People’s Tribunal seeks to Counter Canadian Pro-Mining Spin

(as first appeared in Upside Down World, June 26 2014)

Guilty of human rights abuses. That was the verdict for Canadian mining companies, after two days of in-depth testimony presented in Montreal, Quebec, to a jury of eight experts from around the world.
 

     The Montreal session of The Permanent People’s Tribunal, held from May 30 to June 1, continued a long history of civil society tribunals that started in Italy in 1979. The mandate of the sessions is to examine situations where “legal systems are unable to guarantee universal and effective respect for human rights.” This particular Tribunal will span two years, with the Latin America session being the first of its regional focuses. The session heard activist testimony from Chile, Honduras, Guatemala, Ecuador and Mexico as well as from Canadian civil society groups.

     So why Montreal?
     Canada is home to over 75% of all registered mining companies and in recent years there has been a concerted push by industry and government to further entrench Canadian mining operations at home and globally. The tribunal helped challenge the PR spin of these companies, and also highlighted the Canadian government’s role in supporting them financially, judicially and politically.

Mining Company Charges
     An adult education facility by the Lachine canal was transformed into a media hub complete with simultaneous translation into English, Spanish and French, a live stream of the proceedings on Concordia University’s website CUTV, ongoing radio and television interviews and rows of people busily working on laptops. In addition to the Latin American witnesses there were approximately 80 attendees comprised mostly of people from eastern Canada and nearby American states. To counter the sombre, often infuriating testimony, the organizers held a cultural event with music and dancing after the second day of testimony. 

Lina Solano Ortiz of Ecuador gives a radio interview.

     The first day heard charges against specific Canadian mining companies. These charges were grouped into three categories: the right to a healthy environment, the right to self determination and the right to full citizenship. Quebec educator Paul Cliche, acting as the prosecutor, explained that the cases being represented should be understood as “emblematic” and mere “examples of systemic issues” in the practises and governance of mining operations.
     Among those testifying about health and environmental concerns was Pedro Landa, the Coordinator of the Human and Environmental Rights program at the Honduran Center for the Promotion of Community Development (CEHPRODEC), along with Carlos Amador, a member of the Environmental Committee of the Valle de Siria in Honduras. They described how Goldcorp’s San Martin mine (which has been closed since 2008) continues to cause dire health problems for surrounding communities due to water contamination. Amador explained that Goldcorp’s mine is “destroying the dignity of our towns.” 

     Oscar Morales, coordinator of the Committee in Defense of Life and Peace, provided testimony and pages of evidence outlining the numerous “consultas” (traditional public opinion polls) that have unanimously rejected mining in his area of Guatemala. Mining companies such as Tahoe Resources, with their Escobal mine, have continued to operate without community approval, a direct violation of the right to free, prior and informed consent. 

Oscar Morales of Guatemala shows the results
of a recent consulta on mining.

     Lina Solano Ortiz, founder of the Front of Women Defenders of Pachamama, Ecuador, discussed the "masculinisation" of communities around mine sites. She outlined the changing dynamic of many women’s lives when a mine opens and noted that, “food sovereignty is sustained largely by women [but] when the economy shifts from agriculture and animal husbandry to mining, they become more dependent on men to support the families.” This subservient role may also lead to prostitution as groups of mainly single male mine workers move into small communities. Rising inequality has a disenfranchising effect on women both economically and politically.
     From Mexico, Dante Lopez and Juan Rodriguez spoke of unsafe working conditions and union busting activities at the La Platosa mine run by Excellon Resources and Jose Luis Abarca discussed the social conflict and repression surrounding Blackfire Exploration’s Payback mine, which culminated in the assassination of his father, Mariano Abarca.

State Actions
     Many of the companies accused of human rights abuses during the hearings also have contested mines in other parts of the world. In order to acknowledge the similarities between the practises of various companies, the Tribunal dedicated the second day to examining the role of government in permitting the global spread of mining companies. Their goal was to answer the question, "How is Canada supporting the expansion of the global mining industry?"
     The charges against the Canadian state included interference in the legislative process, financial support and gaps in access to justice. From the testimonies, it became clear that the host states were also at fault. Thus, the jury found that both Canadian and Latin American states are guilty, saying that they have “by act and omission … failed in their obligation to protect human rights and to prevent and sanction violations, particularly those related to Canadian mining companies.” 

