Resistance forces in Philippines storm mining company, torch heavy equipment

By Mindanao Examiner

New People’s Army rebels on Saturday raided a mining firm in the southern Philippine province of Agusan del Norte, reports said.

Reports said the rebels swooped down on Philippine Alstron Mining Company on the village of Tamamarkay in Tubay town and overpowered the security guards without firing a single shot before they torched several trucks and other heavy equipment.

The rebels also seized at least 6 shot guns and short firearms from the company’s security arsenal. There were no reports of casualties.

The raid came following threats made by the NPA on mining firms operating in the southern Philippines.

Just last month, rebel forces attacked a police base and government troops in Davao del Sur’s Matanao as punishment for their “reign of terror” against indigenous tribes and other communities opposing mining operations in the province.

Dencio Madrigal, a spokesman for the NPA-Valentine Palamine Command, said the deadly attacks were a punishment for police and military units protecting Glencore Xstrata. He accused the mining firm of exploiting nearly 100,000 hectares of ancestral lands of indigenous Lumad Blaans tribes, and peasants in the region.

Jorge Madlos, a regional rebel spokesman, also warned mining firms and fruit plantations in the region, saying military operations in Mindanao have escalated and have become more extensive with the aim to thwart the ever growing and widespread people’s protest against destructive mining operations and plantations.

Madlos said among their targets are Russell Mines and Minerals, Apex Mining Corp. and Philco in southern Mindanao; Dolefil, Del Monte and Sumifru plantations in northern Mindanao; TVI Resource Development Philippines in western Mindanao whose operations inside the ancestral domain of indigenous Subanen and Moro tribes are being opposed by villagers.

NPA and Moro rebels had previously attacked TVI Resources in Zamboanga province.

“If one recalls, more than 400 families were forced to evacuate their ancestral lands because of TVI and the ruthless military operations that ensued to protect it in Buug, Zamboanga del Sur. In order to defend the people’s human rights and general wellbeing, the NPA launched tactical offensives against TVI as well as against units of the AFP-PNP-CAFGU protecting it, such as the ambush on February 2012 that hit elements of the army intelligence group operating on the behest of TVI and the imposition of the local government to allow TVI mining operations on Subanen ancestral lands is one of the bases the NPA raided on April 9, 2012 the PNP station in Tigbao, Zamboanga del Sur,” Madlos said.

NPA rebels also intercepted a group of army soldiers who were using a borrowed truck from TVI and disarmed them in Diplahan town in Zamboanga Sibugay province two years ago. The rebels also burned the truck before releasing the soldiers.

“In view of these events, the NDFP in Mindanao calls upon the Lumad and Moro peoples, peasants and workers, religious and other sectors to further strengthen their unity and their courage to oppose the interests of imperialist mines and plantations, which are exceedingly damaging to Mindanao, to its people and to the environment. We call upon the units of the NPA in Mindanao to be ever more daring in their defense of people’s interests against the greed and rapacity of the local ruling classes and their imperialist master,” Madlos said.

TVI Resource Development Philippines has repeatedly denied all accusations against them. It recently ended its gold mining operation in Mount Canatuan in Zamboanga del Norte’s Siocon town after several years of operations and now has a gold-silver project in the town of Bayog in Zamboanga del Sur province and a nickel plant in Agusan del Norte province.

From Mindanao Examiner: http://www.mindanaoexaminer.com/news.php?news_id=20140405091630

Biofuel company charged with bulldozing Asian elephant habitat

By Jeremy Hance / Mongabay

A biofuel plantation near Yala National Park has landed Lanka Orex Leasing Company PLC (LOLC) in Sri Lanka’s highest court. Environmentalists say the company is illegally bulldozing Asian elephant habitat, including scrubland and tree stands, near the buffer zone of Yala National Park for gliricidia (Gliricidia sepium) biofuel plantation.

“This is going to be a permanent cultivation within the home range of few elephant herds,” Vimukthi Weeratunga, Environmental Foundation Limited (EFL)’s head of operations and environmental scientist, told mongabay.com. “When we take the elephant land by developing this area, elephants will move to nearby villages to raid crop as they cannot use this area for their normal activities. This is exactly the way that human-elephant conflict increased in the other parts of Sri Lanka.”

Located near the buffer zone of Yala National Park, Weetatunga states that company never conducted an environmental impact assessment (EIA), transgressing Sri Lankan law. In addition, the Sri Lanka’s Forest Department has repeatedly denied leasing the land to the company in local press, instead it gave 500 hectares (1,250 acres) to local dairy farmers for rearing cattle. Lanka Orex Leasing Company PLC was merely supposed to provide “technical assistance” to the farmers.

The site in question is currently used by smallscale farmers for cattle and farming, but Weetatunga says that this doesn’t mean the ecosystem is degraded. Instead, he says smallscale farming and livestock in the area are actually important for elephants as opposed to a monoculture plantation.

“Shifting cultivation is a traditional farming practice by clearing some scrubland and leave after the harvest for forest to re-grow. This practice is ideal for elephants to thrive as they get high quality fodder after people leave to regrow,” he explains. Between 2,000 and 4,500 Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) roam Sri Lanka’s forests. The species is currently listed as Endangered by the IUCN Red List.

The area in question is home to many other species as well, including leopards, fishing cats, sloth bears, pangolins, and a large variety of birds.

Many have noted in Sri Lankan press the irony of destroying elephant habitat, including forest lands, for so-called green energy made from biofuels. Gliricidia is a woody plant that can be burned in a biofuel power plant.

The Environmental Foundation Limited (EFL) is currently awaiting a court date next month with Lanka Orex Leasing Company over the habitat clearing.

“We are asking [for an] injunction of current activities,” Weetatunga says. “We are also seeking compensation for their action if we win the case.”

Last year, environmentalists in Sri Lanka caught U.S. food giant Dole clearing forest in Somawathiya National Park for a banana plantation. Dole denied it was inside the park for months, but finally abandoned the project after threat of lawsuit.

Like many Southeast Asian countries, Sri Lankan is currently undergoing a tension between large-scale industrial projects, such as monoculture plantations, and local farming and conservation efforts.