Saturday, June 30, 2018

COLONIALISM: Zero Tolerance


Today, this morning in the dawn's early light, standing before the Northwest Detention Center at Tacoma, Washington in the Traditional Territories of the Nisqually Nation, a commission of Indigenous Peoples presented themselves in the spirit of ceremony and self-determination.

Standing before the gates of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement ICE detention center, which is run by the for-profit Geo Group, the call was made to the families inside the compound, families of the thousands of children who have been separated from their mothers and fathers over the past month since the ICE pogrom of persecution called "Zero Tolerance" by US Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

Today the sea of emergence crested in power and prayer, and the tide turned. 
 

The Indigenous Peoples returned to their traditional lands in Tacoma to welcome and greet the relatives from the south detained by the force of state power in illegal violation of Treaty Rights, Human Rights, Indigenous Peoples Rights, Rights of the Family and the Rights of the Child.  Affirming that "As Indigenous Peoples, we are not immigrants in our own continent," the delegation shared their vision of a renewed relationship of respect, equality, and self-determination among all peoples of Mother Earth.



In order for such an initiative to take root, grow and flourish the constituency of Indigenous Peoples in direct action of self-determination proclaimed to the world the end of the age of colonialism has come to the state of Washington.

Today the commission of Indigenous Peoples attending the Protecting Mother Earth Conference at Frank's Landing proclaimed at the gates of the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma that the illegal normalization of colonialism will be challenged now, again and forevermore as long as the grass grows and the rivers flow.


The challenge to the normalization of  525 years of colonialism and white supremacy across the continent of the Great Turtle Island Abya Yala [Americas] will be met in peaceful purpose and prayer as many times as necessary with ZERO TOLERANCE.






This preliminary study establishes that the Doctrine of Discovery has been institutionalized in law and policy, on national and international levels, and lies at the root of the violations of indigenous peoples’ human rights, both individual and collective. This has resulted in State claims to and the mass appropriation of the lands, territories and resources of indigenous peoples. Both the Doctrine of Discovery and a holistic structure that we term the Framework of Dominance have resulted in centuries of virtually unlimited resource extraction from the traditional territories of indigenous peoples. This, in turn, has resulted in the dispossession and impoverishment of indigenous peoples, and the host of problems that they face today on a daily basis.







June 30, 2018 Northwest Detention Center -Tacoma, Washington Traditional Territories of the Nisqually Nation - Commission of Indigenous Peoples present themselves in the spirit of ceremony and self-determination.


 

Thursday, June 7, 2018

Mexico: Alliance of Indigenous Self Determination Councils Formed




La Jornada
Friday June 1, 2018, p. 6
Emir Olivares Alonso

 "We undertake the task of rebuilding our way of life"


Faced with the "lack of credibility" of the partisan proposals, the indigenous communities of the municipalities of Cherán, Michoacán; Oxchuc, Chiapas, and Ayutla de los Libres, Guerrero, have formed an alliance to build new forms of plural and participatory self government through their traditional "uses and customs".

In a conference, representatives of the councils of these Pueblos demanded respect for their forms of organization and construction of their governing bodies, based on their collective rights that as original communities of Indigenous Peoples which are guaranteed by the Constitution, as well as international agreements and treaties.





"Based on the exercise of indigenous rights backed by the second constitutional article, the peoples of Mexico undertake the task of rebuilding our way of life as original communities, in exercise of our right of self-determination."

They criticized the fact that the PRI candidate for the Presidency, José Antonio Meade, expressed himself in referring to the case of Nestora Salgado of the indigenous pueblo of Olinalá, Guerrero, México, with a negative comment regarding the role of the Olinalá community police, self-defense groups or indigenous guards.

"Our community security systems respond to the inefficiency of federal, state and municipal governments to give us peace. These security initiatives of our peoples have legitimate legal foundation.

"Therefore, we demand respect for our own forms of government, we ratify the determination to guide the communities under our traditions and customs," they said.

