Courts

By Wirikuta Defense Front The federal courts have definitively granted the suspension of the violations claimed by the Wixarika (Huichol) People in order that no exploitation permit be granted for the La Luz mining project, in the Municipality of Catorce in San Luis Potosí, so long as the core issue remains unresolved. Given the failure of the Mexican government to guarantee their human rights and with the immovable objective of the integral protection of the sacred territory of Wirikuta, given the agroindustrial and metalurgical mining threats, the Wixarika people presented the judiciary with an injunction for legal protection demanding respect for the rights that the Mexican government had committed itself to protect at the national and international levels. ...

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. ...

By ICTMN Staff The Alaska Native group REDOIL has joined with eight environmental groups in an effort to stop a drilling ship from drilling in Arctic waters, the Associated Press reports. The drilling ship Noble Discoverer, operating for Shell Oil, was granted an air quality permit by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to drill three exploratory wells in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska’s northwest coast this summer. REDOIL (Resisting Environmental Destruction on Indigenous Lands) has joined Alaska Wilderness League, Center for Biological Diversity, Natural Resources Defense Council, Northern Alaska Environmental Center, Oceana, Pacific Environment, Sierra Club and The Wilderness Society in suing the 9th Circuit Court. ...

By Amazon Defense Coalition With its options dwindling and the mistakes of its legal team mounting, Chevron has suffered another courtroom setback in its eleventh-hour attempt to block indigenous rainforest communities from enforcing their $18 billion judgment against the oil giant´s assets around the world. A three-judge appellate panel in Ecuador on Friday ruled that a Chevron request for a special bond waiver had no basis in Ecuadorian law, thereby paving the way for the commencement of enforcement actions. Chevron has stripped its assets from Ecuador, forcing the rainforest communities to consider standard judgment collection lawsuits against the oil giant in other countries. ...

By Reuters France asked the European Commission on Monday to suspend authorization to plant Monsanto’s genetically modified (GM) MON810 corn, the environment ministry said, as the country seeks to keep a ban on GM crops despite losing court rulings. France banned in 2008 the growing of MON810 corn, the only GM crop approved for planting in the European Union, citing environmental risks. Its highest court ruled against the ban in November, following a similar decision by the European Court of Justice last September, leading the government to say it would look at all ways to maintain the freeze on GM planting. ...

By Reuters The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday handed a victory to corporations and a political advocacy group by allowing them to spend freely before Montana’s 2012 elections, a follow-up case to the court’s major campaign finance ruling two years ago. The justices granted a request from the three plaintiffs to put on hold a December decision by the Montana Supreme Court that upheld a century-old state law banning independent corporate campaign spending. ...

By The Associated Press A US federal judge in Seattle has declined to immediately restrain the activities of the Sea Shepherd anti-whaling group. Judge Richard Jones said he would issue a written ruling later, but that he’s inclined to deny a request for a preliminary injunction made by Japanese whalers against the Washington state-based Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. The whalers - the Institute for Cetacean Research - said the Sea Shepherd group has attacked and rammed their ships off Antarctica during the whaling season, and asked the judge to order them to stop. Some of the clashes have been shown on the Whale Wars reality TV show. ...

By Reuters A French court on Monday declared U.S. biotech giant Monsanto guilty of chemical poisoning of a French farmer, a judgment that could lend weight to other health claims against pesticides. In the first such case heard in court in France, grain grower Paul Francois, 47, says he suffered neurological problems including memory loss, headaches and stammering after inhaling Monsanto’s Lasso weedkiller in 2004. He blames the agri-business giant for not providing adequate warnings on the product label. ...

By John Tirman / Alternet The plea bargain in the last Haditha massacre case handed down in January is a fitting end to the Iraq war. In the most notorious case of U.S. culpability in Iraqi civilian deaths, no one will pay a price. And that is emblematic of the entire war and its hundreds of thousands of dead and millions displaced. Sergeant Frank Wuterich, the squad leader who encouraged and led his marines to kill 24 civilians in the Iraqi town of Haditha in November 2005, was the last of eight originally charged in the massacre. The others were let off on technicalities, or to help the prosecution. One officer, not involved in the killing but the coverup, was acquitted in a military trial. ...

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. ...