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Yazzie to UN: Nuclear war doesn't start with detonation of bomb
By Kathy Helms
Special correspondent
June 24, 2022
GRANTS – Janene Yazzie, a community organizer and human rights advocate from the Navajo Nation, this week joined colleagues at a United Nations meeting in Vienna, Austria, to discuss an international law banning nuclear weapons.
Noticeably absent from the “First Meeting of State Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons” was the United States and the eight other nuclear weapons states.
In a message to “Relatives” and Navajo Nation leaders, Yazzie stated that she was attending the U.N. meeting as a member of the Nuclear Truth Project where she serves as coordinator of the Protocols Working Group. The working group presented the protocols it developed as a guiding framework for states, NGOs, researchers, and all actors working to implement the treaty and build a nuclear-free world.
“Even if the US has not signed the Treaty, it is still effectively International Law that will only continue to grow stronger with each new state that joins this global commitment [three more have joined in the last two days],” Yazzie told Navajo leaders.
Indigenous peoples have an “extraordinary opportunity” to lead meaningful actions and discussions in the United States, she said, “making our own commitments as sovereign nations, and holding our state accountable for the harms our communities continue to face from the legacy of uranium contamination and nuclear-related activities.”
U.S. missing in action
Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety in Santa Fe shared an article Thursday on its website authored by Ralph Hutchinson of Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance, questioning why the United States was not participating in the meeting as an invited non-state party or sending observers.
“First, what is the U.S. afraid of?” Hutchinson asked. “With a stockpile of more than 4,000 nuclear warheads and bombs, 1,500 of them deployed around the globe on hair-trigger alert, one would think the U.S. would be strong enough to walk into a room where the only weapons allowed are words and defend its position.”
Hutchinson said that if the United States is committed to pursue nuclear disarmament as it promised in the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, it should welcome the chance to talk about what that could look like – “all the nuclear armed nations coming to an agreement on protocols, verifications, and an enforceable timetable for eliminating nuclear stockpiles,” he said.
Threats condemned
With Russian President Vladimir Putin's threats to use nuclear weapons in its war with Ukraine fresh on the world's collective mind, the states parties in the Vienna Declaration adopted Thursday, expressed their alarm and dismay at threats to use nuclear weapons, and condemned unequivocally “any and all nuclear threats, whether they be explicit or implicit and irrespective of the circumstances,” according to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons.
The states parties resolved to move ahead with implementing all aspects of the treaty, including the positive obligations aimed at redressing the harm caused by nuclear weapons use and testing.
“In the face of the catastrophic risks posed by nuclear weapons and in the interest of the very survival of humanity ... We will not rest until the last state has joined the Treaty, the last warhead has been dismantled and destroyed and nuclear weapons have been totally eliminated from the Earth,” the Declaration states.
Irreparable harm
The impacts and consequences of nuclear war do not start with the detonation of a bomb, Yazzie said. “Nor does the mass murder that results from the nuclear weapons and in the aftermath, the impacts of the blast. Nuclear war, as my people understand it, and as many other people understand it, begins with the mining of uranium and the devastation to the health of our peoples and our environment.
“That devastation and that impact and that legacy continues as long as our waters are undrinkable and our soils are contaminated and our babies are being born with uranium in their bodies or with birth defects due to the exposure of pregnant women to radioactive contamination,” she said.
Yazzie noted that she often has heard state delegates and even NGO representatives state that the potentiality of a future nuclear war “could be the end of our way of life,” a thought she can appreciate because of the footprint the legacy of uranium mining and nuclear testing has left on the Navajo Nation.
“We can't drink the water available to us anymore. It means we can't gather the wild foods or grow the traditional foods that our communities have depended on for millennia,” Yazzie said. “It means that it's dangerous to live in the places of our ancestors, the place where the land knows our name, because it makes our people and our loved ones and our children sick. We do not have the technologies or the answers to fix those issues yet.
“If this isn't experiencing the end of our way of life, I don't know what is,” she said.
It is long overdue for the United States to acknowledge the historic trauma of the Indian boarding school era. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Christian churches collaborated with the government to create hundreds of boarding schools for Native American children. The conditions at these schools, some of them Quaker-run, were unspeakable.
Now we must work with tribal nations to advance congressional efforts to establish a federal commission to formally investigate boarding school policy and develop recommendations for the government to take further action. Although the wrongs committed at these institutions can never be made right, we can start the truth, healing, and reconciliation process for the families and communities affected as we work to right relationship with tribal nations.
