Photos Western Shoshone protest federal court Reno

Photos copyright Lisa Wolf. Western Shoshone protest Barrick Gold's destruction of sacred Mount Tenabo, outside federal court in Reno today. Special thanks to Lisa Wolf for sending today's photos to Censored News. Please read articles below.

http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com

Hearing begins in Reno on disputed gold mine
Tuesday, January 20 2:28 p.m.

By SANDRA CHEREB Associated Press Writer
Western Shoshone tribal members packed a Reno courtroom Tuesday, trying to persuade a federal judge to halt at least part of a huge gold mine they claim would desecrate a sacred landmark.

Lawyers for Toronto-based Barrick Gold Corp. and the federal government disagreed with their claims that mining on Mount Tenabo in northeast Nevada would prevent the Shoshone from practicing their religion.Roger Flynn, an attorney representing members of the Western Shoshone and the environmental group Great Basin Resource Watch, told U.S. District Judge Larry Hicks that Barrick's Cortez Hills Project near Crescent Valley some 250 miles east of Reno would cause irreparable harm to the mountain.

Western Shoshone and environmentalists are seeking a preliminary injunction to block construction of the planned 6,700-acre project until a trial can be held on the merits of the tribe's claims.Among other things, they argue the U.S. Bureau of Land Management used flawed environmental studies when it approved the project, which would include a 900-acre open pit, 2,000 feet deep.

Opponents also claim the approval violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act because the say the mine will prevent Western Shoshone from practicing their religion.

Shawn Collins, a member of the Te-Moak band of Western Shoshone and a third generation miner, said his ancestors were born on Mount Tenabo, which he described as the source of the family's "puha," or life force.A heavy equipment operator for Newmont Mining Corp., Collins said he does not oppose mining, but objects to the work planned on Tenabo.Collins testified he also was concerned about groundwater levels that environmental studies projected could drop more than 200 feet if the mine goes forward.The water, he said, "is like the veins in our body ... the earth blood.""If you do pump the water, you're taking the life from the mountain," he said.

Francis Wikstrom, a lawyer for Barrick, said in his opening statement that the mountain has been mined for more than century, and the mine would not prevent Western Shoshone from practicing their beliefs.Western Shoshone "consider all of the land, all of the air, all of the water sacred," he said, not just Mount Tenabo."They can conduct religious services anywhere," he said.Wikstrom said stopping the mine would cause economic harm to the company and workers.

Outside the federal courthouse, about three dozen Western Shoshone and others demonstrated. Some beat drums while others held signs reading, "Gold is not worth more than water," and "Gold is not above life and culture."

Censored Blog Radio: Western Shoshone and Paiute Protests

Censored News Radio: Western Shoshone and Paiute
By Brenda Norrell
Censored News
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com

Western Shoshone and Paiute protest gold mining and cultural artifacts abuse

Today's special broadcast on Censored News Blog Radio focuses on protests in Nevada. On Saturday at Pyramid Lake, about 150 Paiutes and supporters gathered to protest where the Marina operator has held Paiutes and their cultural items "hostage."
Today in Reno at the federal courthouse, Western Shoshone protest to halt Barrick Gold mining on Mount Tenabo, as a hearing is scheduled to begin.
The show includes an interview with Carrie Dann by Larry Smith, about sacred Mount Tenabo, rebroadcast with permission from American Indian Airwaves. On the telephone with Censored News Radio, Wayne Burke, Paiute, describes the protest at Pyramid Lake to protect the cultural treasures, during the last 10 minutes of the 90 minute show.
Thanks to Pura Fe for today's "Stand Up" song. Pura Fe told Censored News, "The Female rapper is Leilani from Seattle. She's Kwaquiootle and Samoan and then the dude rapper is called "Native Prophecy" form a hip hop group named Antithesis from the Bay area. I met Antithesis during the Longest Walk Benefit concert. And the wild electric guitar solo is Danny Godinez, who is Azteca. He also helped me with the backup vocals and recorded me and my slide guitar and drum loop." http://www.purafe.com/ or www.myspace.com/purafe
Today's show includes music and audio by Janice Gardipe, Paiute/Western Shoshone, Longest Walk singers at Cahokia Mounds, Keith Secola at AIM West Reunion, Floyd Westerman, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Robbie Robertson's ''Music For Native Americans," Mary Youngblood, and a statement by Bill Means on Raymond Yellow Thunder. Thanks to Earthcycles for recordings of Janice Gardipe, Longest Walk singers and Bill Means.
Barrick, the world’s largest gold mining company, headquartered in Toronto, Canada, plans to construct and operate the mine, known as the Cortez Hills Expansion Project, said the Western Shoshone Defense Project.
The Project area is located entirely within the territory of the Western Shoshone Nation, recognized in the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley. The Mine would blast and excavate a new massive open pit on Mount Tenabo over 900 acres in size, with a depth of over 2,000 feet. It would include several new waste disposal and processing facilities (including a cyanide heap-leaching facility), consisting of approximately 1,577 million tons of waste rock, 53 million tons of tailings material, and 112 million tons of spent heap leach material. The Mine would include an extensive groundwater pumping system to dewater Mount Tenabo (in order to keep the open pit and mine workings dry during mining) and associated water pipelines that will transport the pumped water away from Mount Tenabo. In total, the mine would permanently destroy approximately 6,800 acres land on and around Mount Tenabo, over 90% of which is classified as federal “public” land.
Listen at Censored News:
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/

