Blood on the Maple Leaf – Recent killings linked to Canadian Nickel Mine in Guatemala
| RECENT KILLINGS LINKED TO CANADIAN-OWNED NICKEL MINE IN GUATEMALA |  |
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| Written by Dawn Paley | |
| Thursday, 01 October 2009 | |
 Source: The Dominion
Two Qeqchi leaders were shot and killed and over a dozen wounded this week near the site of a shuttered nickel mine in Guatemala. The first shooting took place on Sunday, September 27 on land claimed by the community of Las Nubes, which Compañia Guatemalteca de Niquel (CGN), a subsidiary of Manitoba’s HudBay Minerals, also claims to own. Early reports indicated CGN’s private security guards opened fire while attempting to remove families from their land. Adolfo Ichi Chamán, a teacher and community leader, was killed by gunshot, at least eight more wounded by bullets fired from an AK-47. Prensa Libre, Guatemala’s leading newspaper, reported that during Chamán’s funeral service yesterday, thousands of people marched through the streets of El Estor, demanding that the company and the local police chief withdraw from the area within 24 hours. HudBay released a lengthy statement yesterday claiming that there were no evictions, but instead that “protestors” went on a rampage, attacking government vehicles, a local police station (where they allegedly stole automatic weapons), destroying a hospital built by a coalition of US NGOs, and wounding five employees. Hudbay goes on to make the absurd claim that the protesters proceeded to open fire on each other. Liezel Hill of Mining Weekly went on to parrot the company’s version of events, as did the Canadian Press and Reuters. One day after the murder of Chamán, men armed with machine guns opened fire on a mini-bus carrying Indigenous educators and leaders from the El Estor region to Cobán. One man, Martin Choc, was killed, and at least nine more wounded. These killings are a flare up in a tense area, where the track record of Canadian mining companies includes forced displacement over multiple generations, co-operation with the army, and the burning of homes belonging to Indigenous people. Shortly after a series of violent evictions that took place on nearby lands in 2007, Skye Resources (later acquired by Hudbay) representatives went on the record and lied through their teeth to defend their actions. The English-language corporate media has repeatedly turned a blind eye to recent and past events unfolding in El Estor. This kind of reporting facilitates corporate lies and deceit, plain and simple. Lies and deceit are just what HudBay needs, not only to avoid an international outcry over the recent killings, but also to spin a mining project that is not likely to produce any nickel at all. |
Weekend Update #27: Dying of Racism
September 18, 2009 by admin1
Filed under Commentaries, Featured
In this edition of Weekend Update, Russell Means speaks to the racist portrayals of Indians by Hollywood, the U.S. Government and the media of the left. He speaks as well to the soft racism of exclusion that too often ignores the Indigenous communites of the world and their concerns of their land and their people.
Weekend Update #27: Dying of Racism from Russell Means on Vimeo.
Photos from the funeral of victims of the Acteal Massacre that occurred on December 22, 1997
Acteal Massacre:
On December 22, 1997 paramilitary (state-trained and state-funded pro-governing party civil defense) forces surrounded a Catholic chapel in the pacifistTsotsil Mayan community of Acteal, Chiapas state, Mexico. During a period of several hours, this armed force, with the apparent consent of local Mexican Army units stationed not far away, proceeded to surround Acteal’s chapel, and shot to death those inside, and as many of those who escaped as they could find. A number of residents survived the massacre. Those murdered on that day included 15 children, 21 women (four of them pregnant) and 9 men.
Bagua Shootings:
On June 6, 2009, Police, supplied by the U.S. ‘War Against Drugs, shot dead more than 38 people. The government of Peru ordered for the National Police to attack the Amazonian Indigenous peoples. Civilians were shot from building roofs and helicopters.
Indigenous peoples in Peru were on strike for the previous 52 days protesting against free trade policies that would allow multinationals to take over their territories. The attack occurred around 5:00 AM in the morning, a day after the Congress of Peru decided not to debate one of the most important decrees that allow the sale of Indigenous land. The number of casualities is according to a Twetter sent by a Peruvian journalist who is in the area of Bagua, a city located in the Amazonas region of Peru.
Columbia:
In the first week of February, according to indigenous witnesses, Columbian FARC rebels massacred up to 27 Awa people in the southern Narino province, including women and young children (from ages 3 to 6), bringing the total number of murdered Native people to 50 since the national march in the fall.
FARC press statements have only acknowledged the “execution” of eight indigenous due to their alleged assistance of Columbian military, but witnesses deny that figure and the assertion that the Awa willingly assisted anyone.
The National Indigenous Organization of Columbia, ONIC and regional UNIPA, Indigenous Unity of the Awa People, issued a joint statement the week after the massacre, decrying the murders.
“The UNIPA and ONIC denounce the grave violation of human rights and the collective rights of the Awa people of Narino, which is nothing new. … in the last 10 years [in the AWA territory] there have been four massacres, approximately 200 murders and 50 people affected by antipersonnel mines (land mines). … and now 1,300 Awa people are trapped in the area due to confrontations between the army, the guerillas and the para-militaries.”
Guatemalan Civil War:
In its final report, the Commission for Historical Clarification (CEH- Guatemalan Truth Commission) concluded that army massacres had destroyed 626 villages, more than 200,000 people were killed or disappeared, 1.5 million were displaced by the violence, and more than 150,000 were driven to seek refuge in Mexico. Further, the Commission found the state (funded largely by the United States) responsible for ninety-three percent of the acts of violence and the guerrillas (URNG-Guatemalan Revolutionary Union) responsible for three percent. All told, eighty-three percent of the victims were Maya and seventeen percent were ladino.
