What if there was never a Snowden or Wikileaks. We would have never known ...

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News

What if there had never been a Snowden or Wikileaks, or any of the whistleblowers?

I would have never known that Google, Facebook, my android phone and the others are all part of the massive spy network of the U.S., U.K. and others. I would have never known to cover my phone and computer camera lens with colored tape, and to take the battery out of my phone at times -- because it is a tracker, and can be turned on remotely as a listening and viewing device.

Censored News targeted in law enforcement dragnet of Standing Rock water protectors

Censored News coverage of Standing Rock water protectors, police excessive force and DAPL security brutality.

Collusion of big oil, big money and law enforcement results in targeting of Censored News for coverage of Standing Rock Water Protectors

By Brenda Norrell, publisher
Censored News

The Intercept exposed a blueprint of the intelligence operation at the North Dakota fusion center targeting Standing Rock water protectors, which includes Brenda Norrell, Censored News.
In regard to leaders of the movement at Standing Rock, it is obvious that the intelligence operation did not have a clue as to how the movement began or grew as a global force.
While I am honored to be on the same page with these global heroes, the water protectors of Standing Rock camps, it is disturbing to view how this reporter and Censored News were targeted in this diagram by the fusion center, comprised of multiple law enforcement agencies.
Equally disturbing is the fact that most of those identified were arrested.
Censored News was created in 2006, after I was censored and terminated, without any cause stated, as a staff reporter at Indian Country Today. I had served as a staff reporter for most of the years after it was created in 1995.
Today, Censored News is a service to Indigenous Peoples and others engaged in the struggle for human rights. There are no ads, revenues or salaries. Now in our 12th year, we have 17 million page views.
As a news reporter, I began as a staff reporter at the Navajo Times in 1982. During the 18 years that I lived on the Navajo Nation, I worked as a stringer for The Associated Press for five years, and USA Today for seven years, primarily covering the Navajo Nation government and federal courts.
My work as a news reporter has appeared in Outside magazine and newspapers throughout Indian country and the west. 
The intelligence operations targeting Standing Rock water protectors were an attack on peaceful defenders of the land, water and air, and sacred burial places.
Standing Rock water protectors sacrificed personally to protect their drinking water and the Missouri River from the Dakota Access pipeline.
The intelligence operation diagram exposed by The Intercept, and the arrests of journalists, reveal that this United States intelligence operation is part of the ongoing collusion of big oil, big money and law enforcement. 
The facts exposed by The Intercept reveal that now, more than ever, is a time for journalists and land defenders to bolt into the global arena and halt the ongoing destruction of the Earth for corporate gain and political expediency. 
It is with gratitude to the courage of the water protectors that I write this. I am especially thankful to the photographers, videographers and Standing Rock Spirit Resistance Radio for making possible our coverage at Censored News.
I look forward to the global work ahead.
Brenda Norrell, publisher, Censored News

Excerpt from the article An activist is accused of firing a gun at Standing Rock. It belonged to her love, an FBI Informant, by Will Parrish, The Intercept.

Sara Jumping Eagle, a physician on the Standing Rock Sioux reservation who was among the first DAPL opponents arrested in August, said the heavy-handed law enforcement response at Standing Rock was not altogether surprising. “There’s a long history of the U.S. labeling people who stand up as terrorists, so some of us figured they were gonna use those same tactics against this movement as well,” she said.
Jumping Eagle was among some two dozen activists featured on an early blueprint for the intelligence operation at the North Dakota fusion center, a “links chart on leaders of the movement,” obtained by The Intercept via public records request. The document mapped out connections between DAPL opponents purportedly affiliated with the Red Warrior and Sacred Stone camps, two of the main nerve centers of pipeline resistance on the Northern Great plains. Nearly everyone on the chart is an indigenous person.
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Velocity of Movement: Civil Rights Movement, American Indian Movement and the Zapatistas

Velocity of Movement: Civil Rights Movement, American Indian Movement and the Zapatistas

By Brenda Norrell

Article copyright Censored News
Dutch translation by Alice Holemans, NAIS

The Civil Rights Movement and the American Indian Movement had this in common: They survived the attempts by the US government's COINTELPRO and other secret ops to eradicate them. They survived the attempts by the media to discredit them.

The US government and its media attempted to vanish these movements by focusing on the shortcomings of individuals in those movements.

But the movements surged forward, as a runaway train, not because of the train itself, or its conductor, but because of the sheer velocity, the sheer force, of the movement itself. It was the movement, the compelling movement forward on the side of right, the side of justice, that made each a force independent of who the conductor was, or whether there was a conductor at all.

When the Freedom Riders rode those buses into Mississippi, they faced death at the hands of white Mississippi police officers in the 1960s. Many Freedom Riders went to prison, forced onto prison chain gangs, others were beaten and murdered. Black and white, those youths rode the buses. Regardless of who was the catalyst, those youths were fearless in the face of death and imprisonment.

AIM facing off with Lewis and Clark re-enactors
Photo Brenda Norrell

The American Indian Movement faced the bullets of the US military at Wounded Knee. They stood their ground on the steps of the BIA building in Washington.

