Lakota to UN: Enforce Treaties

Alex White Plume, Lakota, at UN July 2012. Photo Kent
Lebsock/Owe Aku.

Lakota Treaty Leadership Urging United Nations to take Concrete Action on International Enforcement of Treaties
3rd United Nations Seminar on Treaties, Geneva, 16-17 July 2012
July 9, 2012 contact:  oweakuinternational@me.com
By Owe Aku International Justice Project
Posted at Censored News
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.fr/2012/07/lakota-to-un-enforce-treaties.html
French translation:
http://www.chrisp.lautre.net/wpblog/?p=873

Owe Aku International Justice Project (“IJP”) is participating with the guidance of the Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council, which is led by Chief Oliver Red Cloud, in the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, 3rd Seminar on Treaties. Chief Red Cloud personally signed the intervention.  This 3rd Seminar, using the UN Study on Treaties, Agreements and Other Constructive Arrangements, completed by the late and highly respected Cuban diplomat, Miguel Alfonso Martinez, is called "Strengthening Partnership Between Indigenous Peoples and States: Treaties, Agreements and Other Constructive Arrangements.”  It will be at UN Headquarters in Geneva 16-17 July 2012. 
Owe Aku International Justice Project’s conference room paper and supporting annotation can be found at http://www.oweakuinternational.org/Owe_Aku_IJP/3rd_UN_Seminar_on_Treaties.html.  The intervention and conference room paper is personally signed by Chief Red Cloud and is being carried to the United Nations in Geneva by the Eyapaha, or Spokesperson, for the Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council, Alexander White Plume. 
The primary purpose of the conference room paper was for the Lakota Oyate to explore, within the United Nations, action-oriented mechanisms based on creative solutions to enforce international treaty law.  Imposing sanctions, diplomatic pressure and international court proceedings have all been suggested.  The Lakota Oyate is ready to stand up in defiance of colonial arrogance and suggest that the violation of international law by the United States is, for example, no different than the violation of international law by Iran.  We invite Indigenous peoples and nations, with or without treaties, along with member nations with a sense of justice, to join with us in this struggle. 
The Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council is the traditional governing body of the Lakota Nation, sometimes referred to as the Lakota Oyate or the Sioux Nation (“Sioux” is the colonial term).  Historically and contemporarily, the Lakota Oyate has provided some of the strongest resistance to the United States government’s continued efforts to deny our inherent sovereignty and illegally invade and colonize our people, territory and resources.  We were never defeated by the United States militarily and in 1868 they were forced to enter into a nation-to-nation treaty with the Lakota Oyate.  The treaty stands in full legal force and effect under the United States Constitution, a decision of the U.S. Supreme Court and the United Nations Study on Treaties, Agreements and Other Constructive Arrangements. 

Kent Lebsock
Director
Owe Aku International Justice Project
    for Lakota Treaty Justice & Advocacy
oweakuinternational@me.com
646-233-4406
646-395-1617 (fax)
on the web at www.oweakuinternational.org