Category: Global

Glob­al

Groundswell shuts down Ta Ann veneer mill (Tasmania)

 Grass­roots envi­ron­men­tal group Groundswell have today shut down oper­a­tions at Ta Ann’s veneer mill in Smith­ton, with a peace­ful protest. The group are high­light­ing the ongo­ing loss of Tasmania’s forests by Ta Ann, 2 pro­test­ers are locked onto a con­vey­or belt inside the mill, com­plete­ly shut­ting down oper­a­tions. A num­ber of oth­er mem­bers of the group are present and hold­ing a ban­ner in front of the mill, which reads; “TA ANN – SELLING TASMANIAN FOREST DESTRUCTION”.  Ta Ann is a Malaysian-based tim­ber com­pa­ny that has been accused of human rights vio­la­tions and con­tin­ues to destroy pris­tine rain­for­est in the Malaysian state of Sarawak. Ta Ann has had log­ging con­tracts in Tas­ma­nia from 2006 and is the dri­ving force behind the ongo­ing log­ging of old growth forests.  

“Today’s protest is being held at the Ta Ann Smith­ton mill to oppose the ongo­ing dev­as­ta­tion of Tasmania’s native forests just for the sake of a quick prof­it.” Groundswell spokesper­son Dr Lisa Sear­le said.

“As the for­est peace talks have car­ried on over the last 3 years, the destruc­tion of Tasmania’s native forests has con­tin­ued. The talks have so far failed to deliv­er any form of per­ma­nent pro­tec­tion and the future of these ecosys­tems hangs in the bal­ance. .” Dr Sear­le con­tin­ued.  

“There is cur­rent­ly a very lim­it­ed mar­ket for Tas­man­ian wood­chips, and Ta Ann is dri­ving the con­tin­u­ing destruc­tion of huge tracts of for­est. These forests are being clear-felled just to remove a few select logs for Ta Ann while low-grade sawlogs and wood­chip-grade logs are being left behind to rot in these dec­i­mat­ed areas.” Said Dr Sear­le.

The pro­test­ers will stay in place locked onto machin­ery until they are removed and Groundswell will con­tin­ue stand­ing up for the pro­tec­tion of our wild nat­ur­al state.

*Update: ENVIRONNMENTAL activists have been removed from a con­vey­or belt at the Ta Ann veneer mill in Smith­ton.

Tas­ma­nia Police offi­cers were called to the site ear­li­er today after two pro­test­ers from green group Groundswell chained them­selves to machin­ery inside the tim­ber pro­cess­ing plant. Sev­er­al oth­er activists gath­ered out­side the mill.

Groundswell said the “peace­ful protest” was aimed at high­light­ing the ongo­ing loss of Tas­man­ian forests to pro­vide the tim­ber used in the mill.

Ta Ann Tas­ma­nia said it was dis­ap­point­ed the group was ille­gal­ly protest­ing at its Smith­ton mill today.

“Ta Ann Tas­ma­nia also wish­es to point out that it is not a log­ger, as false­ly claimed, but a “tim­ber proces­sor”,” a com­pa­ny spokesper­son said.

Tas­ma­nia Police issued a short state­ment at 12.25pm, say­ing the Ta Ann demon­stra­tion had been cleared

Indigenous Communities in Oaxaca, Mexico Fight Corporate Wind Farms

More than five cen­turies after Colom­bus’ arrival in the Amer­i­c­as, the inva­sion of Euro­pean pow­ers con­tin­ues to threat­en tra­di­tion­al ways of life in indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties in Mex­i­co.  The con­flict against the cor­po­rate takeover of the ances­tral lands of the Huave, or Ikoots peo­ple, in the Isth­mus of Tehuan­te­pec in Oax­a­ca is just one of the strug­gles con­tin­u­ous­ly being played out in the face of trans-nation­al devel­op­ment poli­cies such as Plan Puebla Pana­ma (now known as Proyec­to Mesoamer­i­ca).

The Ikoots peo­ple of Oax­a­ca have inhab­it­ed the Isth­mus of Tehuan­te­pec for more than 3000 years, pre-dat­ing the bet­ter-known Zapotec cul­ture in Oax­a­ca.  They are a fish­ing soci­ety that depends on the ocean for their liveli­hood; the Ikoots peo­ples’ his­to­ry is so inte­grat­ed with the sea that they are also known as Mareños (“Ocean­ers”). Now Ikoots com­mu­ni­ties are strug­gling to defend their ances­tral lands from multi­na­tion­al cor­po­ra­tions who want to build wind tur­bines in the water along the coast, in the very ocean that has sup­port­ed their way of life for cen­turies.

In April of 2004, the Unit­ed States Depart­ment of Ener­gy (DOE) and the US Agency for Inter­na­tion­al Devel­op­ment (USAID) spon­sored a study to accel­er­ate the devel­op­ment of wind projects in the state of Oax­a­ca, which found that the best area for wind project devel­op­ment was in the Isth­mus of Tehuan­te­pec, in the heart of the ances­tral Ikoots ter­ri­to­ry. [1]  The pro­posed Par­que Eoli­co San Dion­i­sio (San Dion­i­sio Wind Park), a wind farm to be con­struct­ed in the ocean along the coast, would con­sist of 102 wind tur­bines in the water out­side the town of San Dion­i­sio del Mar (and 30 more out­side neigh­bor­ing San­ta Maria del Mar), two elec­tric trans­former sub­sta­tions, six access paths and addi­tion­al sup­port struc­tures. [2] It would take up 27 kilo­me­ters of coast­line.  The multi­na­tion­als imple­ment­ing the project have also informed the Mex­i­can gov­ern­ment that they will need to install 5 moor­ing docks in the Lagu­na Supe­ri­or, a coastal lagoon that local com­mu­ni­ties heav­i­ly depend on for fish­ing. [3]

The con­struc­tion of wind tur­bines would have a dev­as­tat­ing effect on both Ikoots soci­ety and the envi­ron­ment.  The com­mu­ni­ty fears that the vibra­tion from the machines would destroy the aquat­ic life in the area, which is the eco­nom­ic basis of sur­vival for Ikoots com­mu­ni­ties such as San Dion­i­sio del Mar, San Mateo del Mar and San Fran­cis­co del Mar.  “This is the life of the poor: we fish so we can eat and have some­thing to sell, to have a bit of mon­ey.  They say that now that the wind project is here, they’ll give us mon­ey for our land and sea, but the mon­ey won’t last for­ev­er.  We don’t agree with this. How are we going to live?” says Lau­ra Celaya Altami­ra­no, a res­i­dent of Isla Pueblo Viejo and the wife of a fish­er­man. [4] The wind tur­bines also present a threat to migra­to­ry birds and would dam­age the ecosys­tems of the local man­grove swamps.  In addi­tion, the pro­posed con­struc­tion would des­e­crate Ikoots sacred ter­ri­to­ry, name­ly the Isla de San Dion­i­sio and the Bar­ra de San­ta Tere­sa (known by the Ikoots com­mu­ni­ties as Tileme).

