Navajo Women Saanii, life sparkling magic

By Brenda Norrell

http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

A book came in the mail, "Navajo Women Saanii." This is no ordinary book, for it is written by Betty Reid, Navajo, with photos by Japanese photographer Kenji Kawano.

This book carries me back to when Betty and I lived in a log cabin in the Chuska Mountains on the Navajo Nation. We worked for the Navajo Times, which for a while was the daily Navajo Times TODAY in the early 1980s. Most days, I traveled across Navajoland for stories and usually Kawano was assigned to photograph those stories.

Our lives were filled with Saanii, Navajo women, who showed us how to spin sheep's wool into yarn and make kneeldown bread from fresh ground corn. There was always something for the women to laugh with us about, always a secret to whisper. They always showed us a gentler and more loving way to be. Stepping lightly on Mother Earth, with memories of trading posts and wagons, grinding blue corn and gathering wild tea, they always spoke to us with tenderness.

At home, in the log cabin on the mountain, we fed the woodstove with wood and dug out of deep snow. We drove down the mountain and struggled with computers, copy editors and deadlines. Those were sweet times and this new book, "Navajo Women Saanii" brings it all back, like Navajo women singing.

Some of the women we interviewed during those years are listed in Betty's new book in the section, "Twenty Noteworthy Navajo Women." One of those women was Claudeen Bates-Arthur, who died in 2004. She was the first Navajo Attorney General and the first female Navajo Chief Justice. One sentence Bates-Arthur said during an interview for Navajo Times is always with me. I asked her who made the most difference in her life and why. She said it was her mother. "She was always there for me," Claudeen said.

Another woman on the list of 29, is Annie Dodge Wauneka, who died in 1997. During her last years, she spent a day showing me her sheep and windmill, remembering how she spent her life. It wasn't the Presidential Medal of Freedom for helping eradicate tuberculosis, or the politics and travel, she remembered. It was her family, the sheep and the windmills.

In this book, "Navajo Women Saanii," Betty tells the stories of women living the quiet life of the Beauty Way and women balancing traditional and modern ways, from educators to rodeo riders. She writes of grandmothers, mothers and daughters. She writes for future generations.

"I remember chubby lambs in the spring and watching women snip wool off the sheep and goats by hand as they gossiped and laughed. I remember the flashlights we relied on for light during inky-black winter nights ..." Betty writes."Traditional Dine' (Navajo) elders say we live in the Fifth World. It sparkles with everything magical."

The mountaintop where we lived in Crystal, between the trading post and the lake, was magical. Looking out the front door, we could see all the journeys, the moon rise, the tracks of bobcats, deer and wild turkey in the snow and the changing colors of oak leaves with the breath of winter.

Life sparkled with everything magical.

Ahe'hee', thank you Betty.

.

"Navajo Women Saanii" is published by Rio Nuevo Publishers in Tucson. Betty Reid is a news reporter for the Arizona Republic. Kenji Kawano lives with his family on the Navajo Nation in Window Rock, Arizona.

Mohawk Women Title Holders: Notice on borders to invaders

Mohawk Nation News
Oct. 29, 2007.

The following position on the Border Issue is being presented by the Mohawk Women Title Holders on November 7, 2007 at the "Indigenous Peoples Border Summit of the Americas" at Tohono O'odham Nation which is claimed by foreign entities known as Mexico and the U.S. The corporate colonial franchises known as "Canada", "U.S." and "Mexico" are trying to illegally place physical and destructive restrictions on our movements over our ancestral lands. The Women Title Holder intend to serve notice to these immigrants and the world community that we refuse to tolerate it. Comments appreciated MNN Mohawk Nation News http://www.mohawknationnews.com/

NOTICE FROM:

The Kohtihon’tia:kwenio of the Kanion’ke:haka - Women Title Holders of the Mohawk Nation of the Rotino’shonni:onwe (Iroquois)

November 7, 2007

TO: The Invaders of North, Central and South America, all their criminal agencies and departments, their international terrorist allies and the useless members of the United Nations;

RE: Freedom of Rotino’shonni:onwe to traverse throughout Indigenous lands known as Onowaregeh, Turtle Island of the “ Western Hemisphere ” and beyond without hindrance from the invading aliens and their agents;

PRESENTED AT:

The Indigenous Peoples Border Summit of the Americas ,
San Xavier Community Center, 2018 West San Xavier Road, Tohono O’odham Nation whose territory is claimed by Mexico and the United States.

PREAMBLE:

Our land is who we are. We can never forfeit ourselves or our land as we are part of Creation on in these lands known as the “Western Hemisphere”, which includes North, Central and South America . We were never conquered by anybody. We survived outright murder, chemical and germ warfare, starvation, genocide by statute, lies and ignorance committed by fabricated colonial nations that are squatting on our Indigenous lands. Canada, United States, Mexico and all the other colonists are fictitious “nations”. They are corporate “franchises” of Europe , not governments. They do not and can never have title to our land. Only we, the original Title Holders, have sovereign authority.

WAMPUM 44 –
GREAT LAW OF PEACE, KAIANEREH’KO:WA

According to Wampum 44 of our law, the Kaianereh’ko:wa, the Great Law of Peace, we, the Kohtihon’tia:kwenio - Women Title Holders - are the caretakers of the land, water and air of “Onowaregeh” [Turtle Island]; and as trustees, our obligation is to preserve and protect the land for the future generations.

a)WHEREAS the Two Row Wampum Agreement and Wampum 58 of the Kaianereh’ko:wa, Great Law of Peace, stipulate that no one shall restrict our freedom of passage on our lands we call Onowaregeh and beyond; we will always reject these artificial borders that were created by the capitalist corporations known as “Canada”, “United States” and “Mexico” which are meant to illegally divide up lands and resources stolen from the Indigenous peoples; and we, the original people, will continue to make agreements and alliances among our nations as we see fit and as we have done since time immemorial.

b)WHEREAS regarding the northeastern area of Onowaregeh, the Kohtihon’tia:kwenio give notice that we reject the attempt by the colonists to make unlawful restrictions on our freedom of passage on our territory and beyond.

c)WHEREAS respect for our rights is entrenched in the constitutions of Canada and the United States .

d)WHEREAS the Charter of the United Nations requires respect for the principles of equal rights and self-determination of peoples; and its members have signed a commitment to resolve differences peacefully without using force.

e)WHEREAS Canada, the United States and Mexico have ascribed to the internationally recognized standards for respecting political rights of the People as set out in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Convention on the Prevention of Genocide, United Nations Convention on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and other international legal instruments.

f)WHEREAS General Assembly Resolution 1541 (XV) requires the informed consent of the people before they are included in another state; and the international Court of Justice affirmed this Resolution in the Western Sahara case.

g)WHEREAS according to article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Sections 1 and 2, every nation has a right to its nationality; and no nation can change another nation’s identity by imposing legislation to restrict travel, trade and commerce which must be unhindered throughout our original pre-contact territories.

h)WHEREAS international law is committed to affirming the equal and inalienable rights of all peoples.

i)WHEREAS Canada, the United States, Mexico and all other colonial states must abide by the international law principles that there can be no arbitrary encroachment on Indigenous peoples; ignoring the true Indigenous people is now universally recognized as illegal; independent Indigenous people’s rights must be respected and heeded; and our perspectives on the issues must not be ignored;

j)WHEREAS the Indigenous peoples have our own constitutions, we cannot be arbitrarily turned into Canadian, American or Mexican citizens without our knowledge or consent; and we cannot be governed by foreign laws that have been arbitrarily imposed without our consent.

k)WHEREAS foreign nations that have invaded our territory cannot restrict our movements and make unlawful demands for us to carry foreign passports and other forms of alien identity; we have made agreements and means by which to traverse the lands of our Indigenous allies; and we have a form of identification, the “Red Card”, which are issued to us under our constitution, the Kaianereh’ko:wa. The “Haudenosaunee Passport” is for travel outside of Onowaregeh.

l)WHEREAS the “Red Card” and the “Haudenosaunee Passport” identifies that a person is a “Haudenosaunee”, Six Nations, of Onowaregeh; according to the Two Row Wampum Agreement we are free to pass and re-pass by land or inland navigation or by air onto our territories; we are free to continue to carry on trade and commerce with each other; it is illegal for taxes, duties or any fees whatsoever to be extracted from us by any foreigners; we are free to hunt and fish anywhere on our territory; and we shall have free passage over all toll roads and bridges that have been built on Onowaregeh.

m)WHEREAS the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights provides that every human being has the inherent right to life and fundamental freedom; no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life or freedom; we demand that the United States stop the practice of murdering and detaining our people for crossing their illegally imposed economic border; this contravenes the internationally recognized principles of fundamental justice; life is sacred; and no product of the human imagination can justify these systemic detentions and murders. Human life may not be sacred to the invaders, but it is to us.

n)WHEREAS the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People has been adopted by a majority of 144 states; international law has affirmed that all Indigenous peoples are to be treated as equals to all other peoples; and we accordingly claim our right to the full enjoyment as collectives and as individuals to all the human rights and fundamental freedoms that have been recognized in the Charter of the United Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and international law, including the right to self-determination and the right to self-government in all our affairs without being subjected to forced assimilation or destruction of our culture.

o)WHEREAS states are required to provide redress for violations of our rights through effective mechanisms; we hereby notify Canada, United States and Mexico that their citizens have been violating our rights; we demand they disarm and stop them from detaining and shooting us; we demand that they stop harassing and charging us in their illegally imposed judicial system; and should they have any issues with us, they must bring their complaints to the legal representatives of our traditional governments.

p)WHEREAS we are aware that torture is an intentional act that is premeditated, systemic and scientific which is meant to break down our dignity, our social fabric and foment terror within our people; and these detentions are illegal and violations of fundamental human rights.

q)WHEREAS most of us have been subjected to illegal “puppet” tribal and band councils imposed by foreign colonial states, we demand that the colonizing states disband their puppet entities and restore proper diplomatic relations with our inherent traditional governments.

WE, THE KOHTIHON’TIA:KWENIO SEEK TO INFORM YOU THAT THIS IS FULL AND FAIR NOTICE THAT:

Canada, United States, Mexico and other colonial franchises must cease and desist their attempts to violate our authority; that they must deal with us on a nation-to-nation basis as required under both our law and international law; that any individual or foreign entity wishing to discuss any issues between our nations must provide full information through proper diplomatic channels, which are the Governor General of Canada and the Presidents of the United States and Mexico, who have a duty to inform us.

We, the Kohtihon’tia:kwenio, brought this matter to the attention of Canada in an action in the Supreme Court of Canada – Kanion’ke:haka Kaianereh’ko:wa Kanon’ses:neh v. Attorney General of Canada and Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Ontarion, Court File: 05-CV-030785.

We, the Kohtihon’tia:kwenio, brought this constitutional jurisdiction issue before the U.S. Supreme Court. See No. 05-165: 2005. In the Supreme Court of the United States in re: Kanion’ke:haka Kaianereh’ko:wa Kanon’ses:ne, Non-party, Petitioner/Movant/Appellant, The Canadian St. Regis Band of Mohawk Indians, Plaintiffs, Respondents v. The State of New York , Defendants, Respondents. Petition for Writs of Certiorari and Quo Warranto with Prohibition and Mandamus in Aid to Prevent Genocide. Rules 17.1 and 20.1.

FOR THE ABOVE REASONS, WE, THE KOHTIHON’TIA:KWENIO, AS MEMBERS OF THE ROTINO’SHONNI:ONWE – IN ORDER TO PROTECT OUR PHYSICAL INTEGRITY AND LEGAL RIGHTS – SAY AS FOLLOWS:

i)The Women Title Holders of the Rotino’shonni:onwe does not tolerate the violations of our constitution, ancient customs, traditions and agreements by Canada, U.S., Mexico or any franchises, corporations and agents violating our inherent rights by encroaching on our land.

ii)Murder and torture have no place in either internal or international relations of any peoples. It is a violation of the Great Law which is the first and only law of the Western Hemisphere .

iii) We invite Canada, the U.S. and Mexico to put away their guns and weaponry so we can resolve our differences in a mature and peaceful way, by rediscovering and brightening the spirit of the Two Row Wampum and the Covenant Chain that began our peaceful international relationship centuries ago.

iv)Should Canada , U.S. and Mexico continue to breach our rights, we shall take the necessary measures available to us in the international arena to correct the injustices that have been committed against us.

v)It has never been acceptable to abuse people on the basis of race, religion, nationality, belief or membership in a particular social group. We invite all members of the colonizing societies to become partners with us to end the cycle of abuse, stop the illegal criminalization of our people and extend dignity, equality and a voice to all peoples.

KOHTIHON’TIA:KWENIO, the Women Title Holders of the Kanion’ke:haka of the Rotino’shonni:onwe:

Katenies
Kahentinetha

Contact: P.O. Box 991 , Kahnawake of Mohawk territory [ Quebec , Canada ] J0L 1B0, kahentinetha2@yahoo.com katenies20@yahoo.com

Mohawk Nation News: Great Law and the Handsome Lake Code

BOOK ON "THE ON-GOING CONFUSION BETWEEN THE GREAT LAW AND THE HANDSOME LAKE CODE"

MNN. Oct. 28, 2007. MNN Mohawk Nation News has published another book in the "Mohawk Issues for Dummies Series". It's called "The On-Going Confusion Between the Great Law of
Peace and the Handsome Lake Code". Here are some comments from two people who read the book:

"Gees, I always thought I was "traditional" because of my belief in the "Creator"! It looks like I have to question how I relate to the natural world and my responsibilities to it", stated a Kanion'ke:haka youth who is always looking for answers.

"What a colonial conspiracy! This is the first time anyone took the Great Law philosophy and compared it with the Christian-based Handsome Lake Code ", said a surprised elder of Kahnawake. This book helps readers to understand the alarming turn of events at Six Nations over the land reclamation. For almost two years the Six Nations people, our friends and allies
successfully took back and held Indigenous land known as "Douglas Creek Estates", now called "Kanenhstaton." Read more ...
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/10/mohawk-nation-news-great-law-and.html

FEMA scolded for phony news conference on fires

FEMA exposed: Used their own employees to stage phony PR for FEMA on fires

Since the Washington Post exposed the phony reporters, now there's a cleanup spin going on. But there's so many big questions, like why did television reporters allow the fire coverage to become all about praising politicians and FEMA. Also, there's Blackwater's pending training base on the border at Potrero, where the Harris fire started.
Some of the most biased news reporting that was ever broadcast assaulted viewers during the California fires last week, ignoring the magnitude of the tragedies, enormous loss of homes and evacuation of nearly a million people. The cameras focused on smiling Arnold Schwarzenegger and George Bush, and praising politicians, while people watched their homes burn and struggled for news of their loved ones.
FEMA's phony news reporters:
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/10/27/fema_scolded_for_staging_phony_news_conference/

Solidarity: Photos of Mohawks and Zapatistas at encuentro

More photos from Zapatistas' encuentro in Sonora, Mexico:

Special thanks to Angela Sterritt and the Indigenous Free School for the photos!
Angela was among the Native youth there, including Dustin from Redwire Native Youth Media and Gord from Warrior Publications. More photos:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/indigenous-encuentro/
.
Special thanks to Redwire Native Youth Media for sending those photos. Read more about Redwire:
http://www.redwiremag.com/


The Vícam Declaration: “We will defend Mother Earth with our lives”
by Hermann Bellinghausen

Originally published in La Jornada
Translation by Zapagringo

... The participants in the encuentro proclaimed their historic right to free self-determination, “respecting the different ways that, for the exercise of this, our people decide, according to their origin, history and aspirations." Also, they reject “the war of conquest and capitalist extermination imposed by the transnational companies and the international financial organizations in complicity with the great powers and nation states.
"They express their rejection of “the destruction and sacking of mother earth by means of the occupation of our territories for industrial, mining, agribusiness, touristic, savage urbanization and infrastructure activities, as well as the privatization of the water, land, forests, oceans and coasts, biological diversity, the air, the rain, traditional knowledge and all that is born of mother earth."
Read more ...
http://zapagringo.blogspot.com/2007/10/vcam-declaration.html

Read more at Narco News:

"Mohawks in solidarity with Zapatistas at Encuentro"
Revolution begins with Awakening
by Brenda Norrell
http://www.narconews.com/

"O'odham: Awakening at the Encuentro"
by Brenda Norrell
http://www.narconews.com/

San Diego Harris fire began at controversial Blackwater site

The Harris fire, that is still burning in San Diego Country, began near Potrero, where one man was killed in the fire on Sunday. Potrero is where Blackwater plans to build a military-style training facility near the border. Now, four more burned bodies have been found. The fire is only 20 percent contained and 97 homes have been lost with many injuries.

San Diego Fires: A Good Reason To Stop Blackwater
23 hours ago by Rosemary
If you have been following the efforts of Blackwater to create a facility in Potrero, you will know that many San Diegans have been blindsided by the plans for the mercenary corporation to build here. These fires are just another reason ...

...Beyond the damage and destruction to life and property, the timing of this wildfire could not be much worse. This fire exploded just as the people of Potrero were preparing for a recall election on December 11 to kick out the planning group members who approved Blackwater's base. With ballots scheduled to be mailed in early November to less than 600 registered voters in this historic vote-by-mail recall, Potrero residents were preparing for an intense campaign over the next six weeks.

Four more burned bodies found near Potrero:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20071025-1757-bn25fires2.html

Somewhere on the border

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

SOMEWHERE ON THE BORDER -- For a couple of years now, I've had this romantic image of a journey from the southern border of the United States, to the northern tip of Alaska. In a perfect world, I would get in my very own camper truck and drive out of Tucson, then to the border at Lukeville, Arizona, and finally to San Diego, before heading north.

In a not-so-perfect-world, I began this journey five days ago, in a rental car with a discount coupon and really sick with a lung infection. Of course, I could have never imagined that when I reached San Diego, a few small fires would turn into all of southern California engulfed in flames. However, when I arrived Sunday afternoon, it was the hurricane force winds tossing the car around on canyon bridges that was the most terrifying.

Still, in just five days along the border, I've learned how extremely complex and different each region is, from Lukeville, Ajo and Yuma in Arizona, to the port of entry at Quechan. Then, there's my new personal favorite, Calexico, California. Driving through town, I had to ask myself, "I wonder if the Minutemen get in their faces here." Later, hanging out around the border wall west of town, a border agent wandered over. Looking at the border wall, he said, "They jump it pretty easy."

Looking back over the past five days, there's two things that stand out in my mind now: If you want to terrify a biologist on the federal payroll -- just ask how the border wall will effect the endangered jaguars, bats and Sonoran Pronghorns migrating along the border. (Their minds seem to take a quick accounting: "Will I be able to get unemployment?") They are terrified to speak the truth.

Second, there's a reason that the people of San Diego are often voted the most beautiful in the United States. There's a beauty of spirit within the people. While evacuees were watching their homes burn, or waiting without any news of homes and loved ones, there was a gentleness and sweetness of spirit that is rare. Yes, they said, they would rebuild. The place is too beautiful to leave.

Last night, I tried to drive back to Viejas to write about the humanitarian efforts there, but the dark smoke, blowing out to the east from the fires, was too heavy to breathe. So, I'm back to asking those questions about the border wall, jaguars, bats and Pronghorns.

And, I'm back on the road.

Photo: On the border near Calexico, California/Photo Brenda Norrell

'We were left behind,' Rincon Indians lose 65 structures

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20071025/news_2m25tribes.html

Navajo and Hopi coalition urges global action for Maoris

Black Mesa Water Coalition in solidarity: Global Day of Action for Maoris

In the spirit of Tino Rangatiratanga, we as Indigenous Peoples of the Americas are calling for International Indigenous solidarity with Indigenous Maori brothers and sisters of Aotearoa (New Zealand) who currently being detained by the Crown and Prime Minster of New Zealand under the guise of "Anti-terrorism law". On October 15, 2007-New Zealand police raided the homes and community spaces across Aotearoa (North Island and Christchurch) under New Zealand anti-terrorism legislation. Seventeen arrests have been made; among those who were arrested and questioned are vocal community leaders of Indigenous Peoples rights movement, environmental justice and peace activists. The Terrorism Suppression Act 2002 is in response of U.S. 9/11 events. It is still unclear what conditions can be defined as "terrorism". This act has given the grounds to allow over 300 police raids, invasion of privacy, relinquishing civil liberties of Maori citizens and could easily be used against those engaging in political or industrial protest action. In September 2007 the UN General Assembly adopted the, UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, a non-binding declaration protecting the human, land and resources rights of the world's 370 million indigenous people, despite opposition from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States. The vote in the assembly was 143 in favor and four against. Eleven countries, including Russia and Colombia, abstained "A violation of human rights to one group of Indigenous Peoples is a violation to all Indigenous Peoples worldwide. Indigenous Peoples have struggled and resisted for hundreds of years against countless forms colonialism and oppression through man-made laws and government regimes whose objective has been to dehumanize and ignore Indigenous Peoples right to live." Black Mesa Water Coalition, Wahleah Johns "As Indigenous Peoples here in the Southwestern United States when we stand up to protect our Mother Earth--when we stand against contaminated snow making on our sacred mountain, or we stand against the extraction of fossil fuels from our lands, or the taking of water from beneath our people -- when we stand up for our basic human rights, will we soon be labeled as terrorists? This is what is happening to our Maori brothers & sisters!" Black Mesa Water Coalition, Enei Begaye What: Please join us locally to observe the Global Day of Action at the "Cultivating the Seeds of Tomorrow Fundraiser Benefit". This event is dedicated to the human rights struggle in New Zealand, come by and learn what you can do to help. Who: Members of Black Mesa Water Coalition and Native Movement Collective
When: October 27, 2007 7 pm-12pm
Where: 113 S. San Francisco Flagstaff, AZ
###Tena koutou katoaIn a wave of massive state repression, 300+ Police, in many casesarmed, raided houses around Aotearoa / NZ on October 16th making 17arrests. Search warrants were carried out in Auckland, Whakatane,Ruatoki, Hamilton, Palmerston North, Wellington and Christchurch.Police are also seeking up to 60 people for questioning. The arresteesare all activists in the Tino Rangatiratanga / Mana Motuhake, peaceand environmental movements.Ka whawhai tonu matou ake ake ake!
For a History on Tuhoe see http://www.conscious.maori.nz/news.php?item.28.6
For more info see http://www.converge.org.nz/pma/nzterror.htm

Blackwater at the border

The small town of Potrero on the California/Mexico border was where one of the first fires broke out on Sunday (see photo) before the whole county became engulfed in fires. Potrero, southwest of Campo, is where the first person died in the San Diego fires. Potrero is also where Blackwater is planning to build a border training camp. (Photo of smoke from Potrero area fire, known as the Harris fire, viewed from a hilltop south of Campo on Sunday afternoon/Brenda Norrell)

Blackwater's run for the border
Salon
October 23, 2007

The notorious security contractor has plans for a military-style complex near the U.S.-Mexico border. Critics worry the firm's "mercenary soldiers" could join the U.S. Border Patrol.
By Eilene Zimmerman
There are signs that Blackwater USA, the private security firm that came under intense scrutiny after its employees killed 17 civilians in Iraq in September, is positioning itself for direct involvement in U.S. border security. The company is poised to construct a major new training facility in California, just eight miles from the U.S.-Mexico border. While contracts for U.S. war efforts overseas may no longer be a growth industry for the company, Blackwater executives have lobbied the U.S. government since at least 2005 to help train and even deploy manpower for patrolling America's borders. Blackwater is planning to build an 824-acre military- style training complex in Potrero, Calif., a rural hamlet 45 miles east of San Diego. The company's proposal, which was approved last December by the Potrero Community Planning Group and has drawn protest from within the Potrero community, will turn a former chicken ranch into "Blackwater West," the company's second-largest facility in the country. It will include a multitude of weapons firing ranges, a tactical driving track, a helipad, a 33,000-square-foot urban simulation training area, an armory for storing guns and ammunition, and dorms and classrooms. And it will be located in the heart one of the most active regions in the United States for illegal border crossings.
Read more ...
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/10/23/blackwater_border/index.html?source=newsletterer/index.html?source=newsletterer/index.html?source=newsletter

Scooby the dog, evacuating the San Diego fires

Scooby is among the animals fleeing the San Diego fire with their human friends. Scooby and his friends evacuated and are waiting near the California/Arizona border, waiting to hear if their homes have been burned. Photo Brenda Norrell

San Diego evacuees to Schwarzenegger: Stop bragging & shut up!

