Event Alert: Ecology of Spirit

Event Alert: Ecology of Spirit

Species extinction. Plastic pollution. Global warming. Catastrophic floods. Raging fires. The failure of coral reefs. Whales dying en masse. Forever chemicals contaminating mothers’ breast milk. Where is our spirit?

Our planet is in crisis. And while the wealthy and governments pour trillions into technological so-called “solutions,” things are spiraling out of control.

What if solving the ecological crisis depended on falling in love with the natural world, and acting to defend those we love?

What if a biocentric worldview — one which places the natural world at the center of our morality — could help us access the courage needed to stop the destruction?

On October 21st, join us for special 3-hour live streaming event on Facebook or Givebutter:

Ecology of Spirit: Biocentrism, Animism, and the Environmental Crisis — “the spirituality of the front lines.”

This live event will explore the connectedness of all life and focus on organized resistance to the destruction of the planet.

It starts at 1pm Pacific Time / 20:00 UTC, and features selected speakers including:

Tiokasin Ghosthorse

 

Ecology of Spirit

Tiokasin Ghosthorse is a member of the Cheyenne River Lakota Nation of South Dakota and has a long history with Indigenous activism and advocacy. Tiokasin is the Founder, Host and Executive Producer of “First Voices Radio” (formerly “First Voices Indigenous Radio”) for the last 27 years in New York City and Seattle/Olympia, Washington.

In 2016, he received a nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize from the International Institute of Peace Studies and Global Philosophy. Other recent recognitions include: Native Arts and Cultures Foundation National Fellowship in Music (2016), National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship Nominee (2017), Indigenous Music Award Nominee for Best Instrumental Album (2019) and National Native American Hall of Fame Nominee (2018, 2019).

He was also awarded New York City’s Peacemaker of the Year in 2013. Tiokasin is a “perfectly flawed human being.”

Suprabha Seshan

Suprabha Seshan
Suprabha is a conservationist and environmental educator committed to the rewilding of habitat and human beings. She lives and works at the Gurukula Botanical Sanctuary (GBS) in the Western Ghat Mountains in India, which she often describes as a refugee center for hundreds of species of plants which are rescued from threatened places, and for the wildlife who they support.
Learning from nature to protect nature better is the work of GBS, through its integrated conservation practices in land, species and community-based ecological nurturance. On behalf of the GBS team, Suprabha received the prestigious Whitely Award for Nature in 2006.

Derrick Jensen

Derrick Jensen: The Man Box and the Cult of Masculinity
Derrick Jensen is a leading voice of cultural dissent. A longtime activist living in Northern California, he has been described as an “ecophilosopher in the anarcho-primitivist tradition.”

He explores the nature of injustice, how civilizations devastate the natural world, and how human beings retreat into denial at the destruction of the planet. His work examines the central question, “If the destruction of the natural world isn’t making us happy, then why are we doing it?”

Keala Kelly

Ecology of Spirit

Keala Kelly is a filmmaker and journalist living on Hawai’i Island. Her works depict the critical links between cultural, Film, and spiritual survival in the movement for Hawaiian self-determination and Indigenous peoples’ struggles for territorial and environmental survival.

She is an outspoken advocate for Indigenous self-representation in mass media. Keala is a Ted Scripps Environmental Journalism Fellow and has an MFA from UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and Television.

Lierre Keith

 

Lierre Keith (auteur de Le Mythe végétarien) - Babelio

Lierre Keith is an American writer, radical feminist, food activist, and environmentalist. She began her public involvement in the feminist movement as the founding editor of Vanessa and Iris: A Journal for Young Feminists (1983–85).

During this same period, she also volunteered with a group called Women Against Violence Against Women in Cambridge, where she participated in educational events and protest campaigns.

In 1984 she was a founding member of Minor Disturbance, a protest group against militarism from a feminist perspective. In 1986 she was a founding member of Feminists Against Pornography in Northampton, Massachusetts. She is a founding editor of Rain and Thunder, a radical feminist journal in Northampton.

Sakej Ward

 

Ecology of Spirit

Sakej (James Ward) belongs to the wolf clan. He is Mi’kmaw (Mi’kmaq Nation) from the community of Esgenoopetitj (Burnt Church First Nation, New Brunswick). He is the father of nine children, four grandchildren and a caregiver for one. He resides in Shxw’owhamel First Nation with his wife Melody Andrews and their children.

Sakej has a long history of advocating and protecting First Nations inherent responsibilities and freedoms, having spent the last 21 years fighting the government and industry. This deep desire to bring justice to all Indigenous people has given Sakej experience in international relations where he spoke on behalf of the Mi’kmaq Nation at the United Nations Working Group for Indigenous Populations (WGIP).