Sources:
Acteal: <em>Originally posted on: http://www.libertadlatina.org/Crisis_Mexico_Chiapas_Acteal_Massacre.htm</em>
Bagua:
http://peruanista.blogspot.com/2009/06/alert-massacre-in-peru-police-shoots-at.html
Columbia:
Guatemala:
http://www.yale.edu/gsp/guatemala/TextforDatabaseCharts.html
Urgent Action! Support Indigenous Radio in Guatemala
Urgent Action: Legalize Community Radio / Guatemala
Support Indigenous Peoples’ Rights in Guatemala: Legalize Community Radio
August 2009
Around the world, the press has become increasingly commercialized and consolidated. If we’re lucky, we have access to independent community radio stations where we can hear news from alternative sources and contribute our own views. For many of us, community radio is a great democratizing movement. For indigenous peoples, community radio may be a matter of life or death.
Actions Needed
(1) Urge the President of Guatemala to support a bill to legalize indigenous community radio stations
(2) Forward this alert to your community radio station and ask for their support!
Although Guatemala has a majority indigenous population, native peoples have historically been persecuted, stripped of their human rights, and massacred. Now, after a 36-year civil war, democracy is emerging in Guatemala, but indigenous people remain excluded from political representation and lack access to crucial information about healthcare and education. Community radio stations help fill this need, broadcasting in 15 indigenous languages and providing an alternative to commercial media.
For indigenous peoples, community radio may be the only source of information available in their language. It’s how they learn from external sources about civic elections, AIDS prevention, flood warnings and daily news. It’s how they share local information among themselves, celebrate their unique cultures, and organize community action.
Despite many promises, the legal use of radio frequencies remains inaccessible for indigenous communities in Guatemala – unless they can come up with as much as $125,000 to bid for a license. Some 600 stations operate without licenses, many of them working out of one-room offices with donated equipment. They are subject to police raids, fines, and closure, especially in regions where indigenous people are resisting mining and other assaults on their lands and their rights.
The stations and their communities are determined to win the right to operating licenses, a right that was promised in Guatemalan Peace Accords, Article 35 of the Guatemalan constitution, Article 16 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the International Labor Organization Convention 169.
On August 3, over a thousand rural people made the long trip to the capital to rally in support of a bill that was introduced to the Guatemalan Congress. The Community Media Act, or “Antiproyecto de Ley de Medios de Comunicacion Comunitaria,” would create a National Council of Community Media that would award licenses to community radio stations, with the participation of the local communities.
Indigenous organizations, community radio stations and NGOs that work for public health, the environment and human rights are calling on international citizens to support this bill by writing to the president of Guatemala. Please refer to the included sample letter and add your own personal reasons for supporting the bill if you wish. Letters may be sent to the following address:
Constitutional President of the Republic of Guatemala
Ingeniero Álvaro Colom Caballeros
Casa Presidencial
6 a. Avenida, 4-18 Zona 1
Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala
Note: Postage from the US is 98 cents.
Sample Letter
Date
Constitutional President of the Republic of Guatemala
Ingeniero Álvaro Colom Caballeros
Casa Presidencial
6 a. Avenida, 4-18 Zona 1
Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala
Dear President Colom,
As a supporter of human rights in my own country and around the world, I am very pleased to know that Guatemalans may soon enjoy the right to free expression via community radio stations. I am writing to encourage you to support the “Ley de Medios de Comunicacion Comunitaria,” which was introduced on August 3rd 2009 to the Guatemalan Congress. I feel strongly about the rights of indigenous peoples in Guatemala and urge you to take this step towards protecting their rights.
As you know, the passage of this law would provide a licensing process for community radio stations in Guatemala, ending the police raids and closures which have threatened the stations’ continued operation. This right is already embedded in Guatemalan Peace Accords, Article 35 of the Guatemalan constitution, Article 16 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, ILO Convention 169 and reinforced by the recommendations of the OAS in 2004.
Community radio stations are essential to indigenous peoples in Guatemala because they broadcast in indigenous languages, often providing the only means of access to important information about health, education, and current events.
I appreciate the work you have done to protect human rights and promote democracy in Guatemala, such as your anti-impunity measures and declassification of Civil War documents. I strongly urge you to continue to advocate for human rights by supporting the Ley de Medios de Comunicacion Comunitaria. Your immediate attention to this matter will ensure that community radio stations continue to operate as powerful tools for democracy and human rights.
Please do everything within your power to secure passage of this important bill. Human rights advocates around the world are eager to celebrate this important step forward for human rights in Guatemala.
Sincerely,
YOUR NAME AND ADDRESS
*********************************
This action alert was requested by: Mujb’ab ‘l yol, Association of Guatemalan Community Radios (ARCG), National Coordinator of Indigenous Community Radio of Guatemala (CNRCIG), Community Media Association of Solola (AMECOS), Community Communications Association of South-Eastern Guatemala (ACECSOGUA)
Participating organizations: Cultural Survival, Health Unlimited, Guatemala Human Rights Commission USA, and Global Response.
For more information about indigenous community radio in Guatemala, see www.culturalsurvival.org.
