Less Than 60 Hours Left to Support Indigenous Land Defenders!

by Amanda Lickers from Reclaim Turtle Island

As yall know, self-representation and independent media are key.

You might have heard about Reclaim Turtle Island , which is a budding platform for Indigenous-run grassroots media projects. Right now we need your support! Literally all across Turtle Island, Indigenous Nations are combating reservation apartheid and industrial genocide. This means fierce ‘n’ frontline resistance to resource extraction! Everything from tar sands, pipelines, fracking, to mining, Land Defenders are throwing down to protect our lands and build up our communities, regaining identity and reclaiming territories.

Born in late 2013, we focused on supporting the Mi’kmaq Warriors fighting fracking, and put out our first short film! Co-produced with subMedia.tv, titled Kahsatstenhsera – Indigenous Resistance to Tar Sands Pipelines.

Reclaim Turtle Island is a form of anti-colonial cultural production and is primarily focused on producing media for and by Indigenous folks, helping to inspire to strive for total liberation. We are raising funds for a few simple reasons.

#1 is equipment. We want to produce high-quality short films that educate and elevate! This means audio, post-production editing tools, data storage (so many hard drives), etc!

The other main reason is that we are in the midst of production right now!!!!

*Funds from this project will go to:

Film production, including Dine’ resistance to frack-sand mining, uranium mining and cultural revitalization and sovereignty projects, Lakota and Ponca resistance to tar sands pipelines, Innu resistance to Plan Nord, and more…

Travel for an ACFN grassroots organizer to attend an important gathering in Lakota territory, marking their 2014 Liberation Day and furthering conversations about tar sands resistanc…

Equipment needed for film-production, such as audio, post-production editing, etc…

Even a small donation will help us reach our goal!!

Donate here.

Nia:wen’kowa – Great thanks!  Your support can help make this happen.

 

Twitter @defendourlands / Facebook 

(amanda lickers, turtle clan/ onondowa’ga haudenosaunee is a curator for Reclaim Turtle Island an anti-pipeline organizer based in tiotiah:ke, so-called montreal @amandalickers)

Sweden’s Indigenous Sami in Fight Against Miners

by Malin Rising and David Mac Dougall / The Detroit News

Per Mikael Utsi, standing, member of the Sami Parliament, takes part in the opening session of the parliament in Jokkmokk, northern Sweden (Carl-Johan Utsi / AP)

Jokkmokk, Sweden — On a dirt road passing through sparkling lakes and spruce woods in the wilds of northern Sweden, a woman belonging to Europe’s only indigenous people — the Sami — chants a traditional, high-pitched tune.

Since the end of the last Ice Age, the Sami have wandered the vast landscapes of northern Europe, herding reindeer and nurturing a philosophy of harmony with nature. This time, however, the woman’s Joik — a Sami chant that involves gliding over notes without lyrics — has a desperate tone to it: Her voice trembles and grows into a scream as four policemen remove her from the road. She had been protesting a British mining company’s plans for an open pit mine on ancient lands.

The woman is one of dozens of Sami and environmental activists who gathered recently on the site, setting up road blocks, burning bonfires and flying the Sami flag, with the aim to block the company from conducting test blasts near the town of Jokkmokk on the Arctic Circle.

Alpha Natural Resources Sued for Desecrating Family Cemetary with Mountain Top Removal Mine

by Associated Press / Washington Post

Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, Maria Gunnoe/Associated Press – In this June 2010 aerial photo released Thursday, Aug. 29, 2013 by Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, mining equipment is seen on a mountain top near a cemetery is inside the forested area on that tiny knob of land in the middle of the mine complex. Six southern West Virginia residents are suing Virginia-based Alpha Natural Resources over damage to a family

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Six southern West Virginia residents are suing Alpha Natural Resources to stop further damage to a family cemetery they say has become “an island in the sky,” barely accessible and literally surrounded by a massive mountaintop-removal mining operation.

They sued Virginia-based Alpha and its Independence Coal Co. subsidiary in Boone County Circuit Court last week after discovering that activity at the Twilight Surface Mine has come within 30 feet of their ancestors’ graves in Jarrell Cemetery.

