By Edward Helmore / The Observer As she stands among villagers in the highlands of western Panama, their chosen leader, Silvia Carrera, is an image of bucolic harmony. Then Carrera, elected chief or general cacique of the Ngäbe-Buglé community, gestures to a woman who hands her a bag of spent US riot-control equipment – rubber … Continue reading Village chief in Panama vows to continue resistance against mining interests→
By Social Science and Humanities Research Centre Indigenous people around the world are among the most vulnerable to climate change and are increasingly susceptible to the pathogen loads found in potable water after heavy rainfall or rapid snow melt. These are the preliminary findings of Sherilee Harper, a Vanier Canada Graduate Scholar in Aboriginal People’s … Continue reading Indigenous peoples suffering water pollution due to climate change→
By Dominic Brown The Lower Omo Valley in south-western Ethiopia is a vast and rugged region of mountains and valleys, inhabited largely by nomadic agro-pastoralist tribes numbering some 200,000 people. Many live a simple existence, living in straw thatched huts and have little contact with the outside world. But the Ethiopian government’s new found appetite … Continue reading Forcible removal of indigenous Ethiopians taking place for sake of sugar industry→
By Jeremy Hance / Mongabay Last October indigenous groups, local people, and domestic NGOs formed the Save Sarawak’s Rivers Network to fight the planned construction of a dozen dams in the Malaysian state on the island of Borneo. The coalition opposes the dam-building plans, known as the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (SCORE) initiative, due … Continue reading Activists form alliance to stop dam-building on Borneo→
A feature-length, multi-award winning documentary by Native American filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin set in the thick of the armed confrontation between Native American Mohawks and Canadian government forces during the 1990 standoff in the Mohawk village of Kanehsatake near the village of Oka in Quebec. The two-and-a-half month ordeal received brief national attention when the Mohawk … Continue reading Video: Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance→
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 … Continue reading Court rules that ski resort can violate sacred mountains with wastewater snow→
By Chris Arsenault Despite living just 90km from a massive diamond mine, Jackie Hookimaw Witt has watched poverty tear at the fabric of Attawapiskat, an indigenous community in northern Canada. The northern Ontario community made international headlines recently, when the chief declared a state of emergency, as many houses lacked heating during frozen winters, and … Continue reading First Nations people suffer extreme poverty as corporations plunder traditional land→
By Tanya Talaga / Toronto Star When members of Wahgoshig First Nation spotted a drilling crew on what they say is a sacred burial site, they demanded to know who the strangers were and what they were doing. The Wahgoshig, whose Algonquin reserve of 19,239 acres is 113 km east of Timmins, running south from … Continue reading Wahgoshig First Nation wins injunction against corporate gold drillers→
By Survival International Judges in Brazil have allowed a Guarani community to stay on its ancestral land, which it reoccupied having been forced to live in a makeshift camp for over a year and a half. The judges have suspended an eviction order which threatened to force the Indians to leave their land and face … Continue reading Judges allow Indians to remain on ancestral land→
By Survival International A week-long protest ended violently on Sunday after police moved in on a group of Ngobe-Buglé Indians in the Chiriquí province of western Panama. Protestors had blockaded part of the Pan-American Highway, the main transport link connecting the Americas. But on Sunday the police moved in with tear-gas, forcing the crowds to … Continue reading Two dead and 40 injured in Panama police attack→