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Without Indigenous Consultation There Can Be No Treaty


Today, from the legal point of view, it can be categorically stated that if there is no Indigenous Consultation in Mexico there can be no total or partial renegotiation of the NAFTA that could be deemed valid.  Without the meaningful participation of the Indigenous Peoples of Mexico, there is a set of national and international standards that make the total or partial renegotiation of NAFTA legally impossible.





Entrevista con Gabriel Méndez López,
asesor legal con la Comisión de Paz del Pueblo Tzeltal Maya, Oxchuc, Chiapas, México.

SOUNDCLOUD

Retos y Alianzas,Responsabilidades y Derechos, Historia y Destino.



Saturday, June 2, 2018

Trade Talks, Trade Wars: Colonization and Terracide


Beyond the issue of the war over tariffs on imports of steel and soft wood lumber between the US and Canada, underlying the issues of subsidy, expropriation and exploitation of labor from Mexico in violation of the terms of Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization specifically as regards the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as Migrant Workers with Families, the call by USVP Pence for a “sunset clause” in the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) which has shut down the trade talks under way behind closed doors, none of the three governments of the Mexico-US-Canada have addressed the fundamental issues of colonization, genocide, and TERRACIDE that are being advanced via the “modernization” of NAFTA under the concept of “development”.

Colonization was declared an illegal violation of international law by UN General Assembly Resolution 1514 on December 14, 1960.

Today, the global geopolitical realities no longer allow for the invasion, expropriation, exploitation and destruction of the territories, resources, and labor of the Original Nations of Indigenous Peoples to be called colonization.

It is called development, and the manufacturing of consent for such regimes of corporate colonization is what and why the Trump Turbulence is so effective to distract from the fight on the ground, the fight against the final plans of annihilation of Indigenous Peoples as Original Nations of Abya Yala [America] with the inherent right of Self Determination unto the Future Generations and in defense of the TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY of MOTHER EARTH.

WE DENY CONSENT!

Against oppression: RESISTANCE!
Against suppression: REBELLION!
Against repression: REGENERATION!

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Rights of Nature and Mother Earth:
Rights Based Law for Systemic Change


 
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The Indigenous Network on Economies and Trade argued that Canada's policy of not recognizing aboriginal treaty rights [in the Canadian-US softwood lumber dispute] was a form of a cash subsidy, a real cash subsidy, because the only thing that the World Trade Organization and North American Free Trade Agreement recognizes is cash subsidies — nothing else, no 'intangibles'. And the WTO actually accepted our amicus curiae submissions three times.
And when we made the same application to NAFTA, the Canadian government, the Quebec, Ontario governments and the forestry ministry launched a joint objection against us, hiring a law firm in Washington DC to fight us on this issue, saying that we had nothing extra to contribute to this discussion on trade subsidies.
And NAFTA still accepted our submission, even after those objections.
In a way, it says that aboriginal peoples are subsidizing Canada, because no matter where it is in the world, industry is supposed to pay for all the resources it gets in order to process them North American companies that have assumed that, under the colonial doctrines of discovery, that it can take from the indigenous peoples without paying a dime for the trees and that's part of the poverty that indigenous peoples are suffering. There's no remuneration, so there's a whole idea of economic subsidy that's involved in this.
Arthur Manuel at a McGill University lecture titled "Canada, a Pariah State? Indigenous rights in Domestic and International Law."

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MEXICO:

No Indigenous Consultation, No NAFTA

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TONATIERRA

CONCLUSION 

We call upon the ministers of government at all levels of Canada-US-Mexico and the public constituencies of their respective societies to address without prejudice or discrimination the above clarifications. We assert that these clarifications command rectification of the crime of colonialism and a moratorium on all NAFTA economic development projects impacting the territories of the Nations and Pueblos of Indigenous Peoples until the right of Free, Prior and Informed Consent of the Indigenous Peoples is fully recognized, respected, and protected in the spirit of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, as follows:

“Affirming that Indigenous Peoples are equal to all other peoples,…..”