by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Feb 23, 2012 | Colonialism & Conquest, Indigenous Autonomy, Mining & Drilling
By Survival International
Security forces are cracking down on the Dongria Kondh tribe as they prepare for a religious festival this weekend at the top of India’s most contentious mountain.
Hundreds are determined to attend the Niyamraja ritual in the sacred Niyamgiri Hills, which are at the center of a controversial mining project involving UK company Vedanta Resources.
During the worship, the Dongria will take an oath pledging never to leave the mountain, which faces renewed threats as companies eye its valuable resources.
The Dongria have fought hard to resist such advances, but speaking out against proposed mining continues to be dangerous.
Survival has received reports of arrests and beatings, and in the last week alone, police have shut down six meetings where food supplies were being organized for this weekend’s festival.
Giridhari Patra from the Niyamgiri Protection Committee said, ‘Intimidating and threatening the Dongria before one of their most important festivals is unforgivable. The mountain is the seat of their god and the basis of their identity. We will never give it up to Vedanta.’
The tribe’s victory in 2010 over the mining giant, which wanted to dig an open-pit mine to reach the mountain’s aluminum-ore deposits, was historic.
However, their way of life is once again in danger as the controversy is reconsidered by India’s highest court on April 9 this year.
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said today, ‘It’s disgraceful that the police are harassing tribespeople in the run up to this religious festival. Niyamgiri is everything to the Dongria Kondh – they must be allowed to remain there. The Dongria’s victory over Vedanta was inspiring for tribal people around the world. All eyes will be on the Supreme Court this April.’
From Survival International: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/8125
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Feb 12, 2012 | Colonialism & Conquest, Indigenous Autonomy
By Indian Country Today staff
The Navajo call them Doko’oo’sliid, or “Shining On Top.” To the Hopi, the peaks are Nuvatukaovi, or “The Place of Snow on the Very Top.” Whatever name they bear, the San Francisco Peaks are sacred to no less than 13 tribes. So Thursday’s decision by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to allow Arizona Snowbowl to make artificial snow out of wastewater is a serious blow to Native American religious beliefs.
Tribes use the peaks for various ceremonies for healing, well-being, balance, commemoration, passages and the world’s water and life cycles.
The Navajo believe the Creator placed them between four mountains: Blanca Peak in Colorado, Mount Taylor in New Mexico, the San Francisco Peaks in Arizona and Hesperus Peak in Colorado. The San Francisco Peaks are the sacred mountains to the west of the Navajo homeland.
The Sacred Land Film Project points out that Navajos collect herbs from the slopes of the peaks and bury the umbilical cords of their children there.
A website dedicated to Navajo religion explains how Navajo beliefs differ from those held by Christians. “In contrast to the Judeo Christian religions which tend to celebrate people and events, and thus can be practiced anywhere, the Navajo religion is founded on relationships to specific places. The Navajo religion is defined by and cannot be separated from its relationship to specific geographical places. These sites are sacred because of special religious events which have occurred in that particular site.”
Ernie Zah, spokesman for Navajo Nation President Ben Shelly, said the decision February 9 was “a disappointment. Although the San Francisco Peaks are not within our reservation, they are within our traditional boundaries, within our realm of dwelling, and we make offerings on the Peaks, we have prayers and songs that incorporate not only the San Francisco Peaks but all elements of life, and this court decision to potentially allow the use of reclaimed water to generate snow negates our inherited traditional foundations.”
Lloyd Thompson, a Navajo medicine man, explained to the Navajo Times in 2002 that religious understanding isn’t extended to Native Americans. “If we (Navajo people) took sewer water and put it on Mount Sinai, we’d be put in jail, fined, and maybe even attacked,” he said. Mount Sinai is the site where Moses is said to have received the Ten Commandments from God. He also told the Navajo Times that the sewer water that would be used isn’t just contaminated with human waste but also with body parts and blood from hospitals and mortuaries.
Native American sacred sites aren’t like churches, mosques or synagogues where people can worship without interference because those buildings are owned privately. Many sacred sites are on federal land. A 2005 High Country News article discusses this aspect and asks “Can federal lands still be sacred?”
In the article Joe Shirley Jr., then-president of the Navajo Nation, said: “To Native Americans, desecrating the San Francisco Peaks with wastewater is like flushing the Koran down the toilet.”
Read more from Indian Country Today: http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2012/02/10/sacred-site-faces-legalized-desecration-from-arizona-snowbowl-wastewater-97050