     Nancy Yañez, a lawyer and professor at the University of Chile, gave testimony on how free trade agreements are overriding the rights of indigenous peoples as enshrined in international treaties such as the UN's International Labour Organization convention 169 (ILO 169). As she noted, “The right to self determination is fundamental to allow all other rights. But this is being limited by international agreements.” The result is a privileging of economic rights over democratic rights.
     Pedro Landa described specific government actions in recent years. He believes that the Canadian government required Honduras to change its laws on mining before the recent Canada/Honduras free trade agreement was finalized. Due to public outcry, there had been a moratorium on metallic mining in place since 2006 but the new law allows open pit mining such as Goldcorp’s San Martin mine to resume.
     The state's unwavering financial support through government corporations such as Export Development Canada and the Canada Pension Plan, as well as the negligible supervision of the financial markets, have provided loans, insurance and a source of equity that are not contingent on a company's adherence to internationally agreed upon best practises. These financial structures led Quebec professor and author Alain Deneault to describe Canada as being the “haven of choice for the world’s mining industries.”
     Those “gaps in access to justice” also prevent individuals or communities outside of Canada from laying charges against mining companies. Osgoode Hall Law School professor Shin Imai argued that these cases should be heard in the company’s home country rather than the host country. However, Imai went on to explain the two main obstacles to bringing a case to court in Canada: the enormous costs and the fact that “none of [the large law firms] can touch any of the cases because they have mining clients.” This leaves small firms that focus on social justice to take on the cases for distant plaintiffs.

The Verdict
     After two days of testimonies, the jury members delivered their verdict and found the following companies guilty of human rights abuses:
· Barrick Gold and its subsidiary Nevada Spa Mining
· Goldcorp and its subsidiary Entre Mares
· Tahoe Resources and its subsidiary Minera San Rafael
· S.A., Blackfire Exploration and its subsidiary Blackfire Exploration México S.A. de C.V.
· Excellon Resources Inc. and its subsidiary Excellon de México S.A. de C.V.

Pedro Landa of Honduras with jury member Gianni Tognoni.

     The jury included Maude Barlow, National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians, Mireille Fanon-Mendès-France, President of the Frantz Fanon Foundation in France, Viviane Michel, former Director of the Innu Nation of Quebec Native Women, Javier Mujica Petit, author and President of the Center for Public Policy and Human Rights in Peru and Gianni Tognoni, the Secretary General of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal.
     The jury also found that “The Canadian state and the countries in which these companies are operating are also at fault for not having prevented and for having facilitated, tolerated or covered up these human rights violations.” However, the jury was careful to reaffirm that “Canadian mining expansion in Latin America would not have been possible without the promotion and direct involvement of the Canadian state.”
     Although this session of the Montreal Permanent People’s Tribunal was only dedicated to Latin America, the resounding guilty verdict, and the round of applause that followed, is a clear message of Canadian disapproval. Concurrently, the rise of land defence movements such as Idle No More and anti-pipeline groups, as well as organizations calling for divestment from mining companies is turning an increasingly critical eye on the industry and state. Just as Barrick Gold, once one of the world’s largest gold companies, has recently lost some of its sheen and been forced to restructure, so too is the status quo within Canada being challenged from at home and abroad.

(all photos by the author)

Toxic Neighbours

A Tour of Aamjiwnaang First Nation and the Petrochemical Plants Around it

(article first appeared on the Toronto Media Co-op's site, May 14 2014)

The borders of Aamjiwnaang have been reduced over the years to where they are currently, just over 12 km². A large portion cutting into the community's scenic waterfront area is now home to one of Suncor's refineries. Its numerous smoke stacks and flares tower over the surrounding trees. While standing on the road near the plant, the smell is formidable. So is the noise. Most of the industries in the area operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. There is no respite for your ears or nose and lungs. By the time the Toxic Tour got to the main entrance of Suncor, about an hour into our walk, my head was already pounding.

The community youth group, ASAP (Aamjiwnaang and Sarnia Against Pipelines), lead by Vanessa Gray, organized a disparate group of about 40 people on a tour to show what daily life on the reserve is like. The walk began at the Maawn Doosh Gumig Community and Youth Centre and worked its way to the St. Clair River, around a refinery and back to the centre. Participants held banners saying "Demand more from your Ministry of the Environment", "Cancer Alley" and two large snake puppets. The snakes, one blue and shiny, the other black and dripping represented the two combating forces of clean water and oil products being transported through the many existing and proposed pipelines.

