With Canada’s Uranium boom in overdrive, more and more indigenous peoples are being threatened by the scourge that is the uranium industry.

The latest threat, according to Ruth Levi, President of the Mawiw Council of First Nations, concerns the Mi’kmaq and Maliseet on the east coast.

Ruth says the two Nations “are experiencing growing frustration with the approach of industry and government toward achieving development and self-sufficiency in the province.”

The First Peoples are being conspicuously ignored, and their rights flagrantly violated and infringed, as result of this new-drive to modernize and expand. Industry pays lip service to aboriginal concerns and hopes to be left alone by First Nations in exchange for a modest donation.

In a letter to the editor dated July 2nd, Ruther further adds that the government is substituting “correspondence” for “consultation.”

Meanwhile, the wealth of generations is being pumped out, …

As you may have heard by now, on Wednesday, June 11 Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued an apology for Canada’s role in the Residential School System — that is, an apology for more than 120 years of state-sponsored crimes against children of Indigenous descent.

I haven’t actually heard the apology myself (heard one, heard them all). And to tell the truth I wasn’t even going to comment on it, but Mike Krebs sent me an article he wrote that I want to single out here.

Calling it The Harper ‘Apology’ — Saying ‘Sorry’ with a Forked Tongue, Mike articulates a number of key points surrounding residential schools and the apology. For instance,

You would think offering an “apology” means taking some sort of accountability for the residential school system. But Harper’s statement acknowledges that what happened is a “mistake” without dealing with it as a crime, and without any …

Authorities in Guerrero, Mexico “have agreed to pay 490,000 pesos (US$48,000) in compensation to 14 indigenous men coerced into having vasectomies,” reports Bill Weinberg of the WW4Report.

The men will each be paid 35,000 pesos (US$3,400) and given water storage tanks and cement to build homes, said state health secretary Luis Barrera Rios. The men agreed to the deal, despite initial demands of 200,000 pesos (US$19,000) each.

The men, represented by the Tlachinollan Center for Human Rights, say that state health workers showed up in the village of El Camalote in 1998 and demanded that men with more than four children have vasectomies. The plaintiffs said they were promised a clinic, medicine, clothes, scholarships for their children and new homes for submitting to the procedure—while those who refused were threatened with removal from government aid programs. The claims were investigated by the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH).

The government earlier …

There were multiple offensives against indigenous people throughout the month of June. A Canadian court paved the way to reclassify 16 lakes as mine waste dumps; The US Supreme court issued at least three rulings against indigenous rights; Police in Australia barred a group of Indigenous People from visiting a scared site; and there was state-sanctioned violence against people in Guatemala, India, Brazil, Colombia, and Peru.

In other news, the O’odham of Gila River became the first Indigenous Community in the US (perhaps in the world) to ratify the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples; The Anishinabek launched a campaign to abolish the term “Aboriginal;” a call for an independent government was established in the CHT; and finally, in northeastern India, Indigenous communities gathered for the first ever convention on peace and unity.

You will find these stories and more in …

Earlier this month, the Mayan community of San Miguel Ixtahuacán issued a public statement denouncing the recent actions of Guatemala’s National Civil Police.

Acting on behalf of the Canadian-mining company Montana Exploradora de Guatemala (Goldcorp), on June 13th the police shot tear gas at local children and used force against women peacefully demonstrating their opposition to Goldcorp’s Marlin mine. Please see the full statement below for more information.

As an aside, Dawn Paley over at the Dominion reports some additional news. Guatemala’s Constitutional Court recently found 8 sections of the federal mining law to be unconstitutional. While this won’t bring an end to the mine, it should help mitigate the damage it will cause to the environment.

Photo by Keith Vass

PUBLIC STATEMENT IN FAVOUR OF COMMUNITIES AFFECTED BY OPEN PIT MINING

13th June 2008

San Miguel Ixtahuacán, Guatemala

To Human Rights Organizations, the Human …

The Anishinabek have launched a campaign to get rid of the term “Aboriginal.” According to a recent press release, the Chiefs of the 42 member-communities endorsed a resolution during their annual Grand Council Assembly that characterizes the word as “another means of assimilation through the displacement of our First Nation-specific inherent and treaty rights.”

“It’s actually offensive to hear that term used in reference to First Nations citizens,” said Grand Council Chief John Beaucage. “Our Chiefs are giving us direction to inform government agencies, NGOs, educators and media organizations that they should discontinue using inappropriate terminology when they are referring to the Anishinabek. We respect the cultures and traditions of our Metis and Inuit brothers and sisters, but their issues are different from ours.”

The resolution notes that “there are no aboriginal bands, aboriginal reserves, or aboriginal chiefs” and that the reference to “aboriginal …

Directed by Randy Vasquez, Something’s Moving tells the story of three Residential School Survivors in the United States, and their efforts to heal themselves, to restore what was taken from them, and to allow future generations to live a life that’s free from trauma, shame, fear, and self-loathing.

“A great general has said that the only good Indian is a dead one, and that high sanction of his destruction has been an enormous factor in promoting Indian massacres. In a sense, I agree with the sentiment, but only in this: that all the Indian there is in the race should be dead. Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.”

This is quoted from a speech given in 1892 by Captain Richard H. Pratt, founder of the Carlisle Industrial Training School - the first Indian Residential School in the United States (noting, …