Remind your members of Congress of their responsibility to tribal nations and urge them to support the Truth and Healing Commission on Indian Boarding School Policies in the United States Act (S. 2907/H.R. 5444).
Bimaadiziwin Nibi - Water is Life
A look into what Indigenous communities in the upper Midwest are doing to conserve & protect water
2022 National Week of Action for MMIW
The National Partners Work Group on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) and the MMIW Family Advisors are organizing a National Week of Action (April 29-May 5, 2022) to call the nation and the world to action in honor of missing and murdered Indigenous women. Take action by participating in these virtual events, exploring our list of resources, and organizing additional actions in your communities on and around May 5th. Join us in saying ‘enough is enough’—not one more stolen sister.
A MESSAGE FROM CHIEF ARVOL LOOKING HORSE
A “disease of the mind” has set in world leaders and many members of our global community, with their belief that a solution of retaliation and destruction of peoples will bring peace.
In our Prophecies it is told that we are now at the crossroads: Either unite spiritually as a global nation or be faced with chaos, disasters, diseases, and tears from our relatives’ eyes.
We are the only species that is destroying the source of life, meaning Mother Earth, in the name of power, mineral resources, and ownership of land. Using chemicals and methods of warfare that are doing irreversible damage, as Mother Earth is becoming tired and cannot sustain any more impacts of war.
I ask you to join me in this endeavor. Our vision is for the peoples of all continents, regardless of their beliefs in the Creator, to come together as one at their Sacred Sites.
Interior Department Renaming Sites With Offensive Native American Names
28 lakes, creeks, rivers and other geographical features in Wisconsin being renamed.
We think you will find our weekly email valuable.
DOI Secretary Deb Haaland. (Public Domain).
The U.S. Department of the Interior is requesting public input on new names for more than 650 geographic features with racially offensive names.
In November, DOI Secretary Deb Haaland signed Secretarial Order 3404 declaring a word that originated as an Algonquin term for “woman” a derogatory name. Its meaning has shifted after centuries of use by white people as an offensive term for Indigenous women.
Melissa Doud, a program director with the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Council and a member of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, supports the order.
“It’s such a derogatory and negative thing to call a woman,” Doud said. “We’re resilient people, and it’s only fair to change the name to something that isn’t so racist.”
The federal order outlined steps for removing the term from federal and state lands, one of the steps included forming the Derogatory Geographic Names Task Force.
By March, the task force identified 664 geographical features — such as creeks, lakes, rivers and valleys — across the country that use the term and proposed five new names for each site. The complete list of places and their suggested new names are available as both a PDF and an interactive map.
The 28 sites in Wisconsin span 19 counties.
The federal government will manage the process, but the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is helping to solicit input and will review proposed names to avoid duplicating the names of nearby geographic features.
While the DNR has its own
council to handle geographic name changes, DNR Statewide Tribal Liaison
Kris Goodwill said the process can be lengthy.
“That process can easily take over a year to get that accomplished. This kind of puts it on a fast track,” Goodwill said.
Under the new order, sites with the word in their title would bypass the state process.
But even before the order, many Wisconsin counties were already trying to eliminate the term.
In 2019, Dane County changed the name of a bay on Monona Lake to Wicawak, the Ho-Chunk word for muskrat. And last year, a lake in Oneida and Vilas counties near the Lac du Flambeau reservation was changed to Amber Lake.
John D. Johnson, Sr., president of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, said the old name was a dishonor to Native women.
“Here in Lac du Flambeau — and I can speak for other reservations too — we put our women on a pedestal,” Johnson said. “We appreciate everything they do for us, because if it wasn’t for the woman, none of us would be here, right?”
People had been trying to change the name for more than 20 years, but nothing ever happened, Johnson said.
Then in 2020, a tribal member who happened to live on what is now Amber Lake approached Johnson about changing the name. They encountered some pushback from local residents, but Johnson said collaboration between the tribe and the
lake’s association was key.
“What we did with the Lakes Association was pretty cool because they had come right to our (Tribal) Council room and we had talked together, we collaborated and that’s what needed to be done,” Johnson said.
Together they submitted a formal petition to the Wisconsin Geographic Names Council and about six months later, residents and tribal members had collectively renamed the lake Amber Lake.
Doud said they initially chose the name Ikwe, which means “woman” in Ojibwe, but some residents felt it might be difficult to pronounce. Together they agreed on Amber because of the golden color of the Tamarack trees that surround the lake.