Another message from evacuees to politicians: Stop comparing the fires to the aftermath of Katrina

San Diego evacuees fleeing the fires have a message for California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, following appalling television news broadcasts centered on his praise: "Stop bragging and shut up!"

San Diego fire evacuees at the California/Arizona border are still waiting to hear if their loved ones are safe and if their homes have burned. The last thing they want is to watch news coverage of the governor bragging about himself and others "kissing up" to him for political reasons.

To Gov. Schwarzenegger, one evacuee said, "If you going to glorify yourselves for something you didn't do right, there's something wrong with that."

The evacuees also said it is unfair to compare the fires' disaster to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

"San Diego has beautiful weather and everyone has a car. Even the teenagers have their own vehicles. It is unfair to compare the victims of Katrina to the victims in San Diego. San Diego residents have the advantage of being able to get in their cars, travel to the shelters, then go about as they please in the days.

"They don't have sewage at their feet," the evacuee said remembering the floods after Hurricane Katrina. Evacuees pointed out that some San Diego shelters are even providing yoga, massage and health food for evacuees.

"Where else would that happen except in southern California."

They said there's a great deal of wonderful humanitarian aid and charitable giving going on, like at Viejas. News reports should focus on those, and exactly what is burning now and when people can return to their homes, rather than glorifying politicians, including President Bush, evacuees said.

A careful examination of the facts is likely to show that few state officials were working on Sunday afternoon and little was done at the crucial moments to prevent widespread disaster, between 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. on Sunday. That is the time when a few fires were first fanned by hurricane-force winds in San Diego County, signaling a pending, large scale disaster.

The leaves and grasses were extremely dry from the drought. Here's the latest from Democracy Now! on how the Bush administration censored the reports on global warming:

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/24/1525214

Indigenous Border Summit responds to human rights crisis

Indigenous Peoples' Border Summit of the Americas, Nov. 7 -- 10, focuses on human rights and right of mobility

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

SAN XAVIER, TOHONO O'ODHAM NATION (Arizona) -- A human rights crisis for Indigenous Peoples living along borders in the Americas threatens their survival, with rapidly expanding militarization and new laws which limit their mobility in their ancestral territories.
Responding to this crisis, the San Xavier District of the Tohono O'odham Nation will host the Indigenous Peoples Border Summit of the Americas II, Nov. 7- 10, with support from the International Indian Treaty Council.
Mike Flores, Tohono O'odham summit organizer, said, "It is necessary for Tohono O'odham and other Indigenous Peoples of the border regions to collectively address the adverse impacts that are increasingly occurring on tribal lands. The Border Summit of the Americas II will provide us the opportunity to do just that," Flores said.
San Xavier District Chairman Austin Nunez joins Flores in welcoming Indigenous Peoples to the Border Summit on Tohono O'odham land, located near South Tucson.
"Welcome," Nunez said, "Our community is pleased to be hosting this year's conference."
The Border Summit will host a human rights workshop by the International Indian Treaty Council. The summit will be broadcast live on the Internet at http://www.earthcycles.net/ as was done in 2006.
From the southern Andes to the northern Arctic, corporations intent on seizing natural resources have increased the oppression and displacement of Indigenous Peoples, resulting in their forced mobility across national borders. Further, free trade agreements, mining and exploitative development have forced Indigenous Peoples into exile in the Americas, displaced from their lands where they farmed, hunted or fished for survival.
In the United States, corporate profiteering for private migrant prisons, experimental spy technology, poorly trained border agents, privatized security and new laws for immigration threaten the right of mobility in ancestral territories.
The human rights crisis at the southern border of the United States and Mexico has resulted in over 4,000 migrant deaths in recent years, including deaths of women from Guatemala on Tohono O'odham tribal land in Arizona who died walking with their children in 2007.
Migrants, including Indigenous Peoples from Mexico and Central America, die of dehydration and severe temperatures while walking in search of a better life. The Border Summit speakers will include Tohono O’odham Mike Wilson, who puts out water for migrants on tribal land.
“No one should die for want of a drink of water,” Wilson said.
The privatization of prisons, including the T. Don Hutto Residential Center and Raymondville migrant tent encampment, both near Austin, Texas, reveals the sinister motivation of profiteering from the plight of migrants. Hutto imprisons migrant and refugee infants and children. Speakers will include Jay Johnson-Castro, Sr., of Texas, among those organizing protests against the prisons.
In May, the United Nations Special Rapporteur for migrants, Jorge Bustamante, was denied entrance into Hutto, and Johnson-Castro helped organize the human rights protests that followed.
The border wall and border vehicle barriers along the southern border have resulted in the removal of ancestors’ remains of the Tohono O'odham and Kumeyaay from their final resting places. Further, the barrier wall on Tohono O'odham land is a barrier interfering with an ancient annual ceremony.
Since ceremonial leaders from Mexico often lead ceremonies in the United States, new immigration laws threaten the survival of ceremonies, culture and languages. Because many Indian people are born at home, or lack funds for visas and passports, crossing the border has become a harsh ordeal.
Further, at both the northern and the southern borders of Canada and Mexico, federal border agents ransack and violate ceremonial items.
Speakers on the right of mobility at the northern border include a delegation of Mohawks, including Mohawk Women Title Holders.
With the increased militarization and surveillance at the borders, the dangers from speeding border agents, aerial vehicle crashes and abuse and harassment by border agents increase.
Women, children and elderly along the border are most often the victims of oppression and suffer most often from the lack of food, safe drinking water and medicines.
With the militarization and oppression increasing for Indigenous Peoples around the world, the Border Summit of the Americas invites Indian people to offer their testimony while receiving information and training on human rights.
The International Indian Treaty Council will present a human rights training, following the United Nations adoption of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The US will be examined by the UN Committee for Racial Discrimination (CERD) Committee in March of 2008, in Geneva, Switzerland.
“This workshop will provide information as to how Indigenous Nations, tribes and organizations can use this historic opportunity to inform the CERD Committee on the true state of racial discrimination in this country and how it affects Indian Nations, Peoples and communities. This information will be very important to help the UN CERD experts get a more accurate picture of racial discrimination in the US and hold the US accountable to their obligations under international human rights law,” IITC said.
“An additional focus will be on strategies to defend our human rights, border rights, and protecting our sacred sites and traditional land rights using the newly-adopted UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples from the local to the international levels.”
The human rights workshop presenters will be Bill Means, Lakota cofounder of the Treaty Council; Andrea Carmen, Yaqui and Treaty Council executive director; Ron Lameman, Confederacy of Treaty 6 First Nations, and Francisco Cali, CERD Member and Treaty Council board president.

More information:
bordersummt2007@yahoo.com
http://indigenousbordersummitamericas2007.blogspot.com/

'No Border Wall' condemns violation of 20 federal laws

NO BORDER WALL CONDEMNS SECRETARY CHERTOFF’S WAIVER OF 20 FEDERAL LAWS TO BUILD ARIZONA WALL

The No Border Wall coalition is deeply disturbed by Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff’s decision to waive 20 federal laws and overturn a judge’s order to resume construction of the border wall through the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area. We believe that his action is highly irresponsible and will result in permanent damage to the San Pedro River and increased deaths in the desert, while the number of people who enter the U.S. illegally will be unaffected. Secretary Chertoff’s actions, and the ill-conceived Real ID Act that permits him to unilaterally waive our nation’s laws, undermine the notion that the United States is based on the rule of law. He cannot suspend the law while claiming to defend the law.

When the Border Patrol and Army Corps. of Engineers began building the border wall through the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area, disregarding important federal statutes such as the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act, Defenders of Wildlife and the Sierra Club petitioned the court for a temporary halt to construction. On October 10th U.S. District Court Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle found that DHS had largely ignored the relevant laws, and that the hasty Environmental Assessment that had been produced without public comment was “inadequate.”

Rather than attempt to comply with our nation’s laws, Chertoff chose to “waive in their entirety… all federal, state, or other laws, regulations and legal requirements” related to the following 20 federal statutes:
National Environmental Policy Act
Endangered Species Act
Federal Water Pollution Control Act (aka Clean Water Act)
National Historic Preservation Act
Migratory Bird Treaty Act
Clean Air Act
Archaeological Resources Protection Act
Safe Drinking Water Act
Noise Control Act
Solid Waste Disposal Act
Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act
Federal Land Policy and Management Act
Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act
Archaeological and Historic Preservation Act
Antiquities Act
Historic Sites, Buildings, and Antiquities Act
Arizona-Idaho Conservation Act
Wild and Scenic Rivers Act
Farmland Protection Policy Act
Administrative Procedures Act
This is a clear admission that the walls being built through the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area and other refuges along the border will run counter to these laws. There is no reason for Chertoff to waive laws that the wall will not violate.

In response to the court order, Secretary Chertoff said, "I have to say to myself, 'Yes, I don't want to disturb the habitat of a lizard, but am I prepared to pay human lives to do that?'” This dilemma is completely false. More than just the habitat of a lizard, federally endangered species such as the jaguar have been recorded in the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area in recent years. And as for human lives, the border walls built to date have not saved lives; instead, they have cost lives. No terrorist has been apprehended attempting to cross our southern border, and a wall would not stop them if they tried. The Border Patrol has repeatedly stated that border walls only slow crossers down by a few minutes. In its June 5, 2007 report Border Security: Barriers Along the U.S. International Border the Congressional Research Service stated, “The primary fence, by itself, did not have a discernible impact on the influx of unauthorized aliens coming across the border in San Diego.” The only measurable impact that the border walls have had is in the number of people who have died in the desert. In August of 2005 the General Accounting Office issued a report titled Illegal Immigration: Border Crossing Deaths have Doubled Since 1995. Walls do not stop crossers, they redirect them into ever more remote parts of the desert where hundreds die of exposure and dehydration every year. When Chertoff asks himself whether he is “prepared to pay human lives,” he has his answer in the GAO report.

No Border Wall calls on Congress to restore the rule of law by repealing section 102 of the Real ID Act. Secretary Chertoff has provided a glaring example of the danger inherent in giving an Administration appointee the power to overrule all of the laws that Congress has enacted. If this precedent is allowed to stand the rule of law may be suspended for any future “crisis” that catches the attention of politicians during an election cycle. Our nation needs to find real solutions to our immigration issues, instead of a wall that destroys vital ecosystems and costs billions of dollars and hundreds of lives, but will only provide a false sense of security.

# # #

No Border Wall is a grassroots coalition of groups and individuals united in the belief that a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border will do irreparable harm to our borderlands and the nation as a whole. No Border Wall is opposed to the construction of a border wall because of the devastating consequences such a wall would have on border economies, on the environment, on human rights, and on the U.S. relationship with Mexico and the rest of the world.

For more information or an interview, contact Scott Nicol at (956) 532-5983 or noborderwall@yahoo.com

Photo: Jaguar; map of jaguar territory/Arizona Game and Fish

Censored Blog hosts Earl Hutchinson on blog tour

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is on a book tour, a "blog tour," and has asked the Censored Blog to host him today. Here's some information on his new book, "The Latino Challenge to Black America," and a message from his publicist about the novel idea of "blog tours."

Chapter 1
Rising Latino Numbers, Rising Black Fears In October 2005, one month after Katrina ripped through New Orleans, a plainly agitated New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin told a town hall audience, "I can plainly see in your eyes that you want to know, 'How do I take advantage of this incredible opportunity? How do I make sure New Orleans is not overrun with Mexicans?'The remark was insensitive and insulting. And within days an enraged United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce denounced Nagin: The rising tension that underlay the Chamber's protest of Nagin was probably inevitable after the Census Bureau in 2002 publicly trumpeted that Latinos were now the top minority in the U.S. The news hit black America like a thunderbolt.
Chapter 3

Warped Perceptions in Black and Brown Despite being in America for centuries, many blacks still remain trapped in a hopeless morass of poverty, crime, violence, drugs and family deterioration. The newer immigrants accuse blacks of demanding expensive and wasteful government programs, rather than emphasizing self-help and personal initiative to draw themselves out of their economic misery. Few immigrants say it publicly, but privately some believe that blacks have stagnated because of apathy, laziness, low self-esteem and poor discipline. Even Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, in his seminal address at the Million Man March in October 1995, after chastising blacks to uplift themselves and their communities pointed a glowing finger at Mexicans as an example of immigrants who are moving forward in America, even if many of them came here illegally.
Chapter 7

Black and Brown Political Coalitions: Fact or Romantic Image

The Reverend Norman S. Johnson was a lonely man in the spring of 2001. The then-executive director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference –West was one of only two of the city's more influential black leaders to endorse Los Angeles mayoral candidate Antonio Villaraigosa. Nearly every other prominent black leader and black elected official had endorsed Villariagosa's white opponent, Los Angeles city attorney James Hahn. Villaraigosa knew that black voters were wary and suspicious of him. He was determined to try to do whatever he could to reassure them that if he won, it would not mean (as some blacks openly said) that Mexicans would now run city hall.
Chapter 9 Illegal Immigrants Versus Black Workers There were no other blacks, whites or even English-speaking native-born Latino workers in the plant or in few other shops in the area. This is not a fictional story. Anti-illegal immigration activists say that the experience of the young black job seeker has played out thousands of times at restaurants, hotels, on farms and at manufacturing plants nationally, and that this is a major reason so many young black males are unemployed, join gangs, deal drugs and pack America's jails. The job loss to blacks that they attribute to illegal immigration is as much perception as slight reality. However, when the perception becomes a widely-held public belief and is continually repeated as fact, it soon takes hold in public opinion.

Nikki Leigh writes to the Censored Blog about the idea of the blog tour:

Authors have begun to use blog tours to promote their books. The process involves finding blog owners who are willing to "host" the author. I've found its much more effective to find blogs that appeal to the "target audience" for the book. This is a way to get information in front of the people who would be most interested in the content of the book. Mr Hutchinson's tour is going well. He's had several appearances on CNN and Fox News and I was very happy to see his book mentioned on the screen while he spoke with the host of the show. His ranking on Amazon has been good through the month and The Latino Challenge is ranking well in several key book categories. It appears that we're getting the book into people's hands and that's the best way to get the conversation started to help the problems he discusses in the book.
Anyone who would like more information about tours or Mr Hutchinson are welcome to contact me at nikki_leigh22939@yahoo.com or can visit my website at www.nikkileigh.com/promo.htm.

Press conference Indigenous Border Summit Thursday

Members of the media are invited to a press conference to announce the Indigenous Peoples' Border Summit of the Americas II
Time: Thursday, October 25, 2007, 11 a.m.
Place: San Xavier District Community Center, 2018 W. San Xavier Rd., Tohono O'odham Nation
Speakers: San Xavier District Chairman Austin Nunez and Tohono O'odham Border Summit organizer Mike Flores

The Indigenous Peoples’ Border Summit of the Americas II will be held from November 7-10, 2007 at the San Xavier Community Center, 2018 W. San Xavier Rd, Tohono O’odham Nation

The four-day Border Summit will host speakers and provide an opportunity for testimony on the militarization of US/Mexico and US/Canada borders, with a focus on Indigenous Peoples' right of mobility in their ancestral territories.
Mike Flores, Tohono O'odham summit organizer, said, "It is necessary for Tohono O'odham and other Indigenous Peoples of the border regions to collectively address the adverse impacts that are increasingly occurring on tribal lands.
"The Border Summit of the Americas II will provide us the opportunity to do just that," said Flores, member of the International Indian Treaty Council.
San Xavier District Chairman Austin Nunez joins Flores in welcoming Indigenous Peoples to the Border Summit on Tohono O'odham land.
During the Border Summit, Indigenous Peoples will discuss the impacts on Indigenous Peoples of borders throughout the world, especially for women, children and the elderly, and new visa and passport policies. Further, the impacts of border regulations on Indigenous Peoples' ceremonies and cultures will be discussed.
The International Indian Treaty Council will host a panel on human rights and the United Nations. The imprisonment of migrant children in Texas, other migrant detention centers, impacts on the environment and experimental spy technology along the US/Mexico border will be among the topics. Further, the right of mobility of Native people in Canada, along the northern border will be presented.
Following the successful Border Summit in 2006, the San Xavier District of the Tohono O'odham Nation will again host the summit this year. The United Nations encouraged the Border Summit to be held for a second time.

bordersummit2007@yahoo.com
Mike Flores: email: Michaelflores_@hotmail.com
Website:
http://www.indigenousbordersummitamericas2007.blogspot.com/

Mohawks unite with Zapatistas at Intercontinental Summit in Mexico

Mohawks: Revolution begins with awakening

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

TUCSON, Arizona – Mohawk Warriors joined in solidarity with Subcomandante Marcos and the Zapatistas at the Gathering of Indigenous Peoples of América. They quickly learned that one factor is the same for Indigenous Peoples all over the world: Corporations intent on seizing the land, minerals and water have no regard for the lives or rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Rarahkwisere, Mohawk Warrior, said the Zapatistas’ encuentro made it clear to him that the same thing is happening to Indigenous Peoples all over Turtle Island. “All of our stories were the same, how we are being mistreated to this day,” said Rarahkwisere, among the Mohawks from the United States and Canada attending the encuentro.

Mohawks and other members of the Iroquois Confederacy (Six Nations) were among the 570 delegates from 67 Indigenous Peoples, coming from 12 american nations at the encuentro hosted by Yaquis in Vicam Pueblo, Sonora, Mexico, Oct. 11 – 14, 2007.

“It is all about the natural resources and the big money people,” he said. In northern Quebec, the invaders go hunting for diamonds and pollute the water. What follows is sickness and displacement, as Indian people have to their homelands and search for places to live.

Remembering the encuentro, he said, “There is a revolution, at least on Turtle Island!” Rarahkwisere said he had no problem crossing the border to attend the encuentro using his Haudenosaunee passport. However, his trip to Mexico revealed the dangers for Indians in the south, including the heavily armed soldiers at military checkpoints. He said it was scary at first, until he realized that many of these young soldiers’ also had Indian ancestry, and supported Indian efforts.

Rarahkwisere said the attacks on Indian people are formulated in the urban minds with corporations. In Mexico, and elsewhere in the south, he realized how often Indian people face death for the risk of speaking out. “You will get killed. The corporations hire paramilitary groups.”

Reflecting on the struggles for Indigenous Peoples, he said, “It is hard being Indian. But we are not going to ever, ever give up. We are just getting started.”

Rarahkwiswere said that Indigenous Peoples in South America face far greater dangers than the people in the north. He said a Colombian attorney told how two groups were called to play football. Instead of a football, the chief’s head was presented. The people were told if they did not play the game, the same thing would happen to them.

Rarahkwiswere, who spoke on the Haudenosaunee, Great Law of Peace and Wampum Belts, said it was good to meet with Subcomandante Marcos and the Zapatistas. “I want to thank them for hooking up with us. We all have to get together to fight colonialism. I hope to meet them again soon.”

The Haudenosaunee, the People of the Longhouse, live by the Great Law which was given to them by the Creator, said a Mohawk Warrior (unnamed here.)

“The Longhouse originally was all of Turtle Island, from where the sun rises to where the sun set. The sky is the roof and Mother Earth is the floor.”

“The Great Law is what the Creator gave us and what the Six Nations live by. The Great Law was made for all the Nations, not just the Iroquois Confederacy.

“When the Creator came to the people, he began with the worst of the worst. The Creator told them about uniting for peace and power and they accepted. This really formed the first union.”

The Creator held an arrow up and showed the people how easy it was to snap. Then, the Creator bound five arrows with deer hide and showed how these could not be broken, like the Five Nations bound together. However, not all of the people have lived by the Great Law.

“If they lived by the Great Law, they would not be polluting or killing each other. If they lived by the Great Law, then they would look for ways to better mankind, rather than destroy it.”

Originally, there were five Nations: Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga and Seneca. Later, the Tuscaroras asked for protection and became the Sixth Nation. The people had their own Constitution and form of government before the invaders arrived.

“The United States Constitution is derived from the Iroquois Confederacy. The invaders that came had no form of government. Benjamin Franklin studied the Iroquois Confederacy,” he said. However, the Europeans took the foundation of the Iroquois Confederacy out of context, the same way they do with the “black book.” They take it out of context and use it for fanaticism and to make rich a few people, he said.

The Iroquois Confederacy was comprised of 50 chiefs and 50 clan mothers. All decisions were reached through consensus, not through majority vote. “They had to agree because it had to reflect the decisions they made for Seven Generations.” Before making any decision, it was important to consider the impacts for Seven Generations. The United States knew this and began killing the chiefs and clan mothers. But what they did not know was that when this happens, the people have the power.

Wampum Belts held the peoples’ history. “It was our form of writing, our form of keeping records. Everything they did, they made a belt, so they could look back and see what happened.” Individuals were selected to memorize the belt so that they could tell the people what it said. “Those were our stories too.”

The Two Row Wampum Belt was white, with two dark lines running parallel. “That was the first agreement made with the Europeans.” “When the Europeans came here, we had the greatest power, we had a Constitution and this is what the Europeans violated.”

On the Two Row Wampum Belt, one line represents the Native people in their canoes and the other represents the Europeans. The Europeans were to keep whatever they brought with them, including their politics and religion, to themselves.

“The two lines on the Wampum Belt were never to cross, never to intersect.” The Creator said everyone had a choice, everyone had the power to reason right and wrong. Today, people have the ability to reason right from wrong. When Native people become members of the band councils, they step out of their canoes. When the Indian police are trained by the Canadian government, they become agents of the government.