Western Shoshone: 'Barack In, Barrick Out!'

Julie Cavanaugh-Bill, Western Shoshone Defense Project (775) 397-6726
Dan Randolph, Great Basin Resource Watch, (775) 348-1986

Barack In, Barrick Out!

On Inauguration Day, U.S. Court to Hear Shoshone Request to Stop Mine Expansion at Spiritual Mountain

By Western Shoshone Defense Project
Censored News
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com


RENO, Nev. -- At 9:00 a.m. this morning (PST), Tuesday, the Federal District Court in Reno, Nevada will begin a two day injunction hearing to protect the world-recognized Shoshone spiritual area, Mt. Tenabo from what would be one of the U.S.’ largest open pit cyanide heap leach gold mines. Just two months ago, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management approved the construction of the mine, wholly owned and operated by Canadian multinational mining giant Barrick Gold Corporation. Western Shoshone communities, the Western Shoshone Defense Project and Great Basin Resource Watch filed suit immediately and a partial temporary restraining order was put in place in early December. Mt. Tenabo is home to local Shoshone creation stories, spirit life, medicinal, food and ceremonial rocks and plants and continues to be used to this day by Shoshone for spiritual ceremonies and cultural practices. Over the years, tens of thousands of individuals and organizations from across the United States and around the world have joined with the Shoshone and voiced their opposition to this mine –in fact, the mine is being referred to as the “most opposed mine in the world”.

Barrick, the world’s largest gold mining company, headquartered in Toronto, Canada, plans to construct and operate the mine, known as the Cortez Hills Expansion Project. The Project area is located entirely within the territory of the Western Shoshone Nation, recognized in the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley. The Mine would blast and excavate a new massive open pit on Mount Tenabo over 900 acres in size, with a depth of over 2,000 feet. It would include several new waste disposal and processing facilities (including a cyanide heap-leaching facility), consisting of approximately 1,577 million tons of waste rock, 53 million tons of tailings material, and 112 million tons of spent heap leach material. The Mine would include an extensive groundwater pumping system to dewater Mount Tenabo (in order to keep the open pit and mine workings dry during mining) and associated water pipelines that will transport the pumped water away from Mount Tenabo. In total, the mine would permanently destroy approximately 6,800 acres land on and around Mount Tenabo, over 90% of which is classified as federal “public” land.

“Martin Luther King had a dream, Shoshone people have a nightmare. Barack is being inaugurated, Shoshone are being intimidated. Shoshone religion lives not in a building, but in a clean environment..” Says Larson Bill, Vice-Chairman of the South Fork Western Shoshone. “Mt. Tenabo is a specific area of spiritual significance for thousands of years hopefully our new President will support a change in favor of protection. Barack In. Barrick Out.” “There are dozens of active gold mines on Western Shoshone lands already, there is no need for this one, which is clearly immoral and irresponsible. The public should be aware that Nevada is not a waste land, but is the home of ranchers, sportsmen, fishermen and homesteaders that have enjoyed the lands alongside the Shoshone people for generations. We have been clear in our opposition to this mine and while Barrick trys to cloud the real issues with gifts and money, we continue to oppose this project – they have not bought our people, the traditions nor the lands of the Shoshone.” he adds.