The pro­posed loca­tion for the aquat­ic wind farm is San Dion­i­sio del Mar, a town of about 5000 res­i­dents.  The project in San Dion­i­sio is being imple­ment­ed by a con­sor­tium called Mareña Ren­ov­able, which con­sists of the glob­al invest­ment bank Mac­quar­ie, based in Aus­tralia; the Dutch invest­ment group PGGM; and the Mit­subishi Cor­po­ra­tion of Japan.  It includes tur­bines con­struct­ed by the Dan­ish Com­pa­ny Ves­tas Wind Sys­tems, and the involve­ment of two wind pow­er com­pa­nies:  Grupo Pre­neal of Spain, and DEMEX of Mex­i­co.  The project also has fund­ing from the Inter-Amer­i­can Devel­op­ment Bank. [5] The elec­tric­i­ty from the farm would be used to pow­er such cor­po­rate giants as FEMSA (based in Mex­i­co, the largest bev­er­age com­pa­ny in Latin Amer­i­ca), Coca-Cola, Heineken, and oth­er multi­na­tion­al cor­po­ra­tions. [6]

A total dis­re­gard for the envi­ron­ment and the liveli­hoods of local peo­ple is par for the course when multi­na­tion­als step in to take over com­mu­nal lands for prof­it.  In the Isth­mus of Tehuan­te­pec, wind pow­er com­pa­nies have been exploit­ing local com­mu­ni­ties for years, pres­sur­ing farm­ers (most with lit­tle for­mal edu­ca­tion) to sign con­tracts they often don’t under­stand in order to give up their rights to land that has been held com­mu­nal­ly for gen­er­a­tions. “Oax­a­ca is the cen­ter of com­mu­nal landown­er­ship. There is prob­a­bly no worse place to make a land deal in Mex­i­co,” says Ben Cokelet, founder of the Project on Orga­niz­ing, Devel­op­ment, Edu­ca­tion, and Research.[7] Devel­op­ers held meet­ings with locals in which mod­el wind­mills the size of din­ner plat­ters were shown; they were led to believe they could con­tin­ue farm­ing around them. Lat­er they were shocked to see 15-to-20-sto­ry tur­bines con­struct­ed, tak­ing up acres of their land.  Devel­op­ers pay the farm­ers a pit­tance in exchange for their land, often pay­ing only 1/5th of what they would pay for sim­i­lar land in the US, or 1/7th of what they would pay the Mex­i­can gov­ern­ment for the same land.  And, in a move that exac­er­bates ten­sion in the com­mu­ni­ty, local lead­ers are giv­en bet­ter deals for their land in order to make the process more appeal­ing to the rest of the pop­u­la­tion: “The first guy or two that bites gets [$8] per square meter. That’s a hun­dred times bet­ter con­tract than the oth­er peo­ple,” says Cokelet. “But the 98 per­cent of farm­ers who sign after­wards sign on for rock-bot­tom prices. Those one or two peo­ple who bite – they don’t bite because they’re lucky. They bite because they know some­one. And their job … is to sell it to all their neigh­bors.” [8]

There are cur­rent­ly 14 wind farms built on land in the Isth­mus of Tehuan­te­pec, with 4 under con­struc­tion in 2012 and 3 more sched­uled for 2013. [9]  Accord­ing to the Declaración de San Dion­i­sio del Mar, released on Sep­tem­ber 17 by the indige­nous rights orga­ni­za­tion UCIZONI (La Unión de Comu­nidades de la Zona Norte del Ist­mo — The Union of Com­mu­ni­ties in the North Zone of the Isth­mus), the com­mu­ni­ties affect­ed by the 14 exist­ing wind farms have not ben­e­fit­ed from low­er elec­tric­i­ty rates; rather, the inten­tion of the farms is clear­ly to serve the inter­ests of transna­tion­al cor­po­ra­tions such as Coca-Cola, Wal­mart, Nes­tle, Bim­bo and oth­ers. [10] The wind tur­bines in San Dion­i­sio are the first pro­posed tur­bines to be built in the sea.  Ikoots com­mu­ni­ties would not even ben­e­fit from the jobs cre­at­ed by the wind tur­bines; the con­struc­tion and main­te­nance of the wind tur­bines would most cer­tain­ly be giv­en to employ­ees of the multi­na­tion­al cor­po­ra­tions fund­ing the project, not to local fish­er­men.

The Ikoots com­mu­ni­ty of San Dion­i­sio del Mar did not con­sent to this project, nor were they even informed that it was under con­sid­er­a­tion.  The Inter­na­tion­al Labour Orga­ni­za­tion, a Unit­ed Nations agency deal­ing with labor rights, specif­i­cal­ly states in its Con­ven­tion 169 (Con­ven­tion on Indige­nous and Trib­al Peo­ples) that “spe­cial mea­sures… be adopt­ed to safe­guard the per­sons, insti­tu­tions, prop­er­ty, labour, cul­tures and envi­ron­ment of these [indige­nous] peo­ples. In addi­tion, the Con­ven­tion stip­u­lates that these spe­cial mea­sures should not go against the free wish­es of indige­nous peo­ples.” Mex­i­co rat­i­fied this con­ven­tion in 1990. [11] In this case, there was no pub­lic forum or announce­ment regard­ing the con­struc­tion of the wind farms.

“A com­mon prac­tice of for­eign busi­ness­es is to ‘buy’ [via bribes] the local PRI­ista author­i­ties,” says Car­los Beas Tor­res, a leader and co-founder of UCIZONI and a well-known activist for indige­nous rights. In 2004, Alvaro Sosa, the then-pres­i­dent of the “comis­ari­a­do de bienes comu­nales” (essen­tial­ly, the com­mis­sary for the ter­ri­to­ry held in com­mon by the com­mu­ni­ty), signed a pre­lim­i­nary con­tract rent­ing a sec­tion of land to the Span­ish cor­po­ra­tion Pre­neal with­out the knowl­edge of the town’s res­i­dents. The 30-year con­tract that gave the multi­na­tion­als access to 1643 hectares of land; Sosa did not inform the com­mu­ni­ty of this action and accept­ed bribes in exchange for his consent.[12]  The peo­ple of San Dion­i­sio del Mar did not find out about the exis­tence of this con­tract until late in 2011, when the munic­i­pal pres­i­dent, Miguel López Castel­lanos (a mem­ber of the Par­tido Rev­olu­cionario Insti­tu­cional, or PRI), again with­out con­sult­ing the com­mu­ni­ty gave his per­mis­sion for the con­sor­tium Mareña Ren­ov­ables to begin con­struc­tion of wind tur­bines in exchange for a pay­ment of between 14–20 mil­lion pesos (between $1–1.5 mil­lion USD). The multi­na­tion­als claim to have giv­en him 20 mil­lion pesos, but Lopez Castel­lanos only admits to receiv­ing 14 mil­lion pesos. [13]

Upon this dis­cov­ery, the res­i­dents of San Dion­i­sio held a pub­lic assem­bly where they demand­ed that the munic­i­pal pres­i­dent revoke his con­sent for the wind farm, which he refused to do. In Feb­ru­ary, rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the com­mu­ni­ty met with DEMEX in Mex­i­co City to request that the con­tract process start over, but were turned down. [14] Thus the strug­gle for con­trol of the Ikoots’ ances­tral land began.

