CANADIAN MINING COMPANY
LINKED TO ASSASSINATION OF COMMUNITY LEADER IN CHIAPAS (MEXICO)
“ a dear friend, admired for his struggle against the Canadian mining company Blackfire , and a member of the Mexican Network of People Affected by Mining (REMA-Chiapas).  Yesterday we spoke to him on the phone and he told us he had filed a complaint against the company.  Today he's dead.  It is with great sadness that I write these words.  I will continue to update here as more news becomes available.”
GUSTAVO CASTRO, Otros Mundos (http://www.otrosmundoschiapas.org) and REMA (Mexican Network of Those Affected by Mining), November 28, 2009, http://www.dominionpaper.ca/weblogs/dawn/3046
BELOW:

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INTERVIEW WITH MARIANO ABARCA ROBLEDO
Mariano Abarca Robeldo, a community leader from the state of Chiapas, was known in Mexico for his work in promotion of community development and environmental defense and 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 Mexican border with Guatemala.  The alleged assassins are employees of and/or linked to Blackfire Exploration Inc, a Canadian mining company.
Alex Halkin of the Chiapas Media Project interviewed Mariano Abarca Robledo in September 2009, about his community development and environmental defense work and the threats against him.  Watch here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UUvYfZPKxQ
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BLACKFIRE EXPLORATION LTD.
4150, 825-8th Avenue SW
Calgary, Alberta, Canada T2P 2T3
403-264-0700, info@blackfireexploration.com
From www.blackfireexploration.com: “Blackfire has Canadian and Mexican mineral properties at various stages of development and is currently focused on three mines in Chiapas, Mexico:  Barite mine: High grade barite with large reserves on surface which is open in all directions. This mine is in production and is selling barite to the Mexican oil fields.  Titanium mine:  Based on current information and cross referencing with DuPont, who worked on the property in previous years, we believe this is one of the highest TiO2 grade hard rock deposit in the world. Our deposit is a unique hard rock titanium deposit due to the large Rutile (TiO2) crystals within the Ilmenite (Fe2O3TiO2) resulting in a high concentration of TiO2.  Magnetite mine (iron ore):  Potential resource of 120,000,000mt.”
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MEXICAN AUTHORITIES SHUT DOWN BLACKFIRE MINE (Globe and Mail, Dec. 08, 2009, by Andy Hoffman and Gloria Galloway)
The Canadian mining company entangled in a murder investigation of a local activist has had its mine shut down by Mexican authorities because of environmental violations.  The Ministry of the Environment for the state of Chiapas has temporarily closed a barite mine owned by Calgary-based Blackfire Exploration Ltd., citing several infractions, including pollution and causing toxic emissions, a government spokeswoman said yesterday.
Three men linked to Blackfire, including a current employee, were recently arrested in the Nov. 27 slaying of activist Mariano Abarca Roblero, who had publicly protested against the mining operation located in Chicomuselo, Chiapas. Ministry spokeswoman Carolina Ochoa denied the mine closing had anything to do with the killing.
Brent Willis, president of Blackfire, said the company has not been told why the mine, which has been operating since November, 2008, was closed. “The government asked for it to be shut down today … we don't have an understanding of why it was shut down,” Mr. Willis said in an interview.
Privately held Blackfire, which is controlled by Mr. Willis, his brother Brent and Mexican investor Emiliano Canales Avila, has denied any role in the death of Mr. Abarca, who was gunned down in a drive-by shooting outside his home.
Mexico's Attorney-General has said that all three men arrested in the murder are linked to Blackfire. Mr. Willis denied this. He said one man, Caralampio Lopez Vazquez, works for the company, but that the other two are no longer employees. “We were not involved in the incident in any manner,” Mr. Willis said.
The mine shutdown and murder investigation comes as Canadian Governor-General Michaëlle Jean visits Chiapas on a diplomatic tour and as Parliament considers Bill C-300, a private member's bill that would impose sanctions on Canadian resource companies that violate human rights and environmental standards in foreign countries.
The powerful mining industry is lobbying hard to quash the bill, introduced by Liberal MP John McKay, but concedes the Blackfire situation is unlikely to help its cause.
“It is a serious situation and it is a tragic situation,” Gordon Peeling, president and chief executive officer of The Mining Association of Canada, said of the murder.  “It is not helpful in terms of the dynamic of the discussion for those that want to link these things. Their thinking is flawed if they try to link it to C-300,” he added.