Now communities will have the backing of the federal government to speed up the process. And the movement to remove offensive terms from geographic features will not stop with this one word.
In November, Haaland also signed Secretarial Order 3405, creating a federal advisory committee that will identify and recommend new names for sites that use other racial slurs and derogatory terms. In the past, similar bodies have renamed geographic features that used the N-word or a pejorative term for Japanese people.
The committee has yet to be formed, but Goodwill said it could consider renaming features such as a rapid on the Tomahawk River that has a name that uses a derogatory term for someone who is of mixed race.
“This is a good move for the future. I think it’s overdue,” said Goodwill, who is a member of the Menominee Nation. “I think it goes along with having our first Native American secretary of the Interior.”
Public input on the current list will be accepted until April 25. You can submit comments online, using the docket number DOI-2022-0001. You can also mail your written comments to: Reconciliation of Derogatory Geographic Names, MS-511, U.S. Geological Survey, 12201 Sunrise Valley Dr., Reston, VA 20192. Be sure to include the docket number.
Listen to the WPR report here.
‘A good move for the future’: Federal officials ask for public input in renaming 28 sites with derogatory names in Wisconsin was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
NO MORE PIPELINE BLUES (ON THIS LAND WHERE WE BELONG)
NO MORE PIPELINE BLUES (ON THIS LAND WHERE WE BELONG)
FEATURING WAUBANEWQUAY, WINONA LADUKE, DAY SISTERS, MUMU FRESH, PURA FE, SONI MORENO, JENNIFER KREISBERG, INDIGO GIRLS, BONNIE RAITT AND JOY HARJO.
https://youtu.be/zjoRB7ETaGk
Film Directed by Keri Pickett | Edited by River Akemann & Keri Pickett
Music Written & Produced by Larry Long | Recorded by Brett Huus
Cinematographers: Sarah Littleredfeather, River Akemann & Keri Pickett
ACTION ALERT: The EPA is now telling us that Enbridge's plan to build a pipeline through northern WI stands to permanently damage our water.
"Application and related information that EPA reviewed, we believe that the proposed project “may result in substantial and unacceptable adverse impacts” to the Bad River and the Kakagon- Bad River Sloughs wetland complex ... and may permanently and negatively impact water quality, aquatic life, and native habitat,” the EPA wrote.
PLEASE EMAIL THE WI DNR and tell them to Just Say No to Line 5!
Department of Natural Resources Line 5 EIS Comments (EA/7) 101 South Webster Street, Madison, WI 53707
By Gerry Adams (for Léargas)
This Christmas take a moment to think about Leonard Peltier.
Leonard was convicted in 1977 of the murder in 1975 of two FBI agents during a confrontation at the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. Two others who were charged with the murders were found not guilty by reason of self-defence. Peltier has always denied involvement in the two deaths. He has been in prison for almost 45 years.
In the years since then serious and significant questions have arisen over the evidence produced by the prosecution at the trial. A witness who recanted her account claimed she had been forced into making a statement by the FBI. A ballistics expert who linked Peltier’s weapon to the murders was reprimanded by the federal court for lying.
In July this year James H. Reynolds, the former US Attorney General whose office handled the prosecution and appeal in the Leonard Peltier case, appealed for his sentence to be commuted. In a letter to President Joe Biden he said: “With time, and the benefit of hindsight, I have realised that the prosecution and continued incarceration of Mr Peltier was and is unjust.”
In October Amnesty International issued an Urgent Action notice calling for clemency for Leonard Peltier. Amnesty pointed out that “Leonard Peltier has been imprisoned in the USA for over 44 years, some of which was spent in solitary confinement, serving two life sentences for murder despite concerns over the fairness of his trial. He has always maintained his innocence. He is 77 years old and suffers from a number of chronic health ailments, including one that is potentially fatal.”
“In October US Congress members Raúl M. Grijalva, Barbara Lee, Jesús Garcia, Cori Bush, Emanuel Cleaver II, Jared Huffman, Teresa Leger Fernández, Rashida Tlaib, Pramila Jayapal, Betty McCollum, and Melanie Stansbury — wrote a joint letter to you requesting the expedited release of Leonard Peltier from the Coleman Federal Correctional Complex in Florida and requesting that Mr Peltier be granted clemency.”
Calls for Leonard Peltier’s release have also been supported by international figures, including the late Nelson Mandela, former Irish President Mary Robinson and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
Join us in urging compassion and clemency for Leonard Peltier. Write to:
President Joseph Biden
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW
Washington, DC 20500, USA.