For his efforts in protecting Indigenous people, freedoms and territory he has received the National Aboriginal Achievement Award.

Will Falk

 

Will-Falk | Oregon Community Rights Network

Will Falk is a writer, lawyer, poet and environmental activist. The natural world speaks and Will’s work is how he listens. He believes the ongoing destruction of the natural world is the most pressing issue confronting us today. For Will, writing is a tool to be used in resistance.

Will graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School and practiced as a public defender in Kenosha, WI. He left the public defender office to pursue frontline environmental activism.

So far, activism has taken him to the Unist’ot’en Camp – an indigenous cultural center and pipeline blockade on unceded Wet’suwet’en territory in so-called British Columbia, Canada, to a construction blockade on Mauna Kea in Hawai’i, to endangered pinyon-juniper forests in the Great Basin, and to Thacker Pass in northern Nevada where Will is trying to stop an open pit lithium mine from destroying a beautiful mountain pass.

Rebecca Wildbear

 

Meet Rebecca Wildbear

Rebecca Wildbear is a river and soul guide who helps people tune in to the mysteries that live within the Earth community, dreams, and their own wild Nature, so they may live a life of creative service. She has been a guide with Animas Valley Institute.

A long-time yoga teacher (since 2003) and a former faculty member at Nosara Yoga Institute (2008-2017), Rebecca created Wild Yoga™ — a practice of worship, veneration, and advocacy for Earth — while teaching yoga in a variety of wild places, including the tide pools of Costa Rica, the mountains and rivers of Colorado, and the ancient red rock canyons of Utah.

Max Wilbert

 

Board of Directors

Max Wilbert is a third-generation organizer who grew up in Seattle’s post-WTO anti-globalization and undoing racism movement. He has been an organizer for more than 15 years. Max is a longtime member of Deep Green Resistance and serves on the board of a small, grassroots non-profit. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Environmental Communication and Advocacy from Huxley College.

His first book, a collection of pro-feminist and environmental essays written over a six-year period, was released in 2018. He is co-author of the forthcoming book “Bright Green Lies,” which looks at the problems with mainstream so-called “solutions” to the climate crisis.

Alan Clements

 

Ecology of Spirit

Alan Clements was one of the first Westerners to ordain as a Buddhist monk in Myanmar (formerly Burma). In 1984, forced by the dictator Ne Win to leave the country, Clements returned to the West and lectured on ‘The Wisdom of Mindfulness.’

In 1988, Alan integrated into his Buddhist training an awareness that included universal human rights, social injustice, environmental sanity, political activism, the study of propaganda and mind control in both democratic and totalitarian societies, and the preciousness of everyday freedom.

In the jungles of Burma, in 1990, he was one of the first eye-witnesses to document the mass murder and oppression of ethnic minorities by Burma’s military dictatorship, which resulted in his first book, ‘Burma: The Next Killing Fields?’ In 1995 a French publisher asked Alan to attempt re-entering Burma with the purpose of meeting Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of her country’s pro-democracy movement and 1991 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

The transcripts of their five months of conversations were smuggled out of the country and became the book ‘The Voice of Hope’.

Other special guests will attend the session as well. There will be opportunities to ask questions and participate in dialogue.
You can join the event through our Facebook page or Givebutter page.

The mainstream environmental movement is mostly funded by foundations which don’t support revolutionary change. Radical organizations like Deep Green Resistance rely on individual donors to support our activism around the world, which is why “Ecology of Spirit” is also a fundraiser.

We’re outnumbered and we need your help.

There is a path out of the this crisis, and DGR is one of the organizations leading the way. But we can’t do it without you. We’re raising funds to support global community organizing, fund mutual aid and direct action campaigns, and sustain our core outreach and organizational work.

Donate here: https://givebutter.com/ecologyofspirit

Whether or not you are in a financial position to donate, we hope you will join us on October 21st for this opportunity to connect with kindred spirit offering light in dark times!

A Transition to “Clean” Energy Is Hurting Indigenous Communities

A Transition to “Clean” Energy Is Hurting Indigenous Communities

Editor’s note: The FPIC (Free, prior and informed consent) and UNDRIP (UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples) are international standards, that some companies have adopted into their policies. The FPIC is an international human rights principle that protect peoples’ rights to self-determination. UNDRIP delineates and defines the individual and collective rights of indigenous peoples. Both of these are important principles that improve the sovereignty of indigenous peoples. However, neither of these are legally binding, which has disastrous outcomes.