Roger Maldonado, another activist in Chiapas who knew Mr. Abarca, said Blackfire has been accused of causing environmental damage and bribing local officials and that anti-mining activists have faced threats and retaliation from mine employees.  “They feel their jobs are jeopardized by somebody protesting against the mine,” Mr. Maldonado said in an interview.
Ms. Jean and Peter Kent, Canada's junior foreign minister for the Americas, were touring in Mexico yesterday as the Blackfire mining operation was being shut down.  A spokeswoman for Ms. Jean said the Canadian delegation was not targeted by protests related to either the environmental accusations that have dogged the mine or the murder charges pending against people linked to the Canadian company.
But in Canada, federal opposition members say there must be some controls placed on Canadian corporations operating abroad.  Mr. McKay, the author of Bill C-300 said allegations like those levied against Blackfire, even if unproven, damage the company, the industry and the reputation of all Canadians.
Peter Julian, an NDP MP who has put forth his own bill that would allow people who have been harmed by Canadian corporations operating in other countries to seek redress in a Canadian court, says Mr. McKay's bill does not go far enough.  “The actions of a Canadian company, good or bad, have an impact on Canada as a whole,” said Mr. Julian, whose proposed legislation is unlikely to get as far as Mr. McKay's.  “There is no doubt that there are a number of Canadian companies that have been irresponsible,” he said. “That, unfortunately, gives a black eye to the whole industry and does have an impact on Canada.”
The government needs a means of address for these kinds of issues to ensure that Canadian companies are always acting in a socially end environmentally responsible manner, Mr. Julian said.
Eleanor Johnston, a spokeswoman for Mr. Kent, confirmed that no protesters greeted the Canadian dignitaries yesterday. “A crime has been committed and the appropriate Mexican authorities are investigating,” said Ms. Johnston.
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CHIAPAS ANTI-MINING ORGANIZER MURDERED
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/notebook/kristin-bricker/2009/12/chiapas-anti-mining-organizer-murdered, by Kristin Bricker, December 1, 2009
MARIANO ABARCA LED A GROWING MOVEMENT TO KICK CANADIAN MINING COMPANIES OUT OF MEXICAN COMMUNITIES
Mariano Abarca Robledo, one of Mexico's most prominent anti-mining organizers, was shot to death on the evening of November 27, 2009, in front of his house in Chicomuselo, Chiapas.  He left behind a wife and four children.  Another man was wounded in the shooting.
The incident comes just days after Abarca filed charges against two Blackfire employees, Ciro Roblero Perez and Luis Antonio Flores Villatoro, for threatening to shoot him if he didn't stop organizing against Canadian mining company Blackfire's barium mine in Chicomuselo. 
According to a formal complaint filed by a government employee who works in the Chicomuselo municipal building, Roblero Perez arrived at the municipal building to say that he had gone to look for Abarca to "fuck him up in a hail of bullets."   He also reportedly said that Abarca and other people were on a list of people Blackfire management wants to hurt.
Blackfire public relations manager Luis Antonio Flores Villatoro was mentioned in the government employee's complaint as one of the people responsible for the list.
Ejido* authorities from the Nueva Morelia ejido in Chicomuselo county took the complaint seriously and helped Abarca launch an investigation.  The day before the murder, Roblero Perez and Flores Villatoro were summoned to testify regarding the alleged death threats, but they failed to appear.
A HISTORY OF HARASSMENT
Even though local authorities acted to try to protect Abarca, the Mexican Network of People Affected by Mining (REMA) blames the Chiapas state government for failing to protect the mining leader.  On the contrary, the state government seems to have been complicit in Blackfire's legal harassment of Abarca.
On August 17, 2009, unidentified armed men in unmarked cars kidnapped Abarca as he was leaving an elementary school in Chicomuselo.  He had visited the school to request permission on behalf of his organization, REMA, to use the building for an anti-mining meeting scheduled for August 29-30.
The kidnappers turned out to be police.  They had arrested Abarca on charges filed by Blackfire regarding a June-July 2009 highway blockade REMA set up to prevent the passage of Blackfire trucks.  REMA was protesting the company's failure to comply with promises it allegedly made regarding community development projects and environmental stewardship.  According to community leaders, Blackfire's open-pit barium mine uses too much of the area's scarce water resources.  They are concerned that the pollution could effect their crop cultivation in the near future.