But their certitude was the same, whether the television cameras were rolling or not. On the banks of the Missouri River, the American Indian Movement faced off with the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Here was the same impenetrable force that held Wounded Knee. When Carter Camp, Russell Means, Floyd Hand, Alex White Plume and Vic Camp exposed the root of genocide in the Lewis and Clark Expedition, and told the re-enactors to leave Lakota Territory, it was with this force of movement. It was that same force of the absolute which corrected the bowels of the history books. Debra White Plume gave the Lewis and Clark re-enactors a symbolic blanket of smallpox.

For those who were ever in the presence of Lakota Chief Frank Fool's Crow, Hopi elders Thomas Banyacya and Dan Evehema, or Muskogee Creek Phillip Deere, there was no question of this absolute power of the invincible spirit. Being in their presence was transforming and emboldened the spirit.

On the Zapatista Caravan through Mexico, this impenetrable force of movement was literally like a runaway train. The Caravan rushed forward so fast that those of us in the buses seldom knew where we were going, or even what city we were in. Leading the caravan of buses rushing through Mexico, Subcomandante Marcos and the Comandantes rallied for justice, autonomy and dignity -- racing ahead of bullets yet to be fired at us.

When we came to Iguala, Guerrero, there was a spirit like non other, an indomitable force. 

Here were the Freedom Fighters, here was Frank Fool's Crow, and here were the Zapatistas of Guerrero. They were the sheer force of unstoppable movement, and there was no doubt the people here were that run away train. They were the velocity itself. 

Photos of 43 disappeared students held
by Zapatistas in 2014.

The Zapatistas of Guerrero, with the blood of the Nahuatl charging through their veins, were each a fortress. Resolute, they were peerless.

Perhaps this is why the police and military disappeared and murdered the students of Guerrero in 2014. They recognized that this spirit of the absolute could never be dissipated, could never be conquered.

But they were wrong. The students were not silenced. 

Do you hear them -- do you hear them now? 

Brenda Norrell has been a journalist in Indian country for 32 years. She began at Navajo Times, during the 18 years that she lived on the Navajo Nation. She was a freelance writer for AP and USA Today. After being censored repeatedly, then terminated as a staff reporter at Indian Country Today, she began Censored News. She has traveled with the Zapatistas and reported from the Southern border and throughout the west. Censored News is now in its 9th year, with no advertising, grants or sponsors, and 3.7 million pageviews from around the world.

Please share our Censored News link for this original article! 

Click link, then copy and paste from your browser:

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Home » Nieuws » * DE SNELHEID VAN BEWEGING: BURGERRECHTENBEWEGING, AMERICAN INDIAN MOVEMENT EN DE ZAPATISTAS.

* DE SNELHEID VAN BEWEGING: BURGERRECHTENBEWEGING, AMERICAN INDIAN MOVEMENT EN DE ZAPATISTAS.

Door: Brenda Norrell: www.besnorrell.blogspot.com

Vertaald door NAIS Gazet: www.denaisgazet.be

De Burgerrechten beweging en de American Indian Movement hebben dit alvast gemeen: zij overleefden de pogingen van COINTELPRO en andere geheime operaties van de VS regering om hen uit te roeien. Zij overleefden de pogingen van de media om hen in diskrediet te brengen.

 De VS regering en zijn media probeerden deze bewegingen in de grond te boren door de focus te richten op tekortkomingen van enkele personen in die bewegingen.

Maar de golf van bewegingen blijft doorgaan, zoals een op hol geslagen trein, niet door de trein zelf, of zijn bestuurder, maar door de grote snelheid, de grote kracht van de bewegingsgolf zelf.

Het was de beweging, de dwingende beweging voorwaarts aan de kant van recht, de kant van rechtvaardigheid. Dat maakte van hen een macht, ongeacht wie de leider was, en zelfs zonder leider.

Toen in 1960’s de Freedom Riders hun bussen in Mississippi rondreden wisten ze dat zij gedood konden worden door de blanke Mississippi politie. Veel Freedom Riders werden in de gevangenissen opgesloten, zij werden aan handen en voeten geketend naar de gevangenis gebracht

Anderen werden afgeranseld en vermoord. Zwart en wit, deze jongeren reden de bussen zonder acht te slaan op wie de katalysator was, deze jongeren waren zonder vrees in het aangezicht van de dood en gevangenisstraffen.

De American Indian Movement kreeg de kogels van het US leger te verduren bij de bezetting van Wounded Knee.

Zij hielden stand op de trappen van de BIA gebouw in Washington.

Maar hun zekerheden bleven hetzelfde, of de televisie camera’s er waren of niet.

Op de oevers van de Missouri rivier confronteerde de American Indian Movement de re- enactors van de Lewis and Clark expeditie. Hier was dezelfde ondoordringbare kracht van Wounded Knee voelbaar.

Wanneer Carter Camp, Russell Means,Floyd Hand, Alex White Plume en Vic Camp duidelijk maakten dat de wortels van de genocide in de Lewis en Clark Expeditie lagen, en de re-enactors dringend verzochten om het Lakota territorium te verlaten, was het met de kracht van de beweging. Het was diezelfde kracht van het absolute die de leugens van de geschiedenisboeken onderuithaalden.

Debra White Plume overhandigde de Lewis en Clark re- enactors een symbolische -met pokken besmette deken.

Voor hen die ooit in het gezelschap hebben vertoefd van Lakota Chief Frank Fool’s Crow, Hopi elders Thomas Banyacya en Dan Evehema, of Muskogee Creek Philip Deere, was er geen twijfel over deze absolute kracht van de onzichtbare geest. In hun aanwezigheid te zijn transformeerde en moedigde de geest aan.

