Indigenous Peoples and Human Rights

January 1, 2023

Enticed by Wealth, the Media is Complicit in the Crimes of Corporations in Indian Country


Israel's Elbit Systems surveillance on Arizona border. Hualapai's Sacred Spring is targeted for lithium mining. Paiute and Shoshone walk for the protection of Thacker Pass from lithium mining. Oil and gas wells of the Three Affiliated Tribes in North Dakota are number 5 in the world producing poisonous gases. Anadarko, Oklahoma, oil and gas wells are number 7 in the world.

Enticed by wealth and self-glory -- the media, corrupt tribal governments, and self-dealing non-profits operate a vacuum for  truth, violating the sacred places of origin

By Brenda Norrell

Censored News

The sacred places hold mysteries and are repositories of precious metals and minerals. While Native elders warn of the responsibility to protect the sacred, the media has become increasingly complicit in the crimes of corrupt tribal governments and self-dealing non-profits.

Today, it was announced that the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation in North Dakota is buying property in Las Vegas. What is not mentioned is that their Bakken oil and gas wells are now fifth in the world producing poisonous gases which cause climate change and respiratory illnesses.

Poisoning the air is not the only thing that the oil and gas industry of the Three Affiliated Tribes, Fort Berthold, in North Dakota is responsible for.

When former Chairman Tex Hall brought in the oil and gas industry, he created a private business for himself, resulting in two murders.

One of his business partners was convicted of murdering two of their other business partners. One was killed execution-style in Spokane, and the other, a young man, was bludgeoned to death. Kristopher Clarke was bludgeoned to death in a trucking shop garage owned by Tex Hall.

Hall was also the longtime popular president of the National Congress of American Indians.

The oil and gas industry has brought in even more violent crime in the workers' man camps that are a haven for sexual violence and drugs for workers in oil and gas fields and pipelines.

This week, a lame-duck Navajo Nation Council voted to gouge out more sacred places on the Navajo Nation with new helium mining. While investing in mining and casinos, the Navajo government has failed to deliver water to sick and elderly Dine'.

The Navajo Nation Council, on a spending spree, approved helium mining this week in three sacred regions of the Navajo Nation: Beautiful Mountain (Red Valley), Porcupine Dome (Sanostee), Tohache Wash (Teec Nos Pos).

This destruction of the sacred places by the Navajo government is not new. Neither is the censorship.

While the media points out Peabody Coal was responsible for relocation, it fails to mention that the Navajo government signed the leases for coal mines and the coal-fired power plant near Page, Arizona, and received the royalty funds. Dine' resisting relocation were forced to live without running water or electricity, while gigantic transmission lines carried electric power to distant cities.

When Bahe Katenay of Big Mountain held the Navajo government responsible for failing to protect Dinetah, the Place of Origin, from the oil and gas drilling in San Juan County, N.M., his words were censored by Indian Country Today.

Now, President Biden and Interior Sec. Deb Haaland are pushing for more oil and gas wells in San Juan County, while at the same time -- in fashionable public relations image making -- they promote the protection of the sacred Greater Chaco Region.

Among the most bizarre was Haaland's session in Farmington, N.M., promoting "energy transition." Haaland announced the Los Alamos National Labs, responsible for stockpiling nuclear weapons, would lead the U.S. government's response team for new energy.

The oil and gas wells, coal mines and Four Corners power plant on the Navajo Nation, are among the top emitters of greenhouse gases in the world, as shown on the new Climate Trace map released at the UN Climate Summit in Egypt.

CEO of Navajo Energy Transition Plans to Violate Hualapai Sacred Spring with Lithium Mining

At the same time, the CEO of the Navajo government's "energy transition" in Farmington, N.M., says he plans to operate the lithium mine that will poison and deplete Hualapai's Sacred Spring, used since time immemorial for healing. Hawstone Mining in West Perth, Australia, has targeted the sacred place for lithium mining.