Companies and countries alike are bypassing these principles in favor of profitable ventures, most recent of which are clean energy projects.

Right now, companies that advance the “clean” energy transition are threatening the land and the livelihoods of indigenous peoples and peasants. Demand for minerals like copper and lithium is skyrocketing, as every economic sector is being transitioned towards the fourth industrial revolution. But indigenous peoples need to have their right to a say in decisions affecting to their land. Ecosystems and people living with the land are being victimized to serve an economy that is desperately trying to save itself from collapsing.

This story is published as part of the Global Indigenous Affairs Desk, an Indigenous-led collaboration between Grist, High Country News, ICT, Mongabay, and Native News Online. This story was originally published by Grist. Sign up for Grist’s weekly newsletter here.


Sarah Sax/Grist

When Francisco Calí Tzay, the United Nations special rapporteur on the rights of Indigenous peoples, spoke at the 22nd United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, or UNPFII, last week, he listed clean energy projects as some of the most concerning threats to their rights.

“I constantly receive information that Indigenous Peoples fear a new wave of green investments without recognition of their land tenure, management, and knowledge,” said Calí Tzay.

His statements — and those made by other delegates — at what is the world’s largest gathering of Indigenous peoples, made clear that without the free, prior, and informed consent of Indigenous people, these “green” projects have the capacity to seriously impede on Indigenous rights.

Free, prior and informed consent — known as FPIC — has always been an important topic at the UNPFII, but this year it’s taken on a renewed urgency.

Mining projects and carbon offsets put pressure on indigenous groups

“The strong push is because more and more of climate action and targets for sustainable development are impacting us,” said Joan Carling, executive director of Indigenous Peoples Rights International, an Indigenous nonprofit that works to protect Indigenous peoples’ rights worldwide.

protester holding a sign that says protect thacker pass
Protest against Thacker Pass lithium mine. Image courtesy Max Wilbert

 

Indigenous peoples around the world are experiencing the compounding pressures of clean energy mining projects, carbon offsets, new protected areas and large infrastructure projects on their lands as part of economic recovery efforts in the wake of Covid-19, according to The International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs 2023 report.

Green colonialism threatens ecosystems

As states around the world trend towards transitioning to “clean” energy to meet their national and international climate goals, the demand for minerals like lithium, copper, and nickel needed for batteries that power the energy revolution are projected to skyrocket. The demand could swell fourfold by 2040, and by conservative estimates could pull in $1.7 trillion in mining investments.

Although Indigenous delegates say they support “clean” energy projects, one of the issues is their land rights: more than half of the projects extracting these minerals currently are on or near lands where Indigenous peoples or peasants live, according to an analysis published in Nature.

This can lead to their eviction from territories, loss of livelihoods, or the deforestation and degradation of surrounding ecosystems.

“And yet […] we are not part of the discussion,” said Carling. “That’s why I call it green colonialism — the [energy] transition without the respect of Indigenous rights is another form of colonialism.”

However, standing at the doorway of a just “clean” energy transition is FPIC, say Indigenous delegates. FPIC is the cornerstone of international human rights standards like the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, known as UNDRIP. Though more than 100 countries have adopted UNDRIP, this standard is not legally binding.

Companies and governments don’t abide by communities

Because of this, delegates are calling on countries and companies to create binding policy and guidelines that require FPIC for all projects that affect Indigenous peoples and their lands, as well as financial, territorial and material remedies for when companies and countries fail to do so.

However, there is some push back. The free prior, informed consent process can lead to a wide variety of outcomes including the right for communities to decline a highly profitable project, which can often be difficult for countries, companies and investors to abide by, explains Mary Beth Gallagher, the director of engagement of investment at Domini Impact Investments, who spoke at a side event on shareholder advocacy.

Indigenous Sámi delegates from Norway drew attention to their need for legally enforceable FPIC protection as they continue to protest the Fosen Vind Project, an onshore wind energy complex on Sámi territory, that the country’s Supreme Court ruled violated their rights.

“We have come to learn the hard way that sustainability doesn’t end colonialism,” said a Sámi delegate during the main panel on Tuesday.

Across the globe indigenous peoples face eviction

In the United States, the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony, the People of Red Mountain and members of the Fort McDermitt Tribe filed lawsuits against the federal Bureau of Land Management for approving the permits for an open-pit lithium mine without proper consultation with the tribes. In the Colombian Amazon, the Inga Indigenous community presented a successful appeal for lack of prior consultation from a Canadian company that plans to mine copper, molybdenum and other metals in their highly biodiverse territory.