CRIMINALIZATION OF STRUGGLE FOR JUSTICE
Then, acting on Blackfire's formal complaint, the state government charged Abarca with attacks against public roadways, criminal association, organized crime, and offenses against the peace. Theoretically, organized crime charges are reserved for drug, arms, and human traffickers, and other members of Mexico's expansive mafia network.  However, the Chiapas government has been known to accuse activists and community organizers of organized crime in order to take advantage of restricted due process rights for people accused of organized crime.
That is what happened in Abarca's case.  The organized crime charged allowed the Chiapas government to imprison him under the highly controversial and international criticized legal instrument of "arraigo" or pre-charge detention.  Under arraigo, the government can arrest a suspect and isolate him or her for months while it pressures and sometimes tortures the person into confessing.
The state government detained Abarca for eight days before it ceded to international public pressure to release him.  Abarca was released and the charges were dropped due to lack of evidence.  His lawyer, Miguel Angel de los Santos, criticized the Chiapas government for ceding to the mining company's pressure to arrest Abarca.  "There was no legal justification for his arrest and detention. Preliminary investigation began on June 12th, two days after the blockade, and was only just beginning to come together. The investigation had not advanced," he told Proceso in August following Abarca's release.
THE WORLD BANK & "STRUCTURAL ADJUSTMENT" STRIKE AGAIN
Social discontent regarding mines in Mexico has been steadily building over the past ten years, beginning when the effects of a World Bank-mandated mining sector deregulation scheme were first felt.  A confidential World Bank document entitled "Implementation Completion Report: Mexico Mining Sector Restructuring Project," which Narco News makes available to the public, outlines exactly how a nine-year loan project drastically transformed Mexico's mining sector.
The project, first proposed by the Word Bank in 1989 and quickly adopted by the Mexican government, aimed to deregulate the mining industry in Mexico.  The Bank proposed the project because, as its Implementation Completion Report (ICR) explains,
“Past lending of the Bank for mining in Mexico was oriented towards specific investment projects, with direct lines of credit to the sector... The lessons learned from those operations were that the continued development of the mining sector required increased access to land rights, reduced ownership limitations, revision of the tax legislation, a restructuring of existing institutional setups, as well as policies that stimulate private investment in mining by both domestic and foreign firms.  The Bank Mining Sector Review identified an inadequate regulatory and institutional framework as the major constraint to increase private investment and further growth of the sector.”
One of the Bank's main goals for the project was to open up Mexico's previously protected national mining industry to foreign companies; the Bank listed "open the sector to foreigners" as its first "strategy to restructure the sector."  It hoped to do so by privatizing state-owned mining companies, slashing taxes, awarding mineral and land rights to private companies, and facilitating foreign companies' ownership of Mexican land in order to "contribute to the increased exploration and exploitation of the vast mining potential of the country, to take advantage of Mexico's strategic location near the United States and Canada."
The Bank proposed a set of changes to Mexican law in its Mining Sector Report, and the Mexican government--at that point still under one-party rule--rushed to implement them under a plan called the National Mining Modernization Program.
In just four years (1990-1994), the legal framework for mining in Mexico underwent a radical change.  Before the ink on the new laws was dry, the Bank began to dole out money to private mining companies to "help finance the surge in demand for investment funding that was expected to result from the improved policy and institutional setting for mining operations."
The Bank was thrilled with the results of the National Mining Modernization Program and its subsequent loans.  According to the Bank, over the course of the project, which ended in 1998, over 8.7 million hectares of land were released and 17,220 new mining concessions were granted.  As a result of the legal changes mandated by the loan, the time required for processing mining concessions went down from 5 years to 5 months, and the Mexican government's backlog of about 14,000 concession requests that were pending since 1989 disappeared virtually overnight.
The Bank was so pleased with the results of the Mining Sector Restructuring Project that it wrote, "Future Bank participation in the sector does not seem justified anymore, in view that mining exploration/exploitation is now open to domestic and foreign investors."
The Bank's structural adjustment of Mexico's mining sector has played a key role in the battle for "land and territory" (as the Zapatistas refer to it) in the country.  Private ownership, increased economic pressure on small and subsistence farmers, and top-down "development" projects are acutely felt in mineral-rich communities.
