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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]
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

An aerial view of Aruba’s Palm Beach. Credit: VWPICS/Jimmy Villalta/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Aruba Embraces the Rights of Nature and a Human Right to a Clean Environment

By Katie Surma

The lawsuit to obtain recognition of the Marañón River’s legal rights was filed by the Huaynakana Kamatahuara Kana, a federation of Kukama Indigenous women. Credit: Miguel Araoz/Quisca

Landmark Peruvian Court Ruling Says the Marañón River Has Legal Rights To Exist, Flow and Be Free From Pollution

By Katie Surma

A man walks through debris in Marsh Harbour, Bahamas on Sept. 9, 2019 in the aftermath of Hurricane Dorian. Credit: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images

How Developing Nations Battered by Climate Change Are Crushed by Debt From International Lenders

By Katie Surma

A member of the Indigenous Baduy tribe works at his field on Indonesia's Java island. Anthropologist Gonzalo Oviedo says Indigenous communities in Southeast Asia “tend to recognize many more varieties of plant subspecies.” Credit: Bay Ismoyo/AFP via Getty Images

Q&A: To Save The Planet, Traditional Indigenous Knowledge Is Indispensable

By Katie Surma

In the case of Great Barrier Reef green turtles, rising temperatures have been linked to changing sex-determination, with an increasing number of new hatchlings born female. Credit: Jonas Gratzer/LightRocket via Getty Images

The World Is Losing Migratory Species at Alarming Rates

By Katie Surma

Andrea Bowers, Rights of Nature I, 2022, neon. Credit: Katie Surma/Inside Climate News.

Fighting for a Foothold in American Law, the Rights of Nature Movement Finds New Possibilities in a Change of Venue: the Arts

By Katie Surma

State park visitors walk along a section of the Great Salt Lake that used to be underwater on Aug. 2, 2021 near Magna, Utah. Credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Utah Legislature Takes Aim at Rights of Nature Movement

By Katie Surma

Anival Tanguila, a Quichua leader from the Corazón del Oriente Community, stands next to decommissioned Perenco oil infrastructure in the Ecuadorian Amazon on March 22, 2023. Credit: Katie Surma/Inside Climate News

How Wealthy Corporations Use Investment Agreements to Extract Millions From Developing Countries

By Nicholas Kusnetz, Katie Surma

Snowfall covers Boulder Creek near Nederland, Colorado. Credit: Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post via Getty Images

Colorado Town Appoints Legal Guardians to Implement the Rights of a Creek and a Watershed

By Katie Surma

Environmental activists from the Irish Wildlife Trust and Extinction Rebellion called on the Irish Government to introduce legislation in the form of a Biodiversity Act at a protest outside the National Biodiversity Conference in Dublin Castle on June 8, 2022. Credit: Niall Carson/PA Images via Getty Images

Ireland Could Become the Next Nation to Recognize the Rights of Nature and a Human Right to a Clean Environment

By Katie Surma

Conta, a member of the Tagaeri and Baihuaeri Waorani Indigenous groups, appears (via pre recorded video) before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights on August 23, 2022 for a hearing in the first ever court case involving the rights of uncontacted Indigenous peoples. Conta lived the first six or seven years of her life in voluntary isolation with her Tageri family. Credit: Courtesy of the Inter American Court of Human Rights

Spanning Two Worlds, Judith Kimerling Explores Ecuador’s Rainforest and the Rule of Law That Might Save Those Who Live There

By Katie Surma

Judith Kimerling kneeling on pipelines above a drilling waste pit in the Ecuadorian Amazon in July 1990. Credit: Courtesy of Judith Kimerling

Judith Kimerling’s 1991 ‘Amazon Crude’ Exposed the Devastation of Oil Exploration in Ecuador. If Only She Could Make it Stop

By Katie Surma

Trucks hauling cut timber in Brazil legally must have license tags visible on the ends of the logs. The driver of this truck, on the Transgarimpeira, near Itaituba, confirmed that his load of hardwoods is illegal and without the required tags. Credit: Larry C. Price

The EU Overhauls Its Law Covering Environmental Crimes, Banning Specific Acts and Increasing Penalties

By Katie Surma

An artisanal cassiterite mine in February 2022 in Manono. The Democratic Republic of Congo is rich with Lithium, an essential mineral for electric car batteries. Credit: Junior Kannah/AFP via Getty Images

Corruption and Rights Abuses Are Flourishing in Lithium Mining Across Africa, a New Report Finds

By Katie Surma

People walk along the beach looking at property damaged by Hurricane Ian on September 29, 2022 in Bonita Springs, Florida. The storm made a U.S. landfall on Cayo Costa, Florida, and brought high winds, storm surges, and rain to the area causing severe damage. Credit: Sean Rayford/Getty Images

Report Charts Climate Change’s Growing Impact in the US, While Stressing Benefits of Action

By Marianne Lavelle, Katie Surma, Kiley Price, Nicholas Kusnetz

Sudanese security forces intervene in October 2021 as smoke billows from tyres set on fire by Sudanese students in the city of Nyala, the capital of South Darfur, demonstrating against the hikes in bread prices due to low wheat supply following the closure of Sudans' Red Sea port of Port Sudan. Credit: Abdelmonim Madibu/AFP via Getty Images.

How Climate Change Drives Conflict and War Crimes Around the Globe

By Katie Surma

Aerial view of Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo. The country is currently facing claims through the investor-state dispute settlements process, or ISDS, from three foreign mining companies seeking more than $30 billion, twice its gross domestic product.Credit: Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images.

A Shadowy Corner of International Law Is Threatening Climate Action, U.N. Expert Warns

By Nicholas Kusnetz, Katie Surma

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