Not sur­pris­ing­ly, an intense resis­tance move­ment against the wind farm has surged in San Dion­i­sio del Mar.  The towns­peo­ple have ini­ti­at­ed a legal bat­tle in the Tri­bunal Uni­tario Agrario (Agrar­i­an Uni­tary Tri­bunal), the gov­ern­ment agency in charge of set­tling agrar­i­an dis­putes, in an attempt to nul­li­fy the con­tract.  How­ev­er they are also tak­ing direct action in an attempt to defend their land.  In late Jan­u­ary 2012, com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers took pos­ses­sion of the munic­i­pal palace in San Dion­i­sio in protest, eject­ing munic­i­pal pres­i­dent Miguel López Castel­lanos, cre­at­ing the Asam­blea Gen­er­al del Pueblo de San Dion­i­sio (Gen­er­al Assem­bly of the Peo­ple of San Dion­i­sio), and declar­ing them­selves in resistance.[15]  In April, the San Dion­i­sio com­mu­nal assem­bly pre­vent­ed employ­ees of the multi­na­tion­als from lay­ing out access roads in the Bar­ra de San­ta Tere­sa, and set up a per­ma­nent watch to make sure the con­trac­tors do not return. [16] In Sep­tem­ber, com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers orga­nized a nation­al encuen­tro (or gath­er­ing) in San Dion­i­sio, with the par­tic­i­pa­tion of around 300 peo­ple from 25 dif­fer­ent indige­nous and activist orga­ni­za­tions from 6 dif­fer­ent states in Mexico.[17]  The intent of the encuen­tro was not only to raise aware­ness on what was hap­pen­ing on Ikoots land, but also to cre­ate a large-scale nation­al plan of action to resist megapro­jects such as the wind farms. “It’s prac­ti­cal­ly a sec­ond Span­ish Con­quest; they’re com­ing again to snatch our land with a con­tract that is com­plete­ly advan­ta­geous, dra­con­ian and in vio­la­tion of our rights as indige­nous peo­ple,” says Jesús Gar­cía Sosa, a rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the Asam­blea Gen­er­al. [18]

The resis­tance move­ment con­tin­ues to grow despite threats and intim­i­da­tion, as well as actu­al phys­i­cal attacks on com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers com­mit­ted by oppos­ing polit­i­cal fac­tions. The gen­er­al con­sen­sus is that these fac­tions are being paid by the multi­na­tion­als involved to ham­per resis­tance to the devel­op­ment project. On August 25, a rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the Asam­blea Gen­er­al named Moisés Juárez Muriel was bru­tal­ly attacked while walk­ing home in the evening by two men who beat him with stones. He was tak­en by two com­pañeros in resis­tance to the IMSS-Com­pla­mar clin­ic, where he was refused treat­ment because the clin­ic was under con­trol of the munic­i­pal pres­i­dent. [19] In mid-Sep­tem­ber, imme­di­ate­ly after the con­clu­sion of the encuen­tro in sup­port of the Ikoots com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers in resis­tance, a group of heav­i­ly armed indi­vid­u­als sur­round­ed the munic­i­pal palace that the com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers were occu­py­ing, point­ing guns at and intim­i­dat­ing the peo­ple who were guard­ing the build­ing. [20]

Resis­tance move­ment lead­ers have also received pub­lic death threats from polit­i­cal par­ties and anony­mous sources. On Octo­ber 6, a group of PRI agi­ta­tors marched through San Dion­i­sio, mak­ing spe­cif­ic death threats against Bet­ti­na Cruz Velazquez, a well-known human rights activist and founder of the Asam­blea de los Pueb­los Indí­ge­nas del Ist­mo de Tehuan­te­pec en Defen­sa de la Tier­ra y el Ter­ri­to­rio (Assem­bly of Indige­nous Peo­ples of the Isth­mus of Tehuan­te­pec in Defense of Land and Ter­ri­to­ry). Cruz Velazquez is deeply involved in the resis­tance move­ment against the wind project. Human rights groups in Mex­i­co have for­mal­ly asked the gov­er­nor of Oax­a­ca, Gabi­no Cué Mon­teagu­do, to guar­an­tee her safe­ty.  [21] Car­los Beas Tor­res of UCIZONI has received threat­en­ing phone calls for his pub­lic stance in oppo­si­tion of the project. [22]

In some cas­es, attempts to stop resis­tance sup­port have led to clashess. In mid-Octo­ber, two orga­ni­za­tions, El Frente por la Defen­sa de la Tier­ra (The Front for the Defense of the Earth) and UCIZONI sent a car­a­van of sup­port attempt­ing to bring food and sup­plies to the com­mu­ni­ty in resis­tance in San Dion­i­sio. A block­ade was set up by armed PRI­ista sym­pa­thiz­ers of the munic­i­pal pres­i­dent, Miguel López Castel­lanos, to keep the car­a­van from pass­ing. [23] A vio­lent con­fronta­tion ensued.

“The store own­ers in San Dion­i­sio belong to the PRI and refuse to sell food to the peo­ple resist­ing the wind project,” says Car­los Alber­to Ocaña, whose father (a native of San Dion­i­sio) was the dri­ver of the first truck in the sup­ply car­a­van. “When the car­a­van approached the town, it was stopped by a block­ade of about 70 peo­ple. They had guns, machetes, and gaso­line for set­ting the cars on fire.  My father was in the first truck with five oth­er peo­ple. They PRI­is­tas in the block­ade pulled them out of the truck and start­ed beat­ing them.” The police even­tu­al­ly arrived, but the car­a­van was unable to pass the bar­ri­cade to reach San Dion­i­sio and even­tu­al­ly it was forced to turn back with­out deliv­er­ing the sup­plies.

