United Nations calls for second Indigenous Border Summit

By Brenda Norrell
Human Rights Editor
U.N. OBSERVER & International Report
http://www.unobserver.com/
Independent news at the Hague


NEW YORK -- The Indigenous Border Summit of the Americas, held in San Xavier on Tohono O'odham land in Arizona, was so successful that the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues is calling for a second Border Summit.

The Border Summit is having far-reaching global impacts.

"As the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues VI came to an end, I am glad to inform you that it too recommended the call for another International Border Summit," said Tony Gonzales, field representative for the International Indian Treaty Council and among the moderators of the Border Summit in San Xavier.

"Migration and development, border deaths and conflict, border crossing and ID use and displacement of whole communities apparently is coming under scrutiny. It is emerging as a hot topic in the halls of the United Nations and gathering movement; and the global search for solutions."

In New York, the Permanent Forum priorities were the protection of intellectual and traditional property rights, safeguarding genetic integrity, climate change and border issues.

The Border Summit of the Americas, organized by Mike Flores, Tohono O'odham, with support from the International Indian Treaty Council, in 2006, issued a proclamation of Indigenous border rights. The proclamation called for an end to the militarization of borders and a halt to the harassment of Indigenous Peoples crossing borders. The declaration opposed the construction of a U.S. and Mexico border wall that would dissect O'odham communities and violate an O'odham ceremonial route.

The summit gathered testimony from those who are living in the border region, including victims of the military and border agents and those struggling to uphold human rights. The summit brought together in solidarity Mohawk from the north with Indigenous from the southern border.

Gonzales said the Border Summit received endorsement from the United Nations at the preparatory session in April, then again in May from the Forum.

"The preparatory meeting held in mid-April 2007 in Minneapolis in the presence of Willie Little Child, UN Permanent Forum member, endorsed the Border Summit including the San Xavier District Declaration, and recommended in their report the support of another such effort to the UN Permanent Forum."

A site has not yet been selected for the second Border Summit.

The United Nations said that Indigenous leaders wrapped up the annual session of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues with a series of recommendations calling on Member States to take steps to protect their rights to lands, territories and natural resources.

Participants urged countries to adopt measures to halt "land alienation" in Indigenous territories – such as by imposing a moratorium on the sale and registration of land in areas that are occupied by Indigenous Peoples, according to the U.N. news release.

They also called for the world’s estimated 370 million Indigenous Peoples to be given a central role in dispute-solving arrangements over the lands, territories and natural resources they occupy and use, as well as the right to receive information about these issues in a language they can understand.

During the two-week summit, recommendations included a call for financial and technical assistance so that Indigenous Peoples can map the boundaries of their communal lands, the imposition of penalties on those who carry out harmful activities on indigenous lands, and the payment of compensation to indigenous peoples as a result of such activities.

The recommendations are contained in the Forum’s report, to be forwarded to the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), which stresses that territories, lands and natural resources are the sources of Indigenous Peoples’ spiritual, cultural and social identity.

Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, Chairperson of the Permanent Forum, said that Indigenous People worldwide have long suffered discrimination over their entitlements to occupying and using lands and natural resources.

“One of the key reason why Indigenous Peoples are being disenfranchised from their lands and territories is the existence of discriminatory laws, policies and programmes that do not recognize indigenous peoples’ land tenure systems and give more priority to claims being put by corporations – both State and private,” she said.

More than 1,500 Indigenous representatives attended the Forum’s session. Next year’s Forum will focus on the theme of climate change and there will also be sessions devoted to the Pacific region and to the protection of the thousands of threatened Indigenous languages.

Indigenous oppose Border Wall and Militarization:
http://americas.irc-online.org/amcit/3648
To read reports on the Border Summit, please see:
http://bsnorrell.tripod.com/
Articles from the Border Summit by Brenda Norrell:
"Mohawk and Tohono O'odham solidarity at Border Summit"
http://bsnorrell.tripod.com/id59.html
"Border Summit opposes border wall"
http://bsnorrell.tripod.com/id62.html
"Tohono O'odham Bennett Patricio, Jr., ran over by Border Patrol"
http://bsnorrell.tripod.com/id63.html
"Tohono O'odham Mike Wilson: Border Patrol is occupying army"
http://bsnorrell.tripod.com/id61.html

PHOTOS: Top: Mike Flores, Tohono O'odham receives flag from Mark Maracle, Mohawk, at the Border Summit in San Xavier. Lower left: Mike Wilson, Tohono O'odham who puts out water for migrants dieing in the desert, speaks at summit. Right: Irvin and Angie Ramon, Tohono O'odham, whose 18-year-old son Bennett Patricio, Jr., was ran over and killed by the Border Patrol speak at summit. Bottom right: Treaty Council staff Tony Gonzales on Alcatraz. Photos Brenda Norrell. Bottom right: Western Shoshone Carrie Dann and Michelle Cook, Navajo and participant at the summit in San Xavier, at the Permanent Forum in May in New York. Courtesy photo.)