“They became aligned with a foreign government. It is like accepting citizenship. It is impossible for a Native person to accept citizenship, because you have to give up your country to do that. How can a Native person do that?

“In 1924, citizenship was forced on Indian people in the United States and this violated the Constitution, because there was no Native Representation or consultation.”

Natives were forced to from band councils in Canada and elected governments in the United States. “All these are are ‘puppet governments’ for the United States and Canada.” In the same way, the United States is establishing a government in Iraq, one that the U.S. can control.

“They become agents of the government; they are not for the people.” When the Europeans came to Turtle Island, they emptied the prisons and insane asylums in Europe to populate this country. “That is why there are serial killers, it is genetic, hereditary.” “A lot of people from Europe didn’t really want to come here. They needed people, so they got all of this riff-raft and sent them here. They just brought them here and turned them loose. In the west, the women were either domestics or prostitutes.”

They emptied the orphanages and brought one million children to work the farms in this country. “They couldn’t force the Natives to be slaves. A Native had rather die than be a slave to the white man. Native people were not used to being treated like that. Native people would starve themselves to death or run away.” The people of Africa were kidnapped, sold, enslaved and sent to this country. Their own people helped sell them into slavery, he said. One-hundred million Indigenous Peoples were killed by Columbus and the Spaniards in what is now North and South America.

“When the treaties were written, they knew they were not going to honor them. If they are not going to keep the treaties and honor them, then they should get rid of them.” Nowhere has there been more atrocities than in the north and south of Turtle Island, known as the Americas. Still, the truth is not taught in schools.

“If you do not know your history, then you do not have a future,” he said. Europeans came here for exploitation and that is what continues today.

“It is all for exploitation. They even exploit their own people. My dad always said, ‘There’s going to be a worldwide revolution one of these days.’”

“The revolution is coming. It begins with this awakening.”

Driving into the San Diego fires

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

CAMPO, California -- A drive to the border to take photos on Sunday afternoon quickly turned into a near disaster. In early afternoon, there was just a puff of white smoke in the distance at Tecate, on the California/Mexico border. In sight from Campo, it looked more like a cloud than smoke on the border. (see photo)

After turning around at the roadblock on Highway 94, I headed back to San Diego. With hurricane-force winds, from 70 to 90 mph on the canyon mountain tops, motorcyclists were hovering in the rest area off Interstate 8.
A semi-truck was pulled off to the side, with the top of its solid metal trailer cut off as if by a can opener from the wind. The truck's metal roof was flapping like a tarp.

The wind was so strong it was difficult to walk outside the car. Then, it seemed like all of San Diego was suddenly on fire, grass was smoking everywhere, flames and plumes of smoke seemed to be shooting out every mountaintop by dusk. At dusk, I made a run for it. Heading out on Interstate 8, near Viejas, a gust of wind picked up my car on a high bridge over a canyon and tossed it around like a toothpick. I pulled over shaking for a while, like other people were doing, then drove on out of there. Suddenly, there were fires everywhere and very few firetrucks were responding. High profile RVs and semi trucks were being halted because of the winds.

By the time I reached the safety of El Centro, huge homes in southern California were burning to embers on television. Now, with fires all over, from Malibu to the border, and one-quarter of a million people evacuated, everything seems to be burning. The Interstates north of San Diego are clogged with cars according to the radio, but cars can still go east on I-8. However, the winds are hurricane strength and light cars will be knocked around, with mountain-top gusts up to 90 mph. Some people just came in the coffeehouse where I'm writing this, fleeing the fire, searching for open highways for their family members to evacuate. The winds are changing quickly and people are having trouble finding safe routes out. The announcements can not keep up with the changing winds.

The grass and trees are parched from drought in San Diego County and the Santa Ana winds are fueling a disaster. In the middle of all this, came a radio report today that a herd of horses were stranded and people were thinking of riding them out of the city. In another report, horses waiting transportation out of the fires were eating the shrubs in town. The radio reporter joked something like, "Tell them to eat fast, less to burn."
Monday, 5 p.m.

Tuesday night
Early Sunday afternoon, when there were only a few plumes of smoke that could be seen from near the California/Mexico border, it seemed that everyone was moving in slow motion. There were only a handful of fire trucks moving and a couple of ambulances, as sadly one man died in the fire near the border at Potrero.

There was an eerie stillness within the movement of people, even in the pace of emergency vehicles. Everyone that knew fires knew what was about to happen. With those hurricane-force winds and the parched grass and leaves, it was inevitable that all of San Diego County would soon be burning. With those conditions, there was little that could be done. At that time, just driving out through the winds on the canyon bridges, with gusts ranging from 70 to 100 mph, was terrifying.

Now, Tuesday night, nearly one million people have been evacuated and more than 1,000 homes burned.

CNN reported the winds peaked at 101 mph

Google Breaking news on California wildfires:
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ncl=1122444127&scoring=n

38th National Day of Mourning

38th National Day of Mourning
Thursday, November 22, 2007 @ 12 Noon
Cole's Hill
Plymouth, Massachusetts

Join us as we dedicate the 38th National Day of Mourning to our brother, Native prisoner of war Leonard Peltier.
Add your voice to the millions worldwide who demand his freedom. Help us struggle to create a true awareness of Indigenous people and demonstrate unity.
For bus tickets from NYC: 212-633-6646
History of the National Day of Mourning:
In 1970, United American Indians of New England declared US Thanksgiving Day a National Day of Mourning. This came about as a result of the suppression of the truth. Wamsutta, an Aquinnah Wampanoag man, had been asked to speak at a fancy Commonwealth of Massachusetts banquet celebrating the 350th anniversary of the landing of the Pilgrims. He agreed. The organizers of the dinner, using as a pretext the need to prepare a press release, asked for a copy of the speech he planned to deliver. He agreed. Within days Wamsutta was told by a representative of the Department of Commerce and Development that he would not be allowed to give the speech. The reason given was due to the fact that, "… the theme of the anniversary celebration is brotherhood and anything inflammatory would have been out of place." What they were really saying was that in this society, the truth is out of place.What was it about the speech that got those officials so upset? Wamsutta used as a basis for his remarks one of their own history books - a Pilgrim’s account of their first year on Indian land. The book tells of the opening of my ancestor’s graves, taking our wheat and bean supplies, and of the selling of my ancestors as slaves for 220 shillings each. Wamsutta was going to tell the truth, but the truth was out of place.Here is the truth: The reason they talk about the pilgrims and not an earlier English-speaking colony, Jamestown, is that in Jamestown the circumstances were way too ugly to hold up as an effective national myth.For example, the white settlers in Jamestown turned to cannibalism to survive. Not a very nice story to tell the kids in school. The pilgrims did not find an empty land any more than Columbus "discovered" anything. Every inch of this land is Indian land. The pilgrims (who did not even call themselves pilgrims) did not come here seeking religious freedom; they already had that in Holland. They came here as part of a commercial venture.They introduced sexism, racism, anti-lesbian and gay bigotry, jails, and the class system to these shores. One of the very first things they did when they arrived on Cape Cod - before they even made it to Plymouth - was to rob Wampanoag graves at Corn Hill and steal as much of the Indians’ winter provisions as they were able to carry. They were no better than any other group of Europeans when it came to their treatment of the Indigenous peoples here. And no, they did not even land at that sacred shrine down the hill called Plymouth Rock, a monument to racism and oppression which we are proud to say we buried in 1995.The first official "Day of Thanksgiving" was proclaimed in 1637 by Governor Winthrop. He did so to celebrate the safe return of men from Massachusetts who had gone to Mystic, Connecticut to participate in the massacre of over 700 Pequot women, children, and men.About the only true thing in the whole mythology is that these pitiful European strangers would not have survived their first several years in "New England" were it not for the aid of Wampanoag people. What Native people got in return for this help was genocide, theft of our lands, and never-ending repression.But back in 1970, the organizers of the fancy state dinner told Wamsutta he could not speak that truth. They would let him speak only if he agreed to deliver a speech that they would provide. Wamsutta refused to have words put into his mouth. Instead of speaking at the dinner, he and many hundreds of other Native people and our supporters from throughout the Americas gathered in Plymouth and observed the first National Day of Mourning. United American Indians of New England have returned to Plymouth every year since to demonstrate against the Pilgrim mythology.On that first Day of Mourning back in 1970, Plymouth Rock was buried not once, but twice. The Mayflower was boarded and the Union Jack was torn from the mast and replaced with the flag that had flown over liberated Alcatraz Island. The roots of National Day of Mourning have always been firmly embedded in the soil of militant protest.

–Free All Political Prisoners!email: nycjericho@riseup.net www.jerichony.org~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~+=+=+=+[In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.]Due to (U.S.) Presidential Executive Orders, the National Security Agency may have read this email, post, blog or message without warning, warrant, or notice, in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
=+=+=+=+=+=LPDC WEBSITE:www.leonardpeltier.net

Priests protesting US torture in Florence prison

Dear friends,
On Saturday morning, October 20, we visited Steve and Louie. They are well, and send thanks for your prayers and support.
They are being held together at the Central Arizona Detention Center, a privately owned prison in Florence, Arizona. There is no telling if they will be there for a short time before being moved, or for the entire five months. They will remain in federal custody for the duration of their sentence.
Below is a revised message about what people can do to support them. And below that is a statement of the Franciscan Friars, Province of Saint Barbara in support of Louie. We'll also attach a wonderful photo taken by Lee Stanley before Steve and Louie went into court on the morning of October 17.
Peace,
Felice and Jack
(Photo credit: Lee Stanley)
SUPPORT FR. STEVE KELLY AND FR. LOUIE VITALE
On October 17, 2007, the first anniversary of the signing of the Military Commissions Act, Fr. Steve Kelly and Fr. Louie Vitale were sentenced to 5 months in prison for their nonviolent witness against torture at Ft. Huachuca, Arizona in November of 2006. They were taken into custody immediately. (More information at http://tortureontrial.org/)
Please support them -
* Write a note of support to:
Stephen Kelly #00816111
CCA
P. O. Box 6300
Florence, AZ 85232
Louis Vitale #25803048
CCA
P. O. Box 6300
Florence, AZ 85232
They were taken to a privately run detention center in Florence, Arizona the day of their sentencing. It is not known if, when or where they may be transferred. If the priests are moved, your letters addressed to Florence will be returned to you. You may then send letters to them c/o The Nuclear Resister, PO Box 43383, Tucson, AZ 85733 and their mail will be forwarded to them.
If you are mailing something to them at this prison, please know:
- All books and magazines must be sent by the publisher or directly from a book store.
- Non-copyrighted documents in manilla envelopes are fine, but to expedite it, print on the manilla envelope "paperwork enclosed".
* Fr. Kelly and Fr. Vitale ask that every woman and man of conscience do all that they can to protest the injustice of torture and to end U.S. policy that sanctions torture.
- They encourage people to participate in the protests at Ft. Benning, Georgia and Ft. Huachuca, Arizona on November 17 and 18, or consider having a protest in your community. For more information, visit http://www.soaw.org/ (protest at Ft. Benning) and http://southwestwitness.org/ (protest at Ft. Huachuca)
- Visit http://torturelaw.org/ and sign the petition to repeal the Military Commissions Act and use the handy form to customize a letter that will be emailed to your Senators.
* Their commissary needs are taken care of but contributions for prison support expenses are welcome. Checks can be made payable to the Nuclear Resister (please put Torture on Trial on the memo line) and mailed to the Nuclear Resister, PO Box 43383, Tucson, AZ 85733. Donations can also be made securely online at the Torture On Trial website at http://tortureontrial.org/donate.html
* Prison visits are being coordinated by Br. David Buer. Visiting hours at the detention center in Florence are limited, and occur very early in the morning. It is very important to contact David if you are interested in visiting either of the men, so he can make sure that no one travels all that way only to be turned away because there is already a visitor there. You can contact David at or call (314)803-6735.
xxxxxxxxxx
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Statement of the Franciscan Friars, Province of Saint Barbara
Regarding the sentencing of Father Louis Vitale, OFMFather Louis Vitale, OFM, is a member of the Province of Saint Barbara (western U.S.) of the Order of Friars Minor (Franciscan Friars).
Striving to be a true follower of Saint Francis of Assisi throughout his 48 years as a Franciscan friar, Father Louie has been dedicated to peace, justice and the well-being of creation. In a world that suffers from violence and war, Father Louie has often engaged in acts of nonviolent civil disobedience to promote these causes.
Father Louie's nonviolent actions are motivated by the deep spiritual conviction that peace, justice and mercy are mandates of Christ, and such actions have a long and respected history in Christianity and many other religious traditions.
On November 19, 2006, Father Louie was among others protesting military "interrogation training" at Fort Huachuca, Arizona. This was in conjunction with a larger protest at Fort Benning, Georgia, calling for the closure of the school there that has supported Latin American military regimes that committed heinous violence against their own citizens.It is our understanding that Father Louie was arrested at Fort Huachuca when he attempted to speak with enlisted personnel and deliver a letter to the commander denouncing the immoral teaching of torture there, and that he has now been sentenced for a total term of five months.Father Louie's religious superior, Father Melvin Jurisich, OFM, Provincial Minister of the Province of Saint Barbara, commented on the sentencing:"Father Louie's Franciscan brothers fully support his actions at Fort Huachuca because we know they are consistent with his life-long dedication to work for good and oppose evil. He does so in the spirit of prayer and nonviolence. He is doing what he believes Saint Francis of Assisi would do if he were at Fort Huachuca. We stand by Father Louie during his time of incarceration, and we know that even in jail he will continue to work and pray for peace."

Treaty Council: Pesticides workshop in Sinaloa, Mexico

Pesticides, human rights and food workshop in Yoreme (Mayo) community in Sinaloa, Mexico

“AGROQUIMICOS: LA AMENAZA A NUESTRA SALUD COMUNITARIA Y AL MEDIO AMBIENTE; CONOCIENDO NUESTROS DERECHOS, EXPLORANDO LAS ALETRNATIVAS Y TRABAJANDO JUNTOS CON UN FUTURO SALUDABLE”
Una Tarea anfitrionada por la Red Indigena Norte y Sur Contra los Plaguicidas, un proyecto del Consejo Internacional de Tratatos Indios (CITI), con la Organización de Yoremes Unidos del Municipio de Ahome, A.C.
*********************************
"Pesticides: The Threat to our Community Health and the Environment, Knowing our Rights, Exploring Alternatives and Working Together for a Healthy Future."
A workshop hosted by North-South Indigenous Network Against Pesticides, a project of the International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) in coordination with the United Municipality of Organizaciones Yoremes of Ahome, A.C.
EJIDO GABRIEL LEYVA SOLANO, AHOME, SINALOA.

Octubre 26, 27, 28 2007
Agenda Provisional
Provisional Agenda
Registration will begin at 8:00 a.m. on Oct. 26, 2007
The agenda will start each day from 9 a.m.- 12:00 p.m.
The afternoon agenda will restart at 2:00 p.m.- 5:30 p.m.
The evening agenda will continue form 7:30 p.m.-9:30 p.m. (Tentative)
El registro para la Tarea se realizara en el sitio a partir de 8 de manana el dia 26.

Programa Diario:
Programa de la manana: 9:00 am – 12:00pm
Programa de la tarde: 2:00 pm – 5: 30 pm
Programa de la noche (no confirmado): 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm

Horario de la comidas del 26-28
de 12:00 pm to 2:00 pm – ALMUERZO
de 6:00 TO 7:30 PM: CENA (el 29 y 30)

Lunch will be served at 12:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.
And 6:00 – 7:30 p.m. for Dinner

VIERNES 26 DE OCTUBRE DE 2007.

PROGRAMA DE LA MAÑANA:

Inaguracion del Evento

Bienvenida
Lic. Bulmaro Bacasegua Campos
Secretario
Yoremes Unidos de la Municipalidad de Ahome

Honores a la Bandera

Ceremonia Tradicional
Fiesteros de Los 8 Centros Ceremoniales del Municipio de Ahome.

Introducción del CITI- Consejo Internacional del Consejo Internacional del Tratado Indios
Saul Vicente
Representanta Nacional deL citi- Mexico

Alberto Saldamando
CONSEJERO JURIDICO
consejo INTERNACIONAL de tratados indios (CITI)

INTRODUCCION de la RED NORTE Y SUR CONTRA LOS PLAGUICIDAS
Sara Mendoza, Coordinadora de Proyecto
Presentación de la Organización “Yoremes Unidos del Municipio de Ahome, A.C.”


PROGRAMA POR LA TARDE

Presentacion: Soberania Alimentaria, Derechos Culturales y los Pueblos Indígenas
Saul Vicente, Representatnte Nacional Mexico

Taller: Indicadores Culturales
Saul Vicente, Representatnte Nacional Mexico


Programa por la Noche

Programa Cultural por los Fieseros del Municipio de Ahome, El Fuerte, Choix, Guasave, Sinaloa de Leyva y Angostura.

Ballet Folklorico a Cargo de la Maestra Alejandra Cervantes Ayala.

*********************************

Friday, October 26, 2007

Morning Program:

Event Inauguration

Welcome
Lic. Bulmaro Bulmaro Bacasegua Campos
Board Member, Secretary
United Yoremes of the Municipality of Ahome

Flag Honoring

Traditional Ceremony
Fiesteros of the 8 Ceremonial Centers of the Municipio of Ahome.

Introduction of the International Indian Treaty Council- IITC
Saul Vicente,
National IITC Representative Mexico
Alberto Saldamando,
General Counsel
International Indian Treaty Council

Introduction of the North South Indigenous Network Against Pesticides.
Sara Mendoza
Program Coordinator
International Indian Treaty Council

Introduction of the “Organización Yoremes Unidos del Municipio de Ahome, A.C.” (United Yoremes of the Municipality of Ahome)


Afternoon Program:

Presentation: Food Soverignty, Cultural Rights, and Indigenous Peoples
Saul Vicente, IITC Mexico Representative

Workshop: Cultural Indicators
Saul Vicente, IITC Mexico Representative

Evening Program

Cultural Program by the Fiesteros of the Municipality of Ahome, El Fuerte, Choix, Guasave, Sinaloa de Leyva y Angostura.

Ballet Folklorico directed by Ms. Alejandra Cervantes Ayala.

*********************************

SABADO 27 DE OCTUBRE DE 2007.

PROGRAMA POR LA MAÑANA

PANEL: QUE SON LOS PLAGUICIDAS? LOS EFECTOS Y DAÑOS A LA SALUD DEL SER HUMANO Y AL MEDIO AMBIENTE

ING. REYNALDO CERVANTES LEYVA, COORDINADOR DEL PROGRAMA ZONA PACIFICO
CONSERVEMOS UN CAMPO LIMPIO

DR. GABRIEL DIAZ YZETA, DIRECTOR DE TOXICOLOGIA, DEL GOBIERNO MEXICANO

PAM MILLER, BIOLOGA Y DIRECTORA EJECUTIVA ACCION COMUNITARIA SOBRE LOS TOXICOS EN ALASKA.

PATRICIA DIAZ ROMO, ASESORA DE LOS INDIGENAS HUICHOLES.

MARGARET REEVE, CIENTIFCA Y COORDINADORA DEL PROGRAMA SOBRE LA COMUNIDAD Y LA SALUD AMBIENTAL (PANNA).

DRA. ELIZABEHT GUILLETT, UNIVERSIDAD DE FLORIDA, ESTUDIOS EN NIÑOS INDIGENAS DEL RIO YAQUI.


PROGRAMA POR LA TARDE

PRESENTACION: DERECHOS HUMANOS, EL DERECHO DEL CONSENTIMIENTO PREVIO, LIBRE E INFORMADO, LA DECLARACION DE LOS DERECHOS DE LOS PUEBLOS INDIGENAS; Actualización sobre el trabajo del Relator de las Naciones Unidas sobre los Productos Toxicos

ALBERTO SALDAMANDO,
CONSEJERO JURIDICO
CONSEJO INTERNACIONAL DE TRATADOS INDIOS

DERECHOS HUMANOS Y LOS EFECTOS DE PLAGUESIDAS
TESTIMONIOS DE PERSONAS AFECTADAS POR LO AGROQUIMICOS:


ING. FRANCISCO VILLEGAS PAREDES, COORDINADOR DE LA ORGANIZACIÓN COMUNITARIA POR LA MADRE TIERRA.

MIEMBROS AFECTADOS DE LA COMUNIDAD YOREME.

LUZ IRENE BACASEGUA CAMPOS, PRESIDENTA ESTATAL DE LOS MEDICOS INDIGENAS DEL ESTADO DE SINALOA.

*********************************

Saturday, October 27, 2007

Morning Program:

Panel: What are Pesticides? The Harmful Effects of Pesticides on Human Health and the Environment.

Reynaldo Cervantes,
Pacific Zone Program Coordinator
Conservemos un Campo Limpio

Dr. Garbriel Diaz Yzeta,
Director of Toxicology
Mexican Government

Pam Miller
Biologist and Executive Director
Alaska Community Action on Toxics

Patricia Romo
Filmaker and Organizar

Margaret Reeves, PhD.
Senior Scientist/Program Coordinator (Community and Environmental Health)Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA)

Dr. Elizabeth Guillete,
Associate Research Scientist
University of Florida

Afternoon Program:

Presentation: Human Rights, Free, Prior and Informed Consent, Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and update on the work on the U.N Rapporteur on Toxics

Alberto Saldamando
IITC General Counsel
International Indian Treaty Council

Panel: Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples and Effects of Pesticides

Francisco Villegas Paredes
Program Coordinator
Yaquis Unidos Por la Madre Tierra
Rio Yaqui, Sonora

Local Community Yoreme Members Affected by Pesticides
Various Participants

Luz Irene Bacasegua Campos
Statewide President
Unites Medical Doctors of the State of Sinaloa

*********************************

DOMINGO 28 DE OCTUBRE DE 2007

PROGRAMA POR LA MAÑANA


Panel: RESTORACION DE CONOCIMIENTO Y DIVERSIDAD, PERSPECTIVAS Y ALTERNATIVAS

ING. REYNALDO CERVANTES LEYVA
COORDINADOR DEL PROGRAMA ZONA PACIFICO
CONSERVEMOS UN CAMPO LIMPIO.

SANTOS VALENZUELA RAMIREZ
EMETERIO VALENZUELA AGUILAR
EXPERIENCIA EN CULTIVOS TRADICIONALES DE AUTOCONSUMO SIN AGROQUIMICOS


PROGRAMA POR LA TARDE

TALLER: A TRAVES DEL LIBRO “LOS PLAGUICIDAS SON VENENOSOS”

SARA MENDOZA
MESAS DE TRABAJO

PLENARIA: ELABORACION DE UN PLAN DE ACCION Y EL FORTALECIMIENTO DE NUESTRAS ALIANZAS

Lino Buitimea Sauceda
ADelina Bacasegua Alvarez
Rita Amarillas Anguamea
SARA MENDOZA
SANTOS VALENZUELA

CLAUSURA DEL EVENTO
SANTOS VALENZUELA RAMIREZ, PRESIDENTE DE LA ORGANIZACIÓN “YOREM UTTIA”
LIC. BULMARO BACASEGUA CAMPOS, SRIO. DE LA ORGANIZACIÓN “YOREMES UNIDOS DEL MUNICIPIO DE AHOME, A.C.


