Agency in Hot Water for Financing Fracking in the Dark courthousenews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from courthousenews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
WASHINGTON Environmental groups sued the United States International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) today for illegally exempting itself from the Sunshine Act, which requires multi-member federal agencies to open deliberations to the public. The DFC provides billions of dollars in financing each year to international projects, including fracking and environmentally destructive road-building.
The Trump administration exempted the agency from the Sunshine Act in April 2020, despite the fact that the DFC’s predecessor agency, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, or OPIC, was subject to the act. In response to the litigation, the DFC has claimed that the Sunshine Act does not apply to it, meaning DFC is under no obligation to notify and hold public meetings.
The United States President Joe Biden requests $58.5 billion 2022 fiscal year budget for the State Department and The United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
“The funding request invests in the core foundations of our country’s strength and delivers for the American people, including by working with allies and partners to address the COVID-19 pandemic and the climate crisis, promote and defend our democratic values, and engage China in the Indo-Pacific and globally from a position of collective strength. This budget will enable the Department of State and USAID to help achieve the President’s vision of restoring U.S. leadership and delivering security and prosperity for all Americans,” according to the statement of the President.
US Executive Branch schedule for June 1 includes commemoration for the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre, will speak on the coronavirus response and economy later in the week.
Uganda and Tanzania last week gave the go-ahead for the construction of an oil pipeline between the two countries, even as environmentalists demanded for it to be scrapped, according to a report in the Hong Kong based South China Morning Post (SCMP).