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Revered as deities amongst the Mayan and Aztec peoples, jaguars inspire through their grace and power. These agile hunters once roamed from South America through the southern and central United States, but lost habitat and were killed off as all large predators. After the jaguar was listed as endangered in the United States in 1997 in response to public outcry and petition campaigns. In early 2010, the Service announced it would grant the jaguar protected habitat in the United States as well as develop a recovery plan. It was proposed that the Government set aside more than 50 million acres of jaguar critical habitat in the Southwest. Free from government traps, snares and poisons; and without barriers between the U.S. and Mexico border to ensure that jaguars will always have access to the full extent of their range. Tragically, in March 2009, the Arizona Game and Fish Department euthanized the last then-known U.S. jaguar,Macho B after capturing and fitting him with a radio collar. An independent medical investigation, revealed that the jaguar’s death was at least in part due to agency mismanagement, and called on Fish and Wildlife Service law enforcement to do an independent investigation, which it did. The Arizona Game and Fish was sued to prevent the killing of any more jaguars, and in January 2010, the Interior Department’s inspector general released a report concluding that Macho B’s capture had been intentional and that Game and Fish had no permit to capture jaguars, either intentionally or incidentally. In April 2010, A notice of intent to sue the predator-control branch of the U.S. Department of Agriculture over its use of traps, snares and poisons that risk injuring or killing both jaguars and ocelots in the Southwest; two months later, a notice over the Fish and Wildlife Service’s permit authorizing Arizona Game and Fish to “take” jaguars with traps and snares. In 2011, though, a brand-new, 200-pound male jaguar was spotted roaming the southern Arizona’s Sky Island mountain ranges. He has now been photographed more than 100 times by remote trail cameras in the Santa Rita mountains, less than 30 miles from Tucson including at some locations less than half a mile from the proposed Rosemont Mine, a massive open-pit copper mine that would destroy thousands of acres of the new jaguar’s home range. The new jaguar’s home range is protected as critical habitat, In March 2014 the Fish and Wildlife Service finalized the designation of 764,207 acres as critical for the survival and recovery of jaguars in the United States, including the Rosemont Mine site and key movement corridors in the Santa Ritas and near the border, but unfortunately omitting the rugged Gila headwaters in New Mexico and the pine-clad Mogollon Rim in Arizona. In May 2015, a letter was sent to the Service objecting to its proposed biological opinion that the Rosemont mine wouldn’t compromise jaguar recovery in the United States, after which the Service withdrew its opinion and began to redo the analysis. Through a Freedom of Information Act request, it was learned that the Service issued the opinion despite four different draft opinions from its own scientists asserting the exact opposite conclusion that the mine would be a disaster for the Rosemont jaguar and recovery of the species in general. Is this any way to treat a big cat which is attempting to re-establish itself? We have seen what happens when an ecosystem is disrupted by the miscalculations of humans. SAVE THE ROSEMOUNT JAGUAR!

It is quite disturbing that a soldier, Lieutenant Barbara Balanzoni, would be sent to military court in Italy because he was trying to the save the life of a dying cat. Lieutenant Balanzoni has been returned to her civilian life and career as an anesthetist in Tuscany, facing charges of insubordination for saving the life of an animal. Her position in the army was medical officer at Nato in Kosovo. Lt. Balanzoni received an alert from military personnel due to outbursts of cat noises at the infirmary. She noticed a cat, later named Agata, a stray around the area, seemed to be in deep pain. The cat was delivering some kittens and, exhausted, could not deliver the last, which turned out to be stillborn. Without help, this cat, the mom, would have certainly died. With the demise of the cat, not only would the entire area be subjected to total disinfecting, the surviving kittens would be orphans without food; no way to be fed. They too would have passed on if their mother was not saved. In essence, Lt. Balanzoni saved more than one life when attending to the needs of Agata. The veterinary office was in Italy at the time and Balanzoni states “far from disobeying orders, I was following military regulations, which state that, in the absence of a vet, the medical officer should intervene.” So what did the officer do wrong if she was following regulations? Charges against Lieutenant Balanzoni states that she disobeyed her commanding officer when told n one would be "bringing in or having brought in wild, stray or unaccompanied animals.” She faces a year in the military penitentiary. Lt. Balanzoni is due to go to trial in Rome in about a month and we all need to help her by protesting this unjust act and accusations against her. Italy’s oldest animal defense association, Ente Nazionale Protezione Animali is involved in the case and should stand behind the decision of this dedicated soldier who was doing what was in her heart and mind; saving a life. Please sign and share this petition worldwide to take a stand for the dedicated soldier who had compassion to save the life of a dying cat and her kittens!!

