Revealed: how energy firms spy on environmental activists
Leaked documents show how three large British companies have been paying private security firm to monitor activists
Rob Evans and Paul Lewis guardian.co.uk, Monday 14 February 2011 21.00 GMT

Three large energy companies have been carrying out covert intelligence-gathering operations on environmental activists, the Guardian can reveal.

The energy giant E.ON, Britain’s second-biggest coal producer Scottish Resources Group and Scottish Power, one of the UK’s largest electricity-generators, have been paying for the services of a private security firm that has been secretly monitoring activists.

Leaked documents show how the security firm’s owner, Rebecca Todd, tipped off company executives about environmentalists’ plans after snooping on their emails. She is also shown instructing an agent to attend campaign meetings and coaching him on how to ingratiate himself with activists. The disclosures come as police chiefs, on the defensive over damaging revelations of undercover police officers in the protest movement, privately claim that there are more corporate spies in protest groups than undercover police officers.

Senior police officers complain that spies hired by commercial firms are – unlike their own agents – barely regulated.

Sir Hugh Orde, the president of the Association of Chief Police Officers, which until recently ran the secretive national unit of undercover police officers deployed in protest groups, said in a speech last week that “the deployment by completely uncontrolled and unrestrained players in the private sector” constituted a “massive area of concern”. …more

Climate’s role in global food crisis
By PAUL KRUGMAN
NEW YORK TIMES
Feb. 7, 2011, 8:34PM

We’re in the midst of a global food crisis — the second in three years. World food prices hit a record in January, driven by huge increases in the prices of wheat, corn, sugar and oils. These soaring prices have had only a modest effect on U.S. inflation, which is still low by historical standards, but they’re having a brutal impact on the world’s poor, who spend much if not most of their income on basic foodstuffs.

The consequences of this food crisis go far beyond economics. After all, the big question about uprisings against corrupt and oppressive regimes in the Middle East isn’t so much why they’re happening as why they’re happening now. And there’s little question that sky-high food prices have been an important trigger for popular rage.

So what’s behind the price spike? American right-wingers (and the Chinese) blame easy-money policies at the Federal Reserve, with at least one commentator declaring that there is “blood on Bernanke’s hands.” Meanwhile, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France blames speculators, accusing them of “extortion and pillaging.”

But the evidence tells a different, much more ominous story. While several factors have contributed to soaring food prices, what really stands out is the extent to which severe weather events have disrupted agricultural production. And these severe weather events are exactly the kind of thing we’d expect to see as rising concentrations of greenhouse gases change our climate — which means that the current food price surge may be just the beginning.
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By Lesley Wroughton

WASHINGTON | Tue Feb 15, 2011 5:21pm EST

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – World Bank chief Robert Zoellick on Tuesday said global food prices have reached “dangerous levels,” and warned that their impact could complicate fragile political and social conditions in the Middle East and Central Asia.

World Bank data released on Tuesday showed higher food prices — mainly for wheat, maize, sugars and edible oils – have pushed 44 million more people in developing countries into extreme poverty since June 2010.

“There is no room for complacency,” Zoellick told a conference call. “Global food prices are now at dangerous levels and it is also clear that recent food price rises are causing pain and suffering for poor people around the globe.”

Zoellick said although higher food prices were not the main cause leading to recent protests in Egypt and Tunisia, it was an aggravating factor and could become worse.

He warned that a sharp rise in food prices across Central Asia could also have social and political implications for that region.

The World Bank report comes days before a meeting of the Group of 20 major economies in France where higher food prices and the reasons for those upward spikes will be discussed.

Zoellick also said he was concerned that as countries such as Egypt, Tunisia and Jordan address causes of their social upheaval, higher food prices may add to “the fragility that is always there any time you have revolutions and transitions.”

The World Bank chief said the international community needed to be aware of such risks and should not exacerbate problems by imposing policies, such as export bans or price fixing, that would push global food prices even higher.

“There is no silver bullet to resolving the potent combination of rising and volatile food prices,” Zoellick said, “but food security is now a global security issue.”
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