In de Zapatista karavaan die door Mexico reed was deze ondoordringbare kracht van beweging letterlijk te vergelijken met een losgeslagen trein. De karavaan snelde haastig voorwaarts, zo snel dat diegene onder ons die in de bus zaten niet wisten waar we naartoe reden of in welke stad we waren.

Subcomandante Marcos en de Comandantes die de karavaan leidden vlogen als het ware door Mexico om het volk te organiseren voor rechtvaardigheid, autonomie en waardigheid -om de kogels voor te blijven die men ons navuurden.

 Toen wij in Iguala, Guerrero aankwamen was de geest, een onverzettelijke kracht voelbaar zoals we nog nooit gevoeld hadden.

“Hier waren de Freedom Fighters, hier was Frank Fool’s Crow, en hier waren de Zapatistas van Guerrero.

Zij waren de formidabele kracht van een onstuitbare beweging.”

De Zapatistas van Guerrero, met het bloed van de Nahuatl in hun aderen, vormden, ieder voor zich een fort.

Resoluut, onverstoorbaar.

Misschien is het daarom dat de politie en het leger in 2014 de studenten heeft doen verdwijnen en vermoord. Zij voelden dat deze geest van het absolute nooit zal verdwijnen, nooit overwonnen zal worden.

Maar de studenten zijn het zwijgen niet opgelegd. De studenten zijn niet monddood gemaakt.

 Kan je hen horen – hoor je hen nu?

Brenda Norrell has been a journalist in Indian country for 32 years. She began at Navajo Times, during the 18 years that she lived on the Navajo Nation. She was a freelance writer for AP and USA Today. After being censored repeatedly, then terminated as a staff reporter at Indian Country Today, she began Censored News. She has traveled with the Zapatistas and reported from the Southern border and throughout the west. Censored News is now in its 9th year, with no advertising, grants or sponsors, and 3.7 million pageviews from around the world.

http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2015/01/velocity-of-movement-civil-rights.html

_________________________________________________________________________

Nota van NAIS: Op 5 februari stelt NAIS de documentaire COINTELPRO 101 voor in Antwerpen.

Lees meer: http://www.denaisgazet.be/activiteiten/nais-stelt-voor-op-5-februari-2015

Article copyright Brenda Norrell, Censored News. Content may not be used without permission.

Tantoo Cardinal receives Agua Caliente Film Award during night of profound films

Tantoo Cardinal after receiving her award tonight.
Photo Brenda Norrell

Tantoo Cardinal receives standing ovation, during night of profound films of natural world

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News Exclusive

PALM SPRINGS, Calif. -- Indigenous actress Tantoo Cardinal was awarded the 2014 Richard M. Milanovich Award tonight for distinguished contributions to Indigenous Film.

The late Chairman Milanovich, well-loved in Indian country, was a lover of this festival, the Native American Film Festival of the Agua Caliente Cultural Museum.

Milanovich's son Reid Milanovich presented the award to Tantoo Cardinal, honoring her for her personal determination to become an actress in response to the exploitation of Native people.

Reid said that his father was a big fan of Tantoo's work, including Dances with Wolves and Black Robe. Reid remembered watching those films with his family. Reid said his father would be honored with the selection of Tantoo because of her activism.

Reid said, "We're not savages, we're good people and you wanted to show that." Remembering his father, Reid said, "He was a big advocate of that to correct the portrayal of our people." Reid said Tantoo and his father both wanted to set the record straight about Native people.

Receiving the award, Tantoo said, "I'm so honored, so honored, to be standing here. I come from good people. And that's what I was filled with." She said she had been disappointed to see how Native people were portrayed in films.

"We're just fabulous and I think everyone should just give themselves an applause," and everyone did.

Tantoo thanked all the film fans, those who support the work, and "all the storytellers before us and all the storytellers coming up."

Tantoo received a standing ovation from the crowd in the packed theater.

DNA carries memory. Films, too, carry memory

Following the award ceremony, the spectacular beauty of Quebec on the big screen brought life to the Cahuilla Desert. Maina, a new Native film in traditional languages, is such an extraordinary film, so complex and so amazing, that it is difficult to describe.

Roseanne Supernault delivers an award-winning and stunning performance as an Innu hunter and chief's daughter who is becoming a woman. The actors portraying the Innu and Men from the Land of the Ice all deliver spell-binding performances, including Tantoo Cardinal as the medicine woman.

"I believe in the power of prayer, and healing and spirit," Tantoo said when asked how she prepared for the role. "It has been a part of my world." She also pointed out that the Earth along with its medicines are being destroyed by development such as the Alberta tarsands, and the current trade agreement TPP is seeking to patent traditional medicines.

Tantoo said whatever we need in order to heal is on this earth, and there are people who know how to use it. She pointed out that there is a cure for AIDS in lichen, which is being destroyed by development.

The story of Maina takes place in the Great North in an earlier time, but the issues are timeless. The spoken traditional languages in the film puts it in a category all its own, and the throat singing of the far north is extraordinary.

Maina, with Maina on far left

"I love working in languages," Tantoo said. "It was just delicious."

She said the language she speaks in the film is a dialect of her own Cree. "It just feeds my soul."

"It breaks my heart to see the languages disappearing."

Tantoo received Best Supporting Actress for her role in Maina at the American Indian Film Festival in San Francisco.

