[IPSM] Underreported Struggles #18

[willowtree at mts.net]

In this month’s Underreported Struggles: a First Nation “Days of action” 
campaign begins in Canada; the UN Admits its Climate Change Program 
Threatens Indigenous Peoples; Sarawak’s government announces policy to 
depose Penan leaders; The Dakota Reclaim Sacred land in Minnesota; 
Uranium leaks coming close to contaminating Hopi water supply.


      Underreported Struggles #18, September 2008

/Originally posted at 
http://intercontinentalcry.org/underreported-struggles-18//
**

*September 30* - Canada drops most charges against Mohawk activist 
<http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/09/29/brant-charges.html> - Facing 
numerous defence motions that would have laid bare police actions, the 
Crown dropped most charges Monday against Shawn Brant, a Mohawk from the 
Tyendinaga who helped organize a blockade last summer of an Ontario 
highway and rail line, and agreed to a slap-on-the-wrist-penalty for the 
remaining ones. Prosecutors were initially seeking a jail sentence of 12 
years.

Makah grandmothers plan long walk to demand treaty rights be honored 
<http://www.peninsuladailynews.com/article/20080930/NEWS/809300307> - 
Three Makah grandmothers will leave Wednesday for a 330-mile walk and 
ride to Portland, Ore., to protest what they say is a continual 
violation of Native American treaty rights. “Article 6 [of the US 
constitution] states that treaties are the law of the land and that 
federal judges will adhere to it,” says Dotti Chamblin, the secretary of 
the group. “A lot of things haven’t happened that way. We ceded land to 
have a peace treaty, and there’s a lot of atrocities that have happened 
to us that would not have happened to any other race of people ­ at 
least we think so, we grandmothers.”

*September 29* - UN Admits Its Climate Change Program Threatens 
Indigenous Peoples 
<http://www.huntingtonnews.net/political/080929-staff-politicalclimatechange.html> 
- On September 25, 2008, The United Nations officially [launched] REDD, 
a collaborative program with the FAO, UNDP, and the World Bank that 
seeks to bring forests in the carbon market. REDD (Reducing Emissions 
from Deforestation and Degradation) has caused anxiety, protest and 
outrage throughout the world since it was created at the failed climate 
change negotiations in Bali and funded by the World Bank.”

First Nation “Days of action” campaign begins 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/first-nation-days-of-action-campaign-begins/> 
- Centered on ushering in “a new era of first nations relations with the 
Crown,” the “days of action” campaign is now officially underway. On 
Sunday, “protesters representing Treaty 4 First Nations brought traffic 
on Highway 1 east of Regina to a crawl and barricaded the road leading 
into a pipeline construction compound…”

Indigenous Leader Assassinated In Colombia 
<http://colombiareports.com/colombian-news/news/1473-cauca-indigenous-leader-assassinated.html> 
- An indigenous leader has been assassinated over the weekend by 
right-wing paramilitaries. It is a deadly reminder of the death squad 
culture still thriving in Colombia under the U.S.-backed Uribe regime. 
According to the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC), Raúl 
Mendoza, indigenous governor of the cabildo Peñón and former member of 
the council, was shot dead inside his home by paramilitary hitmen. The 
council says the murder is the last of three assassinations that took 
place in Cauca the past week.

TransCanada must prove it respects Lubicon rights 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/transcanada-must-prove-it-respects-lubicon-rights/> 
- The Lubicon Cree Nation have informed TransCanada that they are 
willing to consider talking with the company about their plan to build a 
pipeline through unceded Lubicon Territory. However, Chief Ominayak of 
the Cree Nation states that such a meeting depends solely on the Crown 
corporation respecting Lubicon rights, something that must begin with 
the “suspension of TransCanada’s application [...] to build that 
pipeline without first obtaining Lubicon agreement.”


Dam expansion threatens the Winnemen Wintu 
<http://washingtontimes.com/news/2008/sep/29/dam-plan-eyes-indians-land/%20> 
- The federal government is considering enlarging a dam to boost 
[California's] water supply, which would flood what little land remains 
above water where an American Indian tribe had fished and farmed for 
centuries. Nine-tenths of the ancestral land of the Winnemen Wintu was 
submerged in 1945, when the federal government built a 602-foot dam 
downstream of their ceremonial and prayer grounds.