Gwich'in and Saami on Climate Change: The thawing Arctic
http://www.winonadailynews.com/articles/2007/05/15/opinion/otherviews/guest0515.txt

'Wounded Knee' disappointing end to the Hollywood trail

THE END OF THE HOLLYWOOD TRAIL
by Hanay Geiogamah
Reposted from Pechanga Net: www.pechanga.net/

In the wake of HBO' s disappointing and history-deranging adaptation of Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee, American Indian actors, writers, aspiring directors and producers arrive at the end of the trail for their decades-long struggle to gain a footing in Hollywood: our cause is lost in the American film and television industry.
It is now time for us to abandon our stake in the Hollywood camp, this distressed outpost, now time for us to gather on the open beach at Santa Monica and there bury in the sand our hopes for participation and inclusion, then head out of town with our heads held a high as we can hold them. We will be better off re-locating our work back to the reservations, to the tribal communities and scattered remnants of land allotments that were given to us in treaties with the United States government over a hundred years ago in the epic tragedy which Dee Brown described so vividly and thoroughly in his iconic history. And there, hopefully safe from the misbegotten creative and economic forces of the industry, we must knuckle down and produce our own films, our own television dramas, write our own accounts of our history, and present them in images that we create and that we will control. We have an audience of two million American Indians waiting.
With Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee, the power brokers of the industry have demonstrated that their entertainment values and demands prevail over anything we say or do, write or create, that our history is for them to tell, to fictionalize, to distort with false love stories and character portrayals, and to trivialize all that is complex and tragic. HBO did not ask for or seek the help and guidance of any of the experienced American Indian creative professionals who might have helped steer them away from this debacle. Yes, Indian actors played the Indians, but that was all.
With breathtaking arrogance, Bury My Heart's narrative forcibly inducts American Indians into the brotherhood of savagery as a way of universalizing them and making them like all other people. Genocide is dramatized as just as much the result of the mean-spirited and physically cruel behavior of American Indians, who were fighting for their very survival, as it was of the inhumanity of the American armies. The last shreds of Indian nobility are eliminated once and for all.
A feature article on the making of Bury My Heart titled "The Last Stand" in the May 27 Los Angeles Times gives a brief, perplexing account of how Hollywood came to the view that American Indians can now be justly and fairly seen as co-agents of their own destruction. As a two-hour condensation of the book, "The film didn't have time to dwell on the spiritual, Earth-friendly image of Native Americans," says the article's author, Graham Fuller. "Nor does it offer a politically correct perspective," he adds. The Sioux, we're told, were "as rapacious as their white conquerers."
This view is scaldingly laid out with the portrayal of Sitting Bull as a baby killer, as a coward who hid in his tipi at the height of the Battle of Little Bighorn, and as a greedy buffoon who lusts for the white man's money and approval. The scriptwriter, Daniel Giat, confidently tells The Times, "My primary objective was to fully dimensionalize these people. Sitting Bull was vain. He was desperate to hold onto the esteem of his people and win the esteem of the whites. But I think in depicting his desperation and the measures he took in acting on it, it makes it all the more sad and tragic, and I think we identify with him all the more for it."
To complete this grim, determined view, the film presents every Indian cliche imaginable in graphic, full-bodied images without context or explanation: brutal scalpings; stoic, saddened faces of Indian elders; sick, dying babies; herds of wild horses surging across open prairies; vast armies of Indian warriors mounted along high vistas; war ponies being ceremonially painted; desperate ghost dancers, and heartless Indian agents and schoolteachers. We've seen them all far too many times.
And to all of this, unbelievably, the article tells us, "The passel of Lakota and other Indian consultants hired for the project obviously didn't object too strenuously." No credible American Indian historians, scholars or film makers are quoted in The Times article. I was astonished to see the names of two highly respected scholars and historians listed in the film's credit crawl and was grateful that this embarrassment for them would not be seen by many.
As students in the early 1970s, members of my generation of American Indians carried paperback copies of Bury My Heart in our backpacks as talismans of hope. Thirty-seven years later, we must sadly accept that HBO, the avatar of original television programming and creative innovation, has failed to deliver a truthful, even recognizable telling of Dee Brown's history. The more cynical among us back then forecast that this would happen, and, alas....
By letting go of our Hollywood dreams, we American Indians can take control of our stories and images and establish creative sovereignty. Affordable digital cameras and production equipment and scripts written by the Indian writers whom Hollywood rejected and left blowing in the wind will help us to become free and independent tellers our our own stories. The failure of Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee urgently tells us that we must, must do this. Aho, thank you.
Hanay Geiogamah Professor of Theater
UCLA School of Theater, Film and TelevisionDirector
UCLA American Indian Studies Center

Western Shoshone and Navajo at United Nations

Fighting for Indigenous Rights: Western Shoshone Carrie Dann with Michelle Cook, Navajo student at the University of Arizona in Tucson, at the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues at the United Nations in New York. Courtesy photo Michelle Cook.