CONDUCCION DEL PROGRAMA
PROFR. LINO BUITIMEA SAUCEDA
ADELINA BACASEGUA ALVAREZ
RITA AMARILLAS ANGUAMEA

*********************************


Sunday, October 28, 2007

Morning Program:


Panel: Restoring Tradicional Knowledge and Biodiversity: Perspectives and Alternatives

Yernaldo Cervantes Leyva
Pacific Zone Program Coordinator
Conservamos un Campo Limpio

Santos Valenzuela
Presidente
Yorem Uttia Organization

Emerito Valenzuela Aguilar
Presentation: Tradition Farming Methods without Pesticides.

Afternoon Program:

Workshop: “ Pesticides are Toxic”
Sara Mendoza
Program Coordinator
North South Indigenous Network Against Pesticides
International Indian Treaty Council

Panel: Rights, Solutions, and Future Plans.

Alberto Saldamando
Legal Counsel
International Indian Treaty Council

Elaboration of the Action Plan and the Strengthening of our Alliances

Profesor Lino Buitimea Sauceda
Adelina Bacasegua Alvarez
Rita Amarillas Anguamea
Sara Mendoza
Santos Valenzuela

Closing Ceremony for the Event

Santos Valenzuela
Presidente
Yorem Uttia Organization

Bulmaro Bacasegua Campos
Secretary
United Yoremes of the Municipality of Ahome


Agenda Coordiantors are:
Profesor Lino Buitimea Sauceda
Adelina Bacasegua Alvarez
Rita Amarillas Anguamea

Michael Lacey jailed for exposing Arpaio's spying

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.blogspot.com/

Michael Lacey, who created Phoenix New Times and is now executive editor of Village Voice Media, spent the night in jail last night for exposing Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's snooping, a big secret of a Grand Jury.
Lacey was always destined for grand things. Lacey shared an audience bench with me in the federal courtroom of the infamous Earth First! Trial in Prescott, Arizona, when I was a stringer for Associated Press. (The trial was the one where the FBI agent drove the so-called saboteurs to do their supposed monkey-wrenching and Peg Millet outran the Swat Team.)
Anyway, I'll always remember Lacey for his description of the tense federal prosecutor.
Lacey wrote something like this in New Times: She came into the courtroom, grabbed her balls and shot the judge a high-five.

Village Voice Media Executive Editor Released From Jail and Vows to Fight
posted: 11:08 AM, October 19, 2007 by Michael Clancy
Two top executives of Village Voice Media, the parent company of the Voice, were arrested Thursday night and released from jail early Friday morning for revealing information about a secret grand jury proceeding in a story in the Phoenix New Times.
The story—headlined "Breathtaking Abuse of the Constitution", and written by Michael Lacey, Village Voice Media executive editor, and Jim Larkin, VVM chief executive— detailed how Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio used a wide-ranging subpoena "in an attempt to research the identity, purchasing habits, and browsing proclivities of our online readership."
http://www.villagevoice.com/blogs/runninscared/archives/2007/10/village_voice_m.php

O'odham: Awakening at the Zapatistas' Encuentro

O’odham Return from Gathering with Mexico’s Indigenous and Subcomandante Marcos
“I Felt a Sense That This Is an Awakening of the People”

By Brenda Norrell
Special to The Narco News Bulletin
October 18, 2007
http://www.narconews.com/

TUCSON -- When more than 500 Indian delegates gathered in Vicam Pueblo in Rio Yaqui, Mexico, at the Gathering of Indigenous Peoples of América, the power of a global spiritual force was present and released, said Ofelia Rivas, an O’odham woman living on the border of the United States and Mexico.

“It is not a local movement, it is not just the Zapatistas. It is the Indigenous People of the world creating this movement,” Rivas said during an interview.

“I felt a sense that this is an awakening of the people.

“There was a sense of unity, of continuing the struggle, although people still have problems. We were in unity talking about them together. I really felt it was a grassroots effort.”

Rivas said among the powerful cultural presentations was that of the Indigenous Peoples from Michoacan. “That was really moving to me,” she said, recalling a Tzotzil friend from Chiapas telling her, “When things get serious, we dance.”

Rivas said the traditional authorities of Vicam Pueblo offered the ultimate respect. “It was amazing to see the traditional Yaqui leaders attentively and patiently listening to the stories.”

Rivas said it was important for the people from the United States and Canada to share their sufferings. She said often, people in other countries think Indians here have it easy.

“Yes, there are human rights violations in Canada and the United states. People on the outside believe we have it made. They don’t know we live in poverty and we have serious conditions for our women and children.”

In some way, conditions are worse in the United States than elsewhere.

“It is worse. The people are controlled by the government. Your own people are assimilated as well and they abuse the system. The system is controlling us and controlling the people.”

Rivas said the money that flows into Indian Nations, and the conditions and restrictions attached to the money, result in that control.

“With the federal money, state money, gaming money, there is control. Everyone is under control.”

Among the tearful stories shared at the gathering, she said, were those of a Lakota woman, who spoke of the abuses in boarding schools and the conditions that the Lakota still live under. Indian children were seized by the governments of the United States and Canada during much of the Twentieth Century and forced into government-operated boarding schools. Here, they were often abused sexually abused and beaten. Indian children were forbidden to speak their own languages and were forced to assimilate the dominant culture. Those who ran away were placed in solitary confinement and some died. The abuses resulted in generations of traumatized Indian people in the United States and Canada.

As Nation after Nation told their stories at the encuentro, or gathering, Rivas said, “Everyone was so attentive. They heard it straight from the people.”

Meanwhile at home on the US/Mexico border where O’odham ancestral lands are bisected by the international border, the construction of a border vehicle barrier has blocked the ceremonial route of the O’odham people.

“This ceremony has been going on since the creation of the world,” Rivas said.

Before the recent construction of a federal vehicle barrier on tribal land on the border at Ali Jegk in the Gu-Vo District in Arizona, 12 miles east of Sonoyta, Mexico, local O’odham were able to cross in their traditional territory here.

Now, instead of taking less than an hour to go to town for shopping, O’odham have to travel six hours roundtrip to shop in Tucson. For those with diabetes and medical emergencies, the new border barrier means a life-threatening crisis.

“A lot of traditional people do not have passports, because they were born at home.”

For O’odham attending the ceremony during July, the new border barrier violated the spiritual journey.

“It was a real hardship,” Rivas said. “When you are on a pilgrimage to a sacred place, you are in a sacred mode. Then you are stopped by immigration and your papers are checked, that is a disruption. People have prepared spiritually and then they have to go through this ordeal of crossing the border.

Rivas said the Tohono O’odham Nation’s elected government in Sells, Arizona, is not assisting the traditional O’odham people to maintain their right to cross their ancestral territories and carry out their traditional ceremonies. Further, many O’odham lack passports because they were born at home and this makes border crossing difficult.

“This ceremony,” she said, “is hanging on by a thread.”

Rivas said the power, unity and awareness shared at the Intercontinental Encuentro should now be shared with those who were unable to attend.

“So many people who should have been there were not there. They were home guarding their people or their land. Some had problems crossing the border.”

Rivas said she hopes the Vicam Pueblo gathering will continue with regional gatherings in Canada, the United States and South America, so others will be able to participate.

Rivas, bilingual in English and O’odham, delivered her presentation to the Intercontinental Encuento in the O’odham language.

“Speaking my language is my personal form of resistance,” said Rivas, whose presentation was translated from O’odham into English and Spanish.

Rivas shared a statement from the traditional O’odham leaders from the Cu:Wi I-gersk and the ceremonial leaders from the O’odham lands of Mexico and the United States.

“The O’odham resistance began when the prophets told of the invasion of the foreigners and the many changes that would happen to the people and the world. The O’odham defense was to bend to the surge of this coming wind so as not to break. My friends, my people are at the breaking point,” Rivas said, reading from the statement at the encuentro.

The O’odham Nation consists of four bands in the Sonoran Desert. To the north, there is the On’k Ake’mel O’odham (Salt River people) and the Ake’mel O’odham (Gila River people.) In the west, there is the band of Hia’ced O’odham (Sands people) and the southern band is the Tohono O’odham (Desert people.)

The O’odham ancestral territory is bordered by the Yaqui territory to the south and the Apache territory to the east. To the southwest, along the inland waters of the Pacific Ocean at Ka’ch’k (the Sea of Cortez or Gulf of California in Mexico), O’odham land borders the Seri territory.

The United States and Mexico claimed O’odham lands when the International Boundary was created in 1853. The boundary bisected O’odham lands. The Tohono O’odham elected government, which chose to work with the U.S. federal government, receive federal dollars and develop a tribal government based on the U.S. system, was not recognized by the traditional authorities of the O’odham.

“Our peoples’ history begins at the creation of the world. We also have knowledge of former worlds that existed.”

The people were given the Him’dag, the O’odham way of life. They were taught how to live in the desert and given the responsibility and honor of being Indigenous Peoples.

“We are the keepers of the universe; we keep the universe in balance through our teachings from the Creator, through our songs and ceremonies maintain the balance of the universe.”

The first attack on O’odham came by way of foreign diseases, which altered the peoples’ genetic makeup. Then outsiders came to steal and market O’odham knowledge of healing medicine plants.

The second attack came from foreign religion.

“The very Churches that catholic O’odham pray in were constructed with O’odham slaves controlled by the missionaries.”

Today, O’odham ceremonial places are seen as tourist sightseeing places, from the great lava fields along the border to the Sea of Cortez in Mexico.

“The ceremony sites and sacred places are under constant threat by archeologists, mining companies and Mexicans claiming O’odham lands and communities, such as a recent threat of a proposed chemical waste dump proposed location, just eight miles from our ceremony site.”

With the agenda of assimilating O’odham, the United States placed O’odham children in boarding schools and relocated O’odham to cities.

“The destruction of the social structures of the people is evident today; the people are dependent on the system to exist. Our language that was forbidden in boarding school is today surviving, but by a small degree.”

Now, the militarization at the border prevents O’odham from crossing on traditional routes.

In Mexico, ranchers, farmers and corporations are seizing O’odham lands. In 1845, there were 45 villages south of what is now the border. Today, there are nine surviving villages.

The restriction of mobility, exploitation of land and destruction of cultures through genocide and ethnocide means this is a critical moment in the universe.

“Today here in Vicam we gather not as governments and organizations, but as people of the earth. We are here to stand in solidarity, for our survival, to protect the world, our territories and our future generations.”

“A delegation of all Nations must continue to strengthen this message of solidarity and continued education on Universal Indigenous Rights.

“Today we continue to demand access to our lands, including access to our ancestral routes, to conduct our Him’dag and make offering to sacred places. We demand protection of our cultures and sacred places. We demand fair elections and our own representation in the government systems that ignore us.”

Brenda Norrell has been a news reporter in Indian country for 25 years. She is currently based in Tucson and covers Mexico, the U.S. borders and the West. She is the author of The Censored Blog and frequent contributor to The Narcosphere.

Photo: Ofelia Rivas, O'odham, with Marcos in Sonora, Mexico in 2007/Photo Brenda Norrell

Treaty Council presents human rights training during Border Summit

Human Rights Training

Using the United Nations to hold the US accountable for Racism towards Indigenous Peoples & Strategies for Implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

You are invited!
The International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) will conduct a workshop focusing on holding the United States' accountable to its legally binding obligations under the International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD).

The US will be examined by the CERD Committee in March of 2008, in Geneva, Switzerland. This workshop will provide information as to how Indigenous Nations, tribes and organizations can use this historic opportunity to inform the CERD Committee on the true state of racial discrimination in this county and how it affects Indian Nations, Peoples and communities. This information will be very important to help the UN CERD experts get a more accurate picture of racial discrimination in the US and hold the US accountable to their obligations under international human rights law.

An additional focus will be on strategies to defend our human rights, border rights, and protecting our sacred sites and traditional land rights using the newly-adopted UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples from the local to the international levels.

PRESENTERS: Bill Means (Introduction & MC); Andrea Carmen (IITC Executive Director); Ron Lameman (Confederacy of Treaty 6 First Nations), Francisco Cali (CERD Member, IITC
Board President)

This workshop is being held in conjunction with the Indigenous Peoples’ Border Summit of the Americas II” from November 7-10, 2007 which will be held at the San Xavier Community
Center, 2018 W. San Xavier Rd, Tohono O’odham Nation. For more information on the Indigenous Peoples’ Border Summit, contact Kim Garcia at (520) 573-4000 or by e-mail at kgarcia@waknet.org or Mike Flores, (520) 235-2406, email: Michaelflores_@hotmail.com
www.TreatyCouncil.org
Working for the Rights and Recognition of Indigenous Peoples

Border Summit information with updated schedule, hotel and camping information:
http://indigenousbordersummitamericas2007.blogspot.com/

New Zealand terror police storm organic gardeners

Terror raid at the veggie garden

With the ethnic cleansing of Maoris now in full swing in New Zealand, anti-terrorist riot police broadened their definition of terror and stormed a couple of organic gardeners. Police seized computers, cellphones, digital cameras and a pair of camouflage pants. Police dogs aided in the search for terror.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/bayofplenty/4243760a6014.html
Photo: Taupo Times

Protesting police raids: One thousand march in Whakatane
http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/newsdetail1.asp?storyID=126116

Indigenous Border Summit 2007, hotel rooms & camping

Indigenous Peoples' Border Summit of the Americas II
Invitation and proposed agenda:
http://indigenousbordersummitamericas2007.blogspot.com/
San Xavier District, Tohono O'odham Nation
near the Tucson International Airport, Tucson, Arizona

River Park Inn rooms reserved for Border Summit 2007
Room reservations for Border Summit
The Indigenous Peoples' Border Summit of the Americas II, Nov. 7 -10, 2007, has reserved a block of rooms at the River Park Inn for $69 plus tax, per night for rooms with two queen beds. It is located off I-10 near downtown.
River Park Inn Main: 520.239.2300 Toll Free: 800.551.1466 Fax: 520.622.8143
Free: full breakfast; high speed Internet access; heated pool & jacuzzi; microwave; parking; pet friendly; refrigerator; room service available from Bennigan's on site.
http://www.theriverparkinn.com/

Camping
Camping is available at San Xavier, on site at the Border Summit
Campground includes sweatlodge and showers, please bring tents and sleeping bags

This is an alcohol and drug free event

International Indian Treaty Council urges UN intervention for Maoris

In an urgent appeal, the International Indian Treaty Council has asked the United Nations to intervene on behalf of Maoris being subjected to widespread arrests, detainments and police raids. Read IITC's letter appealing for urgent action to United Nations agencies:
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/10/international-indian-treaty-council.html

Good night Fr. Steve and Fr. Louie

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

TUCSON -- I did not go to federal court today.
I did not want to see Fr. Louie Vitale and Fr. Steve Kelly go to prison.
Tonight, no doubt, they are sitting in their cells, either over at the Pima County Jail in transport or in a federal prison. Most likely, they are smiling and praying.
Last summer, when I met Fr. Kelly and first interviewed him, he said there was never enough time when he was in prison. There was so much writing, reading and praying to be done. There were his notes to write down and always the chance of hearing a little news in passing from the outside. He had spent years in prison for literally trying to beat a nuclear weapon into a plowshare. Then, he marched onward and forward for prayer and protest at Guantanamo.
It was unnerving to see someone dedicated enough to spend years in prison because it was the right thing to do.
Then, there was Fr. Vitale, ever-smiling with his gentle and loving nature. The image I remember best is not from Tucson federal court, but the image from a photo. He is standing in the wire cage, the holding cell, at the Nevada Test Site, the same holding cell where so many Western Shoshone stood to protest war and the nuclear industry. He is smiling, and no doubt praying. For Fr. Vitale, 75 years old, going to prison was the right thing to do.
Those are the images I want to remember.
What a sad state of doom and wretchedness that the United States has fallen into, sending two priests to prison for praying in protest of U.S. torture outside an army base.

Priests sentenced to five months in prison:
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2007/10/priests-protesting-us-torture-sentenced.html

Zapatistas imprisoned in New Zealand in crackdown

Pro-Zapatista Activists Among Those Imprisoned In New Zealand Crackdown

Using New Anti-Terror Laws, Police Target Indigenous and Supporters Across the Country

By Julie Webb-Pullman

Special to The Narco News Bulletin
October 17, 2007

http://www.narconews.com/

WELLINGTON: Two hundred people today demonstrated outside the Wellington District Court in New Zealand, to protest Monday’s detention of four Wellingtonians, the first under the country’s new Terrorism Suppression Act. Two peace activists compas from the Wellington Zapatista Support Committee are amongst these supposed “terrorists” – both of whom have been active in Oaxaca and Chiapas in the last year supporting the struggles in Mexico, and fundraising in New Zealand for health services for Zapatista communities.

Read more ...

http://www.narconews.com/

Priests protesting US torture jailed for justice

Two priests who prayed outside Fort Huachuca in opposition to U.S. torture, were each sentenced to five months in federal prison
(Fr. Steve Kelly/photo Brenda Norrell)

Priests Protesting Torture at Fort Huachuca Jailed for Justice
by Bill Quigley

TUCSON, Arizona — October 17 — Louis Vitale, 75, a Franciscan priest, and Steve Kelly, 58, a Jesuit priest, were each sentenced today to five months in federal prison for attempting to deliver a letter opposing the teaching of torture at Fort Huachuca in Arizona. Both priests were taken directly into jail from the courtroom after sentencing.
Fort Huachuca is the headquarters of military intelligence in the U.S. and the place where military and civilian interrogators are taught how to extract information from prisoners. The priests attempted to deliver their letter to Major General Barbara Fast, commander of Fort Huachuca. Fast was previously the head of all military intelligence in Iraq during the atrocities of Abu Ghraib.
The priests were arrested while kneeling in prayer halfway up the driveway to Fort Huachuca in November 2006. Both priests were charged with trespass on a military base and resisting orders of an officer to stop.
In a pre-trial heating, the priests attempted to introduce evidence of torture, murder, and gross violations of human rights in Afghanistan, Abu Ghraib in Iraq, and at Guantanamo. The priests offered investigative reports from the FBI, the US Army, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and Physicians for Social Responsibility documenting hundreds of incidents of human rights violations. Despite increasing evidence of the use of torture by U.S. forces sanctioned by President Bush and others, the federal court in Tucson refused to allow any evidence of torture, the legality of the invasion of Iraq, or international law to be a part of the trial.
Outside the courthouse, before the judge ordered them to prison, the priests explained their actions: “The real crime here has always been the teaching of torture at Fort Huachuca and the practice of torture around the world. We tried to deliver a letter asking that the teaching of torture be stopped and were arrested. We tried to put the evidence of torture on full and honest display in the courthouse and were denied. We were prepared to put on evidence about the widespread use of torture and human rights abuses committed during interrogations at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo in Iraq and Afhganistan. This evidence was gathered by the military itself and by governmental and human rights investigations.”
Fr. Vitale, a longtime justice and peace activist in San Francisco and Nevada, said: “Because the court will not allow the truth of torture to be a part of our trial, we plead no contest. We are uninterested in a court hearing limited to who was walking where and how many steps it was to the gate. History will judge whether silencing the facts of torture is just or not. Far too many people have died because of our national silence about torture. Far too many of our young people in the military have been permanently damaged after following orders to torture and violate the human rights of other humans.”
Fr. Kelly, who walked to the gates of Guantanamo with the Catholic Worker group in December of 2005, concluded: “We will keep trying to stop the teaching and practice of torture whether we are sent to jail or out. We have done our part for now. Now it is up to every woman and man of conscience to do their part to stop the injustice of torture.”
The priests were prompted to protest by continuing revelations about the practice of torture by U.S. military and intelligence officers. The priests were also deeply concerned after learning of the suicide in Iraq of a young, devout female military interrogator in Iraq, Alyssa Peterson of Arizona, shortly after arriving in Iraq. Peterson was reported to be horrified by the mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners.
Investigation also revealed that Fort Huachuca was the source of infamous “torture manuals” distributed to hundreds of Latin American graduates of the U.S. Army School of Americas at Fort Benning, GA. Demonstrations against the teaching of torture at Fort Huachuca have been occurring for the past several years each November and are scheduled again for November 16 and 17 this year.
Bill is a human rights lawyer and law professor at Loyola University New Orleans. He served as counsel for Frs. Vitale and Kelly. You can reach Bill at Quigley@loyno.edu For more about their trial, see http://tortureontrial.org/
Posted from Common Dreams:
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/10/17/4650/

Good night Fr. Steve and Fr. Louie
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2007/10/good-night-fr-steve-and-fr-louie.html

From the Nuclear Resister:

In a statement read to supporters who gathered outside the courthouse and then filled the courtroom of Magistrate Hector Estrada, Frs. Vitale & Kelly declared:

"The real crime here has always been the teaching of torture at Fort Huachuca and the practice of torture around the world. We sought to deliver a letter asking that the teaching of torture be stopped and were arrested. We tried to put the evidence of torture on full and honest display in the courthouse and were denied. We were prepared to put on evidence about the widespread use of torture and human rights abuses committed during interrogations at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo in Iraq and Afghanistan. This evidence was gathered by the military itself and by governmental and human rights investigations. Because the court will not allow the truth of torture to be a part of our trial, we plead no contest. We are uninterested in a court hearing limited to who was walking where and how many steps it was to the gate. History will judge whether silencing the facts of torture is just or not. Far too many people have died because of our national silence about torture. Far too many of our young people in the military have been permanently damaged after following orders to torture and violate the human rights of other humans. We will keep trying to stop the teaching and practice of torture whether we are sent to jailor out. We have done our part. Now it is up to every woman and man of conscience to do their part to stop the injustice of torture." Following their arrest in November, 2006, the men we recharged with one federal count of trespass (USC 18-1382), and later with an additional Arizona state count of "Failure to Comply with Police Officer" (ARS 28-622). Their sentence is three months in prison for the federal conviction, plus two months for the state conviction, to be served consecutively.

After court, a dozen supporters drove to Sierra Vista, Arizona, to hold signs and banners opposing torture outside the maingate of Ft. Huachuca.