Already, the CEO of the Navajo Transitional Energy Office has invested Navajo Nation money in a Texas mining company of rare metals, where he serves on the board.

The oil and gas fields in Anadarko, Oklahoma, are number 7th in the world emitting poisonous greenhouse gases, according to the new Climate Trace map. At the United Nations summit in Egypt, Ponca Casey Camp led a Water ceremony and described how Ponca created the Rights of Nature to protect their water and land from oil and gas drilling and fracking.

Quechan Elder Preston Arrow-Weed warns of the threat to the sacred place near the Salton Sea from lithium mining in Southern California. Quechan's ancient stories tell of a powerful snake whose remains are here.

The Paiute Massacre Site at Thacker Pass, now targeted for lithium mining, will gouge out the earth and deplete and poison the water. Before he was killed, Paiute journalist and activist Myron Dewey spent his last weeks supporting the resistance to this lithium mine in northern Nevada.

Lithium mining is part of the new greenwashing for climate change, which pushes electric vehicles without describing the price that will be paid by Native people. Electric vehicle batteries increased the need for lithium and other metals. Lithium batteries are exploding at an increasing rate.


Photo copyright Ofelia Rivas, Tohono O'odham
“The destruction of our mountain is yet another deliberate attempt to dismantle the hundreds of thousands of cultural connections to our lands.” – Ofelia Rivas
https://www.oodhamrights.org/news/desecration-of-ali-jegk/

Media silent over Israel's spy towers and destruction of O'odham graves

Tohono O'odham Ofelia Rivas describes how Israel's Elbit System constructed spy towers on O'odham burial places on the Tohono O'odham Nation. Elibt is protested around the world for being responsible for Apartheid-type security in Palestine and the manufacturer of weaponized drones and other machines of death.

Now, an ancestral O'odham village is threatened by Resolution Copper's planned copper mine at Oak Flat, which plans to dump its dangerous waste at the village. The runoff will poison the water.

Now, O'odham ancestors' graves are being dug up by a Phoenix housing project. Rivas said it is a violation of the O'odham way of life to dig up remains and entomb O'odham elsewhere. 

As for the spy towers, these integrated fixed towers now provide live feed to the U.S. Border Patrol agents. Here, in the Tucson sector, agents are being arrested for serial rape, assault, murder and drug running. The spy towers on the Tohono O'odham Nation and Arizona border will assist Border Patrol agents in their crimes, which includes spotting for the cartels to bring drug loads across the border.

Armchair journalism, the easy way out

The popular faux journalism -- imitation journalism -- is produced by reporters who never leave their easy chairs. They rely on a mix of plagiarism, rewriting other reporters' hard work, and making phone calls, without ever being present to determine the facts.

The Tohono O'odham Nation is an easy drive south of Phoenix, but reporters rarely go there and report the news. The Oglala Lakota live a short drive from Rapid City, South Dakota, but reporters are rarely present and cover the news at Pine Ridge.

The reckless theft of Native photographers' photos online has resulted in many being forced out of their careers.

The media also fronts for the casino industry.

While ignoring the most vital issue of protecting the sacred, the media in Indian country promotes war and killing machines, including the Raytheon Missile factory on the Navajo Nation's commercial farm.

The media censors the truth about the Las Vegas casino magnates in Indian country and covers up the theft of Native languages and exploitation of Native culture.

The non-profit industry, careful to protect its cash flow from foundations, fails to expose the facts of tribal government corruption, the poisoning of the world's air, and the destruction of the sacred.

Mohawk Mothers Battle University and CIA's MKULTRA in Montreal

The most censored in Indian country in 2022 include the Mohawk Mothers' court battle to protect the land at McGill University from development, which could destroy the unmarked graves of children from residential schools.

The CIA and Canada conducted mind control and torture experiments of MKUltra at Allan Memorial Institute in Montreal. In related court cases, families said Native children in residential schools were among the victims. Mohawk Nation News has detailed coverage of the Mohawk Mothers court case.