A small road branches off Vidal St., the main road along the river, and wraps around the side of Suncor's refinery. The facility was modified in 2008 to refine heavier crude oil that is shipped in from the tar sands. There among the stacks and enormous holding tanks is the graveyard currently in use by the Aamjiwnaang community. It is surrounded by Suncor on two sides, a highway on another and the site of Suncor's proposed ethanol plant on the fourth. There is very little room left for the community to continue keeping families and loved ones together. Norm, a member of the ASAP group, explained that although this is the graveyard currently in use, traditional burial sites were all along both sides of the St. Clair. Many were disrupted by the construction of industry and the large Blue Water Bridge which connects Ontario to Michigan. Lindsay Gray, shouting to be heard, explained that in addition to past graves being unearthed, the constant noise of the machines and regular sirens prohibit the gravesite from being a serene place for her ancestors. She asks the rhetorical question, "Whatever happened to rest in peace? Is this respectful?"

In 2004, the community succeeded in stopping Suncor's plans to build what would have been one of North America's largest ethanol refineries. The proposal was a tipping point and caused them to rally together to prevent another facility being built next-door to their houses. For days Aamjiwnaang members blockaded the road in protest. The pressure helped persuade Suncor to utilize an alternative site further to the south by Mooretown.

As the tour moved along, Zak, a resident of Sarnia and independent environmental monitor, pointed to an area along the road that crosses Talfourd Creek and leads back into Aamjiwnaang. It was recently discovered that an underground benzene pipeline had been slowly leaking. The cleanup is ongoing and orange plastic fences now block off the areas. Benzene is one of many aromatic hydrocarbons that have been leaked into the ground and air all too frequently. It is also considered a human carcinogen, being a cause of leukemia and other cancers. In 2009, Imperial Oil had an accident in which a "material containing benzene" was released causing a shelter-in-place order for residents in the extended perimeter of the plant. More recently, in 2013, a tanker ship unloading at the dock of Lanxess spilled four to five gallons of ethyl benzene into the St. Clair River.

But those are considered accidents. Regular, government approved, emissions from many of the factories contain a host of chemicals. The World Health Organization released a report in 2011 that charted air quality in urban settings around the world. Sarnia registered the most polluted air in Canada. Although the individual plant's emissions are bad but usually within the Ministry of Environment's parameters, the individual facilities do not operate in a vacuum. The pollution from the area's 60+ factories is combined; the cumulative effect is a problem that Aamjiwnaang community members are concerned about. So concerned that in 2011 they started a law suit.

Ada Lockridge  and Ron Plain together with lawyers from Ecojustice, filed a suit against the Ontario Government claiming their Charter Rights are being violated, in particular their, "rights to life, liberty and security of the person, and the right to equality". Ecojustice explains the case by saying the community members "believe that Ontario must consider the cumulative impacts of pollution in Chemical Valley before approving more toxic emissions".

There has yet to be an exhaustive study of the impact air borne and water pollution has on the community. But some things have been well documented, such as the skewed birth ratio of two girls being born for every one boy. This anomaly is attributed to hormone disrupting chemicals such as PCBs, dioxins and pesticides, some of which are now banned but can remain in the environment for years.

Also, high levels of mercury have been found in the blood and urine of some Aamjiwnaang members and a community led survey reported asthma levels in adults and children far exceeding that of surrounding communities. Many of the health and environmental studies which show these results state that a link to the industry present all around Aamjiwnaang cannot be definitively made. It is an argument I can understand rationally but as I was standing with my headache, in the stink of Suncor, reading the warning sign posted at Talfourd Creek and hearing Vanessa say that when she was growing up, all the kids played in the creek, it was impossible for me not to make the connection between the industry and the negative health effects.

The charter challenge with Ecojustice is slowly making its way through the legal system. Suncor, one of the companies cited, has been tapping into their immense capital reserves to mobilize lawyers who are fighting the charge at every stage. It will be a long battle but in the mean time, members of Aamjiwnaang are living in what Lindsay sees as “chemical warfare”, an extension of Canada's genocidal policies toward First Nations.

My hotel was north, along the St. Clair River, where the air does not stink and the cargo ships that glide along the horizon are like the industry to the south; a distant spectacle. I considered the history of the Blue Water community which was situated between Sarnia and Aamjiwnaang. It began in the 1940’s as housing for chemical plant workers and grew into a town of its own, reaching a peak population of over 2,000 people. But in 1966 the community was disbanded and all the residents relocated, largely to the north end of Sarnia, due to “health and safety concerns”.

It seems unjust to find a town full of factory employees too dangerous to live in, while the Native reserve just down the road is left to gasp for air and parents tell their children ‘don’t touch the water’. North Sarnia, with its lush golf course, yachts, and luxury cars reminds me that the petrochemical industry can be lucrative to some but toxic to many others.

