PERU:  More on global investors, including Canada Pension Plan, making a killing on mining investments.  There are few or no laws to hold these companies and investors accountable …
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PERU: VIOLENCE TARGETS ANTI-MINING ACTIVISTS
by Jennifer Moore, jenmoore0901@gmail.com, 07 December 2009, http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/2244/1/
[As of March 31, 2009, the Canada Pension Plan had $3,000,000 invested in the Zijin Mining Group of China: http://www.cppib.ca/files/PDF/Foreign_Equity_Holdings_March31_2009_ENG.pdf.  Do you know where your investments are?]
Local leaders call for dialogue and a full investigation after two campesinos were killed by police in north-western Peru last week.  On Wednesday afternoon, Vicente Robledo Ramírez, aged 55 and father of eight children, and Castulo Correa Huayama, aged 36 and father of six, were shot dead in a confrontation with national police. Another six campesinos were wounded and two detained. The police report that they also sustained several wounded, but further details have not been released.
Over the weekend, a reported 2,000 campesinos turned out to mourn the death of the men in the remote rural province of Huancabamba where campesinos have been opposing a Chinese and UK owned mine for the last six years. The Rio Blanco project is principally owned by the Chinese Zijin Consortium together with the UK's Monterrico Metals.
Juan Amancio Romero, son of Vicente, asked authorities “to investigate what took place and to respect the decisions of the people who don't want the mine to continue in the area, nor a NGO or police.”
The Front for the Sustainable Development of the Northern Border of Peru (FDSFNP by its initials in Spanish) also called for further investigation and reiterated “its will to dialogue” with the government.
The incident brings the death toll in the area to seven. On Nov. 1, two security guards and the mine site manager were killed in an armed attack by unidentified perpetrators at the Rio Blanco mining camp, now the subject of reserved investigations involving national police.  Also, in 2004 and 2005, two campesinos were killed as result of repression against protests.
According to the People's Ombudsman (Defensoria del Pueblo), police report that the deaths last week took place after they detained a man in the area of the community of Cajas-Canchaque. The regional police chief Walter Rivera said that the detention was part of investigations into the November attack on the mine camp and that those implicated in this prior incident had been refusing to cooperate. President Servando Aponte of the campesino community challenged the police version saying that officers acted “arrogantly” and that when they entered the home of Lorenzo Rojas to detain him that his neighbours came out in his defence because there was no official warrant for his detention.
For the last six years, the Rio Blanco project, a proposed open-pit copper and molybdenum mine, has generated opposition from campesino communities on whose land it would be located given potential impacts on water supplies and agricultural activities taking place within the watershed. As a result, the company has never obtained the two-thirds approval from local assemblies that it is required to have by law in order to operate in the area.
On Sept. 16, 2007, three rural districts in Huancabamba and Ayabaca participated a popular referendum and reaffirmed their opposition to the mine in which a majority voted against any mining activity in the area.
Earlier attempts at dialogue broke down because of government refusal to discuss the results of the 2007 referendum. Since then, around 300 local leaders have faced legal processes believed to be a means of political persecution for their role in the referendum.
Most recently, tensions have risen following the Nov. 1 attack on the mining camp for which it is believed that those opposed to the mine are being principally targeted as part of investigations by national police.
A SINGLE HYPOTHESIS
Javier Jahncke of the Ecumenical Foundation for Development and Peace (Fedepaz), whose organization is part of a national network that promotes the sustainable use of natural resources and the rights of rural and indigenous communities, says they have concluded that police are leading investigations into the November incident “with a single hypothesis in which they assume that the campesinos were the authors of the crime.”
The day following the attack the FDSFNP, a coalition of local community leaders opposed to the mine, expressed its condolences for the deaths and urged that thorough investigations take place.
According to the Peru Support Group, the UK company Monterrico Metals was also “quick to distance itself from any accusations blaming local community groups for this latest violence and indeed thanked local communities for the help they showed the mine camp's employees who escaped the attack.”
However, Jahncke is concerned that police have set aside other possible explanations for the attack to focus on the possible involvement of the mine's opponents. He suggests other theories, such that Rio Blanco's workers might have been killed as part of an attempted robbery or that there was a dispute among workers that led to reprisals, are being ignored. He notes that they have not been privy to evidence being considered as part of investigations since they have been reserved by police.
