations to cut emissions and make them contribute to fighting the climate crisis. Instead, it got scrapped thanks largely to pressure from the US and Qatar, and the influential oil & gas lobby.
www.reuters.com/sustainabili...

War Crimes Indictment Reveals a Hard Road to Justice for Syria

The Mossad and Austrian intelligence seem to have hidden one of the Assad regime’s torturers in Austria www.nytimes.com/2025/11/12/w...

New data shows mega-pollution of companies still in scope of CSDDD Even after intense lobbying by polluters and a vote to water down new EU corporate accountability laws, firms affected are still responsible for huge emissions

🚨BREAKING: 2 BILLION tonnes of emissions are at stake when the EU decides on climate laws this week.

Lobbying by big polluters like Shell, TotalEnergies + Exxon is trying to gut the laws.

The EU must not let them dodge accountability.

https://gwitness.org/47hFYJ3

🌍 @globalwitness.org’s @beatebeller.bsky.social added: financial institutions “must not remain exempt from accountability for their impact on people and planet.”

EU: New research suggests majority of Europeans favour human rights and environmental protection in face of EU rollback New polling by Ipsos reveals that a large majority of people (75%) across 10 European countries think it is important that the European Union (EU) uphold its own environmental laws. The new survey of ...

“The European Parliament must now show leadership by rolling back these damaging proposals and put people and the planet over corporate interests” @beatebeller.bsky.social

For more info on the EU's planned rights rollback and poll results see: amn.st/eupublicopin...

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Europeans demand stronger climate action and corporate accountability Majority of Europeans want large companies to be held accountable for human rights and environmental harms in their value chains, according to a new poll

A major new poll by Ipsos, commissioned by Global Witness and Amnesty International surveyed citizens across 10 EU countries and the message is clear:

📢 Europeans want strong climate action and corporate accountability.

Read our analysis: https://gwitness.org/42iPUAn

Wildfires push forest destruction to 20-year high just as EU delays anti-deforestation rules It comes as the European Union decided to delay new trade legislation to curb forest destruction worldwide.

www.politico.eu/article/wild...

What it should say: Wildfires push EU to accelerate its anti-deforestation rules

Killed, dismembered and scattered: the Honduran father and son who made a stand against illegal logging The country is the most deadly to be an environmental activist – and the brutal murders of Juan Bautista Silva and Juan Antonio Hernández are the latest in a long line of violent acts against defender...

📍 In Honduras, a father and son stood up to illegal logging and paid the ultimate price.

Their brutal deaths are a chilling reminder of the dangers faced by land and environmental defenders around the world.

🛑 This must end.

www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Killed, dismembered and scattered: the Honduran father and son who made a stand against illegal logging The country is the most deadly to be an environmental activist – and the brutal murders of Juan Bautista Silva and Juan Antonio Hernández are the latest in a long line of violent acts against defender...

The brutal murders of Juan Bautista Silva and Juan Antonio Hernández highlight ongoing violence against defenders in Honduras. My colleague Laura Furones at @globalwitness.org explains why the country has the highest per capita killings of environmental defenders.
www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Nueva alerta ambiental en la ciénaga de San Silvestre, eterna víctima de la contaminación La organización internacional Global Witness ha denunciado que la multinacional francesa Veolia arroja líquidos tóxicos desde un vertedero en Barrancabermeja. La compañía dice que es manipulación para...

Our latest @globalwitness.org investigation covered in @elpais.com
elpais.com/america-colo...

Pollution : l’ONG Global Witness dénonce les rejets toxiques de Veolia dans une zone humide de Colombie Des employés d’une décharge gérée par la multinationale française ont été filmés en train de déverser des résidus liquides directement dans un cours d’eau. Cette pratique met en péril la santé des écosystèmes et des habitants de la région.

Pollution : l’ONG Global Witness dénonce les rejets toxiques de Veolia dans une zone humide de Colombie

Dying fish, polluted water and a terrible stench: the French firm accused of dumping toxic waste in Colombia’s wetlands A controversial landfill near Barrancabermeja has polluted protected wetlands, causing harm to people and the environment, claim local campaigners

- the landfill receives waste from the region's oil refineries
- water leaching from it into wetlands found to contain 25x "safe" levels of mercury
- people living nearby report health conditions including children "born without parts of the brain and skull"

www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Footage shows Veolia pump pollutants into protected wetlands French multinational Veolia could be risking health impacts including birth defects by pumping toxins from a large landfill into protected wetlands in Colombia

The French corporation’s actions risk causing serious health impacts including birth defects among local community, as EU plans to weaken law that would hold companies accountable for environmental damage. #CSDDD
globalwitness.org/en/campaigns...

Dying fish, polluted water and a terrible stench: the French firm accused of dumping toxic waste in Colombia’s wetlands A controversial landfill near Barrancabermeja has polluted protected wetlands, causing harm to people and the environment, claim local campaigners

French multinational Veolia alleged to be at the heart of a pollution scandal in Columbia, impacting workers their communities and the environment.Based on research of @globalwitness.org www.theguardian.com/global-devel... Company denies

For info on trade unions and Columbia justiceforcolombia.org

Brussels confirms dramatic U-turn on corporate green rules 4 of 5 companies would be exempt from EU corporate sustainability reporting as part of Brussels’ anti-red tape drive.

Von der Leyen’s attack on her own sustainability agenda is disgraceful.

www.politico.eu/article/most...

Civil society and trade union protests outside the EU Commission today as we await the Omnibus. This proposal is a push for deregulation, particularly impacting the Green Deal. Recent leaks suggest the CSDDD may let companies escape responsibility for global human rights and environmental abuses.

The tests identified the most extreme bias on TikTok, where 78% of the political content that was algorithmically recommended to its test accounts was supportive of the AfD party. On X, Global Witness found that 64% of such recommended political content was supportive of the AfD.

Study of TikTok, X 'For You' feeds in Germany finds far-right political bias ahead of federal elections | TechCrunch Recommendation algorithms operated by social media giants TikTok and X have shown evidence of substantial far-right political bias in Germany ahead of a

Our Global Witness investigation of TikTok and X ‘For You’ feeds in Germany finds far-right political bias ahead of elections on Sunday.

techcrunch.com/2025/02/19/s...

Breaking: This is Caesar, the Syrian who smuggled thousnds of photos of people Assad killed under torture. He was the head of the Forensic Evidence Department in Military Police in Damascus, and whom the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act named after.

Big crowd of civil society and trade unions outside the European Commission to protest against corporate capture and deregulation. The looming Omnibus threatens to water down some hard-fought laws on corporate accountability and reporting. Proper public consultations or impact assessments? Absent!

Sunk costs: a mega-airport in the path of climate disaster | Global Witness Flights from one of the world’s largest airport projects may be grounded within 30 years due to the risk of sinking land and rising sea levels.

As the EU threatens to cut back on the European Green Deal and commitments for big business, European companies continue to cause damage overseas. The European law on due diligence for large companies is in danger of being watered down further. #CSDDD
www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns...