Category Archives: Indigenous peoples

Fury in Colombia as soldiers admit rape of 13-year-old indigenous girl

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Seven soldiers confessed to raping child from the Emberà tribe

Outrage has been sparked in Colombia after a 13-year-old girl was gang-raped by seven soldiers from the country’s army last weekend.

On Thursday, seven soldiers confessed to raping the child from the indigenous Emberá tribe, who went missing from her rural reserve in northern Colombia on Sunday. She was found the next day at a nearby school. News of the horrific crime shocked much of the South American nation, which has long reckoned with violence against indigenous women and girls.

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Fifteen people killed in Mexican village linked to windpower dispute

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Investigations under way into the reasons behind deaths of 13 men and two women

At least 15 people have been bludgeoned to death with stones and cement blocks, and some bodies partly burned, in an indigenous village in southern Mexico plagued by a dispute over windpower.

The municipal government of the Pacific coast community of San Mateo del Mar in Oaxaca state said 13 men and two women were killed at the weekend by what it described as a group of six people with the support of a local crime boss. Activists who successfully opposed windpower projects say the mayor’s followers ambushed them at a coronavirus checkpoint.

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‘We are facing extermination’: Brazil losing a generation of indigenous leaders to Covid-19

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Coronavirus has swept through tribes, killing elders – and inflicting irreparable damage on tribal history, culture and medicine

When Bep Karoti Xikrin fell ill with Covid-19, he refused to go to a hospital.

The 64-year-old chief of a Xikrin indigenous village in Brazil’s Amazon was plagued by headaches and fatigue and struggled for breath. But according to his daughter Bekuoi Raquel, he was afraid that if he were admitted to hospital he might never return.

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First Nations chief shown being punched by Canadian police in video

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Chief Allan Adam of Fort Chipewyan First Nation alleges police assaulted him in parking lot in March

Canadian police tackled and punched a prominent First Nations chief in the parking lot of a casino as they accused him of resisting arrest.

On Saturday, Chief Allan Adam of Fort Chipewyan First Nation in Alberta alleged he was assaulted by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) during the incident in early March. It began over an allegation of an expired licence plate but quickly escalated into what Adam claims was a clearcut instance of excessive force.

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Minneapolis has vowed to defund its police. New Zealand needs to have that conversation | Julia Amua Whaipooti

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Dropping the armed police trial is a good step but we need transformational change to show black lives actually do matter

“We honour him today because when he took his last breath, the rest of us were able to breathe.” These were the words spoken at George Floyd’s funeral that I felt directly in my bones, here, on my whenua, or land, of Aotearoa New Zealand. On Tuesday, the New Zealand police commissioner told the country a trial of Armed Response Teams (ARTs) – frontline officers who routinely carry guns – will not continue, and the teams will not be a part of the country’s policing model in the future. 

The United States is 400-500 years deep in a history of colonisation and slavery. In Aotearoa New Zealand, we are 200 years into our colonial history, and the way in which colonisation functions here is also rooted in white supremacy. Colonial structures, by design, take powers away from indigenous people and people of colour, putting them into the hands of the colonisers. 

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Canadian First Nations chief says mounted police assaulted him

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Allan Adam claims police attacked him and his wife after he was stopped over licence tag

A prominent First Nations chief in Canada has said he and his wife were assaulted by police officers over an expired licence plate, an incident that came as the country grapples with continued violence against ethnic minorities at the hands of police.

Chief Allan Adam of the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation, a well-known businessman whose community has extensive operations in Alberta’s oil sands, said he and his wife, Freda Courtoreille, had a violent encounter with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police on 10 March that has left the community in anguish. 

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Canada: DNA discovery lends weight to First Nations ancestral story

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The last of Newfoundland’s Beothuk was thought to have died in 1829 but new research indicates the bloodline did not die out – as Mi’kmaq tradition has always maintained

When a woman named Shanawdithit succumbed to tuberculosis in Newfoundland nearly 200 years ago, it was widely believed that her death marked a tragic end to her people’s existence.

For centuries, the Beothuk had thrived along the rocky shores of the island, taking on a near-mythical status as descendants of the first people encountered by Norse explorers in what is now Canada. But their population was devastated by decades of starvation and diseases, and when she died in 1829, Shanawdithit was believed to be the last of her line.

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Brazil using coronavirus to cover up assaults on Amazon, warn activists

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Fears Jair Bolsonaro’s ‘land grabbers decree’ may be pushed forwards after new rule allows land-grabbing on indigenous reserves

As the coronavirus pandemic eats its way into the Amazon, raising fears of a genocide of its vulnerable indigenous tribes, the government of the far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, and its supporters are dismantling rules shielding protected reserves. Key environment officials have been sacked, and environmentalists and indigenous leaders fear the pandemic is being used as a smokescreen for a new assault on the rainforest.

They say a presidential decree awaiting congressional approval and new rules at the indigenous agency Funai effectively legalise land grabbing in protected forests and indigenous reserves.

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‘We are on the eve of a genocide’: Brazil urged to save Amazon tribes from Covid-19

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Open letter by photojournalist Sebastião Salgado and global figures warns disease could decimate indigenous peoples

Brazil’s leaders must take immediate action to save the country’s indigenous peoples from a Covid-19 “genocide”, a global coalition of artists, celebrities, scientists and intellectuals has said.

In an open letter to the Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, figures including Madonna, Oprah Winfrey, Brad Pitt, David Hockney and Paul McCartney warned the pandemic meant indigenous communities in the Amazon faced “an extreme threat to their very survival”.

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Indigenous input helps save wayward grizzly bear from summary killing

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When a bear starts feeding off garbage and loses its fear of humans it is quickly shot but an unlikely conservation partnership may be setting a different path

In early April, a young grizzly bear swam through the chilly waters off the western coast of Canada in search of food.

Related: Groggy grizzly bear caught emerging from hibernation in viral video

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Nobel laureates condemn ‘judicial harassment’ of environmental lawyer

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Chevron’s treatment of Steven Donziger branded ‘an exceptionally bad case of intimidation’

Twenty-nine Nobel laureates have condemned alleged “judicial harassment” by Chevron and urged the release of a US environmental lawyer who was put under house arrest for pursuing oil-spill compensation claims on behalf of indigenous tribes in the Amazon.

The open letter signed by scientists, authors, environmentalists and human rights activists said the treatment of lawyer Steven Donziger, whose movements have been restricted for more than 250 days, was one of the world’s most egregious cases of judicial harassment and defamation.

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First Yanomami Covid-19 death raises fears for Brazil’s indigenous peoples

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Acutely vulnerable population at risk as wildcat miners in Amazon reserve suspected as source of infection that killed 15-year-old

A Yanomami teenager has reportedly died after contracting Covid-19, further fuelling fears over the disease’s potential to decimate indigenous communities in the Amazon.

The victim – who health authorities named as 15-year-old Alvanei Xirixana – died on Thursday night after spending almost a week in intensive care in Boa Vista, a Brazilian city near the Yanomami’s Portugal-sized reserve.

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Canada: suspect arrested over murder of two Indigenous men in Alberta

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  • Anthony Michael Bilodeau, 31, charged with double murder
  • Jake Sansom and Morris Cardinal killed while on hunting trip

Police in Canada have arrested a suspect in connection with the murders of two Indigenous men gunned down after returning from a hunt in rural Alberta.

Anthony Michael Bilodeau, 31, has been charged with two counts of second-degree murder over the deaths of Jake Sansom, 39, and Morris Cardinal, 57.

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Brazil confirms first indigenous case of coronavirus in Amazon

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Positive test for 20-year-old woman from Kokama tribe comes amid fears virus could devastate remote communities

An indigenous woman in a village deep in the Amazon rainforest has contracted the novel coronavirus, the first case reported among Brazil’s more than 300 tribes, the Health Ministry’s indigenous health service Sesai has said.

The 20-year-old from the Kokama tribe tested positive for the virus in the district of Santo Antonio do Iá, near the border with Colombia, 880km (550 miles) up the Amazon river from the state capital Manaus, Sesai said in a statement on Wednesday.

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Canada shocked by double murder of Indigenous hunters

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Two Métis men were found shot dead in rural Alberta after what police believe was an ambush

Police in Canada are investigating the murders of two Indigenous men who they suspect were ambushed after returning from a successful hunt in rural Alberta.

The bodies of Jake Sansom, 39, and his uncle Morris Cardinal, 57, were found early on 28 March beside Sansom’s pickup truck on a country road near Glendon, a farming town 160 miles north-east of Edmonton. Both had gunshot wounds.

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Costa Rican president pledges to protect indigenous rights after activists murdered

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Carlos Alvarado seeks solution that will end conflicts over land despite previous delays

Costa Rica’s president has pledged to protect the rights of indigenous defenders following a spate of violence against native communities in his country.

Last month, an activist, Yehry Rivera, from the Brörán indigenous community in Térraba, Puntarenas province, was shot and killed after he was attacked by an armed mob while trying to reclaim ancestral land. The murder happened just two weeks after an indigenous leader of the Bribri indigenous people in nearby Salitre was shot in a surge of unpunished violence against native communities in Costa Rica.

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How Panamanian villagers were left at the mercy of a murderous sect

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When a woman and six children were ritualistically killed in the indigenous community of Alto Terrón the official response was complicated by the absence of police and health services

At the Iglesia de Dios church deep in the rainforest of Panama’s Caribbean coast, a number of unsettling objects attest to the horrific events which took place here.

A black and red accordion stands among the overturned pews, children’s belongings are strewn across the floor, and a Bible – open at the Book of Revelation – rests on the wooden pulpit.

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Mexico’s deadly toll of environment and land defenders catalogued in report

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At least 83 murdered in 2012-2019, with a third of attacks targeting opponents of energy mega-projects

At least 83 Mexican land and environment defenders were murdered between 2012 and 2019, while hundreds more were threatened, beaten and criminalized, according to a new report.

Latin America is the most dangerous continent in the world to defend environmental, land and human rights, with Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Honduras and Guatemala ranking worst.

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Canada: Wet’suwet’en and ministers agree tentative deal in land dispute

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Resolution follows days of intense negotiation but falls short of agreement over controversial natural gas pipeline

Indigenous leaders in Canada have reached a “milestone” agreement with government officials in a land dispute that has sparked widespread protests and railway blockades throughout the country.

The tentative resolution follows three days and nights of intense negotiations between hereditary chiefs of the Wet’suwet’en nation in British Columbia and federal and provincial ministers – but falls short of addressing concerns over a controversial natural gas pipeline project.

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‘Revolution is alive’: Canada protests spawn climate and Indigenous rights movement

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An unprecedented movement has been triggered by police raids on Indigenous land – and dialed up the pressure on Justin Trudeau

Since a police raid on an Indigenous territory at the start of February, a wave of civil disobedience has surged over Canada.

Mohawks in Ontario and Quebec have erected rail blockades that paralyzed passenger and freight travel on some lines. Other protesters – Indigenous and non-Indigenous – have followed suit, blockading tracks across the country. Thirty-seven people were arrested in Toronto this week for standing on commuter tracks during evening rush hour, paralyzing the city’s Union Station.

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