Blackfoot Confederacy moves to implement its own passport
By John McGillWednesday, May 30, 2007 10:46 AM MDT

http://www.glacierreporter.com/
As early as Jan. 1, 2008, U.S. citizens may be required to present a passport or other documentation to get to and from Mexico, and more importantly for residents of Blackfeet Country, Canada. The $100 fee per person, said Blackfeet Tribal Councilman Rodney "Fish" Gervais, is a particular hardship for the tribal membership, and one the U.S. based Southern Piegan band of the Blackfeet is working to change, along with their northern relatives.
Representatives of the Blood and Siksika, two of the three Canadian bands, joined with their Southern Piegan relatives Friday, May 25, to finalize plans to create a passport designed for use by members of the Blackfoot Confederacy."I kept going to the Tribal Council about border crossing and the need for a common passport," said Gervais Friday from the Glacier Peaks Casino where the delegates came for lunch. "Now that I'm on the Council, it was one of the first things I did, and now we're in the final process. Tuesday [May 29] is the final signing."Gervais said he'd met with U.S. Immigration officials already, and the American side of the deal seems to be possible because of their willingness to recognize arrangements made in the Jay Treaty of 1794. In that treaty, both governments of the United States and Canada agreed to allow free travel for Native peoples across the international border although both governments have been criticized for their failures to live up to the treaty. Gervais said the Canadians have yet to agree to honor the passport."It's been years in the making," Gervais said. "We're taking the initiative; now comes the accepting part. The idea is a border crossing of our own like the Mohawk have. The Confederacy is behind it, and it strengthens the confederacy." The Akwesasne Mohawk found themselves similarly divided between the United States and Canada and eventually gained a border crossing specifically for members of their tribe.Gervais displayed a model passport - a plastic coated card with the member's name and photo, along with a place for signatures of the chiefs of each of the four bands. An American and Canadian flag grace each corner of the card.
"Since 9/11 it's become much more strict at the border, and it's a hardship for the cultural and religious ties of indigenous peoples," Gervais concluded.

Petition demanding apology from Mel Gibson for Apocalypto
Gibson told to apologize to students and Mayans

To: Mel Gibson and University Administration
Mel Gibson Apologize to CSUN students and the Mayan Community!
We demand that Mel Gibson, writer and director of the film “Apocalypto” apologize to the faculty, students and members of the Mayan community present at the California State University Northridge talk where he used an abusive obscenity in response to legitimate questions about his film. Mel Gibson’s obscene and hostile remarks tarnished the safe learning environment that the university strives to foster for all students, faculty and guests. His refusal to address the questions raised by the Mayan community members and his obscene response saying “F¬ ck off lady” demonstrates a fundamental lack of respect and understanding of the issues raised by the indigenous communities he claims to depict in his film. While we cannot hold a Hollywood movie like “Apocalypto” to the standards of accuracy in its depiction of history, we must hold it and its creator accountable for its public value, impact and influence. “Apocalypto” is a movie that perpetuates a racist and violent understanding of Indigenous peoples; these representations propagate, at best, misconception, and at worst, hate toward the Indigenous communities ...
http://www.petitiononline.com/MAYAN/


Rob Schmidt: Gibson was presenter at the First Americans in the Arts awards ceremony:
" ... The first big moment occurred when Mel Gibson presented an award to Morris Birdyellowhead for his supporting role in Apocalypto. As Gibson walked to the stage, he went right past me. He was literally a foot away.
For a split second I thought of tripping him to advance the cause of race relations. But I didn’t."
http://www.nativevue.org/blog/?p=544

Back home to a breakfast of cactus

It is good to be back near the southern border and a breakfast of cactus (nopalitos) after a train ride from Montana, down the west coast. I was deeply touched by the kindness of strangers on this trip and the great beauty of the mountains and coast.
The good news at home is that Marcos and the Comandantes have been successful in setting up Zapatista camps and traveling throughout northwest Mexico to support Indigenous Peoples and their struggles to survive. The Other Campaign has continued to visit the desperate, the hungry, those forgotten by the Mexican government, and those who have lost hope. The Zapatistas are supporting their rights to fish, to organize, to farm and live without oppression, slavery and toxins and pesticides in their soil, water and air.
The Migrant march from Sasabe, Arizona, is underway and the struggle for human decency continues at the border.
Thanks to all of you for sending me your news, especially rare reports like the turn-of-the-century sovereignty report, that will be in an upcoming article.
Congratulations to the Western Shoshone Dann family whose real life struggle is starting to win awards in the film, "Our Land, Our Life."
The crosses and coffins on the beach in Santa Monica were a chilling reminder of the human cost of war for everyone; a haunting reminder of complicity, censorship and a fear-draped America.
Thanks to all of you who take the time to check in here to read the news. I look forward to hearing from you. Brenda
brendanorrell@gmail.com