A congresswoman from the northwestern department of Piura has also received testimonies that police have detained and tortured people in local communities as part of efforts to gain confessions concerning the attack.
Jahncke further questions the timing of the recent violence given that a judge in the English High Court has only recently upheld an injunction to freeze the assets of Monterrico Metals saying that 29 men and women from Piura have a “good arguable case” against the company for allegations of abuses which took place at the Rio Blanco mine site in 2005.
“This lawsuit has seriously affected the image of the company Monterrico Metals,” says Jahncke, “and by extension, Zijin.” This raises questions in his mind about the recent violence and how it is being dealt with “because of who is being affected by this situation, and if it isn't the same campesinos that have been resorting to international channels to be able to be heard since such a process has not begun in their own country.”
FEARS OF MILITARIZATION
As a result, Jahncke sees last week's violence as part of a “clear effort at any cost” to make way for the mine. He fears that by creating the public perception of a rural population that is “unmanageable” and “violent” that the state will be able to “justify the militarization of this area.”
Only days after the November attack on the mining camp, Peruvian Prime Minister Velásquez Quesquén indicated that the government was evaluating the possibility of installing a military base in the area. The General Manager Jian Wu of the principal stakeholder in the Rio Blanco project, the Chinese Zijin Consortium, was present at the meeting.
However, says Jahncke, “These conflicts cannot be resolved with the military protecting the company operations. This will just put more fuel on the fire and generate more conflict... For this to go ahead would be the worst thing possible.”
Overall, he is concerned that the government continues to favour the company's presence “over the property rights of the communities.”
He concludes, “Until this situation is seen as the rights of some being preferred over the rights of others, in a situation that is not legal, and in which rights have been violated for a long time, the problem will not be solved and you will see decisions that will collide with community rights and the conflict will continue to grow, which is what we least want and what hopefully the state least wants to see happen as well.”
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December 10, 2009
INTERNATIONAL MINING & IMPUNITY DAY:
CANADIAN MINING COMPANIES MAKING A KILLING IN EL SALVADOR, GUATEMALA, CHIAPAS, …
By Grahame Russell
Across the world, December 10th is celebrated as “international human rights day”.  For the global mining industry, we commemorate “international impunity day”.
Below, summaries of three recent assassinations related to community-based struggles in resistance to Canadian mining companies.  Just three stories, of many stories of repression that occur, worldwide, against community and indigenous leaders working in defense of community-controlled development and in protection of their community health and environment; local men and women who are educating and organizing their communities to resist the harms and violations caused by global resource extraction companies.
PACIFIC RIM & THE KILLING OF MARCELO RIVERA MORENO (EL SALVADOR)
In early July 2009, the body of Marcelo Rivera, a teacher and community leader, was found dumped in a well.  He was “disappeared” on June 18.  Torture signs were found on his body, including burn marks and missing toe and finger nails.  Before and after Marcelo’s disappearance, torture and murder, he and other community leaders have been receiving death threats.  For years, the Rivera brothers and many Salvadorans have been working hard, at risk of obvious repression, to prevent Pacific Rim, a Canadian gold mining company, from operating an open-pit, cyanide-laced gold mine in the Cabanas state, near the Honduran border.
No justice has been done for the death of Marcelo Rivera.  Pacific Rim denies any responsibility, or that this death squad assassination is linked to their now aborted mining plans.  The previous ARENA Party government of El Salvador blamed the murder on gang violence.
Meanwhile, Pacific Rim is trying to use a World Bank “mediation” procedure (the World Bank is a major investor in global mining companies) to sue the government of El Salvador for millions of dollars in “lost profits”.  (No, the family members of Marcelo Rivera cannot use this World Bank procedure to seek justice or remedy – it is only for corporations and investors.)
HUDBAY MINERALS & THE KILLING OF ADOLFO ICH (GUATEMALA)
On September 27, 2009, Adolfo Ich, a Mayan Qeqchi teacher and community leader in El Estor (eastern department of Izabal), was shot and captured by security guards in the hire of HudBay Minerals.  Hours later, family members found him abandoned in the company building where the HudBay guards had detained him.  He died soon after of his gunshot wounds and beating.