But Alpha spokesman Ted Pile said late Wednesday the lawsuit has no merit, and allegations that Alpha has “willfully and maliciously” violated a 100-foot buffer zone, toppled headstones and denied relatives access are false.

Alpha has instead “gone above and beyond the letter and spirit of the permit and the law” to protect both the cemetery and the relatives’ access to it, he said. Alpha also is offended by suggestions it would deliberately harm the cemetery, Pile said.

“Our miners are men and women of character who themselves have lost loved ones in the past and understand what these grave sites stand for and mean,” he said.

The cemetery sits on a tiny knob of tree-topped land in the middle of what the Jarrell family descendants say is one of the biggest strip mines east of the Mississippi.

Activists Boat onto Sludge Pond; Confront W.Va. Governor on Dangers of Coal Sludge

Charleston, W.Va. – This morning at 7:30 a.m. two activists paddled out onto the 2.8 billion gallon Shumate slurry impoundment in Raleigh County with banners reading, “Slurry Poisons Appalachia” and “Gov. Tomblin, Put Health Over Profit.”  Later this morning, one activist locked himself to a barrel of black water in front of Gov. Tomblin’s mansion in a Tyvek suit reading “Locked to Dirty Water”.   Activists are calling attention to the failure of the state government to protect its citizens from the abuses of the coal industry and the threats posed by coal slurry disposal.

“I grew up in Eunice drinking water poisoned by coal slurry, went to Marsh Fork Elementary under that dam, breathed the dust from that prep plant, and I’ve suffered the lifelong health consequences of that.  These same abuses are taking place today across our great state, and the blame for that lies squarely at the feet of Gov. Tomblin,” said Junior Walk of Rock Creek, W.Va. who attended today’s protest at the Governor’s mansion.

Coal slurry, the toxic byproduct of “washing” impurities out of coal before it is sold, has long been a matter of deep concern for area residents.  Its common disposal methods have created tragic disasters such as poisoning the public water supplies of Prenter and Eunice, W.Va., and slurry floods in Martin County, Ky., and Buffalo Creek, W.Va..  Despite this, evidence mounts that West Virginia regulators continue to fail at adequately regulating impoundments.

Read the full post on http://rampscampaign.org.

Activists Boat onto Sludge Pond; Confront Gov. Tomblin on Dangers of Coal Sludge

from RAMPS

Charleston, W.Va. – This morning at 7:30 a.m. two activists paddled out onto the 2.8 billion gallon Shumate slurry impoundment in Raleigh County with banners reading, “Slurry Poisons Appalachia” and “Gov. Tomblin, Put Health Over Profit.”  Later this morning, one activist locked himself to a barrel of black water in front of Gov. Tomblin’s mansion in a Tyvek suit reading “Locked to Dirty Water”.   Activists are calling attention to the failure of the state government to protect its citizens from the abuses of the coal industry and the threats posed by coal slurry disposal.

Caught on Tape: One of World’s Rarest Orchids — Watch Video

from the Center for Biological Diversity

Photo by Ron Coleman

Coleman’s coralroot is a stunning purple orchid that exists in only a few mountain ranges in the Southwest. Fewer than 200 are known to exist in the wild, and they remain a mystery: Biologists don’t even know how the flowers are pollinated, largely because there are so few individuals — and because the elusive plants spend most of their lives underground.

It’s extremely rare to actually see these orchids in the wild. Recently, though, Center for Biological Diversity staff wandered the desert and found two specimens in full bloom; we captured them on video so that you, too, can see this beautiful hermit of the desert in all its glory.

Check out the video of the Coleman’s coralroot below; then read about the Center’s work to protect this orchid and other rare plants and animals in the Southwest’s breathtaking Sky Islands region, where many special species and wild places are threatened by an open-pit mine planned for the Santa Rita Mountains.

Hundreds Protest Nickel Mine In Russia, Previous Clashes Resulted in Torched Equipment

from the Moscow Times

VORONEZH — Hundreds of people gathered in a small town in Voronezh region on Sunday for a new protest in their year-long campaign against plans to open a nickel and copper mine in the area, police officials said.