As for the lead Native youth Maina being a hunter, Tantoo said among her people both men and women are hunters who go into the bush. Praising Roseanne, who is from her own region, Tantoo said, "It is good to see someone running through the bush who knows how to run through the bush." She didn't even get her hair tangled in the tree limbs.

The young boy in the film also delivers a stunning performance. "He's such a bright light," Tantoo said, adding that he plays piano. "He can play beautifully." The heavy hitters in the cast include Graham Greene and Eric Schweig.

The film surrounds viewers with the beauty of the north woods and northern Arctic. Speaking of Quebec, Tantoo said, "It is just magical country. It is just beautiful."

Tucson filmmaker Thomas Wiewandt
Desert Dreams: Celebrating Five
Seasons of the Sonoran Desert

In the Wild, oneness with the world of Creation

Before the screening of Maina tonight, which has not been released yet, there were three shorter films shown. It was an incredible tapestry of films, drawing the audience into the natural world, from the Mojave Desert, to the Blackfeet and Crow mountains of Montana, to the ever-evolving life of the Sonoran Desert.

The short films were Mountain Memories: Spirit Mountain Wilderness, focused on the Creation Story of the Mojave; Before There were Parks: Yellowstone and Glacier Through Native Eyes shares the stories of many Native American elders.
                               
Desert Dreams: Celebrating Five Seasons of the Sonoran Desert is a phenomena in itself, with time-lapse photography revealing the exploding red fruits of the cactus, which is breathtaking, and the creatures which make this desert their home, from the turtle and bat, to the deer, javalenas and spiders. Clouds and rain are another incredible explosion in this tapestry whose only sounds are the awakening sounds of the natural world.

Tucson filmmaker Thomas Wiewandt
Desert Dreams: Celebrating Five
Seasons of the Sonoran Desert

During questions at tonight's film festival, Tantoo was asked what is her favorite work that she has done. She said that this is a little like asking which of your children is your favorite. There's something good in each of them. But, she said, if she had to choose one tonight it would be Where the Rivers Run North, filmed in Vermont. She said she not only likes the story, and strong acting, but the way the film was made. For instance, shares were sold in the film and two guys at the local gas station each bought part of a share together. Michael J. Fox also chose to be in the film.

The film included vintage cars, so locals with vintage cars came by. "They got a free lunch" for the use of their cars in the film.

Tantoo said she is looking forward to working in theater in Victoria. "It's Rez Sisters, seven women from the rez and the trickster."

"I'm looking forward to a fun play."

Tanto receiving Best Supporting Actress Award
for Maina at American Indian Film Festival in San Francisco

Tantoo was recently a judge in the Rights of Mother Earth Tribunal in Ecuador which heard expert testimony on the ravaging of pristine lands and waters, from Australia's Barrier Reef to the Amazon, and destructive mining and fracking in the US. The Rights of Mother Earth movement began in Cochabamba, Bolivia, in 2010. Ecuador and Bolivia followed by enacting the Rights of Nature into their country's laws. Tantoo continues to be a voice against the Keystone XL tarsands pipeline, and the tarsands mining that is destroying
her Cree homeland in Alberta, Canada.

The films at the Agua Caliente Film Fest continue on Sunday, March 9, 2014, with seven short Indigenous films. The feature film is Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, in Dine' (Navajo.)  


Also see: 'Rage in the Desert: Tantoo Cardinal on Finding Voice'
by Brenda Norrell, Censored News, at the Agua Caliente Film Fest
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2014/03/rage-in-desert-tantoo-cardinal-on.html

Copyright Brenda Norrell 2014
Please share our link!
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2014/03/tantoo-cardinal-receives-agua-caliente.html
            

We Rode with the Zapatistas

The impenetrable stronghold of the Zapatistas

By Brenda Norrell

Marcos with Tohono O'odham near Arizona border
Photo Brenda Norrell

Censored News

When people speak of Che, they often speak of his deep love, love for humanity, love for Indigenous People, and love of justice.

Those of us who traveled with, rode with, and supported the Zapatistas over the past 20 years, were drawn together because of this same manner of love, this love of humanity, and wanting to build a better world and expose the injustices.

Those of us who live in Arizona and Sonora, Mexico, and along the US Mexico border, felt a special measure of this love. We rode with the Zapatistas on the caravan through Mexico, made the long journey to the Chiapas jungle strongholds, and were honored and gifted with two visits from Marcos and the Commandantes in Sonora, just south of the Arizona border.

Photo Brenda Norrell

We laughed together, cooked together, struggled together, and were bound by a force that can not be put into words, a stronghold and force that surely Che felt, and a force that began long before 1994.

We were, and are, Tohono O’odham, Yaqui, Mayo, Dakota, Hopi, Navajo, and yes gringos and so much more. We were joined by Mohawks from the north, Seri and Cocopah from the west, and the fierce Indigenous from Guerrero in Mexico, who spoke Nahautl.

Among those from Guerrero was one that will be forever imprinted in my mind as a symbol of this struggle. He was a lean young man in his early 20s. He had only one leg, and hopped from place to place on one leg, with a stick to balance. When he was asked in Michoacan why he was here on the Zapatista caravan, he said, “We have no food at home.” When the call for security came, he was the first to volunteer. 

I think of him now, and the young Mayan mother who lived up the footpath in the mountains of Chiapas, grinding the corn from her cornfields for her young children, never knowing how long they could survive, how long before the lands would be seized by the military and corporations. 