According to Gustavo Castro Soto of the Chiapas-based non-profit Otros Mundos, "Beginning in 2000, almost 10% of the national territory has been ceded to transnational companies through mining concessions." REMA notes that in Chiapas, 15.21% of the state's total territory has been ceded through mining concessions.  Many of those concessions don't expire until the year 2050.  If the social unrest that frequently follows mining concessions is any indicator, Mexicans are not willingly handing over their land to foreign mining companies.
MINING INDUSTRY UNDER FIRE
Mariano Abarca's murder comes at a time that the mining industry in Mexico is feeling the heat from Mexico's social movements.  Inspired by the national movement of communities affected by hydroelectric dam projects, mining-affected communities are joining forces in a unified front against destructive mining practices.
In 2008, representatives from Chicomuselo travelled to the state of Jalisco to found REMA during the First Encounter of the Mexican Network of People Affected by Mining.  Representatives from mining-affected communities in eleven states and the Federal District participated in the historic event: Chihuahua, Sonora, Nayarit, Jalisco, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Guerrero, Mexico City, México State, San Luis Potosí, Coahuila, and Veracruz.  REMA agreed at that meeting to raise consciousness about the social and environmental effects of mining.  It also pledged that member organizations would support each other in their struggles against destructive mines in their communities.
One of the most high-profile joint actions that REMA carried out was a protest encampment in front of the Canadian Embassy in Mexico City this past July.  Abarca and representatives from other communities affected by Canadian mining companies participated in the encampment, which demanded the withdraw of Metallic Resources/NewGold, a Canadian company, from Cerro de San Pedro, San Luis Potosi.  At the protest, Abarca spoke about Canadian mining companies' contamination of traditional water sources.
Following the protest, mining-affected communities won a temporary victory: just last month, a federal judge ordered that the Cerro de San Pedro mine be closed because the mining company had failed to comply with environmental stipulations.  The closure comes after ten years of struggle waged by a broad coalition of San Luis Potosi civil society organizations, which include organizations linked to Mexico's center-left Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) and groups affiliated with the Zapatista's Other Campaign.  They opposed the gold mining project because, in addition to environmental concerns, the Cerro de San Pedro is an official historic monument.  NewGold has promised to appeal the ruling.
In Chiapas, Abarca led a previously mentioned highway blockade that prevented Blackfire trucks from entering and leaving the Chicomuselo mine this past June and July.  The community was protesting the company's excessive use of scarce water supplies, its failure to follow through on commitments it reportedly made to the community, and its back-door maneuverings that allowed it to purchase 13.5 hectares of ejido land without the required approval of the ejido assembly.  Blackfire claims it lost $120,000 pesos ($9,334 dollars) as a direct result of the blockade.
This past August, REMA held its Second Encounter of the Mexican Network of People Affected by Mining in Chiapas. Guatemalan communities who are resisting mining projects traveled to Chiapas to participate and share their experienes.  Abarca helped organize the Encounter, and as previously mentioned, it was during the Encounter's organizing process that state police kidnapped Abarca and charged him with organized crime at Blackfire's request.
A communique signed by 25 Mexican organizations from six states and Mexico City holds Blackfire's owners responsible for Abarca's shooting and any resulting violence in the region.  They call for a protest encampment outside of the Canadian Embassy and the Ministry of Economy headquarters in Mexico City on December 3 in solidarity with the people of Chicomuselo.
*An ejido is commonly-held land traditionally managed by assembly.
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WHAT TO DO/ HOW TO SUPPORT
FOR MORE INFORMATION
about and/or how to get involved in efforts in the USA and Canada, to hold North American mining companies and investors (like the Canada Pension Plan, and numerous pension funds across North America) accountable for the environemtnal and health harms and human rights violations caused by companies: info@rightsaction.org, www.rightsaction.org
TO DONATE FUNDS
to REMA (Mexican Network of Those Affected by Mining), Rights Action can put you in touch with REMA and/or send you a complete proposal for their work.
To support indigenous and campesino groups resisting the harms and violations of mining &, hydro-electric dams, make tax deductible donations to “rights action” and mail to:
UNITED STATES:  Box 50887, Washington DC, 20091-0887
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DAILY NEWS:  Watch, listen to and read: www.democracynow.org / www.upsidedownworld.org / www.dominionpaper.ca
READ:  Eduardo Galeano’s “Open Veins of Latin America”;  Howard Zinn’s “A People’s History of the United States”;  Naomi Klein’s “The Shock Doctrine”;  Paolo Freire’s “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”; Dr. Seuss’s “Horton Hears a Who”;
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