On Octo­ber 17 and 18, mem­bers of the Asam­blea Gen­er­al of San Dion­i­sio, UCIZONI, la Asam­blea de Pueb­los Indí­ge­nas del Ist­mo en Defen­sa de la Tier­ra y el Ter­ri­to­rio, la Alian­za Mex­i­cana por la Autode­ter­mi­nación de los Pueb­los (Mex­i­can Allaince for the Self-Deter­mi­na­tion of the Peo­ple, AMAP), and a half dozen oth­er groups held protests in Mex­i­co City. They held ral­lies in front of the Inter­amer­i­can Devel­op­ment Bank, Mit­subishi, Coca-Cola, Ves­tas, and the Dan­ish embassy. Their goal was twofold: to impede the con­struc­tion of the wind park in San Dion­i­sio, but also to pub­licly denounce the envi­ron­men­tal and cul­tur­al dam­age that threat­ens the Ikoots com­mu­ni­ties of the Isth­mus. They were received and allowed to present writ­ten com­plaints at the Inter­amer­i­can Devel­op­ment Bank, Ves­tas, and the Dan­ish embassy.  oca-Cola-FEM­SA refused to meet with them. [24] As of this writ­ing, the Ikoots com­mu­ni­ties’ strug­gle against cor­po­rate takeover con­tin­ues; in Novem­ber rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the com­mu­ni­ty will trav­el to the Nether­lands, with the sup­port of Dutch unions, to present a let­ter of protest in per­son to the Dutch invest­ment com­pa­ny PGGM.  In the words of Asam­blea Gen­er­al rep­re­sen­ta­tive Jesús Gar­cía Sosa, “We will not allow that busi­ness and gov­ern­ment to yet again dis­place us from our ter­ri­to­ry, which sym­bol­izes our very life, our moth­er, our father; we can’t sell it to them or put a price on it, much less in exchange for projects of death and plun­der.” [25]

On Octo­ber 30th, Pres­i­dent Felipe Calderon Hino­josa, who was in Oax­a­ca to inau­gu­rate a new high­way, also trav­elled to inau­gu­rate the Piedra Larga Wind Park. Calderon salut­ed the project, cit­ing it as a solu­tion to pover­ty and cli­mate change, and men­tion­ing the “addi­tion­al income” the res­i­dents of the town Unión Hidal­go would receive for allow­ing the tur­bines to be installed on their com­mu­nal land.

Mean­while, 300 meters out­side the park, theirn entrance blocked by nation­al police, near­ly 200 peo­ple from dif­fer­ent com­mu­ni­ties in the region includ­ing San Mateo del Mar, San Dion­i­sio del Mar, San Fran­cis­co del Mar, Unión Hidal­go, Juchitán, San­ta María Xadani and the UCIZONI, protest­ed the park’s open­ing. [26]

FOOTNOTES

1. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Oct. 14 2012.

2. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Aug. 20 2012.

3. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Apr. 21 2012.

4. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Aug. 20 2012.

5. Recharge News, Mar. 12 2012.

6. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Apr. 23 2012.

7. Chris­t­ian Sci­ence Mon­i­tor, Jan. 26 2012.

8. Ibid

9. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Oct. 11 2012.

10. UCIZONI state­ment, Sept. 17 2012.

11. Inter­na­tion­al Labor Orga­ni­za­tion Con­ven­tion 169.

12. La Jor­na­da, Aug. 23 2012.

13. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Aug. 20 2012.

14. Chris­t­ian Sci­ence Mon­i­tor, Feb. 28 2012.

15. El Sol del Ist­mo, Jan. 30 2012.

16. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Apr. 21 2012.

17. Des­per­tar de Oax­a­ca, Sept. 28 2012.

18. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Aug. 20 2012.

19. Qua­dratin Oax­a­ca, Oct. 9 2012.

20. Ibid.

21. E‑Oaxaca, Oct. 15 2012.

22. Qua­dratin Oax­a­ca, Oct. 9 2012

23. E‑Oaxaca, Oct. 11 2012.

24. La Jor­na­da, Oct. 17 2012:

25. Noti­cias de Oax­a­ca, Aug. 20 2012.

26. Eco Noti­cias Huat­ul­co. Oct 30, 2012.

TAMPAKAN MASSACRE: International solidarity requested against SMI-Xstrata corporation (Philippines, Switzerland)

SMI-Xstra­ta is a Swiss cor­po­ra­tion which has a min­ing appli­ca­tion in south Cota­ba­to, Min­danao. despite the resis­tance of the com­mu­ni­ty the Philip­pine gov­ern­ment is back­ing-up the said appli­ca­tion.

SMI-Xstra­ta is a Swiss cor­po­ra­tion which has a min­ing appli­ca­tion in south Cota­ba­to, Min­danao. despite the resis­tance of the com­mu­ni­ty the Philip­pine gov­ern­ment is back­ing-up the said appli­ca­tion.

In order to silence the resis­tance the gov­ern­ment use the mil­i­tary. 13 peo­ple were killed includ­ing an 8 years old boy and 3 months preg­nant woman. The cul­prit is based in Switzer­land. We are ask­ing for your sup­port to put pres­sure on the cor­po­ra­tion to stop the destruc­tion of nat­ur­al resources and to seek jus­tice for the vic­tims.

At 6:30 a.m. on Oct. 18, in Datal Aliong, Kiblawan, Davao del Sur, Juvy, 27, wife of B’laan leader Daguil Capi­on, was shot in cold blood togeth­er with her two sons, Jor­dan, 13, and John, 8 by ele­ments of the 27th Infantry Bat­tal­ion, led by 1st Lt. Dante Jimenez. The youngest daugh­ter Vicky, 4, escaped but was wound­ed.

When a rel­a­tive of the vic­tims said that it was bet­ter if the chil­dren were not harmed, a sol­dier replied “mas maayo nga tiwa­son  ang  mga bata para wala’y wit­ness” (bet­ter to fin­ish off the chil­dren, so there are no wit­ness­es). Before Juvy was shot, the rel­a­tive heard Juvy say, “tama na ayaw namo sige ug pab­u­to kay nai­go nako” (please stop fir­ing your guns,  as I am already wound­ed). But the sol­diers kept fir­ing their guns.

Imme­di­ate­ly after the inci­dent, Colonel Alex­is Bra­vo, com­man­der of the 27th Infantry Batal­lion, con­duct­ed press con­fer­ences for radio and print, claim­ing the inci­dent was an ‘encounter’ with the NPA. Evi­dence how­ev­er showed there was will­ful intent to kill inno­cent chil­dren and their moth­er. They even talked to the unarmed moth­er before killing her. How can that be an encounter? Juvy, the moth­er, togeth­er with her hus­band Daguil, are active lead­ers in oppos­ing the min­ing project. Col. Bra­vo, Lt. Jimenez and sev­en oth­er sol­diers were relieved of duty imme­di­ate­ly after the mas­sacre.

Kiblawan May­or Mariv­ic Dia­mante, who is an active sup­port­er of Xstra­ta-SMI and receives mil­lions in ‘devel­op­ment’ funds from them, and who is often a guest speak­er in min­ing con­fer­ences in Mani­la, attempt­ed to take pos­ses­sion of two chil­dren who were vital wit­ness­es, say­ing they would be brought to the hos­pi­tal. The moth­er of Daguil refused, trig­ger­ing a tug of war, paci­fied by Atty. Haw­tay of the Com­mis­sion on Human Rights (CHR). The chil­dren are now safe­ly in the hands of the Social Action Cen­ter of Mar­bel. (Sources – Task Force Detainee of the Philip­pines, Social Action Cen­ter Mar­bel, rappler.com, LILAK).

The mil­i­tary wants to con­vince every­one it is a counter-insur­gency war. They do not see it as a people’s war against the multi­na­tion­al they pro­tect. They talk of sus­pect­ed com­mu­nist rebels. That is the way they jus­ti­fy their pres­ence. They say they are there because the rebels are there. They say they want to pro­tect the peo­ple from the rebels. But they kill instead the peo­ple they say they pro­tect. In truth, from their actions, they are there to sup­port and pro­tect the min­ing project. Before the multi­na­tion­als came, there was peace in Tam­pakan. Now the domain of the B’laans has been muti­lat­ed.