At night in the jungle highlands we hung a flashlight from the roof of the hut for light. There was a warm glow, and someone had walked to town to bring us visitors a cold sweet drink, a gesture of that deep, boundless and borderless love. The year was 1995.

Rising from the shadows, Zapatistas in northern Mexico

By Brenda Norrell

UN Observer and International Report 2006

MAGDALENA, SONORA, Mexico – Subcomandante Marcos urged Indigenous in the United States and Mexico to rise up as warriors from the shadows and defend their lands and people from the corporate and political greed that is advancing as a death march.

“We were already dead and we were called upon to become warriors, according to our legend,” Marcos told O’odham and others gathered here during the Other Campaign’s tour of Indian country in northern Mexico on Oct. 21.

Speaking in poetic verse in the border region, Marcos told how the Zapatistas emerged in Chiapas, dying to live again.

“We were dead, we became what we are: shadows. And in a strict sense we are that: ‘shadow’s warriors or warriors of the shadows.’

Peltier Tribunal Judges Findings: Restoration of Justice in Indian Country

Peltier Tribunal Findings include holding FBI agents responsible for crimes, freedom for Leonard Peltier and an end to environmental racism 

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News Breaking News Exclusive
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com
copyright Censored News

GREEN BAY, Wisconsin -- A panel of judges at the International Peoples Tribunal on Leonard Peltier issued an executive summary and preliminary findings late Friday, Oct. 4, following three days of testimony from Native Americans who described abuse inflicted by the United States government and FBI agents.

The Tribunal concluded that US laws must be changed in order for FBI agents to be charged for their crimes of assault and murder on Pine Ridge Indian land in South Dakota and elsewhere. Further, the Tribunal said justice is dependent on the immediate release of Leonard Peltier.

The Tribunal said justice depends on the admission of guilt and systematic change regarding the FBI and their crimes against the Lakota Oyate and other Indigenous Peoples.

"In order for the Lakota Oyate to begin the healing process, the FBI must begin with a Statement of Remorse to the Oglala Lakota Oyate of Pine Ridge Indian Reservation."

The Tribunal said the environmental injustices targeting Indian lands, based on racism, must end.

In the findings, the judges said, "This Tribunal is a proceeding in democracy, justice, and human rights. The case of Leonard Peltier goes beyond his oppression. Leonard Peltier has become an icon for the oppression and injustices practiced by the United States historically and persistently upon Indigenous Peoples."

"Justice for Leonard Peltier can begin a healing process long overdue between Indigenous Peoples and the United States of America," the findings stated.

The Tribunal focused on the historic relationship between the Dakota, Lakota and Nakota people and questioned who has jurisdiction on Lakotas' Pine Ridge Indian land in South Dakota. The Tribunal questioned whether Congress can override treaty obligations using Plenary Power, the findings stated.

Further the Tribunal questioned whether the Fort Laramie Treaties of 1851 and 1868, or Lakota Traditional Laws have been violated during the period of 1868 to present, including the 1973 Wounded Knee stance, the 1975 Pine Ridge Shootout, and the trials that followed these incidents, the findings stated.

During the Tribunal, Oct. 2 --4, on Oneida land in Wisconsin, the Tribunal heard testimony from across Indian country, including testimony from the survivors of the Pine Ridge Shootout in 1975 and survivors of Wounded Knee in 1973. They described the Reign of Terror carried out by the FBI and how the US government armed locals with weapons and ammunition who then targeted Lakotas and the American Indian Movement. The US created a militarized zone at the same time corporations were seizing Lakota territory for uranium mining.

Navajo Lenny Foster testified on Native prisoner rights. Foster and Dorothy Ninham described their visits with Leonard Peltier in prison and his failing health. Peltier called the Tribunal from prison on the first day.

Manny Pino, Acoma Pueblo and professor, testified on the genocide carried out by Cold War uranium mining in the Pueblos, Navajo Nation, Spokane, Lakota lands in South Dakota, and First Nation lands in Canada. Pino described how the US government targeted Indian lands as "sacrifice zones" which left a trail of death for Native American uranium miners who were not given protective clothing, and ate the radioactive food. Dakota historian Chris Mato Nunpa from Minnesota testified on the historic genocide of Dakota people.

The Tribunal concluded that the remedies include the immediate freedom for Leonard Peltier. The options are a new and fair trial consistent with due process, executive clemency or compassionate release.

The Tribunal called for the appointment, by the President of the United States, of independent counsel to review and prosecute all murders, assaults and acts of intimidation by all perpetrators, including the FBI, against the Lakota Oyate of Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.

Further, the Tribunal said that the restoration of criminal jurisdiction in Indian country requires overturning the Major Crimes Act of 1885, and its associated amendments, and the Suquamish v. Oliphant Decision of 1978.

In its findings, the Tribunal listed the international human rights standards which have been violated during the pre-trial extradition, detention, trial process and incarceration of Leonard Peltier.

The Tribunal also made the following preliminary findings and conclusions.

Describing it as "egregious US government misconduct and abuse of power," the Tribunal said the US has continued its genocide against Indigenous Peoples in the US through actions, laws and policies.

