[IPSM] RELEASE: Grassy Narrows Warns Weyerhaeuser

[Nora Butler-Burke]

*For Immediate Release:
*February 28, 2006

*Contact:
*Brianna Cayo Cotter, (415) 305-1943

*Grassy Narrows Warns Weyerhaeuser: “Withdraw or Face Fierce Campaign”

**Grassy Narrows, Ontario*- The Grassy Narrows First Nation today sent 
letters warning the chief executives of Weyerhaeuser (NYSE: WY) and 
Abitibi-Consolidated to “immediately cease and desist from all logging 
and industrial resource extraction on our territory” or face a “fierce 
international campaign”.

The letter follows a decade of failed negotiations, lawsuits, 
environmental assessment requests, public protests, and a 3-year logging 
blockade. The letter asserts that decades of unsustainable logging has 
“poisoned our waters with mercury and other toxins, nearly eliminated 
our ability to practice our way of life, and robbed us of economic 
opportunities.”

The letter includes an SOS to the international environmental and human 
rights community to stand with Grassy Narrows in their demands and 
expand the struggle in the woods, in the streets and in the market place.

*American Dream: First Nation’s Nightmare
*
In the 1990s Weyerhaeuser fiber-supplier Abitibi dramatically increased 
logging rates in Grassy Narrows without the consent or proper 
consultation of the community. According to a report by the Canadian 
Parks and Wilderness Society, Abitibi cut almost all of the remaining 
endangered woodland caribou habitat between 1999 and 2004 and regularly 
clear-cuts huge tracts of land, sprays the land with pesticides, and 
replants with monoculture tree plantations.

According to plans filed with the Ontario Ministry of Forests in 2003, 
Abitibi-Consolidated and Weyerhaeuser will continue their clear-cut 
logging operations within the community’s traditional territory through 
at least 2009, and have requested an extension to log through 2024.

Nearly half of this wood will supply Weyerhaeuser’s Trus Joist/ 
Timberstrand mill and will be used widely by American homebuilders, the 
US building industry and by Weyerhaeuser’s own home-building 
subsidiaries to build American tract homes in suburbs throughout the US.

Most of the remaining wood taken from Grassy Narrows territory is used 
by Abitibi-Consolidated to manufacture Abitibi paper products. Abitibi 
newsprint is used for hundreds of newspapers including the New York 
Times and the Washington Post.

*Grassy Narrows First Nation

*The people of Grassy Narrows First Nation have lived on 2,500 square 
miles of land north of Kenora, Ontario for thousands of years. Nearly 
50% of the community still sustain themselves from the land by hunting, 
trapping, and gathering medicine and berries. The old-growth habitat 
provided by these areas also support animal species like the pine martin 
and woodland caribou critical to the ecological integrity of the area.

The Royal Proclamation of 1763, Treaty #3, and the Canadian Constitution 
all outline the rights of indigenous people to their traditional lands. 
An ongoing lawsuit between the members of Grassy Narrows First Nation, 
the Minister of Natural Resources and Abitibi-Consolidated claims that 
the community was not properly consulted or compensated by the company, 
and that Abitibi’s clear-cut practices are making it impossible for the 
people of Grassy Narrows to exercise their Treaty 3 right to hunt and 
trap on their traditional territory. The lawsuit, if successful, would 
revoke all current cutting rights on Grassy Narrows land north of the 
English river.

*Supporting Statements

*“The clear-cutting of the land, and the destruction of the forest is an 
attack on our people,” says *Roberta Kessik, Grassy Narrows’ blockader, 
grandmother, and trapper*. “The land is the basis of who we are. Our 
culture is a land based culture and the destruction of the land is the 
destruction of our culture. And we know that is in the plans. 
Weyerhaeuser doesn't want us on the land, they want us out of the way so 
they can take the resources. We can't allow them to carry on with this 
cultural genocide."

“For years now, we have attempted to voice our concerns within this 
process with very little constructive response or progress towards 
desired benefits for the trappers,” explains *Gabriel Fobister, Head of 
Grassy Narrows Trappers’ Council*. “All we have seen is the demise of 
our way of life which disappears every time more cutting areas are 
extended to Abitibi and Weyerhaeuser. In despair our trappers are ending 
up in the streets in the cities to become homeless people and living off 
the soup lines.”

“The government and the logging industry have conspired to destroy much 
of what we hold sacred,” says *Joseph B Fobister, Grassy Narrows 
business owner and community leader*. “Our traditional values and 
culture are suffering and are headed towards extinction. This land and 
the forests that are an integral part of it have sustained our people 
for time immemorial. We watch as they disappear on the backs of logging 
trucks to paper mills all over the continent.

We do not have more to give. We are left to deal with the environmental 
and sociological nightmare left behind following tree “harvesting”. Most 
of our trap lines have been decimated along with the old growth forests. 
A way of life disappears with these forests. This way of life does not 
grow back. Tree planters cannot replace it. Yet the government and 
corporations show no interest in correcting unsustainable economic 
growth. We are not against economic development; we simply realize that 
it should not be considered an end unto itself.

We have participated fully in planning for many years and our concerns 
are never properly considered. We are never treated as equal partners in 
the process. What’s worse, our attendance at the information sessions 
and open houses is misconstrued as participation or approval.”

For more information visit *FriendsofGrassyNarrows.com* or 
*WakeUpWeyco.com*.