The proposed mine area has been found by the BLM, in repeated ethnographic studies, as being of extreme spiritual and cultural importance to the Western Shoshone. One report says: “Mt. Tenabo is one of a system of three mountains in the (Western Shoshone) homeland, … it is also considered a traditional locus of power and source of life, and figures in creation stories and world renewal. As the tallest mountain in the area – the most likely to capture snow and generate water to grow pinyon and nourish life – it is literally a life-giver. Water is to earth what blood is to the body, and these subterranean waterways are likened to the earth’s arteries and veins.”

Just before Thanksgiving, a group of Shoshone grandmothers came together and held a Day of Resistance at the mountain. “The whole area is a temple”. Stated one of the grandmothers, Mary McCloud. The grandmothers’ will be coming together again at 8 a.m. each morning before the Federal Court House in Reno. Religious leaders from different faith backgrounds will be joining the Shoshone in the public demonstrations. The address is the Bruce D. Thompson Federal Building, 400 S. Virginia St., Reno, Nevada.

While the hearings are held in Reno, back at the mountain, some of the Shoshone men have built an arbor where they will be holding a 24 hour encampment and watch throughout the court hearing.

The plaintiffs are being represented in court by Roger Flynn and Jeffrey Parsons of the non-profit legal firm, the Western Mining Action Project, which specializes in mining law.

For more information on the Western Shoshone land rights issues, Cortez Hills Project, Mount Tenabo, and the legal challenge go to www.gbrw.org.
WHAT YOU CAN DO AS WE AWAIT THE COURT’s DECISION: We need supporters and media at both of the following locations:
1. Attend the Public Demonstration to Protect Native Spiritual Areas and Human Rights in front of the Courthouse on S. Virginia Street beginning at 8 am on both Jan. 20th and 21st.
2. Attend the Mt. Tenabo encampment and Arbor Vigil which began Thursday Jan. 15th and is lasting through the following week of hearings at the gathering area on the Southeast flank facing Grass Valley, Nevada. (Contact wsdp@igc.org for directions and supplies needed) (Beowawe/Crescent Valley exit of I-80, then south through Crescent Valley, turn left before Pipeline mine – head towards Grass Valley through Cortez Canyon, after leaving canyon look for large green army tent about a mile after exiting the canyon). Please remember NO Drugs, Alcohol or Firearms and – Respect the Mutual Court Order to refrain from disturbing the mine employees as they refrain also from disturbing us – stay away from operations at a minimum of 200 yards. The Court hearing on Tuesday and Wednesday is important and we must respect the mutual temporary restraining order. Report in to Mike Miller upon arrival.

Angelou: Martin Luther King and the power of race unity

Maya Angelou: King and Malcolm killed once they included all races of oppressed people in the movement

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

In tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr., on his day, Censored News quotes Maya Angelou, from an interview with Rosa Guy:

"There was a qualitative growth in Martin Luther King. To me, having just to see him grow from the American Civil Rights Movement, the passive resistance, the non-violent resistance, and to see him grow into one going to Africa, meeting with Nkrumah, return, broadening his sight to include all oppressed people (which is why he was killed, of course), so that his poor people's march said, 'I want Black people, poor white, native American, Mexican American, Asian American; I want everybody who is poor, downtrodden and oppressed, come. We will sit in Washington.' I believe this is why Malcolm was killed. When Malcolm said, 'I no longer believe that by nature a person is born evil. I have seen blue-eyed, blond-haired men who I can call brother with a straight face and an open heart.' The minute he said that, he had to be done. If he had kept narrow, he would have remained, you know?"

Angelou speaks of the movements that followed and how those movements became focused on being "safe," after the massacre of students at Kent State. The women's movement and the free student movement seemed to be safe movements, she said.

"If they were all white, if they were not involved with the Blacks, they thought they wouldn't be killed. And they were right."

From Writing Lives, Conversations Between Women Writers, edited by Mary Chamberlain, Virago Press, 1988.