The Tribunal stated the facts of US government corruption in the US legal system, including the deliberate withholding of exculpatory evidence and the use of manufactured and perjured testimony in the 1973 Wounded Knee trials; 1977 trial of Leonard Peltier; extradition of Leonard Peltier from Canada to the US; 1977 trial of Leonard Peltier; appeals of Leonard Peltier, 1978, 1984, 1986 and 1993, and denial of parole by the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

The Constitutional violations include the violations of the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851 and 1868, the Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842; fundamental right of due process; right to a fair and impartial jury of his peers; sixth amendment right regarding compulsory processes; religious land use and institutionalized persons act of 2000, and free exercise and establishment clause.

The violations of international law include violations of Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851 and 1868; UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007); UN International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) signed in 1966 and ratified in 1994; the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR); the Universal Declaration on Human Rights (1948); and Wester-Ashburton Treaty (1842).

The Tribunal said justice depends on the repeal of the Doctrine of Discovery, Plenary Power Doctrine, and other "Extra Constitutional Fictions by the Supreme Court."

In conclusion, the Tribunal recommended that the findings be submitted to the National Congress of American Indians.

The Jurists are Alberto Saldamando, human rights attorney; Tatewin Means, Oglala Attorney General and daughter of Russell Means; James Riding In, Pawnee professor at Arizona State University; Nise Guzman-Nekheba, professor University of Florida Law School and Shannon Rivers, Akimel O'odham human rights activist.

The judges said this is the first of this type of Indigenous Peoples Tribunal and the complete detailed Findings would follow.


Censored News coverage Peltier Tribunal:
Day 3 Peltier Tribunal: Findings and Testimony, Manny Pino uranium mining genocide
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/10/peltier-tribunal-live-day-3.html
Day 2: Peltier Tribunal Lenny Foster and Dorothy Ninham, Visits to Peltier in prison, Native prisoner rights
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/10/live-day-2-peltier-tribunal-thursday.html
Day 1: Peltier Tribunal Reign of Terror on Pine Ridge, Peltier calls Tribunal
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/10/peltier-tribunal-live-oct-2-4-2013.html
Dakota written testimony by Chris Mato Nunpa, Dakota historian and professor
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/10/dakota-genocide-chris-mato-nun
pa.html

Thank you Alice Holemans at NAIS Gazette for translating Censored News coverage of the Peltier Tribunal into Dutch! NAIS also has coverage of 'plastic shamans' charging for ceremonies in Europe. http://www.bloggen.be/natam/

For permission to repost content, contact brendanorrell@gmail.com or feel free to share the links

Day 1: Peltier Tribunal Live Oct 2--4, 2013

Leonard Peltier Tribunal on Abuse of Indigenous Human Rights

Day 1 Peltier Tribunal focuses on shootout on Pine Ridge, Peltier calls Tribunal

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News
copyright Censored News
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/10/peltier-tribunal-live-oct-2-4-2013.html
Dutch translation NAIS:

GREEN BAY, Wisconsin -- The Leonard Peltier Tribunal on the Abuse of Indigenous Peoples Rights began Wednesday in Green Bay, Wisconsin. 

The first day of testimony focused on the Reign of Terror for Lakotas on Pine Ridge in South Dakota during the 1970s. The abuse was carried out by US agents and the corrupt tribal government at the time. 

Lakotas testified that the shoot out that left two FBI agents dead was the result of a setup by the US, which had targeted and surrounded supporters of the American Indian Movement, and traditional Lakota families at the Jumping Bull camp, on June 26, 1975.

During a phone call from prison, Peltier said, "Get up and start fighting for your people," Peltier told those who have been living easy lives.

"I just turned 69 and can not be here too much longer," Peltier told the Tribunal.

"AIM's policy from years ago was you never leave a brother behind, or a sister," Peltier said. 

Oglala Vice President Tom Poor Bear described being shot by the 'Goon Squad' during the Reign of Terror.

Poor Bear said the feds armed the Goon Squad with weapons, automatic weapons, "to kill their own people."

"Then they started sending people like our brother Leonard Peltier to prison."

"The tribal government was very much a part of that."

Although Poor Bear is part of the tribal government today, he said it has changed a great deal. Poor Bear thanked the American Indian Movement for the courage it gave the people to stand up to the Goon Squad. In Wanblee on Pine Ridge every month Lakotas were shot and killed.

"The list is very long."

"I don't know how many times we shot our way out of Pine Ridge."

"Those days made us strong."

"We got control of our culture, we put it into our schools." He described the creation of the schools, clinic and radio.

"A lot of our people died."

It continued into the late 1970s. 

"All we wanted was to be proud of ourselves, proud of our tribal government."

Poor Bear said people are still being killed today. "The feds are not doing

anything about it."

He said from the day they are born, American Indians are targeted for prison.

"We were arrested the day we were born."

He said he came to the Peltier Tribunal so he could come away with a strategy.

"Wounded Knee gave the people hope, not blind hope."

'Cuny Dog' described a razor strap being used on him, and his mouth being washed out with soap for speaking his language, at the age of six in school on Pine Ridge in South Dakota. He said they did not break him. Today, he said, the strategy is for the feds to lock Indian people up for the rest of their lives.

Cuny Dog said when he understood what the American Indian Movement was about, his life began again.  Cuny Dog said it is time to bring "our brother Leonard Peltier home."

Bill Means said when the American Indian Movement was called to the Jumping Bull camp on Pine Ridge, it was because the people needed AIM security just to accomplish their everyday business, like going to the store. 

