CDM reviews process after human-rights abuse claims

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Recharge News

CDM reviews process after human-rights abuse claims
The UN Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) will conduct a root-and-branch review of how it involves the public in its approvals process.

Published: Friday, May 13 2011

The decsion follows uproar over a Honduran biogas project that has been linked to serious human-rights violations and 23 deaths in the past year.

But the CDM Executive Board has put off until its next meeting a decision on whether to launch an investigation into the project itself, which is on a palm-oil plantation in the northern Bajo Aguán area.

The board has yet to rule on whether the project will qualify for Certified Emission Reductions for the 23,000 tonnes of CO2 it would avoid.

According to human-rights organisations, project developer Grupo Dinant has been at the centre of violent conflicts over land, with evictions and the murder of local people, whose land was taken to build the plantation. Campaigners claim that the site has been used by military forces to attack poor landowners.

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