For more details (WARNING: Con­tains graph­ic pho­to’s of masacre) http://onsiteinfoshopphilippines.wordpress.com/newsupdate/

(USA) LOGGING COMPANY HIT AGAIN

anony­mous report:

“Gilliar­di Log­ging and Con­struc­tion have not got­ten the mes­sage. so we poi­soned one of their semi-trucks, car­ry­ing a vicious wood-chip­per. the evict­ed hawks and owls will be pleased.”

anony­mous report:

“Gilliar­di Log­ging and Con­struc­tion have not got­ten the mes­sage. so we poi­soned one of their semi-trucks, car­ry­ing a vicious wood-chip­per. the evict­ed hawks and owls will be pleased.”

(USA) LOGGING COMPANY TARGETED

anony­mous report:

“puyallup wet­lands are under attack by a pri­vate log­ging com­pa­ny that I and oth­ers have yet to iden­ti­fy. this attack was car­ried out on canyon rd. short-term dam­age was done to a hydraulic exca­va­tor, as a warn­ing. if they con­tin­ue — our attacks will increase.”

anony­mous report:

“puyallup wet­lands are under attack by a pri­vate log­ging com­pa­ny that I and oth­ers have yet to iden­ti­fy. this attack was car­ried out on canyon rd. short-term dam­age was done to a hydraulic exca­va­tor, as a warn­ing. if they con­tin­ue — our attacks will increase.”

logging company hit again, USA

Octo­ber 25, 2012
anony­mous report:

“Gilliar­di Log­ging and Con­struc­tion have not got­ten the mes­sage. so we poi­soned one of their semi-trucks, car­ry­ing a vicious wood-chip­per. the evict­ed hawks and owls will be pleased.”

Octo­ber 25, 2012
anony­mous report:

“Gilliar­di Log­ging and Con­struc­tion have not got­ten the mes­sage. so we poi­soned one of their semi-trucks, car­ry­ing a vicious wood-chip­per. the evict­ed hawks and owls will be pleased.”

Wife of Gulf Coast Oilfield Worker Chains Herself to Keystone XL Pipeyard Gate

Draw­ing con­nec­tions to all coastal com­mu­ni­ties threat­ened by tox­ic tar sands devel­op­ment, Cher­ri Foytlin, an indige­nous South Louisiana moth­er of six and wife of a Gulf Coast oil­field work­er, chained her­self to the gate of a Key­stone XL pipeyard. Effec­tive­ly block­ing pipe from being shipped to con­struc­tion sites along the con­tro­ver­sial pipeline’s route, Foytlin’s action coin­cides with the Defend Our Coast activ­i­ties in British Colum­bia, where more than 60 Cana­di­an com­mu­ni­ties are protest­ing a pro­posed tar sands pipeline through their region.

Yes­ter­day the Athabas­ca Chipewyan First Nation filed a legal chal­lenge to Shell’s pro­posed expan­sion of the Jack­pine Tar Sands Mine in Alber­ta, Cana­da. From It’s Get­ting Hot in Here:

“Fol­low­ing these projects, Coun­cil will con­tin­ue on its six-day No Pipelines, No Tankers Speak­ing Tour, stop­ping in com­mu­ni­ties on or near the routes of the Pacif­ic Trails, Enbridge North­ern Gate­way, and Kinder Mor­gan Trans Moun­tain Pipelines.

” ‘The idea is to build sol­i­dar­i­ty between the dif­fer­ent pipeline cam­paigns,’ says Har­jap Gre­w­al, Pacif­ic Region­al Orga­niz­er of the Coun­cil of Cana­di­ans. This includes cam­paigns to stop the pipelines at their source—in the Alber­ta Tar Sands and Frack­ing region in north­east­ern BC.”

Occu­py the Pipeline activists in New York have been strug­gling against the Spec­tra Pipeline which will pump fuel hydrauli­cal­ly-fracked from Pennsylvania’s gas fields into New York City

Foytlin’s arrest is the 32nd arrest since Tar Sands Block­ade‘s actions began more than two months ago and today marks the 31st day of sus­tained protest at the Winns­boro tree block­ade.

“This pipeline is a project of death. From destruc­tive tar sands devel­op­ment that destroy indige­nous sov­er­eign­ty and health at the route’s start to the tox­ic emis­sions that will lay fur­ther bur­den on envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice com­mu­ni­ties along the Gulf of Mex­i­co, this pipeline not only dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly affects indige­nous front­line com­mu­ni­ties but its clear that it will bring death and dis­ease to all in its path,” Foytlin declared.

Refus­ing to accept the Gulf Coast’s des­ig­na­tion as the Nation’s Ener­gy Sac­ri­fice Zone, Foytlin, along with many Gulf Coast res­i­dents and indige­nous activists are dis­mayed but not sur­prised to find the con­ver­sa­tions regard­ing Key­stone XL as a whole from nation­al envi­ron­men­tal groups to the Pres­i­den­tial cam­paigns have made lit­tle to no men­tion of the dam­age TransCanada’s Key­stone XL Pipeline will heap upon Gulf Coast com­mu­ni­ties like Hous­ton and Port Arthur, TX, where Key­stone XL will ter­mi­nate. Already over­bur­dened with oil refiner­ies and oth­er dirty ener­gy relat­ed indus­try, this neglect­ful atti­tude dove­tails neat­ly with TransCanada’s reck­less dis­re­gard for the health and safe­ty of fam­i­lies in the refin­ery com­mu­ni­ties and else­where along the pipeline’s route.

The Rayne, Louisiana res­i­dent, who in the Spring of 2011 walked 1,243 miles from New Orleans to Wash­ing­ton DC as a call for action to stop the BP Drilling Dis­as­ter, has been a con­stant voice speak­ing out for the health and ecosys­tems of Gulf Coast com­mu­ni­ties.

She con­tin­ued, “This fight is also about the per­son­al free­doms giv­en to us through the blood of all of our com­bined ances­try. Con­ser­v­a­tives believe gov­ern­ment is too big, that they are chok­ing out our free­doms. The Occu­py Move­ment believes cor­po­ra­tions have kid­napped those same rights in the pur­suit of prof­it over human­i­ty. I believe both groups are right, and this pipeline and the use of emi­nent domain by a for­eign com­pa­ny to seize and lay claim to Amer­i­can land, aid­ed by the silence of the gov­ern­ment, is an epic exam­ple of those truths.”

Tar Sands Block­ade is a coali­tion of Texas and Okla­homa landown­ers and cli­mate jus­tice orga­niz­ers using peace­ful and sus­tained civ­il dis­obe­di­ence to stop the con­struc­tion of TransCanada’s Key­stone XL tar sands pipeline.