Means said that was why Leonard Peltier was at the Jumping Bull camp. "He was invited there by our people." Peltier, Dino Butler and others were there to help the people. They were invited.

Clyde Bellecourt, AIM cofounder, described why the American Indian Movement was created. "We felt that absolutely nothing was being done to upgrade the conditions of American Indians in their own country."

Bellecourt described how the movement originated in Stillwater State Prison and transformed the lives of American Indians, focused on education, jobs and empowerment. From prison, they went into the bars, and into the streets. Then, they developed job training in health fields.

"That's the American Indian Movement, that's what we do."

Bellecourt said he was barred from Pine Ridge for life for carrying a Catholic Priest out of the Sundance when he attempted to give communion in the Sundance.

Madonna Thunderhawk, Cheyenne River Lakota, described the beginnings of the American Indian Movement and how the struggle of families resulted in taking shelter in Wounded Knee in 1973. 

Thunderhawk described seeing an armored vehicle for the first time, and when the firefight began at Wounded Knee 1973.

"This was a movement of the local people. We had everyone in the car, from children to grandparents." 

"We took shelter in Wounded Knee."

"I had my ten-year-old son with me. I wouldn't have brought him if I had known what was going to happen to us." 

"We were there for 72 days."

Thunderhawk spoke of the direction and strength that came from the elders, and how they carried on with the wisdom of their ancestors.

"Being inside there, we had no idea what was going on in the outside world."

"We had no idea it had gone around the world, the rise of Wounded Knee." Thunderhawk said there was no separation by age, the young people and the elders were there.

Thunderhawk described going to Leith, North Dakota, recently to support the young Native people in their opposition to the white supremacists trying to take over that small town.

Thunderhawk also described the abuse of Indian children in boarding schools. She also described how ceremonies were held in secret.

Bill Means said the chiefs and headsmen chose Wounded Knee to make a stance, because the spirits of the ancestors are there.

"The young people were flocking, coming to AIM in droves, Porcupine in particular."

"It wasn't hard to organize resistance, in terms of going to Wounded Knee."

"We were ready to go." Means said the women challenged them: "Where is the Spirit of Crazy Horse?" "Where is the Spirit of Sitting Bull."

Bill Means described the Reign of Terror against Lakota people on Pine Ridge.

Jean Roach, Lakota from Rapid City, South Dakota, described the events that led up to the shootout at the Jumping Bulls on Pine Ridge.

Roach described being at the Jumping Bull camp on June 26, 1975. She heard the shots, she was helping Joe Stuntz with a bandage on his arm. He went to see what was going on about half mile a way. It was the last time she saw him.

When they heard the shots, they didn't know what to think. She was 14, her brother was 11, at the time. Leonard said they had a choice, of giving themselves up. "I thought, 'No way.'" Her brother had no choice and went to give himself up at age 11. She heard later he survived, and had taken shelter in an outhouse when they were shooting at him.

"We had spiritual people backing us. We survived it, even though we were surrounded."

"I had bullets going around me, but I survived it," Roach said.

"After that, we went into hiding, the FBI was ransacking homes."

Two months later, she was at home having breakfast. The FBI pushed their way in without a warrant. "Right away I took off running." The FBI terrorized the family, children were screaming and crying. They took Jean and her brother to a grand jury.

Roach said there were never any warrants or subpoenas issued for neither her nor her brother. Still, they stormed her family's home and took them before a grand jury. She was never allowed to consult with an attorney when questioned, as guaranteed by law.

"Every time they asked me a question, I would say, 'I want to speak to my lawyer.'" They were constantly subjected to violations.

"It was pretty traumatic."

Of the people that walked out of Jumping Bull's camp that day, not many of them are alive today, she said.

"Right now Leonard is suffering because he chose to stand up for his people, just like we did." She said she was blacklisted, even though she and her brother were just kids.

Dino Butler, defendant charged with Peltier who was found innocent, described what happened at the Jumping Bull camp. 

Butler began by saying that Norman Brown was pinned down, with an FBI agent shooting at him. Butler started shooting and Brown got out of the line of fire.

Butler said he fired over the heads of the agents to protect the women and children. They could hear the radio communications of the agents.

"I saw Joe (Stuntz) lying on the ground, and I saw a bullet right between his eyes."

Leonard wanted to get in a vehicle and drive out, but Butler said he knew they wouldn't make it. They prayed.

"We waded across that creek, going in a straight line, and came to a culvert under the road." He and Leonard crawled through the culvert and into a tree. Some people hid in the culvert. A plane was flying over the area, and they waited for it to run out of gas.

"It kept flying. Leonard said, 'Let's pray.'" A minute or so later the plane took off toward Pine Ridge. Bob Robideau took off and ran up the hill. Others followed. Leonard and Butler started up the hill.

The agents began firing as the women were running up the hill. Butler ran until he fell down and couldn't run anymore, with bullets flying around him "like bees."

Butler said he fired at a car and kept running up the hill. "Nilak was wearing moccasins, her moccasins came off, she was barefooted." Butler cut up his vest to cover her feet. Two Oglala brothers rode up on horseback. One was Jimmy Eagle's brother, another was a Loud Hawk. They took them to a home nearby. They were given food in a relative's home, cookies. They decided to go to Manderson to the AIM camp. They were told to follow the stars. It started to get cloudy, and suddenly there were coyotes howling in front of them.

