Marlene Benally, Member
Forgotten People
P.O. Box 1661
Tuba City (Navajo Nation), AZ 86045
(928) 401-1777
Consultation with The
Honorable Mr. James Anaya, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples, Tucson, AZ, April 26-27, 2012
Ya’ah’teeh
Honorable Special Rapporteur James Anaya. Forgotten People appreciates your
investigation of the human rights situation of indigenous peoples living in the
United States and wishes to discuss failures of the US government to protect
and remediate highly radioactive abandoned uranium mines and uranium and
arsenic contaminated water sources in communities spanning more than 2 million
acres in the western portion of the Navajo Nation.
Our
communities face serious development issues. These issues have been compounded
by the 43-year US government imposed Bennett Freeze lifted by President Obama
in 2009 without comment, funding or a plan for rehabilitation. The Freeze is
largely responsible for inadequate housing, lack of basic infrastructure such
as water, paved roads, and pervasive poverty in the region. Only 3 % of
families have electricity. Over
90% of the homes do not have access to piped water, requiring families to haul
their water from other locations. EPA estimates 54,000 residents of the Navajo
Nation lack access to a public water system. Only 24 % of homes are habitable
today.
The
Freeze is responsible for intergenerational trauma affecting people mentally,
physically and psychologically. Medical studies confirm that overcrowding in
addition to the absence of running water, refrigeration, and adequate sewage
disposal adversely impact the mental and physical health of Dinè residing in
the former Bennett Freeze. These impacts range from youth suicide and mental
illness; and an array of medical aliments including but not limited to kidney
failure and cancer.
Since 1966, the population in the area has increased by
approximately 65 percent, forcing several generations of families to live
together in dwellings that have been declared unfit for human habitation. The
result of which has been a large number of deaths from exposure to the harsh
climate.
To
compound the effects, the US EPA reports the presence of over 1,300 abandoned
mines on reservation land alone. Up to 25 % of the unregulated sources in the
western Navajo Nation exceeds drinking water standard for kidney toxicants
including uranium.
The
US EPA reports the presence of over 1,300 abandoned mines on reservation land
alone. Up to 25 % of the unregulated sources in the western Navajo Nation
exceeds drinking water standard for kidney toxicants including uranium. Uranium in the drinking water causes multiple
health impacts like bone cancer and impaired kidney function.
Reproductive-organ cancers in teenage Dinè girls average 17 times higher than
the average of girls in the U.S. but a health study of uranium exposure has
never been conducted.
A recent New York Times article
highlighted how abandoned uranium mine remediation is falling short in Cameron,
Ariz., and other parts of the Navajo Nation. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/01/us/uranium-mines-dot-navajo-land-neglected-and-still-perilous.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all This prompted a 4/19/2012 letter from Democrats
in Congress to the US EPA, Department of Energy (DOE) and Indian Health Service
(IHS) calling for “urgent
action” to clean up hundreds of abandoned uranium mines that pose extreme
public health risks to residents of the Navajo Nation Reservation. They state, “The
connection between human exposure to high levels of radioactivity, like those
found at the Cameron site, and development of serious and life-threatening
health problems is undeniable,” the congressmen added.
Across
the wash from the Cameron site all the wells are contaminated but due to a lack
of infrastructure, people are still drinking contaminated water because they
have no choice.
·
President Obama should fulfill his pledge made on
December 16, 2010 and sign a binding declaration to show his commitment to
indigenous people.
·
International law that protects water and land
rights as defined by the declaration should be enacted and where such law
already exists, that they be catalogued and made available in languages
Indigenous peoples speak.
·
Mechanisms and instruments to adjudicate human
rights violations should be set up within UN jurisdiction and the International
Criminal Court to restore land, water and religious rights to solve the Navajo
refugee problem.
·
Mandated rather than voluntary compliance by
industry with independent monitoring and performance review needs to be
implemented with creation of a Task Force on Business and Industry (TOBI) and a
UN code of conduct and binding rules to ensure corporate accountability, the
precautionary principle and polluter pays.
·
An April 2007 statement of the Office of the High
Commissioner for Human Rights that states, "It is now time to consider
access to safe drinking water and sanitation as a human right, defined as the
right to equal and non-discriminatory access to a sufficient amount of safe
drinking water for personal and domestic uses--drinking, personal sanitation,
washing of clothes, food preparation and personal and household hygiene--to
sustain life and health. States should prioritize these personal and domestic
uses over other water uses and should take steps to ensure that this sufficient
amount is of good quality, affordable for all and can be collected within a
reasonable distance from a person's home."
·
We believe the US government
should be held accountable to commitments made internationally including UN
General Assembly (GA) Resolutions on the right to safe drinking water and
sanitation and a commitment by the US EPA at the 2002 United Nations
World Summit on Sustainable Development to reduce the number of its citizens
lacking access to safe drinking water and sanitation by 50% by 2015.
FP
prays for your intervention and the application of emergency
measures to ensure the protection of our rights under the declaration.
Respectfully submitted by Marlene Benally, Member
Forgotten People, Navajo Nation, AZ
