I very much feel that all these following articles, although somewhat lengthy (because ive posted them in full) are very much important to our understanding of Canadian multinationals impact on the world's indigenous peoples, and therefore, i feel that they are very warranted for time taken to read, if you have it.
- Aboriginals don't have enough say in mining development up north: Grand Chief
- Canadian ambassador to Guatemala spreads misinformation about film documenting indigenous Mayan Q'eqchi' communities forcibly evicted on behalf of nickel mining company Skye Resources
- In March, the City of Toronto hosts the "International Convention, Trade Show & Investors Exchange - Mining Investment Show", sponsored by Barrick Gold Corporation, in response, i'm posting the public declaration. THE MINING INDUSTRY'S TRACK RECORD ON THE ENVIRONMENT, HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE RIGHTS OF INDIGENOUS PEOPLES: A SOMBRE ASSESMENT AND A RESPONSIBILITY TO TAKE ON
1.
Aboriginals don't have enough say in mining development up north: Grand Chief
By Chinta Puxley
TORONTO (CP) -- Ontario is allowing mining companies to strip natural resources from northern aboriginal communities without giving First Nations a veto power over projects or a share in the profits, an aboriginal leader said Monday.
The province is granting companies permission to exploit aboriginal land when those companies should be dealing directly with the affected communities, said Stan Beardy, the grand chief representing 49 northern Ontario First Nations.
While the Liberal government is drawing up guidelines on how to consult aboriginals on mining and exploration, the Nishnawbe Aski Nation grand chief said the consultations are meaningless if aboriginals have no power to negotiate development on their traditional land.
First Nations want to be an equal partner, not an afterthought, Beardy said.
"We want to share in the wealth," he said in an interview Monday. "Billions of dollars come out of (our) territory on an annual basis... none of that wealth comes back to our communities. As a result, we're very, very poor."
Many of the Nishnawbe Aski Nation communities have lived under boil-water advisories and are plagued with substandard housing, high unemployment and suicide rates.
The province has drawn up a discussion paper regarding aboriginal consultations but the document rules out giving First Nations a veto on development and doesn't make any mention of profit-sharing.
"Nothing in there tells me things are going to change for my people," Beardy said. "It's a gesture but it's not what we're looking for. We keep hoping we will be dealt with fairly and honourably."
Increasing mining activity in northern Ontario has caused friction between the province and aboriginal communities. The Nishnawbe Aski Nation is a vocal opponent to an open-pit diamond mine on the western coast of James Bay, saying the mine could threaten the boreal forest.
[The Nishnawbe Aski] Nation, is in court-ordered talks with junior exploration company Platinex over drilling in the Big Trout Lake area, some 600 kilometres north of Thunder Bay, Ont. not available for comment Monday, but spokesperson Laura Blondeau said the province takes its responsibility to consult with aboriginals very seriously.
The Supreme Court ruled in 2005 that governments have a duty to consult aboriginals when decisions affect their treaty rights. The ruling also stated aboriginal groups do not hold a veto over proposed projects, Blondeau said.
"That's a Supreme Court ruling, that's not us," Blondeau said. "We are very much looking forward to meeting our constitutional obligations and that involves full consultation."
NDP Leader Howard Hampton said aboriginals deserve more than guidelines. Aboriginals are virtually the only inhabitants in Ontario's Far North and it doesn't make sense for either Ottawa or bureaucrats in Toronto to decide the fate of their land, he said.
"People of Toronto would find it very strange if somebody in Big Trout Lake said we're now going to lay down the rules for (the city's) development," said Hampton.
"I think it's equally strange that a provincial or federal government would attempt to mandate what the rules are in a large part of Ontario where there are virtually only aboriginal people.
"Aboriginal people... deserve the majority decision-making in these issues."