"The clouds came in, we couldn't see the stars anymore. We couldn't see the stars anymore. We walked all that night. We rested, and hid out in the brush. We could see the lights." They saw a town, but it didn't look like Manderson. It looked like Pine Ridge, with no food or water, and they were tired.

They were asked to go to a home where the Goons were threatening Lakotas. They were fed. There was a cabin in the back of the house. They spent the day there and rested. They were eating when a carload of FBI agents drove up. They didn't have any guns with them. But the people who owned the home talked to the agents and they left. That night, a car came for the women, then another for the young boys, then another car from Leonard, Dino and the others. When they saw a cop car, they prayed and were able to keep going.

Earlier, when Leonard, Dino and others went to Shiprock, NM, on the Navajo Nation, and heard the Goons were threatening and throwing things at the people. At first they went to Rosebud, to Crow Dog's, before going to the Jumping Bulls.

"It was like a warzone."

"As scared as I was, they were scareder." They depended on AIM to be security and protect them. The Goons were shooting up Lakotas homes on Pine Ridge. "That was happening almost everyday."

"We were always on the edge."

When the shootout happened, Dick Wilson, who was Oglala tribal president, went to DC and signed over one-fifth of Oglalas land at Pine Ridge over to the US government. The land had been a bombing range, Sheep Mountain Bombing Range, and was supposed to revert back to the Oglala Lakotas, but the US held on it to because the US found uranium there, Butler said.

"Dick Wilson was in Washington signing away the deed to that land."

At the same time, Lakotas were organizing to break away from the Oglala government. Three districts planned to create a sovereign government and seek foreign aid. The Jumping Bull shootout stopped that.

At the same time, the FBI was supposed to be investigated for violating the rights of others, including the Black Panthers, Brown Berets, and others, violating their rights and killing people. The Jumping Bull shootout benefited the FBI by halting this too, Butler said.

Bill Means said Leonard Peltier has become an icon and justice for Leonard Peltier can begin a healing process for Indian country.

Chris Mato Nunpa, Dakota, PhD, gave detailed evidence on the genocide of the Dakota people by the US government. Nunpa, historian and professor from Minnesota, described the genocide of Dakota during his testimony and a morning interview live at the Peltier Tribunal.

Read Dr. Mato Nunpa's testimony at this link:

http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/10/dakota-genocide-chris-mato-nunpa.html

Herb Powless, Oneida, spoke of the American Indian Movement and what it has meant to progress and freedom in Indian country.

Louise Benally, Dineh resisting relocation on Big Mountain sent a message to the Tribunal late Wednesday.

"Thank you for the info and we are all with you during these times. Free Leonard Now! With you all in spirit. We need prayers too, for Leonard Benally, Big Mountain Dineh Resister, in the hospital in Phoenix, Arizona. We need your prayers for healing for Leonard. Thank you and May Peace Prevail on your People -- AIM."

During a concert at the Peltier Tribunal on the first day, Bill Miller, Buggin Malone, and Haudenosaunee dancers performed. Miller shared words of empowerment, and a song written with prayer from Wovoka's descendants.

The US versus Leonard Peltier, and Peltier's incarceration, trials and appeals, will be discussed during the three day Tribunal before a panel of human rights judges on Oneida Indian land here in Green Bay, Oct. 2 --4.

Tribunal issues will cover a wide range of human rights violation in Indian country, including the Cold War genocide of uranium mining on Indian lands, where radioactive contamination remains on Pueblo, Navajo, and other lands across Indian country.

Peltier

The theft of American Indian children by the current US foster system and the historic genocide and abuse of Indian children in boarding schools will be exposed by longtime American Indian Movement activists.

The toxic genocide in Indian country, from radioactive dumping targeting Western Shoshone lands, to the dirty coal fired power plants on the Navajo Nation, will also be exposed.

Lenny Foster, Navajo, was among the first to arrive for the Tribunal and will discuss the violations of Native American spiritual rights in US prisons. 

Foster is the program supervisor for the Navajo Nation Corrections Project in Window Rock, Arizona. Foster, who has given support to Peltier in prison, has been a volunteer traditional spiritual advisor for American Indian adults and juveniles in the state and federal prisons for more than 30  years.

Peltier said:

Wounded Knee 1973

"The goal of our Tribunal is to document our many struggles with the U.S. government. The government was involved in outlawing every freedom we valued, from the way we talked to the Creator with our ceremonies to the way we parented our children. Don’t ever forget the spiritual, emotional, physical and mental damage that came from ripping Native children as young as 3 and 4 years old from the arms of their parents and putting them into the hands of cold, hard matrons in the boarding schools. Men who normally provided for their families by fishing and hunting found themselves on the wrong side of the law and hunger became common. Acres and acres of beautiful gardens in Native homelands were destroyed for the harvest of uranium flowing through the veins of our Sacred mother earth." See Peltier statement.

The Tribunal is sponsored by Dorothy Ninham and Wind Chasing the Sun.

Update Day 3 Tribunal Conclusion and Preliminary findings:

 http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/10/peltier-tribunal-live-day-3.html

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  • Amnesty International statement on Leonard Peltier

    
    

    http://www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/issues/security-and-human-rights/leonard-peltier

  Welcome to Censored News readers from the Peltier Tribunal. On Wednesday, the largest number of our viewers were in: US, India, Canada, Indonesia, Romania, Bulgaria, Philippines, Pakistan, Ukraine and Vietnam. Welcome!
  
  
  
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