Consternation over governments and multinational companies setting aside FPIC has long extended over other sectors, like conservation and monoculture plantations for key cash crops. In Peru, the Shipibo-Konibo Indigenous peoples are resisting several large protected areas that overlap with their territory and were put in place without prior consultation.  In Tanzania and Kenya, the Maasai are being actively evicted from their lands for a trophy hunting and safari reserve. Indigenous Ryukyuan delegates condemn the ongoing use of their traditional lands and territories by the Japanese and U.S. governments for military bases without their free, prior, and informed consent.

Implementing the FPIC is truly sustainable

While delegates put a lot of emphasis on the lack of FPIC, they put equal emphasis on FPIC as a crucial part of the long-term sustainability of energy projects.

“FPIC is more than just a checklist for companies looking to develop projects on Indigenous lands,” said Carling. “It is a framework for partnership, including options for equitable benefit sharing agreements or memorandum of understanding, collaboration or conservation.”

The focus at this year’s conference has emphasized the growing role of FPIC in the private sector. Investors and developers are increasingly considering the inclusion of FPIC into their human rights due diligence standards. Select countries such as Canada have implemented UNDRIP in full, although First Nation groups have pointed out irregularities in how it is being implemented. The European Union is proposing including specific mandatory rights to FPIC in its corporate sustainability due diligence regulation. Side events at the UNPFII focused on topics like transmitting FPIC Priorities to the private sector and using shareholder advocacy to increase awareness of FPIC.

Gallagher of Domini Impact Investments said companies have a responsibility to respect human rights, which includes FPIC: “If they have a human rights commitment or they have a commitment in their policies not to do land grabs, we have to hold them to account for that.”

Indigenous leadership at the center of negotiations

In 2021, the world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, published an expectation that companies “obtain (and maintain) the free, prior, and informed consent of Indigenous peoples for business decisions that affect their rights.” Large banks like Credit Agricole have included FPIC in their corporate social responsibility policy. But in most cases, even when companies have a FPIC policy it doesn’t conform to the standard outlined in UNDRIP and is not legally binding.

“It doesn’t do the work it’s supposed to do to protect self-determination,” said Kate Finn, director at First Peoples Worldwide. “It becomes a check-the-box procedure that’s solely consultations and stakeholder consultation instead of protection of rights and self-determination.”

“If communities aren’t giving their consent, a company has to respect that,” said Gallagher, who added “There’s obviously points of tension where investors have different agendas and priorities but ultimately, it’s about centering Indigenous leadership and working through that.”

Not properly abiding by FPIC can be costly to companies in countries that operate where it is a legal instrument. It comes with risks of losing their social operation to license, and financial damages. According to a study by First Peoples Worldwide, Energy Transfer and the banks that financed the now-completed Dakota Access Pipeline, lost billions due to construction delays, account closures, and contract losses after they failed to obtain consent from the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in the United States.

Ultimately, Indigenous people need to be part of decision-making from the beginning of any project, especially “clean” energy projects mining for transition minerals on their territories, said Carling. “For us, land is life, and we have a right to decide over what happens on our land.”

Banner by Carolina Caycedo. Lithium Intensive, 2022. Color pencil on paper. Courtesy of the artist.

Tribal Nations and Wild Buffaloes

Tribal Nations and Wild Buffaloes

Editor’s Note: Roam Free Nation’s cofounders traveled to Gardiner, MT recently to attend the Interagency Bison Management Plan meeting and speak on behalf of the buffalo. The meeting gave an overview of the recent “hunt” that killed over 1,200 wild buffaloes. The meeting was also attended by a few representatives of tribal people who participated in the “hunt”. Many of the represented tribal people there were satisfied at how “smooth” the “hunt” turned out to be for them. Read the Roam Free Nation’s full report on the meeting here.

Yet not everyone believes that the “hunt” was what could be the best for the wild buffaloes. The following piece is an opinion piece by Jaedin Medicine Elk, a co-founder of Roam Free Nation and a member of the Cheyenne tribe.


By Jaedin Medicine Elk/Native News Online

I expected the recent meeting of those involved with the Interagency Bison Management Plan to be highly emotional given the national and international outrage over the indiscriminate killing of so many Yellowstone buffalo this year. Instead, it was business as usual with no remorse from anyone for killing over 25% of the herd as state and tribal hunt managers talked about how well it went and claimed there were no problems.

If you considered the 1,250 dead bulls, pregnant females, and calves from the buffalo’s perspective, however, the conversation would have gone much differently. But none of the “managers” or tribal representatives did that.

