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Katie Surma

Reporter, Pittsburgh

Katie Surma is a reporter at Inside Climate News covering the rights of nature movement and international environmental justice. Her work has a strong focus on the intersection of human rights and the environment. Before joining ICN, she practiced law, specializing in commercial litigation. Her journalism work has been recognized by the Overseas Press Club, the Society of International Journalists, the Society of American Business Editors and Writers and others. Katie has a master’s degree in investigative journalism from Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism, an LLM in international rule of law and security from ASU’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, a J.D. from Duquesne University, and was a History of Art and Architecture major at the University of Pittsburgh. Katie lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
  • @katiesurma.bsky.social
  • @Katie_Surma
  • [email protected]
A ranger from Kahuzi-Biega National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo walks through an area of the park devastated by logging on Sept. 30, 2019. Credit: Alexis Huguet/AFP via Getty Images

International Human Rights Commission Condemns ‘Fortress Conservation’

By Katie Surma

Native Americans, farmers and ranchers gather in front of the U.S. Capitol as the Cowboy and Indian Alliance protest the proposed Keystone XL pipeline on April 22, 2014. Credit: Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty Images

Should Companies Get Paid When Governments Phase Out Fossil Fuels? They Already Are

By Katie Surma, Nicholas Kusnetz

A jaguar rescued from animal trafficking is seen at the Santa Cruz Foundation in Cundinamarca, Colombia. Credit: Juancho Torres/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Jaguars, Macaws and Tropical Dry Forest Have a Right To Exist, a Colombian Court Is Told

By Katie Surma

UN Expert on Climate Change and Human Rights Sees ‘Crucial and Urgent Demand’ to Clarify Governments’ Obligations

By Katie Surma

Young people from Amazonian communities march during the Pan-Amazon Social Forum in Rurrenabaque, Bolivia on June 12. Credit: Katie Surma/Inside Climate News

To Save the Amazon, What if We Listened to Those Living Within It?

By Katie Surma

An aerial view of kids playing at a school near the metallurgical complex in La Oroya, Peru. Credit: Ernesto Benavides/AFP via Getty Images

Q&A: The U.N.’s New Special Rapporteur for Human Rights and Environment Previously Won a Landmark Case in Peru

By Katie Surma

Aymara activists opposed to mining operations in Peru's southeastern Puno region organized on May 31, 2011 for a wave of protests against the Canada-based Bear Creek Mining Corporation plans to open a silver mine in the area. Credit: Aizar Raldes/AFP via Getty Images

The International System That Pits Foreign Investors Against Indigenous Communities

By Katie Surma, Nicholas Kusnetz

Payam Akhavan (center), lawyer and chairman of the Commission of Small Island States, speaks at a press conference on Tuesday in Hamburg, Germany after the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea issued a legal opinion on measures to protect the oceans from climate change. Credit: Christian Charisius/Picture Alliance via Getty Images

‘Historic’ Advisory Opinion on Climate Change Says Countries Must Prevent Greenhouse Gases From Harming Oceans

By Katie Surma

Turkiye’s State Disaster and Emergency Management Authority, along with the teams from Russia, Spain, Italy, Tunisia, Algeria and UAE conduct search and rescue operations in the aftermath of severe flooding caused by Storm Daniel in Derna, Libya on Sept. 19, 2023. Credit: Halil Fidan/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Significant Environmental and Climate Impacts Are Impinging on Human Rights in Every Country, a New Report Finds

By Katie Surma

Natalia Greene, an Ecuadorian environmentalist and judge with the International Rights of Nature Tribunal, walks through the Chocó Andino cloud forest with her family in Mindo, Ecuador. Credit: Katie Surma

How the Drug War and Energy Transition Are Changing Ecuadorians’ Fight For The Rights of Nature

By Katie Surma

A view of the Barker Meadow Reservoir in Nederland, Colo. Currently, Nederland relies on water from the City of Boulder’s reservoir. Credit: Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post

A Town Board in Colorado Repeals Rights of Nature Resolutions

By Katie Surma

A worker sweeps around a furnace at a coke plant in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine on April 11. Credit: Ukrinform/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Mining ‘Critical Minerals’ in Eastern Europe and Central Asia Rife With Rights Abuses

By Katie Surma

Tish O'Dell, next to artist Andrea Bowers' "We Must Rise Above the Tides," in the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland (MoCa). Credit: Katie Surma/Inside Climate News

‘Truth, Reckoning and Right Relationship’: A Rights of Nature Epiphany

By Katie Surma

American Creosote Works, three blocks north of Pensacola Bay, is a former wood treatment plant turned Superfund site. Credit: Dan Anderson

EPA Faulted for Wasting Millions, Failing to Prevent Spread of Superfund Site Contamination

By Katie Surma

Damage caused by Hurricane Maria in Roseau, Dominica, in November 2017. Credit: Chris Jackson/Getty

International Debt Is Strangling Developing Nations Vulnerable to Climate Change, a New Report Shows

By Katie Surma

Andres Duran, a Sauzal Bonito resident, points to a crack in his chimney that he says was caused by fracking-induced earthquakes.

Fracking-Induced Earthquakes Are Menacing Argentina as Regulators Stand By

Story and photos by Katie Surma

A family of mountain gorillas lives under protection at Bwindi Impenetrable National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site in Uganda. Credit: Mehmet Emin Yogurtcuoglu/Anadolu via Getty Images

The Global Mining Boom Puts African Great Apes at Greater Risk Than Previously Known

By Katie Surma

Pollution from smelting and mining operations in La Oroya, Peru have made the Andean city one of the most contaminated places on Earth. Credit: Mitchell Gilbert/AIDA

International Court Issues First-Ever Decision Enforcing the Right to a Healthy Environment

By Katie Surma

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