*September 28* - Wet’suwet’en Vote Unanimously for 10-Year Coalbed 
Methane Moratorium 
<http://www.nationtalk.ca/modules/news/article.php?storyid=13729&keywords=treaty> 
- The First Nations Summit has just passed a resolution calling for a 
10-year moratorium on all coalbed methane (CBM) drilling in the province 
of BC. The resolution comes on the heels of a similar one passed 
yesterday by the Union of BC Municipalities.

Brazil: Opposition to Guarani land rights intensifies 
<http://www.survival-international.org/news/3760> - The Guarani Indians 
of the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul suffered a setback last 
week when FUNAI, the government’s Indian affairs department, suddenly 
suspended studies being carried out to identify their territories. The 
Guarani suffer from acute land shortages, and have been fighting for 
decades to win back their land. With the rapid expansion of sugar cane 
and soya plantations, they are being squeezed onto tiny reservations or 
forced to camp by the side of highways.

*September 25* - Uranium Contamination threatens Hopi water supply 
<http://www.jackcentral.com/news/2008/09/contamination-threatens-hopi-water-supply/> 
- Uranium leaks discovered in the groundwater have come closer to 
contaminating the entire supply of drinking water for two villages in 
the Hopi reservation. A series of studies conducted by consultants of 
the Hopi tribe and Navajo Nation show uranium contamination within 100 
feet of water supply wells that provide all the drinking water to the 
village of Lower Moencopi. In addition, contamination is within 2,000 
feet of the water supply spring that provides all the drinking water to 
the village of Upper Moenkopi. As of the 2000 census, the two villages 
are home to 901 people.

Tribal members concerned about proposed oil refinery 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/tribal-members-concerned-about-proposed-oil-refinery/> 
- Tribal community members from the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nations 
have major concerns about the dangers they will face if the Council of 
the Three Affiliated Tribes (TAT), along with Triad Engineers Limited 
(of Linden, Utah and Calgary, Alberta, Canada), go ahead with their plan 
to build a new oil refinery on the Fort Berthold Reservation in North 
Dakota.

*September 24* - Sarawak government deposes Penan leaders 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/government-deposes-tribal-leaders-who-oppose-logging/> 
- In an attempt to break the resistance to logging in the rainforests of 
Sarawak, the government has officially announced that it will no longer 
recognize tribal leaders in some Penan communities.

*September 20* - Malaysia pushes individual land titles on to the Orang 
Asli 
<http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Saturday/National/2354870/Article/index_html> 
- The Orang Asli Affairs Department has called on states to push 
individual land titles on to the indigenous community in Perak. An Orang 
Asli activists group says the push is illegal because it violates the 
UNDRIP, which obligates the government to gain the Orang’s consent on 
matters that effect them. (more 
<http://thestar.com.my/lifestyle/story.asp?file=/2008/9/28/lifefocus/2075609&sec=lifefocus> 
recent news 
<http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Sunday/National/2349239/Article/index_html> 
on the Orang Asli)

*September 19* - Police carry out surprise raids on corporate 
contaminators 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/police-carry-out-suprise-raids-on-corporate-contaminators/> 
- On September 10th, a caravan of inspectors from Argentina’s National 
Environmental Authority, the SAYDS, accompanied by 100 national 
guardsman and a busload of federal and local police, carried out a 
surprise raid on 34 companies said to be contaminating the 
Matanza-Riachuelo river basin in northeastern Buenos Aires.

*September 17* - Cameco continues to target Lakota territory for uranium 
<http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2008/09/cameco-continues-to-target-lakota.html> 
- Cameco, the Canadian company that mysteriously received tons of yellow 
cake supposedly from Iraq — and who is responsible for a number of 
spills in Nebraska, Wyoming, and Canada — are continuing to target 
Lakota territory for uranium mining.

Ambushed in the Land without Evil 
<http://angryindian.blogspot.com/2008/09/ambushed-in-land-without-evil.html> 
- On Thursday, September 11th at three in the morning in Tres Barracas, 
near the town of Porvenir, Bolivia, the prefecture’s people ambushed and 
brutally machine-gunned the peasants as they marched towards a congress 
of their departmental organization. Men, women and children ran to save 
their lives, but they were immediately riddled with bullets, wounded or 
taken by force to be tortured and later cynically handed in by illegal 
groups associated with the Prefecture to the Police, pretending that the 
victims of the barbarism were the guilty. (more info 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/oppose-the-us-backed-civil-coup-in-bolivia/>)

*September 16* - Ghana: urgent call for implementation of human rights 
and mining report 
<http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=8804> - The National 
Coalition on Mining (NCOM) and victims of mining related human rights 
abuses across the country have called for the urgent implementation of 
the recommendations of the recently launched report on the state of 
Human Rights in Mining Communities in Ghana.