“From the Pacif­ic Coast to the Gulf Coast, Tar Sands Block­ade acts in sol­i­dar­i­ty with all com­mu­ni­ties and indige­nous peo­ple ris­ing up to defend their homes from tox­ic tar sands pipelines. The refin­ery com­mu­ni­ties of the Gulf Coast have his­tor­i­cal­ly been and con­tin­ue to be treat­ed as col­lat­er­al dam­age by indus­try and now landown­ers from Cana­da to Texas are learn­ing that real­i­ty, too,” stat­ed Ram­sey Sprague, a Tar Sands Block­ade spokesper­son born in Houma, Louisiana to a Chiti­macha fam­i­ly. “From start to fin­ish, tar sands devel­op­ment only fur­ther endan­gers com­mu­ni­ties already at far greater risk for death and dis­ease from tox­ic envi­ron­men­tal expo­sure to human-made chem­i­cal pol­lu­tants than com­mu­ni­ties fur­ther away from the petro­le­um refiner­ies and the uncon­scionable min­ing oper­a­tions that define their ori­gins.”

Indigenous Communities Rise Up in Mexico

For the sec­ond time in less than two years, an indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty in the south­west­ern Mex­i­can state of Michoa­can has erect­ed bar­ri­cades and seized con­trol of secu­ri­ty mat­ters. Locat­ed in the Purepecha high­lands of the Pacif­ic coast state, the small com­mu­ni­ty of Urapi­cho in the munic­i­pal­i­ty of Para­cho has been under the self-declared con­trol of the peo­ple for about a month now.

For the sec­ond time in less than two years, an indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty in the south­west­ern Mex­i­can state of Michoa­can has erect­ed bar­ri­cades and seized con­trol of secu­ri­ty mat­ters. Locat­ed in the Purepecha high­lands of the Pacif­ic coast state, the small com­mu­ni­ty of Urapi­cho in the munic­i­pal­i­ty of Para­cho has been under the self-declared con­trol of the peo­ple for about a month now.

The news was pub­li­cized this week with the post­ing of a video on YouTube that shows armed and masked men, some clothed in mil­i­tary-style cam­ou­flage cloth­ing, attend­ing a sand-bagged check­point, where motorists are searched. Two anony­mous, masked spokesper­sons explain the rea­sons behind the upris­ing and the goals of their move­ment.

Res­i­dents say they have been under assault from crim­i­nal bands which have a strong foothold in the region. The Span­ish-speak­ing spokesman men­tions four peo­ple who were forcibly dis­ap­peared in 2009 and 2010, includ­ing a woman named Bautista. “We don’t know her where­abouts,” he says.

The Purepecha com­mu­ni­ty is locat­ed between the towns of Para­cho, long known for its local­ly pro­duced gui­tars, and Cher­an, a larg­er indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty that rose up in April 2011 and seized con­trol of the local gov­ern­ment. Still bar­ri­cad­ed and under com­mu­ni­ty guard, the Cher­an rebel­lion broke out after locals grew frus­trat­ed by vio­lence and gov­ern­ment inac­tion in stop­ping the clear-cut­ting of the area’s remain­ing forests. Like Urapi­cho, numer­ous deaths and dis­ap­pear­ances blamed on orga­nized crime have been report­ed in Cher­an.

The Urapi­cho upris­ing occurs amid esca­lat­ing social con­flicts that have polit­i­cal tem­per­a­tures at the boil­ing point in Michoa­can. In dif­fer­ent parts of the state, mul­ti­ple con­flicts pit stu­dent, teacher and indige­nous groups against the Insti­tu­tion­al Rev­o­lu­tion­ary Par­ty (PRI)-led state gov­ern­ment, as well as leg­is­la­tors from the PRI and allied Green Par­ty against the cen­ter-left PRD, PT and MC par­ties.

On Sun­day, Octo­ber 14, ten­sions explod­ed when the Fed­er­al Police recov­ered bus­es that had been seized by protest­ing stu­dents from three rur­al teach­ers’ col­leges. In the raid, scores of stu­dents were detained, bus­es burned and sev­er­al offi­cers injured.

In response, any­where between 15,000 and 40,000 demon­stra­tors, the esti­mates depend­ing on the source, crowd­ed the state cap­i­tal of More­lia Octo­ber 17 denounc­ing Pres­i­dent Calderon and demand­ing the res­ig­na­tions of state Gov­ern­ment Sec­re­tary Jesus Rey­na Gar­cia and PRI Gov­er­nor Faus­to Valle­jo, who was elect­ed to office in a con­tro­ver­sial Novem­ber 2011 elec­tion.

Con­tin­gents rep­re­sent­ing the Nation­al Coor­di­na­tor of Edu­ca­tion Work­ers (CNTE), the Purepecha Nation and oth­er orga­ni­za­tions par­tic­i­pat­ed in the mobi­liza­tion. A large group of stu­dents encir­cled the state attor­ney general’s office, while a sec­ond group num­ber­ing in the hun­dreds blocked one of Morelia’s high­way exits.

As the week end­ed, the CNTE vowed to con­tin­ue protest­ing in More­lia until the remain­ing 8 stu­dents detained on Octo­ber 14 were released. Out­side the state cap­i­tal, pro­test­ers report­ed­ly occu­pied the town hall of Para­cho and threat­ened to block­ade access to oth­er munic­i­pal­i­ties.

 

more ingo at http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/2012/10/19/indigenous-communities-rise-up-in-mexico/

Under the watchful eye of engaged youth, Pangea and the PLA’s “City Concept” plan was halted by tribal council

Saca­ton, AZ- At the Octo­ber 17, 2012 Gila Riv­er Indi­an Com­mu­ni­ty (GRIC) Trib­al Coun­cil ses­sion, Pangea, LLC and the Pecos Landown­ers Asso­ci­a­tion (PLA) attempt­ed to rush for­ward their plans per­tain­ing to the con­struc­tion of a city and free­way with­in the reser­va­tion. Pangea sought the trib­al council’s approval for a Mem­o­ran­dum of Under­stand­ing (MOU) which grant­ed Pangea and its investors exclu­sive rights to devel­op over 5500 acres of trib­al land on the reservation’s west­ern end along the route of the pro­posed Loop 202 free­way, which GRIC vot­ed against last Feb­ru­ary. The PLA attempt­ed to pres­sure trib­al coun­cil to approve the Pangea corporation’s ini­tia­tive for yet anoth­er com­mu­ni­ty vote on the Loop 202.

But to their sur­prise, Pangea and the PLA were con­front­ed by young peo­ple wear­ing breath­ing masks and No Build 202 shirts who sought to hold both Pangea and the PLA account­able to last February’s Loop 202 vote. In that vote, GRIC vot­ers vot­ed in favor of the No Build option for the free­way. The Gila Riv­er youth, whose breath­ing masks sym­bol­ized the envi­ron­men­tal tox­ins that free­ways bring to the land and air, were at the trib­al coun­cil meet­ing to demand that their elect­ed offi­cials uphold the No Build voice of the peo­ple.