2. A Public Letter To:
Peter MacKay, Minister of Foreign Affairs James Lambert, Director General, Latin America and Caribbean Bureau, DFAIT Kenneth Cook, Canadian Ambassador to Guatemala
RE:
Canadian ambassador to Guatemala spreads misinformation about film documenting indigenous Mayan Q'eqchi' communities forcibly evicted on behalf of nickel mining company Skye Resources
February 28, 2007
We, the undersigned, write with deep concern over the recent conduct of Canadian ambassador to Guatemala, Kenneth Cook. Ambassador Cook has been misinforming people about the work of Canadian doctoral student Steven Schnoor, who has been in Central America for several months conducting CIDA-funded research, in collaboration with Rights Action and various Guatemalan organizations and communities. The ambassador's allegations also prejudice public perception of the territorial claims of indigenous Mayan Q'eqchi' communities affected by Canadian mining company Skye Resources.
Multiple sources, including Guatemalan church leaders, have now attested that ambassador Cook has been engaging an active campaign of disinformation to discredit what Schnoor has brought to light in his recent work, which examines the conduct of Canadian mining companies operating in Central America, and traces complicity in human rights violations by such companies.
On January 8th and 9th of this year, Schnoor, Canadian journalist Dawn Paley and photographer James Rodriguez were present near the town of El Estor in eastern Guatemala during the forced evictions of several Mayan Q'eqchi' communities that had been residing on lands claimed to be owned by the Guatemalan Nickel Company -- a subsidiary of Canada's Skye Resources. The evictions were illegal, destructive and violent. Close to seven hundred police and soldiers -- many of whom were heavily armed -- encircled the communities as workers paid by the mining company destroyed people's homes. The army's involvement in internal policing is illegal under the 1996 Guatemalan Peace Accords. Skye Resources claims that the evictions were peaceful and that the forces that carried them out were unarmed.
Schnoor captured the evictions on video, and produced a 9-minute documentary that refutes the company's claims. This video, which has now circulated widely on the internet, shows some of Rodriguez's photos of heavily armed soldiers running through the woods, as families watch their homes being burned to the ground. Also in the video, a Mayan Q'eqchi' woman furiously rails against the injustice of the situation as she and her family watch their home being dismantled by company employees, all the while surrounded by hundreds of police. The video is available at the following link:
http://www.rightsaction.org/video/elestor
Paley's article on the evictions, "This is What Development Looks Like," is available at
http://www.dominionpaper.ca/articles/899, and Rodriguez's photographs of the evictions are available at http://mimundo-jamesrodriguez.blogspot.com/2007_01_01_archive.html.
In what can only be seen as an apparent effort to defend Skye's position and discredit the long-standing land claims, development and human rights needs of impoverished local Mayan Q'eqchi' peoples, ambassador Cook has been repeatedly spreading misinformation about Schnoor's video. Multiple sources attest that Cook has been insisting that the video lacks credibility for the following reasons:
1. The photographs shown in the video were not actually taken at the evictions; rather, they are actually old photographs -- from as far back as the Guatemalan internal conflict -- that have been used many times and in different places.
2. The impoverished Mayan Q'eqchi' woman who rails against the injustice of the forced evictions was actually an actress from the town of El Estor whom Schnoor paid to "perform" in this manner.
These accusations are extremely serious and entirely, unequivocally false. They discredit the legitimate voices of the Mayan people depicted in the video, and depict Schnoor as a manipulative propagandist. They deny the ugly reality on the ground, and imply that the indigenous peoples' voices of resistance and the images of the illegal evictions cannot possibly be real.
On Thursday, February 21st, Schnoor wrote an e-mail to ambassador Cook, insisting that the allegations are false and asking that Cook provide an account for why he, as a high-ranking representative of the government of Canada, would make such egregious statements. Schnoor respectfully asked Cook to cease making misrepresentations that cast aspersion on his work and interfere with his constitutionally guaranteed rights of freedom of expression.