The Pope Confessed to Genocide 

The Pope admitted in the summer of 2022 that the Catholic Church was responsible for genocide. After visiting Native communities, the Pope confirmed it was genocide onboard the flight, when he left Canada this summer. The Pope was pressed for a response from the media. The Vatican, obviously fearful of lawsuits and financial seizures, moved all its funds to the Vatican Bank.

Survivors of residential schools, Native children who were kidnapped from their families, described the rapes, beatings, tortures and murders of children held captive by the Catholic Church, and other churches, in residential schools in Canada.

The children died from abuse, torture, murder, starvation and disease. They were the victims of medical experiments, victims of electric chairs, imprisoned in basements, and thrown from windows. Now, the search for unmarked graves of the child victims continues.

Non-Profits in Indian Country: Huge Salaries, Hidden Wealth, and Dangerous Donated Food

Among the non-profits in Indian country receiving the most revenue in the last tax year was the Arctic Slope Native Association. It received $117 million in revenue. It primarily serves Iñupiaq and is based in Utqiaġvik (Barrow), Alaska. The top salaries shown here are for 2020.

The revenues are primarily from oil and gas industries. 


Arctic Slope Native Association salaries

The Censored News investigation into non-profits in Indian country reveals non-Indians operating as CEOs; executive directors funneling money to children and family members; and hidden wealth seldom revealed to the public.

"The Money Pump," reveals how non-profits, using others' resistance and research, quietly receive millions every year.

The largest salaries include the CEOs at the Crazy Horse Memorial in South Dakota. Two non-Indian sisters, daughters of the sculptor, each received $200,000 salaries for a total of $400,000. 

The Native American Heritage Foundation in Virginia received $70 million. It begged for used clothes for Lakotas online and delivered outdated donated food to Lakotas. It paid its board chairman $226,794 in the tax year 2020.

On the Arizona border, a non-profit in the bordertown of Ajo, Arizona, put Tohono O'odham elderly at risk by ignoring the infestation of rats where the food was stored.

Churches are not required to file taxes. However, the Northern Cheyenne in Montana successfully sued St. Labre, a Catholic boarding school, for using Native children's photos for fundraising. The children were left in desperation. The school funneled millions to the Catholic Church.

The facts about non-profits in Indian country were usually kept secret from the public until Citizen Audit, and ProPublica, posted the tax documents online.

"The Money Pump in Indian Country: Fraud, Secrecy and Deep Deception"

https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2022/07/the-money-pump-non-profits-in-indian.html

References

Mohawk Nation News articles

https://mohawknationnews.com/blog/

Three Affiliated Tribes buy land in Las Vegas

https://www.minotdailynews.com/news/local-news/2022/12/three-affiliated-tribes-purchase-las-vegas-property/

Climate Trace Emissions Map

https://climatetrace.org/map

New York Times: In North Dakota, a tale of oil, corruption and death

https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/29/us/in-north-dakota-where-oil-corruption-and-bodies-surface.html

Censored by Indian Country Today: Navajo government fails to protect sacred Dinetah from oil and gas drilling

https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2022/11/poisoning-air-we-breathe-san-juan-oil.html

Censored News: In the Quechan battle against lithium mining, songs carry the sacred origin

https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2022/12/in-quechan-battle-against-lithium.html

About the author

Brenda Norrell has been a reporter in Indian country for 40 years, beginning at the Navajo Times during the 18 years that she lived on the Navajo Nation. She was a correspondent for Associated Press and USA Today. After serving as a longtime staff writer for Indian Country Today covering the west, she was censored and terminated in 2006. As a result, she created Censored News, now in its 17th year with 22 million page views. It has no ads, grants or revenues. Norrell has a master's degree in international health.


Article copyright Brenda Norrell, Censored News

1 comment:

TLW2-NR said...

Thank you for persevering…