“I can’t vote yet, but if I could, I would have vot­ed No Build too. The peo­ple who want the free­way should think about what my gen­er­a­tion will go through if all we have to inher­it is free­way pollution”said 14 year old Lily Miles, of Komatke and Vah-ki, who was one of the twelve who wore med­ical breath­ing masks and No Build shirts in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the community’s No Build voice.

Since the his­toric Loop 202 vote, many GRIC mem­bers, espe­cial­ly the youth, have felt their trib­al lead­er­ship has not ful­ly upheld the community’s No Build stance. This sus­pi­cion is height­ened since GRIC Gov­er­nor Men­doza allowed Pangea to con­sult with GRIC’s Office of Gen­er­al Coun­sel for their City Con­cept and free­way plans. In addi­tion, Gov­er­nor Men­doza pre­sent­ed the PLA ini­tia­tive that calls for anoth­er Loop 202 vote at the Sep­tem­ber 26th GRIC Leg­isla­tive Stand­ing Com­mit­tee (LSC).

If approved by the GRIC Trib­al Coun­cil, the mas­sive Pangea City Con­cept, the size of over 5000 foot­ball fields, would be the largest con­struc­tion project in the his­to­ry of the Bureau of Indi­an Affairs (BIA) and the Gila Riv­er Indi­an Com­mu­ni­ty. The GRIC No Build sup­port­ers who attend­ed the Wednes­day coun­cil ses­sion were com­pelled to raise their voic­es against Pangea and the PLA in the trib­al coun­cil cham­bers with­out say­ing one word. Their breath­ing masks and No Build 202 shirts, stat­ing “Bio­haz­ard 202” spoke to the loom­ing des­e­cra­tion of Muhadag Do’ag (South Moun­tain) and to the neg­a­tive impacts the pro­posed free­way would bring to the envi­ron­ment and over­all com­mu­ni­ty health.

“Our trib­al lead­ers must be held account­able for where their alle­giances lie,” said Renee Jack­son of Vah-ki, who was one of the No Build sup­port­ers who wore breath­ing masks and Bio­haz­ard 202 shirts dur­ing the meet­ing. “Our rep­re­sen­ta­tives must be trans­par­ent in where they stand on the issue of the free­way”.

While coun­cil went to exec­u­tive ses­sion to decide the mer­it of Pangea’s MOU and the PLA vot­ing ini­tia­tive, the twelve youth engaged pro-free­way Gila Riv­er landown­ers in the hall­ways out­side coun­cil cham­bers. The youth shared their con­cerns regard­ing the envi­ron­men­tal, health and cul­tur­al impacts the City Con­cept would bring to their future while coun­cil was in exec­u­tive ses­sion and closed to the pub­lic. The mere pres­ence of these twelve helped give a voice to the 720 GRIC mem­bers who vot­ed for No Build, and their breath­ing masks showed the poten­tial dan­ger the free­way would bring.

“Today we showed where the youth stand and we showed that there are youth who care. Pangea and the PLA’s city con­cept is a dan­ger to our future and both are bio­haz­ards to the land and to the moun­tain,” said Andrew Pedro, 18 years old, from Saca­ton, who print­ed the Bio­haz­ard shirts. “Peo­ple were ask­ing me for more t‑shirts, and I believe that this is the first of more visu­al demon­stra­tions to come.”

“I felt like it was my respon­si­bil­i­ty to be here and get informed about what is hap­pen­ing around me and in my com­mu­ni­ty because I will be inher­it­ing this land too.” said Kar­ma Miles, 11 years old, from Komatke and Vah-ki.

Despite the dif­fer­ences the youth had with fel­low GRIC landown­ers, the youth pre­sent­ed them­selves in a respect­ful mat­ter, and even helped PLA elders by set­ting up chairs dur­ing exec­u­tive ses­sion.

After near­ly an hour in exec­u­tive ses­sion, Trib­al Coun­cil decid­ed that eleven key points need­ed to be met before any MOU regard­ing Pangea’s land use plans could be approved. The eleven points cen­ter around pub­lic safe­ty, bud­get­ing, juris­dic­tion, and land man­age­ment issues that were not addressed with­in the MOU sub­mit­ted by Pangea. Coun­cil clear­ly declared that all points must be met before Pangea’s MOU could be brought back before the coun­cil. Addi­tion­al­ly, the mis­lead­ing Save the Moun­tain ini­tia­tive was held to stan­dard GRIC Com­mu­ni­ty Coun­cil Secretary’s Office (CCSO) pro­ce­dure regard­ing sig­na­tures ver­i­fi­ca­tion. The PLA sub­mit­ted their Pangea-backed ini­tia­tive to the GRIC Com­mu­ni­ty Coun­cil Secretary’s Office (CCSO) on Sep­tem­ber 27 with the back­ing of 1,527 landown­er sig­na­tures. Trib­al coun­cil declared that each sig­na­ture must be ver­i­fied first before coun­cil would con­sid­er the ini­tia­tive. As with the per capi­ta ini­tia­tive, a pre­vi­ous people’s ini­tia­tive in Gila Riv­er, the sig­na­tures could take the CCSO four to six months to ver­i­fy, espe­cial­ly with reports of miss­ing trib­al enroll­ment num­bers with the sig­na­tures sub­mit­ted, as report­ed by Com­mu­ni­ty Coun­cil Sec­re­tary Lin­da Andrews at the coun­cil meet­ing. The Save the Moun­tain ini­tia­tive, which Pangea and PLA deemed” first ever Peo­ples Ini­tia­tive through the People’s rights under the GRIC Trib­al Con­sti­tu­tion”, does not save the moun­tain because it calls for the reject­ed free­way to be con­struct­ed on trib­al lands along the foothills of Muhadag Do’ag (South Moun­tain).

Despite the steps that are legal­ly required to approve a vot­er ini­tia­tive, a Pangea rep­re­sen­ta­tive pres­sured coun­cil to move for­ward and approve the pro-free­way ini­tia­tive. GRIC mem­ber Joey Perez of Pangea attempt­ed to have coun­cil set a much short­er time frame for approval, by cit­ing the 14th amend­ment of the GRIC con­sti­tu­tion, which declares coun­cil has 60 days to make a deci­sion on any ini­tia­tive bought forth to them. The Pangea corporation’s inter­pre­ta­tion, as stat­ed by Perez, was that the 60 days start­ed on Sep­tem­ber 27, when the sig­na­tures were sub­mit­ted, which would force coun­cil to pos­si­bly recon­sid­er anoth­er Loop 202 vote by the end of the year. But Perez, Pangea and the PLA were soon con­front­ed with stan­dard GRIC pro­ce­dures regard­ing ini­tia­tives: sig­na­tures must be ver­i­fied before the ini­tia­tive can be con­sid­ered by the coun­cil.