To be absolutely clear: all photographs in Schnoor's video were shot by photographer James Rodriguez at the evictions near El Estor on January 8th and 9th, 2007. In fact, one particular photograph which Cook claims to have seen many times before -- of an indigenous man burying his head in his hand in a gesture of despair -- is currently on the cover of
Guatemalan magazine Este País (February 2007, Vol. 2, No. 8) for a feature story on the recent evictions. Several more of Rodriguez's photos from the evictions can be found inside the magazine. Dawn Paley, the Canadian journalist who was also present at the evictions and was also photographing the events, has photographs of the very same individual. All are willing to testify and provide evidence that Cook's allegations are entirely false and that all photographs included in the video were indeed taken at the evictions.
Cook's allegation that the Mayan Q'eqchi' woman in the video was actually a paid actress is so absurd that it almost might not merit a serious response, were it not for the damage such a claim can do to Schnoor's reputation, to say little of how insulting such a claim is to the woman in question.
We hereby call upon the Government of Canada for an explanation, apology and inquiry into this matter. We are very concerned that such behaviour is symptomatic of a larger policy position which privileges Canadian extractive industries operating abroad over concerns for the rights and well-being of local communities.
Those familiar with Guatemalan history know that the country is infamous for its record of repression, corruption and flagrant violations of human rights. During the 36-year armed conflict, which officially ended 10 years ago, it is estimated that over 250,000 people were killed or disappeared -- 80% of whom were indigenous people.
Canadian mining investment is implicated in this bloody history. Subsoil rights to the lands where the recent evictions took place were granted to INCO by a Guatemalan military government in 1965. INCO's activities were facilitated by brutal and repressive military dictatorships that massacred and repressed the local indigenous people. Both the United Nations Commission for Historical Clarification in Guatemala (CEH) and the "Nunca Mas" ('Never Again') report by the Human Rights Office of the Archbishop of Guatemala, found INCO (through EXMIBAL -- the Guatemalan mining company 80% owned by INCO) complicit in grave human rights violations against opponents of the mining project, including threats and assassinations.
It is within this historical context and through the recent illegal evictions that Skye Resources advances its plans for the Fenix nickel mine in the region. It does so despite local indigenous peoples' claims that they were never previously and freely consulted, as required by the International Labor Organization's Convention 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Independent Countries, ratified by Guatemala in 1996. Furthermore, Skye has never produced property titles to many of the lands it claims to own -- casting doubt upon the legality of the recent evictions.
The serious human rights violations and developmental harms that for decades have accompanied nickel mining near El Estor are but a few examples amongst many -- from Guatemala to Ghana, from Colombia to the Congo -- of the complicity of Canadian mining companies, the Canadian government and by extension, the Canadian public, in political, socio-economic and cultural rights violations. For years, Canadian governments have promoted and funded harmful mining operations through the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT), the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), Export Development Canada (EDC) and the Canada Pension Plan (CPP). Many of the mining activities supported are at complete odds with the locally-controlled integral development envisioned by local communities and indigenous peoples.
We call upon Ambassador Cook to provide an account for why he made his statements and to publicly retract them. We call upon the Government of Canada for an inquiry into this matter, investigating the broader implications of the ambassador's actions -- actions that are symptomatic of Canadian government policy that privileges Canadian extractive industries operating abroad over the human rights and development needs of local communities. Cook's
predecessor, James Lambert, also made public statements defending Canadian mining investments while dismissing concerns over human rights violations in the process. We also add our voices to the others that are demanding the ratification of binding legislation in Canada that would hold Canadian mining companies and governmental institutions legally accountable for their complicity in human rights violations abroad.
We look forward to hearing from you and will respond to any questions you might have, provide further information about these issues and participate in any hearings your offices and parties might organize.
