Australians Rush to Mine Lithium in Hualapai's Sacred Place, a Navajo Enterprise is Leading the Desecration

 

Australians Rush to Mine Lithium in Hualapai's Sacred Place, and a Navajo Enterprise is Leading the Desecration

Update:
The Bureau of Land Management approved the Big Sandy lithium project in the area of Hualapai's Ceremonial Place in June. The so-called 'Navajo Transitional Energy Company,' a Navajo Nation enterprise is carrying out the drilling operation for an Australian mining company. This is the latest attack on sacred places by Interior Sec. Deb Haaland's BLM. It is another fake green project destroying ceremonial places for lithium for batteries, under the name of green energy for profits for an Australian corporation.
BLM approves lithium mine on June 6, 2024 
https://www.blm.gov/announcement/blm-approves-lithium-exploration-project-arizona

 Ha’Kamwe’

By Brenda Norrell, Censored News, April 11, 2024

Translated into French by Christine Prat

SYDNEY, Australia -- While sipping wine at the Sydney Opera House, investors hear how much money they can make mining lithium in Arizona. The enthusiastic project manager is excited to tell them that Arizona loves mining, as can be seen with all its copper mines.

"They are a mining friendly state," says Paul Lloyd, managing director at Arizona Lithium, owned by Hawkstone Energy, in Perth, Australia.

"They are very pro-lithium production."

On the other side of the world, Hualapai are offering prayers at their sacred spring, Ha’Kamwe’ their sacred place for healing and rites of passage, including childbirth and coming-of-age ceremonies for young women. It has been their ceremonial place since time immemorial.

Not far away, in Farmington, New Mexico -- a bordertown with a long history of crimes against Native Americans -- a new epicenter of fake green energy projects emerges.

Navajo Government Joining Australian Company to Devastate Hualapai Sacred Land for Lithium Mine

Hualapai Walk for the Sacred Opposing Lithium Mine

Navajo Government Joining Australian Company to Devastate Hualapai Sacred Land for Lithium Mine

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News

December 10, 2022

The Navajo Nation's "energy transition office" plans to operate the lithium mine that will devastate Hualapai's sacred spring used for healing since time immemorial. In a deal with the Australian company, Vern Lund, the CEO of the Navajo office in Farmington, N.M., would join the lithium company's board.

The lithium mine will deplete and poison the water on Hualapai sacred ancestral land in northwest Arizona. Hualapai elders point out their sacred plants and the animals will be poisoned.

"It will destroy what is important to our people," said Ivan Bender, Hualapai caretaker at the sacred spring Ha'Kamwe. "Every living thing needs clean water."

Already, Navajo Transitional Energy Company has invested Dine' money in a Texas company mining rare metals, and operates the Navajo Mine, three coal mines in Wyoming and Montana. It owns a percentage of the coal-fired Four Corners Power Plant on the Navajo Nation, among the worst polluters in the world.

Arizona Lithium, a subsidiary of Hawkstone Mining in Australia, said that the Navajo Transitional Energy Company will take over the operational development of Big Sandy, managing everything from permitting requirements to a definitive feasibility study and mine construction, under the terms of the deal.

Hualapai said carving an open pit mine into the earth would devastate the aquifer that feeds Ha’Kamwe, a sacred spring that the Hualapai people have used medicinally since time immemorial.