On November 18, in solidarity with the School of the AmericasWatch vigil and protest at Ft. Benning Georgia, hundreds of people from around the country will gather at Fort Huachuca to continue the nonviolent witness against U.S. policy sanctioning torture.
General who served in Iraq declares that "History will honor" actions of the priests

Major General: History will honor your actions

October 17, 2007 -- Pace e Bene co-founder Fr. Louie Vitale, O.F.M. and Fr. Steve Kelly, S.J. were sentenced today by Magistrate Hector Estrada to five months in federal prison for nonviolent action they engaged in last year at Ft. Huachuca, Arizona. Training in torture techniques have been documented at this US Army base.
They began their sentences immediately.
Major General Antonio M. Tacuba, who served in Iraq and wrote a report critical of torture carried out at Abu Ghraib prison, phoned the Franciscan and Jesuit priests the night before to convey his support and to express his belief that “history will honor your actions.” Their lawyer, Bill Quigley, shared General Tacuba’s words of support with the court.
The judge, who confessed that the case had put him in “an uncomfortable position,” meted out to both men three months in prison for trespass and two months for disobeying an officer. They will be incarcerated at a federal prison in Florence, Arizona.

For more information, visit http://tortureontrial.org/

Global oppression intense as Indigenous Peoples rise up and organize

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

Global oppression has intensified as Indigenous Peoples are organizing at the international level to control their resources and halt oppression. Maori leaders in the sovereignty, environmental and peace movements have been arrested. Tame Iti is in prison without bail. New Zealand authorities are attempting to brand the Maori as terrorists. New Zealand is under international pressure to adhere to the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples adopted by the U.N., which recognizes the right of Indigenous Peoples to their ancestral lands. Earlier, New Zealand, the United States, Australia and Canada voted against the UN Declaration.
Just now, Wednesday morning (October 17) the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has announced it will revisit its ruling halting a plan to make snow from sewer water on sacred San Francisco Peaks, a place of healing ceremonies and healing plant gathering for 13 area Indian Tribes. The federal Appeals Court said it is responding to pressure from the United States and Snowbowl Ski Resort.
In the south, the military oppression is unabated in Chiapas and Oaxaca, while mining corporations crush communities in Central and South America.
All of this comes at the same time that Zapatistas are organizing at the international level and Indigenous Peoples are fighting the corporate destruction -- copper and gold mining, oil drilling, coal mining, power plants, uranium mining and nuclear dumping -- from the Andean highlands in South America to the Inuit in Alaska and Aboriginals in Australia, and uniting in solidarity.
At the same time in Canada, Indian Nations are rising up to protect their ancestral territories, resisting colonization and the seizure of their lands for uranium mining, housing developments and oil drilling, as the Bush administration rushes to seize the oil in the melting Arctic.

URGENT APPEAL: Maori plea for support:

Dear Friends, Colleagues and Family,
It is in great distress that I am urged to write this appeal and to inform our international community of the recent events that are happening within Aotearoa (New Zealand) social justice, environmental justice and indigenous movements.
For the past 60 hours Aotearoa activists have been subjected to home invasions,raids and interrogation under threats of terrorist activities against the state.The Crown has decided to employ its recent Terrorism Suppression Act to lockdown on social justice activist, movers and shakers and this is now world widenews with many of our close friends and families houses (mine included) being invaded, possessions confiscated and charges being threatened which will allow for solid activists to be charged under the Terrorist Suppression Act that carries sentencing for life.
The ages of people currently under custody range from 18 – 64. Many of us being implicated in this investigation are young people trying to do good things for our communities.We are headed into an election year and these events are the largest scale operation headed by special operations from the head of states office. We have difficulty in understanding the timing for these invasions of our privacy except for political campaigning off of our backs.The indigenous movement for self - determination is what is being blamed by the media for instigating acts of terrorism.
The Police showed up at my house with files of my activities over years, my phones have been tapped for years, my house under surveillance and everything subject to their review. We have not been involved in any activities that could allow the police to make these claims and the distress they are causing for our families and children is devastating.
Right now we are fighting for friends in Police Custody to make bail. A number of these requests have been denied. A number of people are now been moved between prisons and I will be liasing with them and their families.
Court costs, travel costs, food costs and lawyer costs are above the heads of many of our people and we are asking for support from our communities both national and international to come to our aid in this time of need.'Terrorism' world wide has become a cause for unjust state intervention into the lives of many peoples committed to change and now we are seeing that reality play out here in our own backyards within our own community.
Please support us in anyway specifically: Sending your concerns against state interventions to Annette King, Minister of Police (aking@ministers.govt.nz) and to your local New Zealand Embassy's;- By sending financial support towards the Family Support Network to assist with food, travel expenses and Court costs and;
By sharing our stories with your own networks.We have had some international support by indigenous brothers and sisters by way of protests on the streets outside the NZ Embassy's, we encourage any of you to organize and do the same. Thank you all for taking the time to hear what is happening for us here in Aotearoa, these are very troubling times.
For further information please refer to:http://www.indymedia.org.nz/http://www.stuff.co.nz/4240168a25364.html
Most of our Internet sites have been taken down also in relation to these chain of events however all responses and correspondence can be made through me.
Mauriora, Kiritapu Allan Co – Director, Conscious Collaborations
http://www.conscious.maori.nz/
Collaborations
http://www.conscious.maori.nz/

Maori: Race relations set back 100 years
(Radio New Zealand) Maori Party co-leader Pita Sharples says this week's police raids have set race relations back 100 years.
Dr Sharples says the justice system has lashed out against Maori, and the raids used "storm trooper" tactics.
He says the police actions remind him of the atrocities committed at Parihaka in the 19th century, when 1500 armed police occupied the settlement and arrested its leaders.
Dr Sharples says no charges have been laid under the Terrorism Suppression Act since it was introduced in 2002, and questions whether there will be what he describes as trumped-up evidence to justify the police actions.
Alliance view
Alliance Party president Victor Billot says confusion and secrecy surrounding the alleged terrorism activities needs to be cleared up.
Mr Billot says the use of the terrorism suppression legislation to raid houses was unnecessary, and the nature of the alleged threats to public safety should be made public immediately.
Copyright © 2007 Radio New Zealand


Profits priority over sacred lands, federal court to revisit San Francisco Peaks case

Contact:
Klee Benally
Save the Peaks Coalition
(928) 380-2629
coalition@savethepeaks.org

Ninth Circuit Court Allows Review In Legal Case of Recycled Sewage On Sacred Mountain

Flagstaff, AZ -- The 9th Circuit Court has granted the U.S. Forest Service and an Arizona ski resort the opportunity for review of the court's decision on March 12th, 2007 that had provided protection for a mountain held holy by more than 13 Native American Nations. The slopes of the San Francisco Peaks, located in Northern Arizona, have been at the center of a historical and lengthy battle that has pitted economic interests on public lands against environmental integrity, public health and cultural survival. A small local ski resort proposed a plan to expand and use treated waste effluent to make fake snow. However, their development has been halted due to the Ninth Circuit Court ruling, which has been hailed as a victory for Religious Freedom, Environmental Justice & Cultural Survival.
"The decision of the Ninth Circuit to rehear this case is regrettable. It means that the Court will reconsider the case - not that it has reversed any decision at this point. It is, however, even more regrettable that our federal government seems to place the profitability of a privately owned, non-destination ski area, that operates on federal land, over the deeply held religious and cultural convictions of hundreds of thousands of Native Americans living in the southwestern United States." said Howard Shanker, of the Shanker Law Firm, PLC, representing the Navajo Nation, the White Mountain Apache Tribe, the Yavapai-Apache Tribe, the Havasupai Tribe, Rex Tilousi, Dianna Uqualla, the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, and the Flagstaff Activist Network.
Shanker, who is running for Congress in Arizona Congressional District 1, further provided that, "this situation is indicative of the fact that we need better laws and lawmakers who are willing to stand up and be counted in the face of this type of injustice. The continued pursuit of the use of reclaimed waste water to make snow on the San Francisco Peaks should be an affront to all people of conscience everywhere."
"We are confident that a hearing en banc by the 9th Circuit Court will only make the current ruling stronger." Rudy Preston of the Flagstaff Activist Network.
"Why in 2007 do we as America's first people have no guarantee for protection of our religious freedom?" said Jeneda Benally a volunteer with the Save the Peaks Coalition. "The case to protect the sacred San Francisco Peaks demonstrates the need for further protection of Native American religious freedom and rights in this country. We will continue our dedication to save the Peaks until we have our human rights fully upheld."

For more information visit: http://www.savethepeaks.org/

Ninth Circuit 'buckles' under US pressure for sewer snow on San Francisco Peaks

US government and Snowbowl Ski Resort pressure has resulted in the Ninth Circuit revisiting its decision to halt snowmaking from sewer water on sacred San Francisco Peaks, a place of healing ceremonies and medicine plant gathering for 13 area Indian Nations, near Flagstaff, Arizona

Appeals court to revisit ruling barring snowmaking at AZ resort

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
October 17, 2007

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal appeals court says it will reconsider its ruling barring snowmaking at the Arizona Snowbowl ski area north of Flagstaff.
The decision by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals came after both the federal government and the Snowbowl’s owners asked it to revisit the case.
A three-judge panel issued a ruling in March blocking the resort’s plan to expand and add snowmaking equipment that would use treated wastewater. The panel was acting on a suit filed by Indian tribes who consider the San Francisco Peaks sacred.The full court’s decision to reconsider the case sets aside the earlier ruling. A date for a full rehearing hasn’t been set.

Love triangle in New Zealand: Police, media and white supremacy

Lockdown traumatised families, says elder
By MIKE WATSON - The Dominion Post Thursday, 18 October 2007

A Ruatoki elder has rejected the police response as to why their settlement was the subject of heavy-handed terror raids.
"The police have ulterior motives and are testing out the Suppression Terrorism Act on Tuhoe people," said Ruatoki executive committee member Paki Nikora.
"We want some answers to our questions." http://www.stuff.co.nz/4241379a11.html


Tears after Iti denied bail: 'Iti is no terrorist'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/feature/story.cfm?c_id=1501470&objectid=10470607

"Suppression of Terrorism or Oppression of Tangata Whenua"
by Leonie Pihama
15 Oct 2007 10:12 pm
Today we get news that Tame Iti has been arrested under the Suppression of Terroism Act and the media swings into action with all its sensationalist glory. We see Tame with guns, Tame on Protest, Tame spitting at Parliamentarians, but what we don't get is any facts, any reasons, any justification for his arrest or any analysis by the media of what reeks of another police set up of a Maori activist. Its 100 years since the Tohunga Suppression Act, that too was an Act design to oppress and suppress Tangata Whenua, it was an act that sought to put an end to any following of healing or rongoa, it was an act that was designed to oppress and suppress matauranga Maori and any or all attempts by iwi to keep control of our own wellbeing. Sound familiar? Now 100 years later the Suppression of Terroism Act is used to silence Maori activism. With the arrest of Tame Iti a message is being sent to the wider Maori activist movement that under this Act the police can move in and remove your fundamental rights and in doing so there is no reason required. The media machinery loves this. We see TV3 and TV1 in full flight, including camera's giving 'exclusive' footage of a raid on a wellington house. What is that? How do the media get to be on raids with the cops? What better way than to ensure that the police propaganda machine works than to have your own 'objective' (read and laugh) television journalist in tow. How pathetic is our media that they buy in to such tactics, but hey - gives a good taste of realism!! The fact there is no actual 'evidence' is a minor issue, right?Accusations of terrorism are not new to the Maori activist community. Many of our great leaders have been accused of being terrorists and imprisoned for acts of resistance to colonial rule. The Suppression of Terrorism Act is another colonisers tool to imprison those that question the legitimacy of colonial rule.
http://www.kaupapamaori.com/blog/posts/leonie/post1/
Labels: Indigenous Sovereignty, State Repression, Te Mana Motuhake O Tuhoe
Posted from Indigenist Intelligence Review:
http://indigenist.blogspot.com/2007/10/suppression-of-terrorism-or-oppression.html

Naomi Klein: Blackwater-Halliburton-Bechtel lapping up dollars in the disaster zones

Naomi Klein speaks out on Iraq and New Orleans:

"There were the same contractors -- Blackwater-Halliburton-Bechtel. The point of this is that disaster zones are laboratories. They're testing grounds. In the chaos of this moment, you have these leaps forward for the privatization agenda. What was Blackwater doing there?"
Read more about disaster profiteer CH2M HILL OMI and others:

Column: BuzzFlash.Com
Naomi Klein -- Shocking the World Bank and IMF Crowd With Her Analysis of 'Disaster Capitalism'
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0710/S00252.htm

Zapatistas' Intercontinental Encuentro attracts 547 Indian delegates

Speaking out for resistance against colonization and uniting in solidarity, Mohawks, Mic'mac, Anishinabe, Lakota, Hopi, Navajo and O'odham were among 547 Indigenous delegates and 800 observers at the Zapatistas' encuentro at Vicam Pueblo in Sonora, Mexico. Rising up against the ongoing oppression in Mexico, Subcomandante Marcos said the delegation from Chiapas was subjected to violent harassment from the military.
Narco News reports:
http://www.narconews.com/Issue47/article2834.html
Lisen to Marcos and others, recordings in Spanish:
http://enlacezapatista.ezln.org.mx/
Photo: Narco News

Congratulations to NAMMY winners

Congratulations to Keith Secola, Floyd Westerman and all of the winners at the Ninth Annual Native American Music Awards. Here's the complete list of winners:

http://www.nativeamericanmusicawards.com/index.cfm

News articles on Cherokee National Youth Choir, Pipestone, Corn-Bred, Brule, Night Shield and others:

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&scoring=d&ie=UTF-8&q=NAMMY&btnG=Search

Photo: Keith Secola and Floyd Westerman, with memers of Secola's band, at the Indigenous Peoples' Border Summit of the Americas in 2006 at San Xavier, Ariz. Photo Brenda Norrell

NINTH ANNUAL WINNERS ARTIST OF THE YEAR: Arvel Bird “Animal Totems 2,” BEST BLUES JAZZ RECORDING: Corn-Bred “Corn-Bred,” BEST COMPILATION RECORDING: “Heart of the Navajo Land,” Various DEBUT ARTIST: Shelley Morningsong “Out Of The Ashes,” DEBUT DUO OR GROUP OF THE YEAR: Women of Wabano “Voices,” BEST FEMALE ARTIST: Susan Aglukark “Blood Red Earth”

BEST COUNTRY RECORDING: “A Tribute To Johnny Cash” Floyd Red Crow Westerman, BEST FOLK RECORDING: “Welcome To Your Rainy Day,” Tonemah, FLUTIST OF THE YEAR: Robert Tree Cody “Heart of the Wind,” BEST GOSPEL OR INSPIRATIONAL RECORDING: “Comfort & Joy” Cherokee National Youth Choir

DUO OR GROUP OF THE YEAR: Brule’ & AIRO “Silent Star Night” BEST HISTORICAL RECORDING: “Remember Me Grandfather: Lakota Pipe & Ceremonial Songs” Wahancanka BEST INSTRUMENTAL RECORDING: “Alluvia” Evren Ozan, BEST MALE ARTIST: Robert Mirabal “Pueblo Christmas,” BEST NATIVE AMERICAN CHURCH RECORDING: “Voice of a Dakota” Gerald Primeaux, Sr, BEST NEW AGE RECORDING: “Kinship” Brule’, BEST POP RECORDING: “American Indian Story” Jana, BEST ROCK RECORDING: “Crazy Woman Mountain” Gary Small & The Coyote Bros, BEST POW WOW RECORDING: “Long Winter Nights” Northern Cree & Friends

BEST PRODUCER: Tom Bee “Voice of the Drum,” BEST RAP/HIP HOP RECORDING: “The Total Package” Night Shield, RECORD OF THE YEAR: “Good Ol’ Fashioned NDN Lovin’” Pipestone, SONG/SINGLE OF THE YEAR: ‘Have Hope’ Jennifer Kreisberg

BEST LINGUISTIC RECORDING: “Anishinabemoin” Keith Secola & Karen Drift, BEST TRADITIONAL RECORDING: “Dancers of Mother Earth” Todi Neesh Zhee Singers

SONGWRITER OF THE YEAR: Arigon Starr “The Red Road,” BEST SHORT FORM MUSIC VIDEO/DVD: Inchelium - Jim Boyd, BEST LONG FORM VIDEO/DVD: “The Trail of Tears Cherokee Legacy” Rich Heape Films, BEST WORLD MUSIC RECORDING: “Cultural Legacy: Traditional Music from Equador & Bolivia,” NATIVE HEART: Peter Buffett “Spirit – The Seventh Fire”

Maori Tame Iti denied bail

Police arrest Maori in sovereignty struggle for ancestral land rights, after New Zealand voted "No" to UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
Tame Iti denied bail today:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/timaruherald/4241220a6432.html

Torture protest Tucson Wednesday 7:30 a.m.

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

TUCSON, Arizona -- Two Catholic priests will ask the court to sentence them Wednesday morning, October 17, following the court's action of gagging the priests' defense which would have exposed torture in Abu-Graib and Guantanamo.

Fr. Louie Vitale and Fr. Steve Kelly knelt in prayer at Fort Huachuca in southern Arizona after being halted at the gate as they attempted to deliver a letter in opposition to U.S. torture.

After being gagged on the subject of torture in a trial, the priests will forgo a bench trial, and instead change their pleas from not guilty to no contest at a hearing set for 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, October17, in U.S. District Court, Tucson.

Since a September pretrial ruling forbid all facets of their planned defense, their attorney William Quigley has told Magistrate Hector Estrada that Fr. Vitale, and Fr. Stephen Kelly, will change their plea, and would like to be sentenced immediately.

Both men have served time in federal prison for their nonviolent acts for peace, and these prior convictions add to the likelihood of another prison sentence on Wednesday morning.

Supporters will rally with the priests outside the Courthouse beginning at 7:30 a.m.Frs. Kelly ,58, and Vitale ,74, are each charged with one federal count of trespass (USC 18-1382), (six-month maximum jail sentence), and one Arizona state count of "Failure to Comply with Police Officer" (ARS28-622) (four month maximum).

The priests were arrested last November 19 as they attempted to enter Fort Huachuca, in Sierra Vista, Arizona, and deliver a letter tothen-commander Major General Barbara Fast, denouncing torture and the Military Commissions Act of 2006.

Coincidentally, their October 17 court date is also the anniversary of the signing of the Military Commissions Act, which sanctions evidence gained from the torture of terror suspects and suspends habeus corpus for so-called "enemy combatants.

"The court has forbidden the defense from even mentioning issues related to torture, the Military Commissions Act, international law, etc. during a trial."

Magistrate Hector Estrada has a great opportunity to mark this dark legal anniversary," said Jack Cohen-Joppa, a Tucson supporter of the California-based clergymen."Within the law, he could also declare that 'though their acts be criminal' and the Law would not permit the priests to present their defense, the interests of Justice compel him to commend their intent, and suspend any sentence."

For more information, visit http://tortureontrial.org/

Franciscan Father Louie Vitale served as the provincial of the California Franciscan Friars from 1979 to 1988. He is cofounder of the Nevada Desert Experience, a faith-based movement to end nuclear weapons testing. Jesuit Father Steve Kelly worked with the Jesuit Refugee Service in Central America for many years. In December, 2005, he served as chaplain for Witness Against Torture, a peaceful march across Cubato the gates of the Guantanamo prison camp. Both have a long record of nonviolent protest and subsequent imprisonment.

Photo: On Saturday night in Tucson at the Tucson Meet Yourself festival, a lone protester drew attention to U.S. torture and imprisonment with charges or trial. Photo Brenda Norrell.

Maori seeking return of ancestral lands raided and arrested

UPDATE: New Zealand Radio

The two men charged and named after police carried out raids across New Zealand remain in custody. A total of 17 people were arrested after 300 officers searched properties in eastern Bay of Plenty, Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington, Palmerston North and Christchurch on Monday.
On Tuesday, an Auckland High Court judge revoked bail for Jamie Lockett, while Maori activist Tame Iti is still awaiting a decision on his bail application. Both are facing firearms charges.
Mr Lockett was granted bail at a hearing in Rotorua District Court on Tuesday morning, but bail was revoked that evening after police appealed against the decision.
Mr Iti is still in custody waiting on a decision on his bail application in the same court.
The other 15 have not been identified.

ABC RADIO: Maori MP sceptical over terror claims

16/10/2007 An MP in New Zealand says the police operation aimed at what have been described as guerilla style training camps in the eastern Bay of Plenty was over the top. Te Ururoa Flavell, the Maori Party MP for the Maori electorate of Waiariki, where the main police operation was carried out, says the whole thing could be a misunderstanding and he's sceptical about the idea of a terrorist training camp in his electorate.
Presenter - Bruce Hill Speaker - Te Ururoa Flavell, the Maori Party MP for Waiariki.
Listen:
http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/pacbeat/stories/s2061077.htm

New Zealand police raided Maori groups seeking the rights to their ancestral land on Oct. 15. Maori have been arrested and jailed. This comes after New Zealand voted against the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Maori land claims are at the heart of the attacks by the government of New Zealand, now trying to brand the Maori as "terrorists."

http://indymedia.org.nz/newswire/display/73860/index.php

On 14 September 2007, New Zealand was one of only four nations to vote against the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, speaking against the declaration just prior to the vote.
The landmark declaration, approved after 143 Member States voted in favour, outlines the rights of the world’s estimated 370 million indigenous people and outlaws discrimination against them – a move that followed more than two decades of debate. The Declaration emphasizes the rights of indigenous peoples to maintain and strengthen their own institutions, cultures and traditions and to pursue their development in keeping with their own needs and aspirations. It also prohibits discrimination against indigenous peoples and promotes their full and effective participation in all matters that concern them, and their right to remain distinct and to pursue their own visions of economic and social development.
In other words, the declaration gives the weight of the United Nations to the notions of Tino Rangatiratanga and Mana Motuhake.
But how is this connected with the October 15 raids?
Well, Ngai Tuhoe have a claim before the Waitangi Tribunal for their ancestral land. Land that was never ceeded to the crown. Ngai Tuhoe did not sign Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and the land that is now in crown hands was stolen. Submissions on the claim closed in 2005 and the report on their claim is expected back at the end of 2007.
There is no moral or law (domestic or international) which can justify the crowns continued possession of the Tuhoe nation. By the occupation of Tuhoe land, the NZ Government imposes a pakeha colonial system of taxation, schooling, education and health upon Ngai Tuhoe. And these systems have been shown again and again to be failing Maori.
What the new UN Declaration sets out, what the Waitangi Tribunal must find, what justice should prove, is that these lands, the control of their communities, the Mana Motuhake, of Tuhoe must be returned. Of course, the government is not prepared to allow an alternate system to exist within our national boundaries. They are not willing to admit to the heinous wrongs of our predecessors, and they are not willing to return these lands, and Tino Rangatiratanga, to it's rightful heirs.
THIS is why there must be a fight for the rights of the Tuhoe nation, THIS is why, in my opinion, the police and government decided to act now - to cast a light of their making ("terrorists") upon those people who are brave enough to stand up for the justice for which the Tuhoe nation has been waiting so long.
KIA KAHA FREEDOM FIGHTERSME WHAWHAI MO TE TIKA!Links:
NZ votes against indigenous peoples' rights at the UN as Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples is adopted by overwhelming majority www.converge.org.nz/pma/in140907.htm
Tuhoe claims at the Waitangi tribunal
www.waitangitribunal.govt.nz/resources/urewera_panui.asp

Blackwater trained US police

http://www.rense.com/general78/blackwater.htm

Maoris arrested, denied bail

Police repression in New Zealand, Maori peace activists and
environmentalists raided and arrested

http://www.indymedia.org.nz/
In a wave of massive state repression, 300+ Police, in many cases armed, raided houses around the country today making 17 arrests. Search warrants were carried out in Auckland, Whakatane, Ruatoki, Hamilton, Palmerston North, Wellington and Christchurch. Police are also seeking up to 60 people for questioning. The arrestees are all activists in the Tino Rangatiratanga, peace and environmental movements.
Prominent Tino Rangatiratanga activist Tame Iti was among the first arrested at his home at 4am Monday morning. At 6am raids were carried out at A Space Inside anarchist social centre in Auckland [ Search Warrant ] and the 128 activist Community Centre in Wellington [ Video of police raid ]. .