Adolfo Ich, and local Mayan-Qeqchi villagers, have long been resisting the harms and forced evictions caused by Canadian nickel mining companies.  The first wave of evictions, killings and repression occurred in the 1970s, early 1980s.  Evictions and repression began again in 2006 (by Skye Resources), through to today.  No justice has been done for any of the earlier killings and abuses, nor in Adolfo’s case.  HudBay Minerals denies any responsibility and continues with efforts to “relocate” potentially thousands of Mayan-Qeqchi villagers, living on these lands since long before the first nickel miners (INCO) arrived in the 1960s.
BLACKFIRE EXPLORATION & THE KILLING OF MARIANO ABARCA ROBLEDO (MEXICO)
Mariano Abarca Robeldo, a community leader from the state of Chiapas, was known in Mexico for his work in promotion of community development and the environmental, in opposition to health and environmental harms and human rights violations caused by mining.
On November 27, 2009, he was assassinated in the town of Chicomuselo, state of Chiapas, near the border with Guatemala.  The alleged assassins are employees of and/or linked to Blackfire Exploration Inc, a Canadian mining company, … that denies any responsibility for the crimes.
IMPUNITY – LOCAL TO GLOBAL
These are not exceptional cases.  They are stark snap-shots of repression, let alone environmental and health harms that are common in communities (usually poor, often indigenous) where many mines operate.
Neither is the impunity exceptional.  Companies operate with effective impunity from prosecution or accountability in many countries where they operate mines.  They operate with impunity in the sphere of international law.  And, above all, they operate with impunity in Canada where they are headquartered, where all the major corporate and investor decisions are taken.  There are basically no criminal or civil laws to hold Canadian companies accountable for environmental and health harms or human rights violations (including killings) that occur related to their business operations elsewhere.
There are efforts in Canada to pass legislation - Bill C-300 – that would provide an administrative framework for government oversight and possible economic sanction (withdrawal of public funds a particular company might be receiving) in the case of mining company wrong-doing.  If passed, Bill C-300 would not provide for criminal law punishment, in cases where crimes were committed; it would not provide for financial or other remedies to the victims of mining company harms and wrongs, if proven.
Even at that, Bill C-300 is being strongly opposed by the mining industry and supporters in the Conservative and Liberal parties.
Their opposition to enforceable laws, remedies and punishment is hypocritical and cynical.  I wager that all the mining company executives and politicians opposed to the enactment of binding and enforceable legislation swear by the values and accountability mechanisms of democracy and the rule of law – just not when they would and should apply to their corporate activities abroad.
I wager that were these company executives and politicians themselves (and their families and home communities) victims of environmental and health harms, or human rights violations, they would expect and demand nothing less that full political and legal accountability for the harmful actions, and full remedy for the harms and losses.
Happy international impunity day to the global mining industry.
(Grahame is co-director of Rights Action, info@rightsaction.org, www.rightsaction.org, that funds and supports community development, environmental defense, disaster response and human rights projects in Guatemala and Honduras, as well as Chiapas, El Salvador and Peru.)
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WHAT TO DO
"The greatest weapon in the hand of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed"
(Steve Biko)
EDUCATION IN YOUR COMMUNITY
Invite Rights Action to your community to give a series of talks on these and other issues over a couple of days.
FUNDING COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONS AND PROJECTS
See below, about how to make tax-deductible donations.  Consider organizing education events in your community that double as fund-raising events, whether for community development projects, like schools and scholarships, or for resistance struggles against military regimes and harmful “development” projects.
EDUCATIONAL DELEGATIONS
Consider coming on an educational delegation to Honduras, January 24-31, 2010. For more info: info@rightsaction.org
Join our listserv to find out when all our trips happen, or form your own group of people and have us plan and host a trip for your group.
TAX-DEDUCTIBLE DONATIONS
for indigenous and community organizations resisting the harms of large-scale “development” projects (mining, tourism, hydro-electric dams) and implementing their own development projects (schools and scholarships, health clinics, solidarity economy, etc), human rights and environment projects, make check payable to "Rights Action" and mail to:
* UNITED STATES:  Box 50887, Washington DC, 20091-0887
* CANADA:  552 - 351 Queen St. E, Toronto ON, M5A-1T8
CREDIT-CARD DONATIONS: http://rightsaction.org/contributions.htm
 
FOR MORE INFORMATION & QUESTIONS
Annie Bird, 1-202-680-3002, annie@rightsaction.org
Grahame Russell, 1-860-352-2448, info@rightsaction.org

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