Conflicts

ISSUES

War and the environment

In 2007, 67 of the 328 conflicts in the world (of variable intensity) were linked to natural resources. Most were in Africa and Asia. (1) These conflicts were sometimes about the ownership of certain resources. Conversely, resources could also be used to fund conflicts. The two sides of the problem were often linked.
Wars over resources
There are many examples of wars over resources. The colonial conquests were obviously aimed at seizing more wealth. More recently, during the First Gulf War, Iraq invaded Kuwait to take over its oil and currency reserves. Such conflicts have occurred on all the continents, and not only between North and South. Thus, in the Saltpetre war, around the turn of the 1880s, Chile, Peru and Bolivia were fighting over the control of nitrate reserves among other things. (4)

NEWS

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AUSTRALIA - WASHINGTON - La réunion de la Commission baleinière internationale (CBI) qui s'est ouverte mardi en Floride, dans le...

ARGENTINA - The imminent arrival of a British oil exploration rig in the South Atlantic ocean has recharged tensions between...

ALBANIA - The Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM), which seeks to ban the use, production, stockpiling and transfer of these...

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DEBATES

The Sino-Indian Water Divide

Brahma Chellaney

As its power grows, China seems determined to choke off Asian competitors, a tendency reflected in its hardening stance toward...

Will the Jordan River Keep on Flowing?

The River Jordan has flowed freely for thousands of years,...

Climate Change and Water Security

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently...

INITIATIVE

Survival to the rescue of the Bushmen

The Bushmen are among the oldest inhabitants of southern Africa where they have been living for more than 20,000 years. Part of these hunter-gatherers was living in the Central Kalahari Nature Reserve, in Botswana, until important diamonds deposits were discovered...

VIDEOS

26/02/2010	More than a decade after the 1999 Kosovo conflict left behind a trail of...	15/01/2010	Un cimetière de matériel militaire mis au rebut, voilà ce que montre cette...
06/01/2010	Des images du choc qui a conduit au naufrage du bateau Ady Gil de Sea...	13/12/2009	Lucka Kajfez-Bogataj, climatologist, argues that rather than being a...

GREEN TIPS

Water and peace in the Middle East

In Israel, Gidon Bromberg, the director of ecoPeace – Friends of the Earth in the Middle East, brings...

INDICATORS

Ecological footprint

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