Read updated news on Maori arrests at:
http://www.indymedia.org.nz/
http://www.indymedia.org/
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

Thanks to Indigenous Action for this post:
http://www.indigenousaction.org/ - Independent Indigenous Media

Makah filmmaker's 'Maria Tallchief' airs on PBS

Makah Filmmaker Sandy Osawa's new film about Maria Tallchief, comes to PBS in November, check local listings.

'Maria Tallchief' video available from the filmmakers:
http://www.upstreamvideos.com/

America’s First Prima Ballerina


San Francisco, California -- Makah film director Sandy Osawa's new film Maria Tallchief, the story of “America’s First Prima Ballerina” will have its public television debut in November on PBS. This is the first full-length documentary on this legendary dance figure who helped spark the founding of the New York City Ballet Company in 1948. Maria Tallchief began ballet lessons at age four in Fairfax, Oklahoma—an Osage Indian community—and went on to stardom in roles created specifically for her by her husband and choreographer, George Balanchine. In the film Maria Tallchief tells her own story, accompanied by archival photos, rare dance clips, and interviews with dance colleagues and historians.


Osawa, citing her motivation to produce the film, said, “There is a lack of positive stories about Native American women in film and although a television tribute to her is long overdue, I am honored to be the one to introduce Maria Tallchief to both old fans and a new generation of fans.” Maria’s professional life is prominent throughout the film with clips from Swan Lake, Firebird Pas de Dix, , Nutcracker and Le Baiser de la Fee. Audiences will also long remember the more chilling aspects of Maria’s Native American heritage. Shortly after Maria was born in 1925, the Osage Tribe was the richest group of people in the world due to the discovery of oil. This ignited what historians have termed a “reign of terror” as non Indians began plots to rob the Osages of their fortunes.


Murder was rampant and the tribe declined in population by almost 25 percent. Maria’s mother was greatly affected by this period of history and encouraged Maria and her sister to develop their own strengths and skills, as those could never be stolen. At the age of seven, Maria and her family moved to Los Angeles, where she studied with world class teachers such as Mr. Belcher and Madame Nijinsky. By the late 1940’s, television, the New York City Ballet, and even
ballet as an American art form were all emerging. Tallchief became a new prototype of the ballerina that was distinctively American. The ballet world that was dominated by Russian, French and English performers changed dramatically in 1948. The night Maria Tallchief
took center stage in Orpheus, a thunderous ovation was heard and history was made with the founding of the New York City Ballet. Author Francis Mason, who is featured in the film said, “Maria Tallchief lit a fire under classical ballet that is still burning.”
.
ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
The film Maria Tallchief is the third in a trilogy of films that highlights contemporary American Indian themes, issues and people by the production company, Upstream Productions, based in Seattle, Washington. Sandy Osawa is a member of the Makah Tribe with a lifelong dedication
to bringing alternative images of Indians to the screen. Yasu Osawa, has assisted her in all the films and has been lauded for his camera and editing work . The two other previous documentaries were Pepper’s Pow Wow and On & Off the Res ‘ w/ Charlie Hill, which were also
broadcast on PBS stations and are now used as curriculum resources in college libraries across the country.

Hopi Sacred Water Run to Mexico film in Albuquerque

(double click on image to enlarge)Presented by the Native American Studies Department at the University of New Mexico
Wednesday, October 17, 2007 7:30 p.m.

Global Green Indigenous Film Festival in New Mexico

Inaugural international Global Green Indigenous Film Festival to be launched in New Mexico, April 18 - 20, 2008

By Stephine Poston
stephposton@msn.com

The international Global Green Indigenous Film Festival will be held at the El Museo Cultural de Santa Fe in Santa Fe, New Mexico, April 18 -20, 2008. Gary Farmer will be a part of the film festival team. Charmaine Jackson-John, film festival manager, is accepting submissions for films and videos that address indigenous environmental concerns and issues from all countries. Read more ...
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/10/global-green-indigenous-film-festival.html

Mohawk Nation News: 'Who's Sorry Now?'

Mohawk Nation News

Mohawk Nation News has published a book on one of our Mohawk communities, Kanehsatake. The following is the preface: Title: “Who’s Sorry Now? The good, the bad and the unapologetic Mohawks of Kanehsatake” by Kahentinetha Horn.

The title of this book, “Who’s Sorry Now” was inspired by the remarks of Judge Nicole Duval Hesler of Quebec Superior Court. She wanted the Mohawks of Kanehsatake to apologize to get more lenient sentences from her. She wanted an admission of guilt andsubmission to the colonizers who are engaged in stealing our community’s assets. She wanted our men to bow down to those heavily armed goons who had invaded our territory on January12, 2004 carrying a “hit list”.

They’ve been convicted as “rioters”. Wouldn’t an apology be dandy? It would save her the embarrassment of her case being appealed. The treatment we have been receiving at the hands of the police, judicial system and colonial government officials is corrupt,deceitful and threatening. We’ve learned that we are in the way of multi-national corporate interests who control colonial governments. We have learned that we Mohawks have been and continue to be targeted for various reasons. Our ancestors always refused to knuckle under. So do we!

That’s why we are still the targets of genocide. Our land,our constitution and our tie to our land has kept us strong. We continue to take energy from our ancestors who made the sacrifices so we could be here today. They made sure that there would be at least seven generations of our people in the future. This book is about how we spoke out and about the way we were persecuted for exercising a right that Canada pretends to defend. We also wanted the Canadian public to know what is being done with their tax dollars. This will give them something to think about as they sit around waiting for medical services which we are told cannot be provided. Where is all the money going? Well, this is about one leak in the bucket.
Read more ...
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/10/mohawk-nation-news-whos-sorry-now.html

BOLIVIA RISING!

Indigenous Peoples in Bolivia celebrate their resistance and sovereignty over their land and resources, announcing decrees on migration, their right to water and women's rights, while celebrating the emergence of a new world leader: Bolivian President Evo Morales

Bolivia Rising
A Formal Summons to World States by Indigenous First Nations and Peoples Chimoré, Cochabamba, Bolivia
From the heart of South America, on this 12th day of October, 2007, the delegates of the indigenous first nations and peoples of the world, meeting in the World Encounter “For the Historic Victory of the Indigenous Peoples of the World”, to celebrate the adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, hereby declare: That, after 515 years of oppression and domination, here we stand; they have been unable to eliminate us. We have confronted and resisted the policies of ethnocide, genocide, colonization, destruction and plunder. Read more ...
http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/2007/10/formal-summons-to-world-states-by.htmlRead

Texas migrant prisons, free the children!

Hutto child prison and Raymondville tent internment camp in Texas

Freedom Ambassadors: A Texas Super Weekend…

Raymondville Walk II Oct. 26 - 27, 2007
Hutto Walk III Oct. 28-30, 2007
These prisons are models and manifestations of the elitist supremacy…with callous greed as the driving force that permeates our country and exploits the worlds’ inhabitants.
The Hutto child prison in Taylor and the Raymondville tent internment camps are the most visible yet sinister violation of international human rights on American soil…and they both happen to be here in Texas. Hutto has children and their mothers imprisoned at the tune of about $10,000 per child/per mother/per month. Raymondville is the most flagrant of adult immigrant internment camps in the world, let alone on American soil.
Read more from Jay Johnson-Castro:
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/10/texas-migrant-prison-free-children.html
Photo Raymondville tent internment camp/Courtesy Jay Johnson-Castro

Vernon Bellecourt takes flight to the Spirit World

Vernon Bellecourt (WaBun-Inini) Anishinabe/Ojibwe Nation 1931 - 2007

From: Chris Spotted Eagle
Date: Sat, 13 Oct 2007 18:51:34 -0400

Vernon Bellecourt (WaBun-Inini) passed over into the spirit world earlier today, October 13, 2007. Minneapolis, Minnesota surrounded by his friends and family.

Vernon was a principal spokesman for the American Indian Movement and a leader in actions ranging from the 1972 occupation of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Washington to the 1992 Redskin Superbowl demonstrations. He Co-founded and was the first Executive Director of the Denver AIM Chapter. His involvement at Wounded Knee in 1973 led to a Federal indictment. He was a special representative of the International Indian Treaty Council and helped organize the first Treaty Conference in 1974. He was jailed for throwing his blood on the Guatemalan Embassy to protest the killing of 100,000 Indians. He was elected to a 4-year term in his White Earth tribal government and developed a model program for the spiritual education of Indian prisoners. Vernon was President of the National Coalition on Racism in Sports & Media and recipient of the City of Phoenix, Martin Luther King Human Rights Award 1993

Last journey was to Venezuela in north and south solidarity

Vernon Bellecourt, in poor health and in a wheelchair, joined an American Indian delegation to Venezuela in August, 2007, to unite Indigenous from the North and South in solidarity:
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/09/american-indians-in-venezuela-build_26.html

Bellecourt fell ill after last great journey: Trip to Venezuela

http://www.startribune.com/466/story/1483509.html/

From Lenny Foster, Navajo

I wish to offer my deepest condolences to the family of Vernon Bellecourt. I am sadden and with grief as I recall my friendship with Vernon Bellecourt since the fall of 1970 when I first met Vernon in Denver. I had already made my spiritual pilgrimage to Alcatraz Island that spring. He took me and many others under his wing and became a mentor for the young American Indians. I joined the American Indian Movement and I traveled with the Denver American Indian Movement chapter for the next three years (1970-1974) including the campaigns at Ignacio, Colorado; Omaha, Nebraska; Raymond Yellow Thunder in Gordon, Nebraska; Cass Lake, Minnesota; Alliance, Nebraska; Flagstaff, Arizona; Gallup, New Mexico; Trail of Broken Treaties Caravan & the BIA Takeover in Washington, D.C.; Wounded Knee, South Dakota; and the First International Indian Treaty Council gathering in Mobridge, South Dakota.
He was a fearless leader and was a very eloquent and articulate speaker whose words inspired a generation. He was the founder of the Denver chapter of the American Indian Movement and he was one of the founders of the International Indian Treaty Council and he became a staunch advocate and speaker for the Indigenous Peoples and became a world figure and traveled throughout the world.
He strongly believed in the spiritual sovereignty of the American Indian. He supported our struggle at Big Mountain with his presence at the Sun Dance. He took us with him from the Navajo Reservation and other Indian reservations throughout the country and he helped bring the Indian Nations into the world arena and became one of the leaders who traveled to the United Nations in Geneva.
He took on the corporate world of major league baseball teams such as the Atlanta Braves and the Cleveland Indians and the national football league teams of the Washington Redskins and the Kansas City Chiefs because of the dehumanizing racist cartoon caricatures that portrayed the American Indian as mascots.
We were awarded and a recipient of the City of Phoenix, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Human Rights Award in January 16, 1993 which was the first time the state of Arizona recognized the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday. We both worked on the religious freedom and traditional worship for Native prisoners in the state prisons and federal penitentiaries and we both kept Leonard Peltier in the forefront for the religious freedom struggle.
This was my relationship with a great warrior, human being and a passionate advocate for his peoples.
My deepest condolences to the family and relatives of Vernon Bellecourt. We share your sorrow and grief.
Farewell my friend and comrade in the struggle and it was my pleasure and honor to have rode with you.
Lenny Foster (Dine’)
Wounded Knee vet
International Indian Treaty Council

AIM Leader Vernon Bellecourt Dies at 75

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Vernon Bellecourt, a longtime leader of the American Indian Movement who fought against the use of American Indian nicknames for sports teams, died Saturday his brother said. He was 75.
Bellecourt died at Abbott Northwestern Hospital of complications of pneumonia, according to Clyde Bellecourt, a founding member of the militant American Indian rights group.
Just before he was put on the respirator, Vernon Bellecourt joked that the CIA had finally gotten him, his brother said.
"He was willing to put his butt on the line to draw attention to racism in sports," his brother said. Clyde Bellecourt said his brother had been in Venezuela about four weeks ago to meet with President Hugo Chavez to discuss Chavez' program for providing heating assistance to American Indian tribes. He fell ill around the time of his return, Clyde Bellecourt said.

PHOTO: Vernon Bellecourt, critic of American Indian sports monickers, dead at 75 by STEVE KARNOWSKI - Associated Press Writer© AP

.

Leonard Peltier, and the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee extend ourcondolences to the Bellecourt Family.

Vernon died Saturday, October 13, 2007at Abbott Northwestern Hospital, Minneapolis Minnesota surrounded by his friends and family.Vernon Bellecourt, whose Objibwe name (WaBun-Inini) means Man of Dawn was a member of Minnesota's White Earth Band and was an international spokesman for the AIM Grand Governing Council based in Minneapolis. He was 75. In recent years, Bellecourt had been active in the fight against American Indian nicknames for sports teams as president of the National Coalition on Racism in Sports and Media. He was arrested in Cleveland during the 1997World Series and again in 1998 during protests against the Cleveland Indian's Mascot, Chief Wahoo. Charges were dropped for the first time and hewas never charged on the second case.A Celebration of Vernon's Life to be held on Monday, October 15, 2007 at All Nations Indian Church, 1515 E 23rd Street Minneapolis, MN 55404. Waketo be held on Tuesday, October 16, 2007 at the Circle of Life School, White Earth Reservation, MN. Burial will be Wednesday Morning, October 17, 2007at White Earth Reservation, MN.

Respectfully,

Leonard Peltier

Toni Zeidan, Co-director

LPDC Website: http://www.leonardpeltier.net/

http://www.leonardpeltier.net/>Email: info@leonardpeltier.net

Breaking news articles on Vernon Bellecourt's passing from Google News, 211 articles:

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ie=UTF-8&q=%22Vernon+Bellecourt%22

Censored Blog's Nobelist Prize goes to Inuit Sheila Watt-Cloutier

Al Gore may have officially captured the Nobel Peace Prize, but the Censored Blog is awarding its Nobelist Prize to Inuit Sheila Watt-Cloutier.
For a world weary of politicians, there's nothing like the real thing.




No big disappointment but Nobel win would have helped Arctic: Watt-Cloutier

The Canadian Press
IQALUIT, Nunavut - A Canadian nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize says she's not that disappointed about failing to get the prestigious award because her nomination still brought more attention to climate change.
Sheila Watt-Cloutier is an Inuit leader and campaigner against global warming who had been tabbed as one of the favourites for the prize.
On Friday it was awarded jointly to former U.S. vice-president Al Gore and the International Panel on Climate Change, a United Nations scientific team that wrote what is considered the most authoritative assessment of the issue. Gore has campaigned to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and won an Oscar earlier this year for his climate change documentary "An Inconvenient Truth."
"As long as the earth is a winner, I am very pleased about the outcome this morning," Watt-Cloutier said in Iqaluit, Nunavut, on Friday.
Watt-Cloutier, 53, is known for emphasizing how climate change affects people, especially indigenous cultures such as the Inuit. She won Norway's Sophie Prize for the environment in 2005 for calling attention to the impact of climate change on life in the Arctic.
And when she was head of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, she brought a petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights against the United States, saying the country's refusal to limit greenhouse gas emissions was harming the Inuit way of life.
That human rights approach to global warming has only been strengthened by the nomination, she said.
"The Nobel nomination put that issue a lot further out there."
Watt-Cloutier added the nomination has also strengthened her ability to carry that message.
"My work got propelled way out there beyond what I would have expected. Since the nomination I am very, very busy being invited all over the world.
"It has been very, very helpful to the cause."
Invitations to speak come almost daily now, Watt-Cloutier said.
Photo:CBC

The Not-So-Green Al Gore, oil drilling on Indian burial grounds
Al Gore: The Other Oil Candidate .. Read more ...
http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=468

Harvey Arden: Welcome to Leavenworth

WELCOME TO LEAVENWORTH
Flashpoint Magazine
Excerpt from, "Have you thought of Leonard Peltier lately?"

By Harvey Arden
(Harvey's first meeting with Leonard in 1997, at a pow-wow held in the gymnasium at Leavenworth Penitentiary)
THE NEXT DAY I WAS driven to Leavenworth by two Peltier supporters who would be attending the prison powwow with me. I can tell you, I physically feared going into Leavenworth, even if only as a visitor. My stomach tied itself in knots at the prospect as the time for my visit approached. It was our first in-person meeting to speak about me editing a book of Leonard's writings-a book that eventually became PRISON WRITINGS: MY LIFE IS MY SUN DANCE (St. Martins Press, 1999).
Read more:
http://www.flashpointmag.com/ardenlev.htm

Harvey Arden was a National Geographic staff writer for over 23 years. He has continued to pursue his desire to collaborate with extraordinary people to share their stories, life lessons, and messages as an author and editor.
Harvey's book website: http://www.haveyouthought.com/
Photo: Harvey Arden with Edna Gordon of Voice of a Hawk Elder


Leonard Peltier's imprisonment remains one of the most censored issues in American Indian newspapers. --Censored Blog

Morales withdrawing Bolivian military from School of Americas training

WASHINGTON, DC - October 10 – President Evo Morales announced Tuesday that Bolivia will gradually withdraw its military from training programs at the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC), formerly known as the School for the Americas (SOA). Bolivia is the fifth country after Costa Rica, Argentina, Uruguay and Venezuela to announce a withdrawal from the Fort Benning school, citing its history of collaborating with repressive regimes and human rights abuses.
http://www.commondreams.org/news2007/1010-04.htm

Columbus Day Denver: Video of arrests

In this video of the Columbus Day protest and arrests in Denver, there is a message from the Indian Resistance: The resistance will not be broken.
Watch as a policeman draws a weapon on a person tackled to the ground:

http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=19846699

Dirty coal and ash on the Navajo Nation

In a time of Monsters, coal mining and dirty power plants on Navajoland

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/blogspot.com/

Dailan J. Long, community organizer with Dine' Citizens Against Ruining our Environment (Dine' CARE) exposes one of the toxic realities of power plants for Navajos: coal ash. Long, Navajo, is among those fighting the proposed Desert Rock Power Plant.

Long sends in these photos of the coal ponds just west of Four Corners Power Plant on the Navajo Nation land near Farmington, N.M.

"This highly toxic waste consists of fly ash which becomes most airborne on windy days, covering most communities downwind towards Shiprock," Long said. "Desert Rock will add millions of tons of this waste into our land, polluting our aquifers and compromising our respiratory health.

"We have at least 60 millions tons of this from Four Corners and 65 millions tons from San Juan Generating Station = 125 million tons! We have the largest mine filling site in North America," Long said.

The sad truth is that while Navajo leaders mourn the loss of traditions and speak out about protecting Mother Earth, simultaneously Navajo President Joe Shirley, Jr., and the Navajo Nation Council continue to push for a third power plant here, the Desert Rock Power Plant, and expanded coal mining.

The royalties and taxes from energy corporations are largely what pays the salaries and travel expenses of elected Navajo leader, including the 88 council delegates. Meanwhile, many of the Navajos who live with the destruction and pollution are forced to live without running water and electricity.

The Desert Rock Energy Project , the proposed 1,500 megawatt coal-fired power plant planned for the Navajo Nation in Northwest New Mexico, would be the third major coal-fired facility within a 15-mile radius in the San Juan River Basin.

Navajos opposing the power plant, Dooda Desert Rock, said the project would accelerate environmental degradation in the Four Corners, a National Sacrifice Area notorious for runaway energy development and lax governmental oversight.

Layne Corporation of Denver, Colorado, a water well drilling contractor for Sithe Global LLC (Sithe), Desert Rock Energy Company, and Dine Power Authority vacated the area of the proposed Desert Rock Energy Facility in Ram Springs, NM., on September 27.

Dooda Desert Rock President Elouise Brown said that a categorical exclusion issued by the Bureau of Indian Affairs to the promoters of the planned mine-mouth coal-fired power plant had intended for drill tests to be completed in 45 days. However, activity at the drill site actually dragged on for 300 days.

Water drilling tests conducted for Desert Rock have not conclusively determined how drilling in the Morrison Aquifer would interact with groundwater sources used by local tribal members for domestic use, including drinking water, she said.

Brown said in response to the corporation’s exploratory work, Navajo Elders of Dooda’ (NO) Desert Rock established a resistance camp at Ram Springs on December 12, 2006. Since then, the elders have been day-to-day eye witnesses to the damage done in the drilling process, and the overall shoddy workmanship at the site.

During the nine month intrusion, the vicinity of the site has been overrun and abused. Vegetation has been destroyed, as heavy equipment has operated outside the designated area, and the land has been fouled with a grayish, muddy sludge.

“These are open wounds in our Mother Earth! Who knows how much damage has been done,” said Brown. “We can only hope that our water and lands have not been badly contaminated and that they clean up after themselves and reclaim the grounds.”

Brown said project promoters keep offering the public assurances that construction of their Desert Rock Energy Facility will start as planned in March of 2008, but the project has been hamstrung by the failure of Sithe to acquire or receive necessary permits, environmental issues (including those raised by the Environmental Protection Agency and the United States Fish & Wildlife Service), and the lack of a proven, available water source and secured water rights threaten to derail the entire project.

“We are being treated like unwelcome guests in our own home,” said Elder, Pauline Gilmore, vice president of DDR. “Why do our leaders continue to disrespect our ancestral lands?”

Photos 1 and 2: Coal ash and Four Corners power plant. Photo 3 and 4: Layne water drillers live land 5: Burnham Chapter voices opposition.

Federal judge agrees to stall border fence

Federal judge sides with enviros, stalls border-fence work
By Howard Fischer
CAPITOL MEDIA SERVICES
A federal judge late Wednesday temporarily blocked further work on a new border fence and barrier through the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area.
U.S. District Judge Ellen Huvelle accepted the arguments by Defenders of Wildlife and the Sierra Club that construction, which already has started, needs to be halted immediately. She concluded the organizations showed there was strong evidence of irreparable environmental damage if the project is completed as planned.
The judge also noted that the assessment of environmental effects of the project prepared by the Bureau of Land Management took just three weeks in August, with no opportunity for public comment. Construction started less than a month later.