Garifuna Women Stake their Claim

Garifuna land along the north coast of Honduras is experiencing an unprecedented development rush. Tourism projects financed by state and international capital such as that of Canada's 'Porn King' Randy Jorgensen with his 'Banana Coast' project, sprawling African palm plantations, as well as the expansion of neighboring urban centers are increasingly usurping ancestral, communally held lands. The community of Triunfo de la Cruz is actively resisting these encroachments by asserting their collective right to the land using legal channels as well as physically occupying the perimeter lands to maintain current borders.

The women's agrarian collective, the Voice of Women, is one such group that is holding back encroachments. A group of 22 women maintain as many plots of land which they have cleared and are cultivating yucca plants on. Much of this area in included in a land dispute between the community and the Honduran government. In 2003 residents initiated a case with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) which claimed the government was negligent in its duty to protect the ancestral Garifuna land as well as not acquiring free, prior and informed consent for the current developments in and around their community. Some of these developments are the Micos and Marbella tourism projects, as well as a large nature reserve, all of which severely restrict, if not completely remove, the land from Garifuna control and usage. The case is slowly working its way through the system with the latest milestone being the 2013 acceptance by the IACHR to hear the case in its courts. The community is now preparing the evidence needed to argue their case as well as raising funds to cover the costs of sending members to Costa Rica where the case will eventually be heard.

Sisters Beatrice and Olivia are two of the women who work plots in the women's collective and have testified before the IACHR. Olivia’s nickname within the community is "Mother Earth", a nod to her dedication to the protection of their land. The two women and the other collective members work long hours on their plots, weeding and nurturing the plants but many must travel a maze of roads to access the land.

Teresa, a member of the collective as well as a founding member of the community’s land defense committee, leads the group I was part of to a small gate in the high cider block fences. Inside are armed private security guards in the employ of the absentee investors. Many large buildings have been constructed within the cordoned off lands despite the ongoing dispute over land title. The women’s determination to continue working their fields and the daily trek along the circuitous roads, past the guards, in and of itself, is an act of defiance. 

However, not all of the fences that are built remain standing. During our visit, a new barbwire fence had been strung up blocking off the beach from the fields. Members of the women’s collective, who believe it was built by workers of the Marbella project, assert that they are illegal and use their sharp machetes to chop down the support posts. The fence will soon be rebuilt but the women's act is another way of resisting the incursions.

As well as the coastal tourism projects, the expansion of African palm plantations is putting pressure on the community from further inland. Honduran millionaire Miguel Facusse, through his extensive Dinant Corporation, holds contested titles to large swaths of land in the northern part of the country. Most of this land is used to grow African palm, the oil of which is used in a wide variety of processed foods and to a lesser extend in the manufacture of biodiesel. Many of the plantation’s processing facilities are also part of the international carbon credit trading industry. This seemingly 'eco-friendly' initiative ignores the fact that the promotion of non-native, monoculture plantations is irreparably damaging the soil in addition to the land disputes both within coastal Garifuna communities and areas such as the Bajo Aguan where numerous activist campesinos have been assassinated.

Conversely, the yucca that the collective grows is a native plant and they employ organic farming techniques. Additionally, it is largely for consumption within the community itself. A small portion will be sold to neighbouring communities but most ends up at the public kitchen back in the centre of Triunfo de la Cruz. The kitchen is a small brick building with ventilation holes blackened by the coal fired stoves that burn within. There, women dry, grind, then fry the yucca, making cassava bread. The community was connected to the electricity grid only in 1980 but access to machinery is still limited resulting in most of the work being done manually.

The Voice of Women collective is held up as an example of not only how to resist land usurpation, but as a means of establishing food sovereignty. A resident of nearby Sambo Creek praised the women’s collective and described her desire to establish a similar one, saying, “They have crops and food and they don’t have to buy their yucca, or cassava bread or plantains. Not like here, where we have to buy everything”¹. Her community is also struggling with land loss despite a favourable State ruling in 2003. A model such as the Voice of Women could be a way to maintain the land conceded back to the community as well as feeding them.

Teresa shrugs off the notion that the women in the agrarian collective, such as herself, are leading the land reclamation fight, saying, “It’s part of our (Garifuna) culture, women are in all our struggles”. Certainly in Triunfo de la Cruz, the women are making their resistance known.

¹ as quoted in Brondo, Keri Vacanti, (2010) “When Mestizo Becomes (Like) Indio… or is it Garifuna? Multicultural Rights and “Making Place” on Honduras’ North Coast”. Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology. Vol. 15, No. 1, page 189