"Brazilian indigenous protection officers to make emergency visit to isolated community facing threat from heavily armed gangs."

"WASHINGTON, DC -- Heads of a host of federal agencies agreed Thursday to develop environmental justice strategies that will protect the health of people living in communities 'overburdened' by pollution.

"U.S. researchers have discovered a genetic mutation unique to African Americans that could help explain why blacks are so susceptible to asthma."

"Poverty in Appalachia is concentrated in the communities around mountaintop removal mines, and people living in those areas suffer greater risk of early deaths, according to a new scientific paper by a West Virginia University researcher."

Some half a million people live in Texas' colonias, impoverished communities often without flush toilets, clean drinking water, or electricity. Such commmunities exist in other border states, and their residents suffer disproportionately from a spectrum of serious diseases that arise from this environment.

FEMA trailers rejected after Hurricance Katrina because of formaldehyde concerns are being welcomed by Indian tribes in Oklahoma who have little else to live in.

"THERMAL, Calif. — Community activists in Southern California's Coachella Valley have been toiling for years along the eastern rim of this crescent-shaped breadbasket to spread the word about the abandoned waste dumps, shoddy migrant housing and overburdened recycling facilities that are a fact of life in this poor, farmworker community."

The rehabilitation of San Francisco's Hunters Point Naval Shipyard is bringing pressure on the minority population of the area.

"The source is a Coachella Valley soil-recycling plant on tribal land, regulators say. Operators defend their enterprise, but agencies have cracked down."

EPA and Justice Department officials in the Obama administration are putting more emphasis on environmental justice  -- an effort to reduce the greater hazards faced by poor and minority communities. But that job is not easy, especially in the face of industry resistance.

"Japan's 'nuclear samurai' are risking their lives to avert catastrophe, but many are manual labourers unequal to the task."

"Instead of going straight to the faucet, many Navajos in northeastern Arizona have to drive 40 miles to haul water from a well back to their homes." Now a University of Arizona project may offer some help.

"When environmentalist Naomi Davis walks past the boarded-up homes and businesses in her Woodlawn neighborhood, she envisions a community that will confront the climate crisis by becoming self-sustaining, with vibrant, black-owned stores and green gardens."

The Pacific island nation of Kiribati is generally only 6.5 feet above sea level. That means 6.5 feet above oblivion as sea levels are predicted to rise up to 3 feet by the end of the century. But many islanders remember God's biblical promise to Noah that he would never send another flood.

"Huge population growth and food insecurity count among the factors that fuelled the revolution in Egypt and serve as a caution for other countries facing human and environmental overload, say analysts."