Respectfully,
Steven Schnoor, independent filmmaker & PhD candidate, York/Ryerson Universities
steven_s@yorku.ca
Dawn Paley, independent journalist
dawnpaley@gmail.com; (604) 715-4180
Grahame Russell, Rights Action co-director
info@rightsaction.org; (860) 352-2152
James Rodriguez, independent photographer
rodochan9@yahoo.com
cc. Canadian media outlets, leaders of opposition parties, foreign affairs critics, civil society organizations
3. PUBLIC DECLARATION
THE MINING INDUSTRY'S TRACK RECORD ON THE ENVIRONMENT, HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE RIGHTS OF INDIGENOUS PEOPLES: A SOMBRE ASSESMENT AND A RESPONSIBILITY TO TAKE ON
This March, the City of Toronto hosts the "International Convention, Trade Show & Investors Exchange - Mining Investment Show", sponsored by Barrick Gold Corporation. The convention brings together mining industry representatives from around the world. This event gives us the opportunity to express our deep concerns and to denounce the critical situation regarding increasing exploitation of natural resources, particularly mineral resources.
Today's unfettered economic growth, with its emphasis on profits, power and wealth, runs roughshod over any concerns for the human, social and environmental effects of unregulated exploitation of resources. This trend is devastating for the environment and for communities. Ecosystems are disrupted. Soils contaminated. Air and water pollution increases. The food chain is disturbed. These often irreversible impacts are a direct result of the industrial extractive activities of the gas, petroleum and mining sectors. The recent GIEC report about climate change clearly outlines these impacts. There are also profound human consequences faced by communities, especially indigenous ones, which inhabit the regions where resource exploitation takes place.
The expansion of multinational extractive enterprises, including mining firms, particularly in Third world nations, appear like a new form of colonialism that succeeds by virtue of the use of economic might. These enterprises strip the earth of its natural wealth through full-blown devastation of vast portions of land. Often they set up shop through million-dollar lobby campaigns that provide them with access to the corridors of power of the local political and economic elite, combining seductive promises of profits, the purchasing of "gifts", and the use of fear-mongering, threats and aggressive business tactics, sometimes even repressive actions. These practices constitute a fundamental violation of human rights. A marked increase in violence occurs as mining companies push to expand their operations, including the use of repressive forces within communities as well as generalized militarization in and around the sites.
Testimonies of such realities are turning up from all over the world. For example, nickel extraction in Sorowako (Indonesia) by the Canadian firm Inco completely disrupted the Karonsi'e Dongi indigenous community life: the people were forcibly displaced with the complicity of local authorities and the police. Traditional indigenous lands were taken over by the company, part of which was turned into a golf course and Inco constructed buildings on an indigenous graveyard. By taking advantage of local social conflicts, this firm was also able to take control of the territory of other communities in central Sulawesi. In 1999, the United Nations Truth Commission linked Inco to both human rights violations and murders in Guatemala. In San Marcos, one of the poorest regions of this nation, Glamis Gold Ltd. (now Goldcorp Inc.) has created a hostile climate filled with threats and intimidation. It continues to operate the Marlin mining project in spite of almost unanimous opposition from the local population (popular consultation of Sipacapa).
The case of the Pascua Lama mining project by the Canadian multinational, Barrick Gold Corporation, at the Chilean-Argentine border further illustrates the potential for unforeseen negative consequences. Situated at the heart of the Andean Cordillera, the Pascua Lama project endangers the entire watershed ecosystem of the Huasco valley, directly affecting the essential water resources within this semi-desert region: the glaciers. Not only does the project diminish the region's already retreating glacial water sources, it will affect the quality of the water available by polluting it with the use of toxic products such as cyanide (already denounced in Berlin Declaration, 2000) and some heavy metals. The amount of water available will also be affected: mining operations needs enormous quantities of water (about 360 l per second). With this project, Barrick Gold has violated the territorial and ancestral rights of the Diaguita indigenous peoples who inhabit the territory of the mine. The firm's efforts to begin mining in a territorial area that is already in dispute has disrupted life in the region, where agriculture is the main economic activity, as well as violating the right of the population to self-determination, that is, the right to choose their own form of development.
The extracting industries make enormous profits, among others, because of very low royalties and the often difficult social, economic and political conditions in the countries where they set up business. The traces and repercussions of mining enterprises are not part of community development, collective prosperity, security, well-being nor quality of life, as their official statements would have us believe. On the contrary, their activities mean social, environmental, cultural and human devastation.