Native Lives Matter
Native Lives Matter goes beyond police brutality to also include social and environmental injustice, MMIW, and protection of women & water. Discussion and bringing about awareness of the police brutality and Injustice occurring within Indian Country and working towards solutions.
Inspire and support the activist movement of Native Lives Matter to be the catalyst of change and create longstanding solutions within our law enforcement & judicial systems.
Direct Action
Standing in support and advocate for the families and victims who have experienced, police brutality loss of family and injustice.
Standing in solidarity to honor ancestors of the past in remembrance & memorials.
Solidarity with Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women
National Day of Awareness for Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, 2 Spirit Thursday, May 5, 2022
#VAWA -VAWA Law: Protections and rights to prosecute non-natives who abuse our Women on Tribal Lands. End the Violence Against Women, End the Sexual Assault against Indigenous Native Women.
Native Lives Matter Coalition-consists of multiple groups and organizations that support in collaboration.
Women Of The White Buffalo
Feature documentary film and ‘Leica’ sponsored photography of the Native American Lakota Nation. Produced by Deborah Anderson Creative.
Delacina Chief Eagle is one of the women featured in the soon to be released feature documentary film Women Of The White Buffalo.
Save the date! This powerful and important feature documentary film is coming out April 12th!!
LN3: Seven Teachings of the Anishinaabe in Resistance
https://www.facebook.com/events/782757979786820/?acontext=%7B%22event_action_history%22%3A[%7B%22mechanism%22%3A%22search_results%22%2C%22surface%22%3A%22search%22%7D]%2C%22ref_notif_type%22%3Anull%7D
The South Shore of Lake Superior and Line 5: Impacts
https://www.facebook.com/RejectLine5/videos/1050867815489741
Shut Down Line 5 - Protect the Water!
https://www.facebook.com/WinonaLaDukeHonorTheEarth/videos/313448660748647
Menominee Indian Tribe No Back 40 Mine
https://www.facebook.com/NoBack40Mine
The Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin, a federally recognized Indian Tribe, is indigenous to what is now known as Wisconsin and Upper Michigan. By the early 1800’s, the start of the treaty era, the Menominee occupied a land base estimated at 10 million acres; however, through a series of seven treaties entered into with the United States Government during the 1800’s, the Tribe witnessed its land base erode to little more than 235,000 acres today.
Our sacred place of origin exists within our 1836 treaty territory, at the mouth of the Menominee River which is located in the border cities of Menominee, MI and Marinette, WI. It was here, a mere 60 miles east of our present Menominee Indian Reservation, where our five main clans: ancestral Bear, Eagle, Wolf, Moose and Crane were transformed into human form and thus became the first Menominee.
As a result of our undeniable ties and long occupation of the Menominee River area, we have numerous sacred sites and burial mounds up and down the Menominee River, including the area of the proposed Back Forty Mine. Much like our brothers and sister in the NODAPL movement we also know that water is essential to life. The Menominee River is, in fact, the very origin of life for the Menominee people. It also provides life to Michigan and Wisconsin residents and the natural wildlife within the Great Lakes ecosystem. The harmful threats to this area and all who depend on it far outweigh the corporate interests of a Canadian exploratory company and justify the denial of the necessary permits for the proposed mine.
The Menominee Nation is steadfast in its opposition to the proposed mine and its commitment to preserving the Menominee River. We ask you to stand in solidarity with us as we continue our fight to protect our place of origin, our sacred sites, the wildlife, water and environment for future generations.
https://www.grandcanyontrust.org/white-mesa-uranium-mill
https://www.facebook.com/yo.nuche/videos/409028270945404
This group is to help white Mesa community fight!! Against the uranium mill that's only 3miles from the rez line.. This stuff has got in to the water.. They want to expand the mill where there is sacred burial sites, please all I ask is for your support.
EPA faults uranium processor for not keeping Superfund waste covered
Energy Fuels Resources barred from accepting some radioactive material after federal authorities conclude the White Mesa facility has not been properly storing dangerous waste.
@cleanupthemines · Community
A national campaign to clean up thousands of toxic abandoned uranium mines throughout the U.S. that poison our the air, land & water.
Irresponsible corporations and negligent government agencies have abandoned thousands of toxic uranium mines throughout the US. These hazardous abandoned uranium mines poison our air, land and water. Currently no laws require clean up of these dangerous sites. Together we can safeguard our health and environment.
