Inside E-LAW U.S.: Working Exchange Visitors

Shantha Fernando, Sri Lanka

Shantha Fernando

Shantha Fernando has performed invaluable work helping E-LAW advocates in Asia protect the environment and human rights. As the E-LAW U.S. Technology Circuit Rider for Asia, Shantha has traveled from his home office in Sri Lanka to the offices of E-LAW partners throughout Asia to help them use communications tools to protect the environment.

With Shantha’s help, grassroots leaders are collaborating with colleagues and tapping critical legal and scientific resources around the world. Shantha is senior lecturer at the University of Moratuwa’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering.

Shantha spent two weeks in Eugene in January to work with E-LAW U.S. and the University of Oregon’s Network Startup Resource Center. Shantha and E-LAW U.S. Information Technology Manager Glenn Gillis created a website and content management system for E-LAW advocates at the Public Interest Law Foundation in Sri Lanka. Steve Huter at the Network Startup Resource Center helped Shantha learn about the University of Oregon’s web-based course management and online learning systems.

Shantha joined the E-LAW network in 1998 and has traveled to service the technology needs of E-LAW advocates in Tanzania, India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, and Australia.

Doris Balvin, Peru

Sin Limon, No Hay Ceviche!

Doris Balvin is a pioneering grassroots attorney in Peru using environmental conflict resolution and the courts to protect communities from ill-advised mining projects. She traveled to Eugene in December to work with E-LAW U.S. staff on efforts to protect Peru’s environment and human rights.

Peru’s Tambogrande region is threatened by a Canadian company’s proposed gold mining operation. Building the mine would disrupt the lives of 16,000 residents and destroy prime agricultural land in Peru’s premier lime and mango growing region.

Doris Balvin, Peru

Doris is working with 12 Peruvian NGOs and local communities on a national campaign challenging the project. The campaign has been extremely effective at galvanizing local support. Festive parades have featured community members in lime costumes carrying signs reading: “Sin Limon, No Hay Ceviche!” (Without limes, there is no ceviche!) Ceviche is Peru’s national dish.

In December, Doris received the good news that the government denied permission for one of five mining blocks. This block was sited over the center of Tambogrande!

Raju Prasad Chapagai, Nepal

Raju Prasad Chapagai (left) and Shantha Fernando enjoy the snow at Odell Lake, Oregon.

Raju Prasad Chapagai, an attorney with Nepal’s leading public interest environmental law organization, is in Eugene on a 10-week Working Exchange Fellowship. Raju is a staff attorney at the Forum for the Protection of Public Interest (Pro Public) in Kathmandu, where he is working on pioneering environmental law cases.

In Eugene, Raju is working one-on-one with E-LAW U.S. attorneys and scientists on many efforts to protect the environment through law in Nepal. He is also enrolled in an intensive English program at the University of Oregon’s American English Institute.

Before joining Pro Public, Raju helped initiate a Supreme Court case to protect the Narayani River from a polluting pulp and paper mill. The Court ordered the mill to clean up its act and establish a wastewater treatment plant. Raju and his colleagues at Pro Public are working to ensure that the court order is enforced.

Pro Public has won landmark decisions from Nepal’s Supreme Court, including a judgement that establishes the right to a healthy environment and gives non-governmental organizations the ability to enforce this right directly in the Supreme Court of Nepal.