The demonstration was organized by the local anti-mine movement and residents of Novokhopersk who called for halting the mining project. The rally organizers said that about 3,000 people took part in the demonstration, including those from neighboring provinces, while the police put the number at 900.

It is the first mass gathering of the campaigners after the 13-month standoff exploded last month with a crowd of several hundred storming the premises of a geological exploration party and torching cars, construction trailers and drilling rigs.

The miner, privately owned Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company (UMMC), has denied that its mine would harm the environment.

Community Justice vs. Minas Conga Mine

Local indigenous farmers on horseback form part of a protest against the Minas Conga gold mine, June 17, 2013

From Root Force:

A recent Reuters article examines the role that community justice institutions have played in the struggle against the Minas Conga mine in Peru, which would be the country’s largest gold mine. The indigenous- and peasant-led resistance movement has already led to the project being placed on hold once and the President’s cabinet being reshuffled twice.

Although the article quotes several people who are obviously deeply uncomfortable with the traditional, indigenous-influenced rondero justice model due to its failure to place all authority in the hands of the state, it obviously strives to paint a fair picture. The article seems relevant not just for its relation to the Minas Conga struggle in particular, but also for expanding our frame of reference in regard to models of community justice and organizing.

For those of you who are skimmers, don’t deprive yourself of the pleasure of the article’s concluding quote:

Ronderos in Cajamarca say they stopped carrying guns years ago. Punishments they mete out draw on traditional Andean practices, ranging from push-ups to lashings with cow whips. [NOTE:  Peruvian cow whips are thick, not thin like the “Indiana Jones”-style whip that is designed to draw blood. Not that it necessarily feels good to be hit with one. —Root Force]

One of the most severe sentences is the “rondero chain” that requires offenders to toil in fields by day and parade barefoot through frigid villages by night, some ronderos said. It can go on for days or weeks as people are handed off from one village squad to another.

Referring to Mines and Energy Minister Jorge Merino, a laughing Ponce said: “We would make Merino carry out a rondero chain for three or four months. [Peruvian President Ollanta] Humala would get six months.”

Peru peasant squads rally against U.S. firm’s $5 billion gold mine

(Reuters) – Forty years ago, peasants in rural Peru banded together as “ronderos” – Spanish for “people who make the rounds” – to curb cattle rustling.

Today, squads of these ronderos are working toward a different aim – thwarting an American mining company’s planned $5 billion gold mining project that they contend would spoil lakes vital to the local population high in the Andes.

Colombian Military Massacres Peasants in Oil-and-Coal Related Protests

Police violently disperse unarmed peasant protesters in Catatumbo, Colombia, Jun 2013 (photo by Telesur)

from Root Force

The Colombian military has killed at least four peasant protesters in the region of Catatumbo, wounded dozens more (including 21 gunshot wounds) and arrested hundreds.

From Alliance for Global Justice:

In Catatumba, peasants have been holding protests, blocking roads and occupying facilities to protest to the government’s chemical spraying of Monsanto’s RoundUp Ultra herbicide as part of coca eradication efforts; and the refusal of the government to establish a Peasant Reserve Zone, as authorized by legislation in 1994 and 1996. That legislation would provide protected land for collective farming. Protesters say that they are being denied this in favor of concessions made to foreign coal [and oil] companies.

Learn more about the background of the protests here, then send a letter to Colombian officials demanding an end to the  violence.

Jaguar Threatens Open-pit Mine Plan in Southern Arizona

by Tony Davis / AZ Star

A male jaguar has roamed the Santa Rita Mountains’ eastern flank for at least nine months, photos obtained from the federal government show.

The remote cameras have photographed the big cat in five locations on seven occasions since October.

Three times, the federally financed remote cameras photographed the jaguar immediately west of the proposed Rosemont Mine site in the mountains southeast of Tucson.

The photos were taken for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service by University of Arizona cameras as follow-up after a hunter gave state authorities a photo of a jaguar’s tail that he took last September in the Santa Ritas.

The sightings next to the mine site were at roughly the same location where the earlier jaguar tail photo was taken, wildlife service officials said. Other photos ranged from two to 15 miles from the mine site.