In the current state of the world in which neo-liberal ideology dominates, foreign investment is naturally given priority above all other consideration. Given this reality, Canada must assume a major responsibility for its firms: a total of 60% of the international mining companies are Canadian. Voluntary measures that encourage them to respect the environment that are currently being adopted are clearly insufficient and despite this the Canadian government is considering them as potential means of regulating enterprises. Firm regulation and a rigorous system of control are vital. Media campaigns that portray mining multinationals as "responsible enterprises," and in the case of Barrick as a "community mining enterprise", are a far reach from the painful reality of their human rights violations (environmental, social, indigenous) that occur alongside mining development projects around the world.
In order to improve this situation, we demand the following:
- The adoption of clear, urgent and effective measures that ensure the respect of the environment and of communities;
- The respect of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a sine qua non requirement that should be integrated into the extractive projects of the mining industry.
March 2, 2007, Montreal
Groupe Non à Pascua Lama-Montréal (Canada)
L'Entraide Missionnaire (Canada)
Chaire de recherche du Canada en éducation relative à l'environnement, Université du Québec
à Montréal Social Justice Committee (Canada)
Comité chilien pour les droits humains, Montreal (Canada)
Association Culturelle Araucaria (Canada)
Chiliean Canadian Community Association of Calgary Club du Fric Éthique (Canada)
Coalition Romero, Montreal (Canada)
Comité pour les droits humains en Amérique latine - CDHAL, Montreal (Canada)
Comunidad Eclesial de Base "Mártires de El Salvador" - CEBES, Montreal (Canada)
Grupo de apoyo a FUNDELIDDI - Montreal (Canada)
MiningWatch Canada Projet Accompagnement Québec-Guatemala (Canada)
Proyecto Cultural Sur (Canada)
Solidarité Laurentides Amérique centrale-SLAM, Saint-Jérôme (Canada)
Observatorio latinoamericano de conflictos ambientales - OLCA
Concejo de salud de Conay (Chile)
Consumidores de agua y regantes del Huasco (Chile)
Coordinadora Ambiental de Alto del Carmen (Chile)
Coordinadora del Huasco (Chile)
Grupo operativo pro defensa del Huasco (Chile)
Junta de vecinos de La Pampa (Chile)
Movimiento ciudadano anti Pascua Lama (Chile)
Pastoral Salvaguarda de la Creación (Chile)
Santiago Luis Faura, Enrique Gaytan Arcos, and Arturo Aliaga, Town councillors of Alto del
Carmen (Chile)
Afirmación para una República Igualitaria "ARI", La Rioja (Argentina)
APresTur - Chilecito, La Rioja (Argentina)
Asociación de Mujeres Riojanas (Argentina)
Autoconvocados en Defensa de la VIDA (Argentina)
Coordinadora de Asambleas Ciudadanas por la Vida - Chilecito, La Rioja (Argentina)
Environment Defense Foundation (Argentina)
Grupo Apu Huaira - Chilecito, La Rioja (Argentina)
Inka Ñan Turismo EVT - Chilecito, La Rioja (Argentina)
Operarios ex Gatilar Chamical (Argentina)
Proyecto Nexos de articulación entre Universidad y Movimientos Sociales - Universidad Nacional Quilmes (Argentina)
Raúl A. Montenegro, Professor, Alternative Nobel Prize (Argentina)
Theomai Network & Journal, Society, Nature & Development Studies (Argentina)
Vecinos Autoconvocados de Capital (Argentina)
Vecinos Autoconvocados de Chamical (Argentina)
Vecinos Autoconvocados de Chañarmuyo (Argentina)
Vecinos Autoconvocados de Famatina (Argentina)
Vecinos Autoconvocados de Patquial (Argentina)
Vecinos Autoconvocados de Pituil (Argentina)
Vecinos de Malanzán (Argentina)
Vecinos de Punta de los Llanos (Argentina)
Centro de Investigación sobre Inversión y Comercio - CEICOM (El Salvador)
US-El Salvador Sister Cities
