Australia's largest woodlands 'will not be protected if it prevents mining'

[unhappycamper]

http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/jul/01/australias-largest-woodlands-will-not-be-protected-if-it-prevents-mining

‘Any sort of recognition which would put constraints on mining would be absolutely devastating,’ Western Australia mining minister Bill Marmion says

Australia's largest woodlands 'will not be protected if it prevents mining'
Calla Wahlquist
Wednesday 1 July 2015 02.43 EDT



Environmental recognition of the Great Western Woodlands, the largest remaining temperate woodlands in the world, will not be supported if it impinges on mining, the Western Australia mining minister, Bill Marmion, has said.

The woodlands cover 16m hectares (39m acres) from Kalgoorlie, 600km east of Perth, to Esperance and the Nullarbor Plain.

They’re home to 3,000 species of flowering plants – about 20% of all those identified in Australia – and 25% of all known eucalypt species.

But despite its ecological significance only about 12% is protected, with most falling on unallocated crown land.

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This sure reminds me of Bến Tre, Vietnam.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%E1%BA%BFn_Tre

Vietnam War

A famous quote from the Vietnam War was a statement attributed to an unnamed U.S. officer by AP correspondent Peter Arnett in his writing about Bến Tre city on 7 February 1968:

'It became necessary to destroy the town to save it', a United States major said today. He was talking about the decision by allied commanders to bomb and shell the town regardless of civilian casualties, to rout the Vietcong.[3]