The dominate, colonized culture has made its way onto our Tribal Nations. But we can’t live as tribal people when all we think about is ourselves and our rights and not Mother Earth or the wildlife our ancestors loved and depended on.

Killing hungry, pregnant female buffalo at the Park’s border isn’t what we should be doing. We need to allow these matriarchal family groups – mainly pregnant females and grandmothers – to teach the young ones the migration corridors so more buffalo can establish themselves on the lands that are their birth right.

The buffalo know what to do, they just need our help to allow them to do it — it’s the humans who need to be managed. As buffalo culture tribal people, when we see things like Blood Creek at Beattie Gulch in the new documentary by Yellowstone Voices: A Path Forward for the American Bison, we must speak up, not participate in the massive kill.

We have to stop treating these buffalo like they are just meat animals that don’t have a right to roam free on Turtle Island. We’re treating the Buffalo Nation as the Veho (whites) want us to, controlling and destroying these buffalo to appease Montana and the livestock interests – with our help! They want us to forget our ancient relationship and obligations to the Buffalo Nation.

When first joining this issue, I expected powerful native voices who see what is going on to say something. But I came to find out the reality is, people are afraid to say anything as tribal members. We don’t want to fight our own people, but at the same time when it’s our people helping facilitate the destruction of a wild buffalo population, what are we supposed to do? Sit by and let buffalo keep dying because Tribal people have been brain-washed to believe humans are everything and we matter the most? This ‘hunt’ isn’t the right way to reconnect with the Buffalo Nation. They’ve had our back since we made that spiritual connection. Now it’s time we had theirs.

The older I get, the more I understand why our elders tell us to learn our language and culture. When I started being with wild buffalo, things became more clear as to how our ancestors lived their ways of life, copying the Buffalo Nation that kept them going for thousands of years.

Today the Buffalo Nation is like our own Tribal nations…forgotten. Our relationship and connection to them is likewise forgotten — because tribal members are killing pregnant female buffalo and preventing the next generation 0f buffalo from seeing the sun, moon, grass, blue skies, rain, and everything this beautiful Turtle Island has to offer. The Buffalo Nation is looking to tribal nations to help them, not just kill as many as we can because we have treaty rights to do so.

The laws made by men can be unmade by men and now is the time to “un-make” the “management plan” that is decimating wild Buffalo Nation and allow them to once again roam free.

Jaedin Medicine Elk is a co-founder and board president of the Montana-based Roam Free Nation. Jaedin is Northern Cheyenne, a Sundancer and Sacred Pipe Carrier from a traditional Buffalo Culture family.


Videos of reports from public on the meeting

Jaedin Medicine Elk (Roam Free Nation)
Stephanie Seay (Roam Free Nation)
Bonnie Lynn (Yellowstone Voices)
Dagmar Riddle (Earth advocate)

Banner Photo by R Gray on Unsplash

 

Lithium Nevada Sues Tribal Members and Activists

Lithium Nevada Sues Tribal Members and Activists

Editor’s Note: In order to deter the tribal members and activists from fighting for Thacker Pass, Lithium Nevada has sued them. Unsurprisingly, as a corporation, they have greater funds to sustain their legal action. We appeal for all who can to support in whatever way you can. The details for financial donations are at the end of the post.


Lithium Nevada Corporation has filed a lawsuit against Protect Thacker Pass and seven people for opposing the Thacker Pass lithium mine.

The lawsuit is similar to what is called a “Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation,” or SLAPP suit, aimed at shutting down free speech and protest. The suit aims to ban the prayerful land defenders from the area and force them to pay monetary damages which could total millions of dollars.

“This lawsuit is targeting Native Americans and their allies for a non-violent prayer to protect the 1865 Thacker Pass massacre site,” said Terry Lodge, attorney working with the group. “These people took a moral stand in the form of civil disobedience. They are being unjustly targeted with sweeping charges that have little relationship to the truth, and we will vigorously defend them.”

The lawsuit targets Dean Barlese, respected elder and spiritual leader from the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe, Dorece Sam from the Fort McDermitt Paiute-Shoshone Tribe, Bhie-Cie Zahn-Nahtzu (Te-Moak Shoshone and Washoe), Bethany Sam from the Standing Rock Sioux and Kutzadika’a Paiute Tribes, Founding Director of Community Rights US Paul Cienfuegos, and Max Wilbert and Will Falk of Protect Thacker Pass, which is also named in the suit.

They are charged with Civil Conspiracy, Nuisance, Trespass, Tortious Interference with Contractual Relations, Tortious Interference with Prospective Economic Advantage, and Unjust Enrichment.