Articles at Google News:
http://news.google.com/news?rls=com.microsoft:en-us&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1&tab=wn&ncl=1121933429&hl=en

Arizona Border Fence Environmental Impact Questioned
Brenda Norrell
americas.irc-online.org
With over a billion dollars in "border security funds" allocated by Congress, private companies are carrying out the biggest hoax of all—a $31.5 million dollar, seven-mile border fence at Sasabe, Arizona. The project has been whitewashed by a slim environmental assessment that obligingly finds "No Significant Impact."
Of all the self-serving U.S.-produced environmental assessments published in recent years, the slender pile of papers recently deposited in the Caviglia-Arivaca Library on the Arizona border has to be among the worst.
http://americas.irc-online.org/am/4599

Maps to federal spy towers on Tohono O'odham tribal land, from spy towers environmental assessment:
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2007/09/censored-blog-exclusive-us-spy-tower.html

Map of Arizona: EPA

Denver: Columbus protesters promise lawsuit over arrests

AIM members promise lawsuit over parade arrests
RELATED LINKS
PDF: Arrest reports from Columbus Day parade

By Berny Morson
Rocky Mountain News
October 10, 2007

Members of the American Indian Movement of Colorado vowed today to fight charges of obstructing Denver's Columbus Day Parade and to sue Denver police for brutality while arresting them.
Police collared 81 to 83 people — the count varies — during an annual ritual in which protesters try to stop the Columbus Day parade. The protesters said at a press conference today that police used unnecessary force and that they were held in jail longer than necessary after posting bond.

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_5719253,00.html

Bush, life in the White House Bubble

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

President Bush said today, "This government does not torture people."

Now, to me, the ring, rhythm and tone of that statement sounds a lot like, "I did not have sex with that woman."

The Bush administration said the case of the torture of a German citizen, Khaled El-Masri, should not be heard by the Supreme Court because it would expose state secrets.

Pssst, President Bush, everyone in the world knows that the U.S. tortures people. Everyone in the world knows that the U.S. tortures people in violation of the Geneva Conventions.

This is not a secret.

In fact, in Tucson, Arizona, two priests are willing to go to prison to expose more of the details of torture. Fr. Steve Kelly and Fr. Louie Vitale knelt in prayer outside Fort Huachuca in Arizona, while delivering a statement in opposition to U.S. torture to one of the masterminds of torture in Abu-Ghraib. They were arrested. It wasn't Fort Huachuca's first experience with torture. The U.S. torture training manual was developed here. It resulted in the torture, rape, murder and disappearance of masses in Central America and South America until it became public in 1996.

During pre-trial motions in the priests' case, attorney Bill Quigley presented a foot-high stack of documents proving that the U.S. tortured people in Iraq and Guantanamo. In the stack were documents of the International Red Cross. At one point, the prosecuting attorney, Army Judge Advocate General Capt. Evan Seamone, did state that at least one of the reports was supposed to be confidential.

The trial begins October 17, 2007 in federal court in Tucson.

In Iraq, prisoners were not just tortured, they were tortured to death in at least six cases.

Meanwhile, El-Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese descent, said he was kidnapped by CIA agents in Macedonia in 2003 and then taken to Afghanistan where he was held for months and tortured by his captors. His case against the CIA was dismissed by the Supreme Court today. El-Masri was released in 2004 after he says U.S. officials realized he was not involved with terrorism.

Here's hoping that El-Masri writes a bestseller with all those state secrets. If there's no justice in the U.S. legal system, perhaps he can at least make a great deal of money to compensate him for the torture.

Whoops, did I say torture.

Just today, President Bush said, "This government does not torture people. We stick to U.S. law and our international obligations."

"Priests gagged on torture"
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2007/09/priests-gagged-on-torture.html
Torture on trial
http://www.tortureontrial.org/

Whoopi Goldberg & The View insult Columbus Day protest in Denver

Whoopi Goldberg insulted the American Indians' protest in Denver on Columbus Day. Chiming in, the rest of the women on The View television talk show, revealed their ignorance on the issues and the condescending attitudes of the wealthy in America today, as they made light of the protest and supported the Italian parade.
Link to show segment:
http://abc.go.com/daytime/theview/index

Comment online:
Our Founding Fathers??? Really? One Nation Under God and Jena 6 Too???
Did you know that of these United States Minnesota, South Dakota and Nevada do NOT recognize “Columbus Day”? In 1992, the United Nations and the National Council of Churches called on not only Christians but all people to refrain from celebrating Columbus.
Please help me remind the world that October 12th is really the “International Day of Solidarity With Indigenous People” because 150 years after Columbus came to the Americas in what was explained to us as children in textbooks and classrooms as a day that represented newness of freedom, hope and opportunity for the Europeans really brought about the end of the lives of some 85% of the millions of Native Americans from disease, oppression, degradation and genocide.
http://hitsusa.com/blog/156/whoopi-pelosi/

Denver Columbus Day protest:
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2007/10/83-protesters-arrested-at-columbus-day.html

Let the Censored Blog hear from you:
brendanorrell@gmail.com

AlaskaWild: Bush administration pushing for oil drilling in melting Arctic

AlaskaWild
October 4, 2007

http://www.alaskawild.org/wp-content/images/awllogo-web.jpg
Alaska Wilderness League: Senate Asking Administration to Protect the Polar Bear Seas[http://www.alaskawild.org/wp-content/images/polarbears_usfws.JPG] Polar Bear and Cubs; Photo: USFWS Species Act. Calls on the administration to postpone scheduled lease sales in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas until potential impacts to polar bear habitat can be determined. This request is significant because of the administration’s aggressive push to open arctic waters to oil and gas development. There are five lease sales planned in the next five years for the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas that together will open more than 73 million acres of arctic waters to industry. America’s two polar bear populations depend on the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas – together known as the Polar Bear Seas – as their primary offshore habitat. As the Polar Bear Seas continue to lose ice, polar bears are forced to travel greater distances to find food and to den. Cases of drowning polar bears and cannibalism have further illustrated the unprecedented challenges facing these arctic inhabitants. A recent U.S. Geological Survey report indicates that both of America’s polar bear populations could disappear by 2050. We must act now to change that outcome. As our nation moves toward implementing forward-looking solutions to reducing global climate change, it is important that the administration does not allow vital polar bear habitat to become overrun with industrial development. If unchecked, loss of habitat from expanded oil and gas development in and near the arctic waters could contribute to the polar bear’s decline. Sen. Kerry will close the letter on Monday, October 15, so please take action now! Contact your senators and urge them to sign the letter and join Sen. Kerry in asking the government to protect America’s Polar Bear Seas.

[http://www.alaskawild.org/wp-content/images/standing_in_the_tongass.jpg] Standing in the Tongass National Forest; photo courtesy of Alaska Rainforest Campaign/ Established in 1907 by President Theodore Roosevelt, the Tongass celebrated its 100th birthday in September. Well over 100 trees were planted around the country in honor of the Tongass, which, at nearly 17 million acres, is by far our country’s largest national forest. Many tree planting events were organized by Alaska Wilderness League field staff. Read more about these events and see pictures from across the country on our website. Over the years, the Tongass has suffered from excessive clearcut logging practices. More than half of the most important old growth trees in the Tongass have been lost to clearcutting, fracturing critical wildlife habitat and scarring the land. With the Alaska Rainforest Conservation Act, Congress now has the opportunity to protect what remains of these old growth stands.

[http://www.alaskawild.org/wp-content/images/team_west_with_rep_mcdermott.JPG] A Wilderness Week lobby team visits ... Please help the efforts to protect wild Alaska by joining Alaska Wilderness League or making a donation. Thanks for keeping Alaska wild. [http://www.alaskawild.org/wp-content/images/md_signature.JPG]

Censored Blog: 'Cry from the top of the world, Arctic sea ice is melting'
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2007/10/black-carbon-from-us-smoke-stacks-and.html

Photos for teaching children about protecting endangered species: PHOTOS: Endangered Animals

Berkeley protests to escalate, museum attacks repatriation

Triumphant Rally Spurs Tribes and Allies to Escalate Protest AgainstUC Berkeley’s Attack on Repatriation of Ancestral Remains

Chancellor Ignores Sovereign Tribes Once Again; Native Americans to Proceed with Lawsuit and Demand Respect from Regents, UC System President

By Native American NAGPRA Coalition

BERKELEY, Calif., Oct. 8, 2007 – After a dramatic demonstration that attracted hundreds of Native Americans, tribal leaders and social justice allies from around the country, the Native American NAGPRA Coalition (NANC) today announced it would escalate its protest against the University of California at Berkeley and the entire UC system. The three-hour rally and Chancellor Birgeneau’s continued refusal to meet with the Coalition have energized Native American opposition to the elimination of the tribally approved UCB NAGPRA unit, the biased UC repatriation committee process, the failure of the University to comply with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) and the complete disrespect on the University’s part toward Federally recognized tribes.

“Friday’s rally was a remarkable show of unity and support for just Native American claims on our ancestors’ remains and sacred objects,” said Mark LeBeau, a citizen of the Pit River Nation and NANC spokesman. “We intend to build on the momentum and take our protest to the courts, Congress, the state legislature, the Regents and the new acting UC system president, Rori Hume. Berkeley’s Chancellor Birgeneau has snubbed tribal nations multiple times, and now refers us to his assistants. We will not negotiate with underlings. We will not tolerate disrespect, and we expect California public officials to repudiate it as well.”

Friday’s demonstration was prompted by Chancellor Birgeneau’s original refusal to meet with NANC concerning the elimination of the Hearst Museum’s autonomous NAGPRA unit. This unit was a highly trained, cohesive team that fairly and impartially administered federal NAGPRA and a soon-to-be-implemented state law (AB 978) affecting the second largest collection of Native American ancestral remains and sacred objects in the Nation. NANC strenuously rejected the University’s decision-making process, which deliberately and completely excluded Native Americans, and denounced the anti-NAGPRA bias in the resulting organizational structure. Over the last several months, however, NANC has also recognized that the problems are far broader and more systemic, and include the lack of fair Native American representation on repatriation committees, the failure of UC to meet NAGPRA-mandated tribal consultation requirements, and the system’s unwillingness to acknowledge that Native American ancestral remains belong to Native Americans. The Coalition will adopt a comprehensive and aggressive strategy to deal with all of these problems.

The demonstration started at noon on Friday in UC Berkeley’s famous Sproul Plaza, the birthplace of the Free Speech Movement. It began with prayers and traditional healing ceremonies; included passionate speeches and poems from tribal leaders and other Native Americans; and was interspersed with ceremonial drumming and singing. After an hour, a throng of hundreds marched peacefully to California Hall to again request a meeting with the Chancellor. The Chancellor was “unavailable.” Assistant Chancellor Beata FitzPatrick emerged briefly from the building to say, without apparent irony, “Our Chancellor has very great respect for native peoples.” She accepted the Coalition’s petition, and the group then moved on to the faculty glade, a former site of a Native American village. After a brief ceremony, the march continued and ended with a demonstration in front of the Phoebe Hearst Museum, where the remains of over 13,000 Native Americans are stored in basement drawers and boxes.

NANC members urged other tribes to join the Coalition and all Americans to insist that public officials redress the longstanding injustice that allows Museums and scientists to keep huge collections of Native American remains and conduct research that violates tribal religious beliefs.

Tribes and individuals can add their voices by contacting congressional and state representatives; by writing or calling Provost Rori Hume at the University of California Office of the President, 1111 Franklin Street, Oakland, CA 94607, 510-987-9020; or by writing or calling the Governor and other University Regents at the addresses listed at http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/regents/contact.html.

For additional information on the UCB NAGPRA issue, visit http://nagpra-ucb-faq.blogspot.com/ and http://nagpra-ucb.blogspot.com/

EDITORIAL CONTACTS: Mark LeBeau, 916-801-4422, Mark.LeBeau@CRIHB.NET; Corbin Collins, 510-652-1567, corbincollins@comcast.net.
COALITION CONTACTS: Reno Franklin 707-591-0580 Ext 105; Lalo Franco, 559-925-2831; Radley Davis 530-917-6064; James Hayward, 530-410-2875; Morning Star Gali 510-827-6719; Ted Howard, 208-759-3100; Bennae Calac, 760-617-2872; Silvia Burley, California, 209-931-4567; Douglas Mullen, 530-284-6135.

Berkeley: Failed respect over ancestors' remains

The Daily Californian reports on the protest over remains of ancestors at a Berkeley museum. While the writer states these are "remains," either the writer or editor has chosen to call these "relics" in the headline. Would their great-grandparents' bodies be referred to as "relics" or "remains?" We're waiting for a response from the newspaper. Censored Blog

Protesters Call for Return of Relics
BY Lilya Mitelman
Contributing Writer
Monday, October 8, 2007
American Indian groups gathered Friday to protest Chancellor Robert Birgeneau’s refusal to meet with them to discuss the return of thousands of American Indian remains housed in a campus museum.
The Native American NAGPRA Coalition began the protest on the Mario Savio steps on Sproul Plaza and marched to California Hall demanding to meet with Birgeneau.
The Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology at UC Berkeley houses the second-largest collection of American Indian remains in the nation, said campus spokesperson Marie Felde.
The coalition is asking that the remains be returned to their respective tribes to be reburied.
“UC Berkeley has 13,000 native remains in a drawer in the bottom of a museum,” said Mark LeBeau, a member of the Pit River tribe.
The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, a federal law passed in 1990, mandates the return of certain American Indian items, including human remains and funerary objects, to lineal descendants.
Associate Chancellor John Cummins and Associate Vice Chancellor for Research Robert Price have been made available to the group, Felde said.
However, Birgeneau decided not to meet with the group personally after a number of e-mail exchanges between group members and administrators included “rather accusatory language,” Felde said.
Speakers during the protest said that as an American Indian descendant himself, Birgeneau should show them respect and meet with them. Birgeneau is a descendant of the Metis Nation, a Canadian tribe, Felde said.
“Wake up and be an Indian again because that’s what he’s supposed to be,” said Reno Franklin, a member of the Kashia Pomo tribe.
Assistant Vice Chancellor Charles Upshaw and Assistant Chancellor Beata Fitzpatrick addressed the crowd outside California Hall and said the campus is in compliance with the act and is committed to working with tribes. She added that they will relay the protesters’ concerns to Birgeneau.
The protest follows a move in July to disband a unit at the anthropology museum that handled American Indian repatriation claims in order to integrate its work with the museum’s main operations.
Campus officials said the reorganization was intended to improve relations with tribes and is more in line with the structure of other museums with similar collections.
However, coalition members say the changes may worsen relations with tribes and are concerned over the lack of consultation with American Indian tribes over the change.
Felde said tribal groups were not consulted because the change was a managerial decision regarding administrative changes.
“This was just literally reorganizing the organizational character,” she said.
Contact Lilya Mitelman at lmitelman@dailycal.org
http://www.dailycal.org/sharticle.php?id=26319

Berkeley: Fox guarding the henhouse

Corbin Collins
http://us.f520.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=corbincollins@comcast.net

Mark LeBeau
http://us.f520.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=Mark.LeBeau@CRIHB.NET

http://nagpra-ucb-faq.blogspot.com/

Tribes from Across the State Rally Against UC Berkeley’s Attack on Native American Human Rights

Anger Sparked by UCB’s Assault on Unit Dedicated to the Repatriation of Ancestral Remains and Sacred Objects

From: The Native American NAGPRA Coalition

The University of California at Berkeley (UCB) has disbanded the critical unit that discharged UCB’s obligations under Federal law to repatriate the Hearst Museum’s collection of Native American ancestral remains and sacred objects to tribes for reburial. The Hearst holds the second largest such collection in the Nation, with remains from approximately 13,000 biological individuals. Administrators made the decision to eliminate the unit in a secretive process that completely and deliberately excluded tribal representatives, in spite of strenuous protests by tribes and the Native Americans on the unit’s staff. As a result, services mandated by the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) will be drastically cut, and the services that remain will be controlled by scientists with professional interests in keeping the collection intact.

The University action prompted the formation of the Native American NAGPRA Coalition, which consists of eight tribes representing coalitions of almost 40 more. On August 6, the Coalition wrote to Chancellor Robert Birgeneau requesting that he stop the reorganization, reopen the review process to include Native Americans and meet with the Coalition to discuss the future of NAGPRA at Berkeley. The Chancellor ignored the letter, just as all UC administrators have ignored all Native Americans throughout the entire decision process.

Throughout American history the U.S. Government has extended the right to control ancestral remains to almost every group except Native Americans. For hundreds of years, scientists and collectors have pillaged Native American graveyards and shipped their human remains to Museums for study. NAGPRA was intended to redress this injustice, but tribes often complain that it is difficult to enforce and allocates too much power to the Museums and scientists who control the collections. Tribal leaders maintain that UC Berkeley has abused the law by classifying over 80 percent of the collection as “culturally unidentifiable,” and therefore, unavailable for repatriation. The NAGPRA unit was a cohesive group of professionals who helped tribes challenge this classification. Without the unit, tribes will have a far harder time making successful repatriation claims.

“It’s really a case of the fox guarding the henhouse,” said Corbin Collins, a NANC representative. “The Museum decides which remains are culturally identifiable and routinely rejects tribal evidence to the contrary. Now, by disbanding the autonomous unit and eliminating its fair and impartial consultation and research services, the University has decimated tribes’ ability to marshal any sort of evidence at all.”

Denver Columbus Day protesters arrested

Protesters pour fake blood on dismembered dolls to symbolize Columbus' genocide of Indigenous Peoples; more than 80 arrested in Denver

UN OBSERVER & International Report
http://www.unobservver.com/

Canadian Press:
http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5jmSGwYIJCD3zX5xhPsXMECMEuNgAxhPsXMECMEuNgA

Denver: Pain Compliance holds used against Non-Violent Protestors
http://www.infoshop.org/

Sunday, October 07 2007 @ 09:51 AM PDTContributed by: strongwindsahead

DENVER: 10/6/07 Riot-clad Denver police officers moved quickly and violently against non-violent protestors this morning in downtown Denver. Over fifty people sat down in the street to protest the Columbus Day parade. Unlike past years when officers and protestors cooperated during the arrests, officers moved in quickly and used violence against the protestors. Many ofthose arrested were led away by two officers, both using pain compliance holds on the detained person. Those arrested were clearly in pain as they were pushed, pulled and dragged to two Denver Sheriff's Department buses.The use of force by police, particularly the extended periods those detained endured pain compliance holds, constitutes a significant human rights violation.CopWatch observers report that the sit in protestors did not use violence.At least a dozen other arrests were reported as well. After the initial arrest several other protestors ran into the street to block the parade, these individuals were also forcibly arrested. Several of those arrestedwere not participating in the sit-in. At least one arrest by Denver Sheriff's deputies did not appear to have any reason at all.Although police routinely have worn riot gear during the annual protest, this year CopWatch observed a clear escalation in the show of force by police. Riot sticks were being brandished by officers rather than remainingin their belts. Denver Sheriffs actually had an officer armed with a shotgun facing protestors.Denver CopWatch believes that an excessive amount of force was used in detaining and arresting the protestors. Although the sit-in was blocking acity street, those participating in the sit-in did not use violence. The organized nature of the arrests suggests that the use of force was plannedand approved in advance by the command staff of the Denver Police Department. Chief Whitman was on scene during the arrests.The actions by the Denver Police and the Sheriff's Department was a serious and unnecessary escalation in the use of force. Today's police action was a clear departure from the tactics they have used in previous years which quickly and peaceably removed protestors. The new tactics resulted in the spectacle of people crying out in pain with tears on their cheeks while their hands and arms were being bent backwards by Denver Police Officers.Denver CopWatch will be issuing pictures and video clips of today's violent events in the coming days._________________________________________________________________Denver CopWatch - Stephen Nash 303-742-9928From the news wires ...

PHOTO: Denver police drag a Columbus Day Parade protester away across fake blood in Denver, Colo., on Saturday morning, October 6, 2007. Demonstrators poured fake blood on the street to protest the parade. (AP Photo/Peter M. Fredin)

Parade greeted by protests

By Tom McGhee The Denver Post

Police arrested American Indian Movement leader Russell Means and 83 protesters at today's Columbus Day parade for blocking the route.
But there were no major incidents or violent behavior, police said.
At least 500 people protested, and many of them came prepared to draw attention and go to jail over their belief that the Italian American celebration has racist roots.
After marching from four separate locations in Denver to converge on the state Capitol for a rally, the demonstrators walked to the parade route at Stout and 15th streets.
Glenn Morris, a member of the American Indian Movement of Colorado's leadership council, urged those willing to face jail to block the parade route. Other demonstrators were told to remain on the sidewalk and out of the way of police.
"We can either watch history or we can make history and today we intend to make history," Morris said.
Others just enjoyed the parade.
Jeff Miller of Denver was among the several hundred revelers. He held small American and Italian flags as he watched Italian Americans on motorcycles, in cars and riding on flatbed trucks, move along 15th Street after police cleared the way.
Miller said he isn't Italian but came to show support for the celebration.
"I am tired of these lefties trying to put these guys out of business," he said.
Denver Cop Watch accused police of using painful holds to move peaceful demonstrators, some of whom cried as they were carried away, the group said.
Police spokesman Sonny Jackson said officers used "appropriate measures" for the situation.
Demonstrations at the parade have become routine. Last year, only three people were arrested, but in 2004 about 300 were hauled away.
Protesters chanted "Hey, hey, ho, ho, Columbus Day has got to go," and carried signs accusing Christopher Columbus of beginning a genocide against Native Americans.
Some carried bandanas to hold to their faces and protect them from tear gas if it was used by police.
"We don't want any harm here," said Carlos Castaneda,50, a member of Grupo Tlaloc, a Native American dance troop.
Protesters sat down in the street to face off with police after Morris poured a bucket of red liquid bearing pieces of dismembered toy dolls.
"This is only the beginning. The frustration has reached critical mass," Means said as police led him toward a pair of buses on Stout Street they used to transport prisoners.
Tom McGhee: (303)954-1671 or tmcghee@denverpost.com

Hats off to Texas! Tribute to Texas activists, not its politicians

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

Texas offers the best of both worlds and both extremes. It offers us George Bush who claims he is from Texas, and it offers us activists who struggle for justice in a state that is, well, Texas.

So, today the Censored Blog honors the American Indian Genocide Museum in the Great State of Texas, for refusing to compromise or give up in its efforts to establish the facts of American Indian genocide and have those recorded in history. Today's honors go to Steve and Cheryl Melendez who carry out the museum's courageous work in Houston, Texas.