Two decades after the end of the Cold War, more than 17,000 nuclear weapons remain in the world. The usage of nuclear weapons would affect us all in ways we can begin to imagine. While it is unlikely that the U.S. and Russia would use their arsenals, nuclear powers like India and Pakistan pose a more likely threat, even if they possess less than .5% of the world’s nuclear arsenal. Climate researchers have concluded that the soot produced by a limited nuclear war in Asia would impact crop production as far away as America’s breadbasket. The resulting "nuclear famine" would last a decade and put up to 2 billion people at risk of starvation. Last year, 128 national governments sent delegations to the Oslo conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons, but the United States government was conspicuously absent. Why? This February, Mexico is hosting the second such conference in Nayarit, Mexico. Please direct the President and State Department to send an official U.S. delegation to this important conference. The world is asking for a faster reduction in nuclear weapons. It is time for the United States to lead. Ban the Bomb!

Hunting and eating whale meat looks more like a case of misplaced patriotism than anything else, Iceland has stubbornly refused to stop whaling for decades, despite international condemnation. Little economic and even less cultural benefit comes from whaling, but still Iceland continues. It’s exploiting the “scientific” loophole, although of course the hunt is actually for meat, much of which is sold to tourists and almost all the rest exported to Japan. Icelanders themselves eat very little whale meat – it’s not supposed to be very nice – and demand is rapidly dropping in Japan. However, Iceland isn’t planning to stop whaling at all. It’s planning to kill more whales. The government recently announced that in 2014, it plans to kill six percent more minke whales – that’s 13 more individuals. These little whales, the smallest of the baleen whales, face constant threats from pollution, entanglement in fishing gear and climate change. The last thing they need is more hunting. Tell Iceland that national pride shouldn’t and doesn’t come from annihilating whales and to turn its attention to something productive, elsewhere

Plastic consumption has grown at a tremendous rate worldwide. They play an increasingly important role in most aspects of modern life and as a community, we are becoming more dependent on the benefits they provide. This has caused the disposal of plastic waste to emerge as an important environmental challenge due to its non-degradable nature. Normal plastics will not decompose biologically and the amount of plastic waste in our surroundings is steadily increasing.. With your support, we can raise awareness about this rapidly growing problem and find a way to reduce our plastic waste footprint.

The proposed Pebble Mine in Alaska's Bristol Bay wilderness may be the worst corporate assault on America's natural heritage that no one’s ever heard of. Bristol Bay's untamed wilderness is home to the greatest wild sockeye salmon runs on the planet, an astounding diversity of wildlife, and a way of life for Native communities that have thrived there for thousands of years. But a Canadian mining company wants to carve a gargantuan open-pit, gold and copper mine out of the heart of this American Eden. The Environmental Protection Agency has confirmed that the Pebble Mine carries catastrophic risk for Bristol Bay. But despite the warnings, Canada's Northern Dynasty Minerals is recklessly pushing ahead with this $6 billion mega-mine. Send an urgent message to Northern Dynastys President telling him to abandon plans for the disastrous Pebble Mine. Please Help Us Stop the Plundering of the Planet!