The rea­son why the Pangea cor­po­ra­tion and pro-build sup­port­ers dis­re­gard the No Build vic­to­ry and are attempt­ing to rush the trib­al coun­cil to sched­ule anoth­er vote on the pro­posed free­way is because in 2013 fed­er­al land leas­ing reg­u­la­tions for trib­al allot­ted lands become much more restric­tive. Changes to Title 25 of the BIA’s Code of Fed­er­al Reg­u­la­tions will require 100 per­cent of landown­er con­sents before the BIA will approve any new leas­es per­tain­ing to the use of trib­al allot­ted lands for busi­ness­es. This would make the Pangea City Con­cept, which is cen­tered around the con­struc­tion of the Loop 202, sub­ject to height­ened fed­er­al reg­u­la­tions.

The deci­sion by Coun­cil to hold Pangea and the PLA trans­par­ent and account­able to the process was a long over­due first step in revers­ing its nine months of inac­tion regard­ing the No Build vote. Pangea and the PLA were expect­ing to walk out of the trib­al coun­cil meet­ing with anoth­er Loop 202 vote sched­uled, and their land devel­op­ment plans to be unop­posed. But Pangea and the PLA left the Octo­ber trib­al coun­cil ses­sion in defeat when con­front­ed with the gap­ing holes of their fraud­u­lent cam­paign to bull­doze over 5500 acres for a Pangea city, and by the faces of the young peo­ple whose future health depends on the preser­va­tion and pro­tec­tion of Muhadag Do’ag, and their lands.

“It was a won­der­ful day, a small vic­to­ry once again,” said Lori Thomas, of Gila Riv­er Alliance for a Clean Envi­ron­ment. “The youth who were present were awe­some. It was good to see them engage in the issue. A small bat­tle was won but the fight still rages on.”

For the youth who attend­ed this round of the big­ger fight to com­plete­ly stop the Loop 202, it showed that their involve­ment will be cru­cial for the future of the com­mu­ni­ty, and that a new form of expres­sion is need­ed so that their voic­es can be heard by the Pangea cor­po­ra­tion, the PLA, as well as by the GRIC trib­al coun­cil and Gov­er­nor Men­doza.

“We made an impact by rep­re­sent­ing all the No Build sup­port­ers who can’t be here, to go to these meet­ings and be heard,” said Ana Mor­a­go, 18 years old, of Sto­ton­ic. “We aren’t bused in, like the way Pangea brings in their peo­ple. And even though we didn’t speak, our actions and how we pre­sent­ed our­selves spoke loud­er”.

For more infor­ma­tion regard­ing the strug­gle against the Loop 202, please con­tact us at: gricagainst202(at)gmail.com or at our Face­book page: Gila Riv­er Against the Loop 202

(USA) Croatan Earth First! Locks Down North Carolina DENR For Complicity In Fracking

Sev­en mem­bers of Croatan Earth First! and par­tic­i­pants from our Pied­mont Direct Action Camp locked togeth­er today, bar­ri­cad­ing the front of North Carolina’s Depart­ment of Envi­ron­ment and Nat­ur­al Resources (DENR) build­ing in down­town Raleigh. Pro­vid­ing phys­i­cal, active resis­tance against frack­ing in North Car­oli­na, CEF! has cho­sen DENR for an action as they are respon­si­ble for help­ing legal­ize frack­ing, and will be respon­si­ble for reg­u­lat­ing it. They have also hired a cor­rupt Min­ing and Ener­gy Com­mis­sion board, which includes peo­ple with vest­ed inter­ests in hydraulic frac­tur­ing occur­ing. We are let­ting them know that this farce won’t stand! No com­pro­mise in defense of Moth­er Earth!

In addi­tion, a size­able demon­stra­tion is being held around the lock down, with sev­er­al large ban­ners, signs, lit­er­a­ture, etc. Police active­ly cleared the site, and have closed off the road, label­ing the entire block a crime scene. Press was being pre­vent­ed from approach­ing the site.  In nego­ti­a­tion made with the police, press was allowed inside to do inter­views and take pho­tos if the block­aders agreed to unlock lat­er. The pro­test­ers decid­ed to unlock as a tac­ti­cal deci­sion to walk away with­out arrests and save our legal funds for future events.

Press Release

Croatan Earth First! Locks Down NC DENR For Com­plic­i­ty In Frack­ing

Raleigh, NC – This morn­ing mul­ti­ple peo­ple locked them­selves to the front of the Depart­ment of Envi­ron­men­tal and Nat­ur­al Resources head­quar­ters at 217 W. Jones St. in protest of the state’s con­tin­ued path towards the legal­iza­tion of hydraulic frac­tur­ing (or frack­ing) for nat­ur­al gas.  Envi­ron­men­tal­ists across the state have orga­nized and cam­paigned against hydrofrack­ing leg­is­la­tion for over a year, which result­ed in a veto of SB 820 this past sum­mer by Bev­er­ly Per­due.  The leg­is­la­ture over­rode the veto short­ly after dur­ing a con­tro­ver­sial vote in which a mis­tak­en bal­lot was cast for legal­iza­tion, and the vot­er was refused a recast.

“All legal chan­nels of protest have been exhaust­ed,” says Earth First!er Emi­ly Smith at the ral­ly out­side the action.  “We’ve learned that the leg­is­la­ture and reg­u­la­tors will not pro­tect the water we drink and air we breathe.  It’s time for the pub­lic to take oth­er types of action to stop hydrofrack­ing. “   This past Spring NC DENR released a report that gross­ly under­es­ti­mat­ed the pos­si­ble envi­ron­men­tal risks of frack­ing.  Since then, they have been work­ing with the new­ly formed Min­ing and Ener­gy Com­mis­sion which includes sev­er­al mem­bers that are close­ly linked to oil & gas: Ray Cov­ing­ton, a part­ner at NC Oil & Gas, who prof­its finan­cial­ly from an increase in leased lands for frack­ing; Chair­man Jim Wom­ack, a Lee Coun­ty Com­mis­sion­er and an oil indus­try sup­port­er who claimed at a DENR pub­lic meet­ing that you were more like­ly to be hit by a mete­or than have water con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed by frack­ing; and Charles Hol­brook a for­mer employ­ee of Chevron Oil.

“Hav­ing peo­ple who sup­port and ben­e­fit from oil and gas extrac­tion on a reg­u­la­to­ry com­mis­sion is like a fox guard­ing the hen­house.”  The EPA recent­ly released a study that con­firmed con­t­a­m­i­na­tion of the water aquifer in Pavil­lion, Wyoming with frack­ing flu­ids, but DENR has done noth­ing to mod­i­fy their report.  “We’re not going to let indus­try destroy North Car­oli­na like they have Penn­syl­va­nia,” says Smith refer­ring  to the numer­ous spills that have occurred in the high­ly fracked Mar­cel­lus Shale—including 4,700 gal­lons of hydrochlo­ric acid spilled this year in Brad­ford Coun­ty and a 30-foot methane geyser which erupt­ed in Tio­ga coun­ty, PA.  A blowout at one of Chesa­peake Energy’s rigs in Wyoming this year burned escap­ing methane for sev­er­al days and more than 70 res­i­dents had to be evac­u­at­ed.  “Frack­ing is not only con­t­a­m­i­nat­ing our land and water irre­versibly, but it’s spew­ing mas­sive amounts of methane, a green­house gas, into the atmos­phere.”