The Censored Blog also honors those tireless freedom fighters pressing to free the imprisoned children in Hutto prison, near Austin, Texas, where migrant and refugee infants and children are imprisoned.
Read more: http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/10/hats-off-to-texas-tribute-to-texas.html

Photo: Hutto protest 2007/Photo Jay Johnson-Castro

Cheryl Melendez: American Indian ancestors should be buried with respect
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/09/american-indian-ancestors-should-be.html

Arizona Border Fence Environmental Impact Questioned

Americas Program Investigative Article

Arizona Border Fence Environmental Impact Questioned
Brenda Norrell October 2, 2007

Americas Program, Center for International Policy (CIP)
americas.irc-online.org

With over a billion dollars in "border security funds" allocated by Congress, private companies are carrying out the biggest hoax of all—a $31.5 million dollar, seven-mile border fence at Sasabe, Arizona. The project has been whitewashed by a slim environmental assessment that obligingly finds "No Significant Impact."
Of all the self-serving U.S.-produced environmental assessments published in recent years, the slender pile of papers recently deposited in the Caviglia-Arivaca Library on the Arizona border has to be among the worst.

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/4599

Cry from the top of the world, Arctic sea ice is melting

Black carbon from US smoke stacks and tailpipes melt sea ice as US rushes to stake claims for oil drilling in the Arctic

By Brenda Norrell

http://www.blogspot.com/

TUCSON, Ariz. – With the sea ice melting in the Arctic at an alarming rate, the whales, walrus, seals and polar bears are threatened with the loss of their homelands and changing migrations of their food sources as water temperatures rise.
“This is really affecting the communities that rely on the bowhead whales,” said Nikos Pastos, Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Nation in Montana, born and raised in Alaska. He is cofounder of the intertribal network group Alaska’s Big Village Network.
“As we advocate for sacred sites and human rights, we realize that it all comes back to water,” Pastos said.
Recent studies show black carbons from smokestacks and tailpipes in North America, Europe and Asia in the melting Arctic ice. Pastos said the changing climate, combined with expanded oil drilling, threatens to bring an end to the diversity of the planet.
Currently, there is an unprecedented amount of mining on Alaska Native lands. Further, as the Arctic melts, the United States and other countries are rushing to claim the homeland of the whales, walrus, seals and polar bears for new oil drilling.
“There are changing salinity levels and changing wind patterns. It makes the polar bears have to go further for food. It is also changing fish migration patterns and the patterns of sea birds," Pastos said.
At the Western Mining Action Network Conference in Tucson, hosted by MineWatch Canada, Sept. 28 -29, Pastos joined Indigenous Peoples from the Americas organizing to halt mining and oil drilling in Indigenous territories.

Indigenous Peoples from Peru and Guatemala united with Western Shoshone, Navajo, Spokane, Dene from Saskatchewan, Acoma Pueblo and other Indian Nations to organize resistance to the destruction of Indigenous homelands.
Scientists point out that the Arctic’s pristine, white snow is actually more polluted than it appears to be. Tiny particles of black carbon from forest fires and human pollution have been found in the melting ice in Greenland. Using microscopes, scientists can see black carbon particles by the trillions, which came from North America, Europe and Asia.
"Black carbon absorbs sunlight and it causes warming," said Stephen Warren, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Washington.” He says the only way to save the Arctic is to cut emissions and decrease black carbon from smokestacks and tailpipes, all the way from the United States to China.
Pastos, a research sociologist and facilitator, is among the American Indians now organizing to preserve the homelands of Indigenous Peoples and the environment. He lives on the Flathead Nation in Montana and in Anchorage and works as a consultant on environmental policies for Indian Nations.
“Alaska’s Big Village Network is a networking group based in Anchorage that is guided in principle by Alaska Native values. We are advised by youth and elders councils. We are working on healing the mental, social, and physical environment through building communities of inclusion,” Pastos said.
While growing up in the beauty of Alaska and Montana, Pastos became aware of the destructive mining and development around him.

“I always lived in the sacred mountains of Alaska and Montana. I grew up fishing, hiking and camping,” Pastos said, adding that his father was a fishing guide.
As oil drilling and pollution increased in Alaska, the way of life was devastated.
“I always lived and worked with many great Indians, Aleuts, and Eskimos. My tribe, Salish-Kootenai in Montana, was a leader in wildlife management and land management. Many of my friends and neighbors in Alaska were destroyed by the Exxon Valdez oil spill,” Pastos said.

As a fisherman in the Bering Sea, he began to see the world with new insight.
“I had been a commercial fisherman in the Bering Sea. This was the turning point in my life. I went back to school and focused on environmental studies and human rights. Later on, I worked on ships in the Bering Sea as an environmental technician, and laborer, cleaning up after the Selendang Ayu oil spill. I also worked as a hazardous waste technician in the Anchorage landfill.
“Watching the social disintegration in the cities and villages of Alaska due to reckless pollution, and super destructive greed motivated by oil, gas, mining and logging made me want to work for social and environmental justice.

"I am a whole person working for the healing and restoration of the mental, social and physical environment," said Pastos, when asked what inspires him to work within this struggle.
Now an environmental sociologist, Pastos is a consultant to Indigenous groups and Indian tribes on environmental and Indigenous human rights policies.
Recently, with Alaska's Big Village Network, Pastos participated and served as an observer at the International Bering Sea Forum, the International Whaling Commission world meetings, and sessions of the National Congress of American Indians in Anchorage. He conducted research and worked with the Cook Inlet Marine Mammal Council, and the Cook Inlet Marine Mammal Hunter's Committee on federal scoping hearings on listing the Cook Inlet Beluga Whales under the Endangered Species Act.
Among those in danger as the Arctic sea ice melts, are the Belugas or "white whales.”According to the Arctic Studies Center, Belugas are one of the three whales that spend all their lives in Arctic waters. The other two are the bowhead and the narwhal. Known as “sea canaries,” Belugas are very social and make a wide variety of sounds. Belugas use echolocation for sea hunting and subtle forms of communication, including a wide variety of facial expressions. Belugas have good vision, but don't have is a dorsal fin like many whales, earning them the name "delphinapterus" or dolphin-without-a-wing.
Pastos, working with the Center for Water Advocacy, is involved with research on Indigenous Peoples' water rights, and is working to support litigation that protects and preserves the water resources of traditional subsistence cultures.

Meanwhile, the threats to Arctic life are increasing at a faster pace than ever before.

A new NASA-led study said there was a 23-percent loss in the extent of the Arctic's thick, year-round sea ice cover during the past two winters. This drastic reduction of perennial winter sea ice is the primary cause of this summer's fastest-ever sea ice retreat on record and subsequent smallest-ever extent of total Arctic coverage, according to the report Oct. 1, 2007.
Between winter 2005 and winter 2007, the perennial ice shrunk by an area the size of Texas and California combined. Scientists observed less perennial ice cover in March 2007 than ever before, with the thick ice confined to the Arctic Ocean north of Canada. Consequently, the Arctic Ocean was dominated by thinner seasonal ice that melts faster. This ice is more easily compressed and responds more quickly to being pushed out of the Arctic by winds. Those conditions facilitated the ice loss, leading to this year's record low amount of total Arctic sea ice.

Indigenous Peoples gathered at the mining conference in Tucson called for a halt to mining and oil drilling and preservation of Indigenous territories for future generations.

Western Shoshone Carrie Dann said Indian territories are being devastated by mining, including gold mining in Western Shoshone territory which poisons the water in Nevada and cores out mountains. Further, Shoshone are under constant assault from nuclear testing and dumping. With global threats of new uranium mining, Navajos and their relatives to the north, Dene in Canada, spoke out against the trail of radioactivity, disease and death left by uranium mining.

Louise Benally, Navajo from Big Mountain, Arizona, where coal mining and relocation have devastated Navajo communities on Black Mesa for 30 years, said Indigenous Peoples must rise up to halt the slaughter of Mother Earth.

"Mother Earth is going to be butchered if all these operations take place," Benally said.

Benally spoke out against the proposed Desert Rock Power Plant on the Navajo Nation land in New Mexico, pointing out that the Four Corners region does not need another power plant.

With temperatures already rising, Benally said Indian Nations should become world leaders to halt global warming and protect the environment.

Arriving from South America at the conference, Miguel Palacin, Quechua from Lima, Peru, said mobilizations in South America on the "Day of Genocide," October 12, will be a time to voice resistance to the genocide of Indigenous Peoples and halt the ongoing genocide of mining and oil drilling in Indigenous territories.

More information:
Nikos Pastos also serves on the Board of Directors for the Center for Water Advocacy. http://www.wateradvocacy.org/

Contact information:
Alaska’s ‘Big Village’ Network, 8101 Peck Avenue #M-88 Anchorage, Alaska 99504 phone: 907-764-2561 fax: 907-333-3009
Alaska’s ‘Big Village’ Network e-mail: alaskabigvillage@gmail.com

Carl Wassilie 907-382-3403 carlwassilie.acyn@gmail.com

Nikos Pastos 907-764-2561 : nikospastos@hotmail.com

Censored Blog's coverage on the Western Mining Action Network Conference in Tucson:

Peru's Indigenous Peoples arise in defense of Earth from mining

http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2007/09/perus-indigenous-arise-in-defense-of.html

Mayans in Guatemala: 'No Compromise,' halt gold mining

http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2007/09/mayans-in-guatemala-no-compromise-halt.html

Links:
NASA research on melting Arctic
http://winds.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/quikscat/index.cfm

Defenders of Wildlife

Among those threatened is the spectacled eider’s winter feeding grounds in the Bering Sea, whose homeland is shrinking and changing because of global warming. It will likely lead to a food shortage for this already threatened sea duck, according to the tenth and final chapter of Defenders of Wildlife’s “Navigating the Arctic Meltdown” series.
The spectacled eider, named for its unmistakable white eye patches with black rims, is especially vulnerable to the warming temperatures in the Arctic. The entire world population gathers for the winter in a small area of the Bering Sea southwest of Alaska’s St. Lawrence Island. However, global warming is now upsetting the delicate balance and threatening the spectacled eider’s winter stronghold by warming the water and attracting fish that compete with the eider for their limited winter food source.
“The spectacled eider’s American population was being decimated by lead poisoning, which resulted in the species being listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in 1993,” said Jean Brennan, senior climate change scientist for Defenders of Wildlife. “Now the struggling American population, along with every other spectacled eider in the world, is facing additional peril because of the changes that global warming is creating in their feeding grounds and breeding habitats.”
Global warming also threatens to dry up the small ponds and wetlands that dot the Arctic coastal plain on Alaska’s north slope, on which the spectacled eider and many other bird species rely for breeding habitat. These vast areas of tundra wetland exist because of permafrost, the permanently frozen layer of ground that prevents water from draining away. As climate change accelerates the melting of permafrost, it is transforming the eider’s nesting habitat as wetlands give way to shrublands and forests.
"The changes to the Arctic caused by global warming are creating almost year-round problems for the spectacled eider. The breeding grounds they use in spring and summer are drying up. In the winter, they return to an altered seascape where much of their shellfish diet is being depleted by the fish that now flock to the warmer waters. This is all on top of their early autumn molting when eiders cannot fly, so they congregate in small areas where they are vulnerable to potential fuel spills and entanglement with fishing gear or floating trash,” said Brennan.
In its series on global warming and the Arctic, Defenders of Wildlife stresses the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as a key to reducing the effects of global warming over the long term, both in the Arctic and worldwide. But in the meantime, immediate action must be taken to reduce the other pressures on species being negatively impacted by global warming, and to better understand what steps we can take to preserve Arctic animals and plants.
For the spectacled eider, much more research is needed into the birds and the ecology of their wintering grounds, which were only discovered in 1999. In particular, we need to find out more about how global warming is changing the Bering Sea and what those changes mean to the spectacled eider and other Arctic wildlife.
Second, protecting the eider while they are in their breeding habitat is key to helping them survive global warming. Experts believe that lead poisoning, contracted when ducks accidentally eat lead shot, caused the steep decline that led to the species’ listing under the Endangered Species Act. Lead shot was banned in waterfowl hunting in 1991 because of the devastating impacts it was having on ducks and geese nationwide. In the remote region of western Alaska where the eiders breed, this ban has been difficult to enforce, but wildlife and public health officials must continue their efforts and stress the impacts that lead shot has on wild birds, and on people who eat birds that have been killed with lead shot.
Finally, fishing and ship traffic should be curtailed in areas where molting birds are present. The spectacled eider gathers in large groups in tightly concentrated areas just off of the Alaskan and Siberian coast to molt, so any oil spill or other human-caused catastrophe in these areas would be devastating to the species, especially in light of the new threats that global warming presents. “While it may take 100 years or more to begin to reverse some of the harmful changes we’ve already caused to the Earth’s climate, it is our responsibility to step up our efforts to protect wildlife that is being affected by global warming today so our children and grandchildren will be able to enjoy wildlife tomorrow,” says Rodger Schlickeisen, president of Defenders of Wildlife.
The entire “Navigating the Arctic Meltdown” series can be found at http://www.defenders.org/globalwarming/. It includes all ten chapters of the series, which describe how global warming is threatening the polar bear, ivory gull, wolverine, red-throated loon, Arctic cod, Kittlitz’s murrelet, caribou, orange-crowned warbler, walrus and spectacled eider.
PHOTOS: Endangered Animals
Most Polar Bears Could Be Gone By 2050

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Indian Uprising Radio: Kunstler filmmakers and Bill Means interviews

Chris Spotted Eagle's KFAI’s Indian Uprising for Oct. 7th, 2007 from 7:00 - 8:00 p.m.

William Moses Kunstler (1919-1995) was an American jurist, self-described "radical lawyer" and civil rights activist. He represented Russell Means in the Wounded Knee AIM Leadership Trial , and also Dennis Banks and Leonard Peltier. When he died in 1995, The New York Times called him "the most hated and most loved lawyer in America." He was a director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) from 1964 to 1972, when he became a member of the ACLU National Council. In 1969 he co-founded the Center for Constitutional Rights. Kunstler also worked with the National Lawyers Guild. To many, Kunstler's image was that of a flamboyant radical. He defended many controversial clients, including Salvador Agron, Lenny Bruce, H. Rap Brown, Jack Ruby, Abbie Hoffman, Assata Shakur, Angela Davis, Jerry Rubin, Martin Luther King, Lemuel Smith, Siddig Ibrahim Siddig Ali, Ibrahim A. Elgabrowny, Gregory Johnson, Wayne Williams, Larry Davis and Gary McGivern. He gained national renown for defending the "Chicago Seven" (originally "Chicago Eight") against charges of conspiring to incite riots in Chicago during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. During the trial, he and the other defense attorney, Leonard Weinglass, were cited for contemp (the convictions were later overturned). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Kunstler

A new documentary feature, a work-in-progress, Disturbing the Universe, about William Kunstler, is being co-produced by his daughters Emily and Sarah who explore their father’s life, from middle-class family man, to movement lawyer, to “the most hated lawyer in America.” For more information visit the film's website http://www.disturbingtheuniverse.com/

EMILY KUNSTLER, a filmmaker, and SARAH KUNSTLER have a production company, Off Center Media. It produces documentaries exposing injustices in the criminal justice system. Emily graduated from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in Film and Video. She worked as a video producer for Democracy Now! Sarah graduated from Yale University with a BA in photography and from Columbia Law School with a JD. She is currently a criminal defense attorney. Their mother, Margaret Ratner, is the president of the William Moses Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice "Our father believed that every generation has its time to struggle, and that every person has a moment in life when they are challenged to act and must choose whether to stand up and disturb the universe, or to quietly blend into the crowd and lead an unexceptional life. Why did he choose the life he did? Was he a hero? Was he a menace? And where do we, his daughters, fit into that choice? This is our first look beyond the legend, at the life he led before we were born, as well a chance to take another look at the man we knew."

WILLIAM 'BILL' MEANS (Oglala Lakota) a Vietnam combat and Wounded Knee (1973) veteran, is the Executive Director of the Opportunities Industrialization Center State Council of Minnesota. Bill is a founder of the International Indian Treaty Council and currently President of the Board. During his 9 years as Executive Director, he was responsible for the establishment of a system for documenting human rights violations against Indians. He is Co-founder of the U.N. Working Group on Indigenous Populations and an expert on U.S. & Indian Treaty relations. Russell Means is his brother.
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Note: KFAI's Fall Pledge Drive runs through October 12th. Doners of $50 or more receive a copy of The Emerging Police State, a book of speeches by William Kunstler on the erosion of our civil rights. Read more. Other premiums to be announced. To donate visit http://www.kfai.org/pledge.
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Indian Uprising a one-hour Public & Cultural Affairs program is for and by Native Indigenous People broadcast each Sunday at 7:00 p.m. CDT on KFAI 90.3 FM Minneapolis and 106.7 FM St. Paul. Producer and host is volunteer Chris Spotted Eagle. KFAI Fresh Air Radio is located at 1808 Riverside Avenue, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55454, 612-341-3144. For internet listening, go to http://www.kfai.org/ and for live listening, click Play under ON AIR NOW or for later listening via the archives, click PROGRAMS & SCHEDULE > Indian Uprising > STREAM. Programs are archived for two weeks.

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Arm chair journalism, parasite reporters and editorial scams

Arm chair journalists, parasite reporters and editorial scams: Editors go to a great deal of effort to deceive and hustle profits

By Brenda Norrell
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/
As if censorship wasn't enough, there's a pervasive trend in the news, called "arm chair journalism." That's news that comes from reporters sitting in their chairs and making a phone or call or two, then writing news stories as if they were present. It happens because editors and publishers don't want to pay the expenses of reporters to go out on news stories. (In some cases, the reporters are lazy.) So, what you have, and what you are reading much of the time, is an article based on a phone call or two. Read more ...
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2007/10/arm-chair-journalism-parasite-reporters.html

Berkeley: Rally to protect ancestral remains

Natives and social justice allies to rally at UC Berkeley to protect ancestral remains

Rally Oct. 5 at high noon

By Mark LeBeau, Citizen of the Pit River Nation, MS
With input from the Native NAGPRA Coalition
October 1, 2007

Historically, Native people have endured a great deal of traumatic experiences through actions of the dominant society, including loss of land, life, and liberty. Today, many Native people contend with post-traumatic stress issues stemming from historical situations and their own traumatic experiences. Healing such wounds takes dedication on the part of the traumatized, the proper health providers, and an appropriate support system. Many Natives find traditional Indian wellness methods to be some of the most effective prevention and treatment approaches available. In spite of the advances that have been made in healing traumatized Natives, there are parts of the dominant society that continue to cause great harm to these people. A primary example is the University of California Berkeley's (UCB) Hearst Museum which refuses to maintain an appropriate program whereby Natives can reclaim their ancestral remains from the museum and rebury these love ones.

The right to control ancestral remains is a basic human entitlement that nearly all groups in the United States are afforded except Natives. Throughout American history, scientists routinely pillaged Native burial grounds and shipped massive amounts of ancestral remains to museums for study, including the UCB Hearst Museum.

The Hearst Museum houses human remains from approximately 13,000 biological individuals. UCB spokespersons insinuate that the figure is lower because the collection only has 9,000 or so "catalog entries." This is an attempt to mislead: "Catalog entry" does not refer to a biological individual; it designates where biological individuals are recorded in the museum archives. A single catalog entry can, and often does, designate multiple biological individuals.

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) was intended by Congress to redress the injustice of Natives not being able to control their ancestral remains and require Museums, including the Heart Museum, to repatriate human remains for reburial by tribes.

In the 101st Congress, NAGPRA was actively promoted by both Republican and Democratic legislators, including then-House of Representatives Udall, Campbell, Young, Rhodes and Richardson and Senators McCain, Inouye and Domenici. Sherry Hutt, current National NAGPRA Program Manager of the National Park Service and former Arizona Superior Court Judge, in congressional testimony called NAGPRA, "one of the most significant pieces of human rights legislation since the Bill of Rights." A purpose of NAGPRA was to reduce the looting of Native cultural sites in the U.S. and the selling of Native human remains on the local, regional, national, and international art and black markets. Reports to Congress in 1988 estimated that between 50-90% of known cultural sites on private and public lands had been looted. Over the objections of the Interior Department, the Senate and House unanimously passed NAGPRA and President Bush signed the bill into law on November 16, 1990.

Although the Hearst Museum purports to have "complied" with NAGPRA, this claim is false. NAGPRA directed museums to submit an inventory of its Native collections by 1995. UCB did not finish until 2000. Before submitting the inventory, museums were required to determine which remains and artifacts could be traced to specific tribes. When this was possible, the items would be classified as "culturally affiliated" and repatriated. Museums were allowed to keep the rest of the remains indefinitely, which were designated "culturally unidentifiable." UCB classified less than 20 percent of its remains and artifacts as culturally affiliated and more than 80 percent as culturally unidentifiable. Although UCB has repatriated some of the culturally affiliated remains, it is out of compliance with respect to more than 80 percent of the collection. This is because NAGRPA also required that museums make a good faith effort to consult with tribes before submitting their inventories and to consider tribal evidence for cultural affiliation. Acceptable evidence could be historical, geographic, linguistic, based on oral tradition, etc., as well as archaeological. UCB did not make a genuine effort to consult with tribes. To the extent that consultation occurred at all – and often it did not – it was entirely inadequate and did not meet NAGPRA requirements. The law mandated that the standard for deciding whether remains were affiliated was the "preponderance of the evidence." This means that all evidence must be considered before classifying remains as culturally affiliated or unidentifiable. However, since tribes were not allowed to submit evidence before the Hearst Museum submitted its inventory, the Museum did not abide by NAGPRA's evidentiary mandate.

UC Berkeley has terminated its NAGPRA program, which resisted pressures from research scientists and provided tribes with fair, impartial and comprehensive research and consultation services. These services helped tribes defend their claims before biased repatriation committees, which are completely dominated by archaeologists. UCB completely and deliberately excluded all Natives from the secretive review process that eliminated the NAGPRA program, and did so in spite of strenuous protests by tribes and other Native Americans. The review was conducted by two non-native archaeologists hostile to NAGPRA. The Museum reorganization is designed to keep the Museum's collection intact, frustrate legitimate tribal claims, and subordinate NAGPRA obligations to scientific research that often violates Native religious beliefs.

Given that UCB is not adhering to the NAGPRA law and is traumatizing and causing great harm to Natives working to reclaim their ancestral remains, Native people and social justice allies will rally at the University on October 5th at high noon to demand UCB immediately comply with the law. The University must: bring the Hearst Museum into compliance with NAGPRA; stop the reorganization and reopen the review process to include Native Americans; reinstate the autonomous NAGPRA unit and remove it from the administrative control of the Museum and the Vice Chancellor for research; reform the UCB repatriation committee process and work to reform the committee process at the UC system-wide level; acknowledge that when NAGPRA interests conflict with Museum interests, Natives' standing as legal claimants must take priority; and meet with the Native American NAGPRA Coalition to discuss the future of NAGPRA at Berkeley.

Please participate in the demonstration if you are able to or send good prayers, thoughts, and songs to those standing up against forces attempting to continue to deny Natives their ancestral remains.
For more information contact: Reno Franklin 707-591-0580 Ext 105; Lalo Franco 559-925-2831; Radley Davis 530-917-6064; James Hayward 530-410-2875; Morning Star Gali 510-827-6719; Corbin Collins 510-652-1567; Mark LeBeau 916-801-4422.

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