Group suing to give chimps human rights
ALBANY, N.Y. – An animal rights group is asking New York courts to recognize scientific evidence of emotional and cognitive abilities in chimpanzees and to grant the animals “legal personhood” so that they are ensured better treatment.
Nonhuman Rights Project, a nonprofit founded in 2007 by Massachusetts lawyer Steven Wise, filed a second lawsuit Tuesday and plans to file a third Thursday that asks the courts to declare that the chimps are not things to be possessed and caged by people and should be released from “illegal detention.”
The group is seeking an order, on behalf of four chimps, for their release to a sanctuary that is a member of the North American Primate Sanctuary Alliance, to live out their lives with other primates in a natural outdoor setting.
“In this case, we are claiming that chimpanzees are autonomous,” Wise said. “That is, being able to self-determine, be self-aware, and be able to choose how to live their own lives.”
Rapid climate changes pose danger, panel says
WASHINGTON – Hard-to-predict sudden changes to Earth’s environment are more worrisome than climate change’s bigger but more gradual impacts, a panel of scientists advising the federal government concluded Tuesday.
The 200-page report by the National Academy of Sciences looked at warming problems that can occur in years instead of centuries. The report repeatedly warns of potential “tipping points” where the climate passes thresholds, beyond which “major and rapid changes occur.” And some of these quick changes are happening now, said study chairman James White of the University of Colorado.
The report says abrupt changes such as melting ice in the Arctic Ocean and mass species extinctions have already started and are worse than predicted. It says thousands of species are changing their ranges, seasonal patterns or in some cases are going extinct because of human-caused climate change. Species in danger include some coral; pika, a rabbitlike creature; the Hawaiian silversword plant and polar bears.
Prosecution opens case against BP engineer
NEW ORLEANS – A federal prosecutor has vowed to prove that a former BP drilling engineer destroyed evidence when he deleted hundreds of text messages from a mobile phone after the company’s 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
But a defense attorney told jurors Tuesday that Kurt Mix deleted the texts “for the most innocent of reasons” and didn’t hide anything from a grand jury probing the nation’s worst offshore oil spill.
Mix is charged with two counts of obstruction of justice for deleting messages to and from a supervisor and a BP contractor.
At the start of Mix’s trial, a prosecutor said BP repeatedly warned the Texas resident about the consequences of deleting messages.
Mix’s lawyer, however, said he preserved documents containing the same information he allegedly tried to conceal.
Associated Press