As part of the lawsuit, Lithium Nevada has been granted a Temporary Restraining Order which restricts the defendants and “any third party acting in concert” with them from interfering with construction, blocking access roads, or even being in the area. The accused parties are not involved in planning further protest activity at the mine site.

Regardless, these allegations are alarming to the Great Basin Native American communities who believe their religious practices are protected by the American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978. The lawsuit’s language places fear in the hearts of Native American people who want to pray and visit their ancestors’ gravesites.

The case references instances of non-violent prayer and protest that took place on April 25th, and a prayer camp named after Ox Sam (survivor of the 1865 massacre and ancestor of Dorece Sam and Dean Barlese) which was established at Thacker Pass on May 11th. On June 8th, that camp was raided and dismantled by police. One young indigenous woman was arrested and transported to jail inside a pitch-black box. In the aftermath of the raid, a ceremonial fire was extinguished, sacred objects were put in trash bags, and tipi poles were broken.

The American Indian Religious Freedom Act states that it is “the policy of the United States to protect and preserve for American Indians their inherent right of freedom to believe, express, and exercise the traditional religion of the American Indian…including…access to sites.”

Dorece Sam, President of the Native American Church of the State of Nevada:

“I take my grandkids to Peehee Mu’huh to teach them to pray for our unburied ancestors whose remains are scattered there, to collect our holy plants, to hunt and fish, and to collect medicinal herbs. The ancestors who were killed at Thacker Pass have never been given the proper prayers for their spirits. Lithium Nevada is desecrating our unceded lands and our ancestors’ resting places.”

Dean Barlese, respected elder and spiritual leader from the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe:

“The Indian wars are continuing in 2023, right here. America and the corporations who control it should have finished off the ethnic genocide, because we’re still here. My great-great-grandfather fought for this land in the Snake War and we will continue to defend the sacred. Lithium Nevada is a greedy corporation telling green lies.”

Bethany Sam:

“Our people couldn’t return to Thacker Pass for fear of being killed in 1865, and now in 2023 we can’t return or we’ll be arrested. Meanwhile, bulldozers are digging our ancestors graves up. This is what Indigenous peoples continue to endure. That’s why I stood in prayer with our elders leading the way.”

Bhie-Cie Zahn-Nahtzu:

“Lithium Nevada is a greedy corporation on the wrong side of history when it comes to environmental racism and desecration of sacred sites. It’s ironic to me that I’m the trespasser because I want to see my ancestral land preserved.”

Paul Cienfuegos:

“Virtually every single accusation against us is a lie, and of course the corporation’s leaders know this. But our actions have scared them, so they are lashing out against classic nonviolent direct-action tactics. And this is yet another prime example of why we need to dismantle the structures of law that grant so many so-called constitutional ‘rights’ to business corporations, like access to the courts.”

Max Wilbert, Protect Thacker Pass:

“Around the world, a land defender is killed every two days. Murdering activists is hard to get away with in the United States, so corporations do this instead. This lawsuit is aimed at destroying the lives of people non-violently defending the land. But we’re not giving up. There are millions of people opposing this mine, and this fight will continue.”

Will Falk:

“I’ve been involved in directly petitioning the courts for two years to enforce tribal rights to consultation without success. Now Paiutes and Shoshones are being sued for peacefully defending the final resting places of their massacred ancestors. Lithium Nevada is just another mining corporation bullying Native Americans once again. This pattern has got to stop.”

Lithium Nevada corporation has been locked in legal battles since 2021, when four environmental groups, a local rancher, and several tribes sued the Federal Government to attempt to overturn the permits for the mine. The suits allege failures of consultation, violation of endangered species law and water laws, and dozens of other infractions. The most recent filing in an ongoing Federal Court case brought by three local tribes was filed on Friday, arguing that Lithium Nevada needs to halt construction while it consults with tribes about the Thacker Pass massacre sites. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in California will hear oral arguments in other cases later this month.

The news comes as Lithium Nevada’s parent corporation, Lithium Americas, has been implicated in four alleged human rights violations and environmental crimes related to their lithium mining operation in Cauchari-Oloroz, Argentina.

The defendants are seeking attorneys to join the legal defense team, and monetary donations to their legal defense fund. You can donate via credit or debit card, PayPal (please include a note that your donation is for Thacker Pass legal defense), or by check.

Lithium Nevada

New Lawsuit Challenging Thacker Pass Mine [Press Release]

New Lawsuit Challenging Thacker Pass Mine [Press Release]

February 17, 2023

Late yesterday, three Native American Tribes — the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony, Burns Paiute Tribe, and Summit Lake Paiute Tribe — launched a major new lawsuit against the Thacker Pass lithium mine.

