Indigenous Peoples and Human Rights

September 26, 2023

White Mesa Ute Spiritual Walk and Protest of Uranium Mill: Oct. 7, 2023




Annual White Mesa Ute Spiritual Walk Draws Attention to Threats from Nearby Uranium Mill 

White Mesa Concerned Community

protectwhitemesa.org 



What: A rally and spiritual walk to protect the White Mesa Ute community’s health, water, air, land, culture, and sacred sites from the nearby White Mesa uranium mill and show community opposition to the mill operating as an international dumping ground for radioactive waste from around the world. The protest and walk are sponsored by the White Mesa Concerned Community and the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe. All supporters are welcome.

 

When: Saturday, October 7, 2023, 11 a.m. MDT rally followed by spiritual and protest walk to the White Mesa uranium mill.

 

Where: The White Mesa Ute Community Center, located in White Mesa, Utah, just south of Blanding, Utah off of Highway 191. The community center is located on the west side of the highway. Turn in at the gas station and continue one block south to the community center.

 

Why: Citizens of the Ute Mountain Ute community of White Mesa and the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe are concerned about contamination from the nearby uranium mill and desecration of sacred sites and cultural resources.


The mill is now taking radioactive waste from Estonia in Europe.

 

Quotes:

“We live down the road from this mill. When it’s running, we can smell it from our houses. They’re bringing radioactive wastes from all over the country and the world to this mill. We want this to stop. We want the mill to close and clean up its mess.” –Yolanda Badback, White Mesa Concerned Community

 

“I’m walking with my family, my kids and grandkids. We’re just a small reservation, but people need to know what is going on at the mill. We’re doing this for our young ones, our future generations. Walk with us, for our children and our grandchildren here in our Ute Mountain Ute community.” – Thelma Whiskers, White Mesa Concerned Community


Censored News coverage:



Dumping on Indian Country -- The White Mesa Uranium Mill Poisoning Utes with Radioactive Waste


Grand Canyon Trust's Report Reveals Facts:

The company that is poisoning Utes with radioactive dumping keeps a lot from the public. (1) The radioactive waste ponds are above the Navajo Aquifer, where Dine' and Hopi get their water. (2) Radioactive waste from the Nevada Test Site -- among the deadliest places in the world -- has already been received at the White Mesa uranium mill. (3) The mill has been approved to receive radioactive waste from Japan and now receiving radioactive waste from Estonia in Europe. Censored News
https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2022/10/water-is-life-white-mesa-ute-spiritual.html


Contact for White Mesa Ute Spiritual Walk and Protest:


Yolanda Badback, White Mesa Concerned Community ybadback427@gmail.com

Bradley Angel, Greenaction for Health & Environmental Justice bradley@greenaction.org


White Mesa Concerned Community is a grassroots group of concerned citizens of the Ute Mountain Ute community of White Mesa, Utah, located south of the White Mesa uranium mill. We work to inform our fellow citizens and protect our community, health, water, air, land, culture, and sacred sites from toxic contamination.

 

The 2023 Rally and Spiritual Walk is sponsored by the White Mesa Concerned Community and the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe.

 

Event co-sponsors: Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition, Earthworks, Grand Canyon Trust, Great Old Broads for Wilderness, Greenaction for Health and Environmental Justice, HEAL Utah, Indigenous Environmental Network, National Parks Conservation Association, PANDOS, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, Uranium Watch, University of Utah Environmental Justice Clinic, and the Utah Chapter of the Sierra Club.



Also see: 
Plans are underway for another uranium mill in Utah

White Mesa Uranium Mill now taking radioactive waste from Estonia, Europe

Mohawk Nation News "Collective Guilt"

 


Mohawk Nation News' latest article on POWs, band councils, residential schools, genocide, and holding Canada responsible.

September 23, 2023

Standing Rock: Federal Appeals Court Hears Case of Law Enforcement Brutality at Backwater Bridge



From L to R: Center for Protest Law Litigation (CPLL) Executive Director Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, Michael Avery with National Police Accountability Project, CPLL Senior Counsel Rachel Lederman, Standing Rock water protector and attorney Wašté Win Young, Co-Counsel Melinda Power, CPLL attorney Amanda Eubanks outside the courthouse in St. Louis.

Standing Rock: Federal Appeals Court Hears Case of Law Enforcement Brutality at Backwater Bridge 

By Brenda Norrell
Copyright Censored News
Sept. 19, 2023

ST LOUIS -- A federal appeals court heard arguments in the class action lawsuit filed for excessive force at Backwater Bridge at Standing Rock. The issues argued included whether water protectors were free to leave, whether law enforcement feared for their lives, and whether the use of munitions, bean bags filled with shot, and water sprayed on water protectors in temperatures below freezing, were justified or legal.

Rachel Lederman, lead counsel for water protectors, told the Eighth Circuit Appeals Court's three-member panel of judges, that the district court had based its decision in favor of law enforcement on "hotly disputed facts."

Lederman said that a jury should decide whether it was objectionably reasonable for officers to bombard hundreds of individuals with high-pressure water hoses, impact munitions, explosives, and chemical agents for ten hours, causing serious injuries, for the people that were allegedly causing problems.