India: the hills are alive with the sounds of protest 
<http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=8805> - A powerful 
organisation of uranium-rich villages of Meghalaya today asked the 
Centre to “forget” about mining uranium in West Khasi Hills, as it would 
continue to oppose any move to put people’s health at risk. The Langrin 
Youth Welfare Association (LYWA) is an NGO comprising representatives 
from 15 villages in West Khasi Hills.

*September 7* - Reclaiming Sacred Dakota Land in Minnesota 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/reclaiming-sacred-dakota-land-in-minnesota/>
On September 2nd, members of the Oceti Sakowin (Seven Council Fires) of 
the Dakota Oyate (Dakota Nation) reclaimed a sacred site known as 
Coldwater Spring, in the city of Minneapolis, Minnesota.

*September 5* - One wounded as paramilitaries attack Zapatistas 
<http://www.ww4report.com/node/5990> - The Zapatista Good Government 
Junta (JBG) “Corazón del arcoiris de la esperanza,” based in the Chiapas 
jungle village of Morelia, issued a statement denouncing aggression by 
followers of the Organization for the Defense of Indigenous and 
Campesino Rights (OPDDIC) in the community of K’an akil, autonomous 
municipality Olga Isabel. Various shots were fired “without reason or 
motive” in the Aug. 29 attack against Zapatista campesinos—one of whom 
was wounded in the abdomen.

People of Bhopal Lead the Way to Justice 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/the-people-of-bhopal-lead-the-way-to-justice/> 
- Some important news came out of India last month that didn’t get much 
play here in the West, and perhaps for good reason. On August 8, the 
People of Bhopal won a major victory when the Indian government agreed 
to meet the full set of demands issued by the ‘Walk Your Talk’ campaign 
for justice in Bhopal.

*September 2* - The Ashaninka People Will Not Allow These Abuses 
<http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=43763> - “We will not allow the oil 
company to come in because it will bring pollution and we will suffer,” 
said Medaly Pancho, a member of the Ashaninka community in the central 
Peruvian province of Junín. “We hunt and fish, we live our peaceful 
lives, and we don’t want that to change.” Junín is the scenario of yet 
another conflict between indigenous people and extractive industry 
companies in Peru’s Amazon jungle region.

Grassy Narrows youth show signs of poisoning 
<http://www.ammsa.com/windspeaker/articles/2008/wind-sep-08-2.html> - 
Are Aboriginal children in North Western Ontario still paying the price 
of a 46-year-old environmental crime? Cerebral palsy, developmental 
delays and seizures are symptoms of mercury poisoning, and they are 
conditions that community members at Asubpeeschoseewagong (Grassy 
Narrows) are noticing with concern among their young.

*September 1* - B.C. Court rules on consultation obligations to First 
Nations 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/bc-court-rules-on-consultation-obligations-to-first-nations/>
“The Crown’s obligation to reasonably consult is not fulfilled simply by 
providing a process within which to exchange and discuss information”, 
states B.C. Supreme Court Justice Kathryn Neilson in her final ruling on 
the Crown’s consultation obligations to Indigenous People in Canada.


      Videos

On the Matter of Tar Sands & Indigenous Lands 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/on-the-matter-of-tar-sands-indigenous-lands/> 
- In this 10 minute video, Clayton Thomas-Mueller, of the Mathais Colomb 
Cree Nation (Pukatawagan) in Northern Manitoba, talks about the Alberta 
Tar Sands industrial project, its effect on the health of indigenous 
communities, and the industry’s role in continuing Canada’s exploitative 
colonial legacy.

Damning the Yin Ta Lai 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/damning-the-yin-ta-lai/> - Damning the 
Yin Ta Lai is a short, 13-minute video that provides a rare glimpse into 
the heart of Karenni State in eastern Burma, and the lives and 
environment of the Yin Ta Lai. Living along the Salween river, the Yin 
Ta Lai are facing extinction from the Weigyi dam, one of five 
controversial dams that are planned for the Salween.

Testimony of indigenous lawyer to the Supreme Court 
<http://intercontinentalcry.org/testimony-of-indigenous-lawyer-to-the-supreme-court/> 
- Before the first of eleven Brazilian Supreme Court Judges handed down 
his ruling on whether or not the government should uphold the 
legally-recognized Indigenous Territory of Raposa-Serra do Sol — an 
indigenous lawyer, Joênia Batista de Carvalho, rose in front of the 
Judges to defend her people. This is a video of her words.