Will Falk is representing RSIC and SLPT in this lawsuit, and Protect Thacker Pass is providing media support. Please donate to support the case and fund legal costs!

DONATE: https://www.protectthackerpass.org/donations-and-funding/

This new case contains major allegations that were not heard in the prior court case, and may be a significant road block for the mine.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

“This Fight Isn’t Over” – Three Tribes File New Lawsuit Challenging Thacker Pass Lithium Mine

February 17, 2023

RENO, NV — Three Native American tribes have filed a new lawsuit against the Federal Government over Lithium Nevada Corporation’s planned Thacker Pass lithium mine, the latest move in what has become a two-year struggle over mining, greenwashing, and sacred land in northern Nevada.

The lawsuit, filed by the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony, Burns Paiute Tribe, and Summit Lake Paiute Tribe on in Federal District Court on Thursday evening, includes three major allegations.

First, the tribes claim that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) withheld crucial information from the Nevada State Historic Preservation Office and lied about the extent of tribal consultation in order to secure legally-required concurrence about historic properties in Thacker Pass.

Second, the tribes allege that Lithium Nevada, with BLM’s complicity, lied about terminating a set of older permits for mining-related activities in Thacker Pass. Further, the tribes say that the BLM has, without notifying tribes or the public, expanded the scope of previous permit authorizations dozens of times, allowing Lithium Nevada to conduct preliminary mine construction activities that are harming traditional cultural properties in Thacker Pass.

Third, the lawsuit argues that the BLM lied about consulting with Tribes before issuing their Record of Decision, and that the agency has continually refused to acknowledge both oral and written histories presented by the Tribes about the sacredness and cultural significance of Thacker Pass.

In total, the lawsuit asserts that the BLM has violated the Federal Land Policy Management Act, the National Historic Preservation Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act, and is also guilty of Breach of Contract.

This lawsuit comes just one week after Judge Miranda Du ruled largely in favor of Lithium Nevada and the BLM in a prior consolidated case involving claims brought in 2021 by environmental groups, a local rancher, and two Native American tribes (the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony and the Burns Paiute Tribe).

However, that case only considered events and information prior to January 15, 2021, when the BLM issued the Record of Decision (ROD) — the main Federal permit — for the Thacker Pass lithium mine project. Tribal claims were curtailed by this limitation, which blocked key evidence from being heard — evidence that is integral to the new case.

The new lawsuit is also strengthened by the addition of the Summit Lake Paiute Tribe, one of the Tribes that the BLM claims to have consulted with prior to issuing the ROD. Summit Lake and both other tribes the BLM claims to have consulted (the Winnemucca Indian Colony and Fort McDermitt Paiute-Shoshone Tribe) have disputed BLM’s assertion that any consultation took place. (The Winnemucca Indian Colony filed to intervene in the previous court case, but was blocked from taking part by Judge Du, for seeking intervention too late in the case.)

All three litigating tribes hold Thacker Pass, known as “Peehee Mu’huh” in the Paiute language, as a sacred and culturally important site which has been used for gathering edible and medicinal plants, hunting and fishing, conducting ceremonies, camping, and everyday lifeways of Paiute and Shoshone peoples. Many oral histories, passed down for generations among regional Native American communities, tell of the significance of this area.

Thacker Pass is also the site where two massacres of Paiute people took place – one which occurred prior to colonization as part of an inter-tribal raid, and a second which took place on September 12, 1865, when Federal troops massacred between 31 and 50 Paiute men, women, and children in a surprise attack at dawn.

Much of this history has been assembled for the first time in a comprehensive ethnological report commissioned by the Reno Sparks Indian Colony and Summit Lake Paiute Tribe, which is titled “Thacker Pass/Peehee mu’huh: A Living Monument to Numu History and Culture.” The tribes submitted that report to the Department of the Interior on February 3rd as part of an application to list both the 1865 massacre site and the whole of Thacker Pass, which tribes are calling the “Thacker Pass Traditional Cultural District,” under the National Register of Historic Places. (Numu is what the Northern Paiute call themselves.)

Arlan Melendez , Chairman of the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony:
“When the decision was made public on the previous lawsuit last week, we said we would continue to advocate for our sacred site PeeHee Mu’Huh. A place where prior to colonization, all our Paiute Shoshone ancestors lived for countless generations. And is the very same place they were massacred (never laid to rest properly) by the U.S. Calvary. It’s a place where all Paiute Shoshone people continue to pray, gather medicines & food, honor our non-human relatives, honor our water, honor our way of life, honor our ancestors.
Our contention is with the largest lithium mine in country and the expansion of the 40 plus other lithium claims proposed for the State of Nevada. They should have notified all Tribes sooner. The Thacker Pass permitting process was not done correctly. BLM contends they have discretion to decide who to notify or consult with. They only contacted 3 out of the 22 tribes who had significant ties to Thacker Pass.
One of the Biden Administration’s first actions when they took office was to prioritize ‘regular, meaningful, and robust consultation’ with Tribes. That did not happen with Thacker Pass, and we need the Federal Government to make that right. Our history, our culture, our people, and our sacred sites must be protected.”

Diane Teeman, Director, Culture & Heritage Department, Chairperson, Tribal Council, Burns Paiute Tribe:
“Thacker Pass is known as a spiritually powerful place because of the presence of the remains of tribal Ancestors and their spirits. Our Paiute oral history tells us that we Paiutes have lived in this area since before the Cascade Mountains were formed. Our people follow our unwritten traditional tribal laws and philosophy of life which require we respect all other living things including plants, animals, minerals, and so on. Our traditional ways require we live in reciprocity with all other things and never put ourselves as feeble humans above others. For this reason, our unwritten traditional tribal law requires we do everything in our power to protect it. Only the Tribe and its members can speak to the significance of an area to the Tribe.”

Will Falk, attorney representing the RSIC and SLPT:
“BLM fast-tracked its review of the Thacker Pass Lithium Mine Project and was moving so fast, it made a number of mistakes including failing to identify the September 12, 1865 massacre site, even though BLM possessed descriptions of this massacre in its own General Land Office records. The Tribes have notified BLM of the cultural, spiritual, and historical significance of Thacker Pass, but BLM continues to refuse to acknowledge this information. BLM’s failure to acknowledge the information the Tribes have provided about the significance of Thacker Pass was not reviewed by the court in the previous lawsuit. BLM has committed a number of violations of federal law since the original lawsuit was filed in 2021. My clients and I look forward to exposing the tricks BLM has played on the Tribes for the Thacker Pass Project.”

Michon Eben, Tribal Historic Preservation Officer at the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony:
“Part of the Federal Government’s responsibility is to determine if a proposed mining project may adversely affect historic properties. Historic properties include Native American massacre sites. The BLM failed in its trust responsibility to tribes and now our ancestor’s final resting place is currently being destroyed at Peehee Mu’huh. Why is it that when our ancestors’ burials are under threat, its business as usual? We are demanding mutual respect for our dead relatives and their final resting place. The BLM and non-native archeologists do not have the expertise to determine whether a property is of religious or cultural importance to a tribe. Native American tribes are the special experts of our culture and Peehee Mu’huh/Thacker Pass is significant to regional tribes and to American History.”

Shelley Harjo, Fort McDermitt Tribal Member:
“Are we willing to sacrifice sacred sites, health and internal balance for short term economic gains while giant corporations create unmeasurable wealth, deplete resources, and leave our future generations to endure the disorder the Thacker Pass mine would leave behind? I will never believe this is the best method for greener living and nor do many other native people in our area. My elders who have been going up to fish and gather medicine in the Thacker Pass have been followed and harassed by Lithium Nevada’s private security, and now say they don’t feel safe on their own ancestral homeland. This is an unacceptable bullying tactic against elderly women by a foreign mining company that has no business here.”

Max Wilbert, Protect Thacker Pass:
“Global warming is a serious problem and we cannot continue burning fossil fuels, but destroying mountains for lithium is just as bad as destroying mountains for coal. You can’t blow up a mountain and call it green.”

The Thacker Pass lithium mine project has become emblematic of what critics say is a rushed transition to “green energy” that is replicating many of the problems of the fossil fuel industry, resulting in major environmental damage, and harming communities on the frontlines. Opponents of the Thacker Pass say they aren’t arguing in favor of fossil fuels, but in favor of protecting the Earth. Lithium Nevada claims that its lithium mine will be essential to producing batteries for combating global warming, and the Biden administration has previously indicated some support for Thacker Pass. Opponents of the project have called this “greenwashing,” arguing that the project would harm important wildlife habitat and create significant pollution, including greenhouse gas emissions. They say that electric cars are harmful to the planet and a different approach is needed to address the climate crisis.

General Motors recently entered into an offtake agreement with Lithium Americas, the parent company of Lithium Nevada, to purchase a $650 million stake and to buy the lithium that is produced at Thacker Pass. News reports have stated that the agreement is contingent on the results of the previous lawsuit. It is unclear at this time how the new lawsuit will affect GM’s commitment to Thacker Pass.

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