Arizona

University Continues Appache Assault At Mount Graham

April 5, 2015 Robin Silver, www.PopularResistance.org Educate! Apache, Arizona, Indigenous Rights, Navajo

Under smokescreen cover of a admirable petition to help the Navajo protect their sacred San Francisco Peaks against a ski resort, the University of Arizona and its partners have secretly renewed their Mount Graham telescope permit for another 20 years. On Mount Graham, in order to promote their astronomers, the University of Arizona has achieved several firsts, including securing two congressional exemptions from federal cultural, religious and environmental laws. In order to promote the Mt. Graham telescopes, the University of Arizona has become: the first University to fight against the listing of an Endangered Species ( July 21, 1986) the first University to secure a congressional legislative exemption from federal environmental, religious and cultural laws (1988) the first University to promote a project whose biological basis (1988 USFWS Biological Opinion on the Mt. Graham Red Squirrel) is acknowledged to be fraudulent the first University to litigate against the rights of Native Americans to practice their religion (1992)

Stop Theft Of Apache Land

February 28, 2015 Serene Fang, www.america.aljazeera.com Resist! Arizona, Energy, Land Rights, Mining

A place of great natural beauty, popular among rock climbers and campers, a part of Tonto National Forest known as Oak Flat has been under federal protection from mining since 1955, by special order of President Eisenhower. On the nearby San Carlos Apache reservation, many consider Oak Flat to be sacred, ancestral land – the home of one of their gods and the site of traditional Apache ceremonies. But Oak Flat also sits on top of one of the world’s largest deposits of copper ore. Resolution Copper Mining, a subsidiary of British-Australian mining conglomerate Rio Tinto, has sought ownership of the land for a decade, lobbying Congress to enact special legislation on its behalf more than a dozen times since 2005. Year after year the bills failed to pass. But in December, the legislation was was quietly passed into law as part of the 2015 National Defense Authorization Act.

Black Mesa Communities Continue Stand Against Mine Expansion

December 16, 2014 Liza Minna Bloom, www.wagingnonviolence.org Resist! Arizona, Indigenous Rights, Land Rights, Wars and Militarism

This October, as many Americans returned to work after their Columbus Day holiday, rural Dineh, or Navajo, communities in the Black Mesa region of Northeastern Arizona were rocked by an invasion. SWAT teams descended upon this remote region, navigating unpaved, washed out roads, while drones and armed helicopters flew overhead. For nearly two months, Hopi Rangers, with the backing of the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs, or BIA, and the Department of the Interior, have been impounding the livestock of the Dineh residents of the area now known as the “Hopi Partition Lands,” or HPL. The official justification given is that residents’ herds exceed the size allowed to them in permits, and that they are, therefore, overgrazing and causing harm to the land in a period of prolonged drought.

Native Americans Demand Return Of Ancestors’ Bones

December 12, 2014 Leslie Macmillan, www.theguardian.com Resist! Arizona, Indigenous Rights

In 1967 the Peabody coal company came to the Navajo and Hopi reservations in northern Arizona and Utah to excavate a strip mine – but the land it leased from the tribes was on an ancient tribal burial ground. So, as required by law, it hired archeologists and for the next 17 years a dig known as the Black Mesa archeological project – the largest in North American history – unearthed more than one million artefacts, including the remains of 200 Native Americans. Now the bones and artefacts are at the centre of a debate between tribes people who say ancestral remains and archeological ruins have been desecrated, and a coal company and government officials who are planning a new dig.

Arizona Defenders Face Land Grab By Foreign Mining Companies

December 11, 2014 Tracy Barnett, www.intercontinentalcry.org Resist! Arizona, Indigenous Rights, Land Rights

Apache leaders and concerned citizens from Superior, Ariz., including a strong contingent of former miners, met on Sunday with touring members of the Huicholes: The Last Peyote Guardians film crew on the sacred ground near Superior, Arizona, where Rio Tinto and other foreign mining companies are planning a takeover of public lands for the installation of a massive copper mine. Congress is set to approve the giveaway of 2,400 acres of National Forest lands, including the burial, ceremonial and medicinal lands of the San Carlos Apaches, to Resolution Copper, a subsidiary of British-Australian Rio Tinto Mining Corp., a company with a long history of environmental and human rights abuses in developing countries.

Promises Broken, Latino Voters Split On Election Day Strategy

October 3, 2014 Alice Ollstein, www.thinkprogress.com Organize! Arizona, Elections, Latinx

With the 2014 election just weeks away, and the Democratic control of Congress’ upper chamber in question, Latino voters in Arizona and around the country remain divided on the best strategy to build enough political pressure to achieve real action on immigration reform. The idea of a boycott has some traction in Phoenix and beyond. Carlos Garcia, the executive director of the organization Puente, recently released a statement saying, “Without affirmative relief for our families, we are calling for a boycott of the vote.” Other groups, including Los Angeles-based organizing group Presente, are urging a targeted boycott of certain political races — specifically, against the Democratic Senators in tight races who joined Republicans in a recent vote to repeal the temporary protections given to DREAMers, recipients of deportation deferrals.

Public Rallies To Reinstate Marijuana Scientist

July 16, 2014 Matt Ferner, www.huffingtonpost.com Organize! Arizona, Education, health, Marijuana, Politics

A petition demanding that the University of Arizona reinstate a research scientist fired after she won federal approval to study marijuana for military veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder has received more than 27,000 signatures. Dr. Suzanne Sisley, a Department of Psychiatry faculty member and researcher at the school, was suddenly terminated last week for reasons she maintains were related to her research. She won federal approval in April for the long-delayed veterans study, when the Department of Health and Human Services signed off on the project. Ricardo Pereyda, an Iraq war veteran with PTSD who said he's been treating his symptoms with marijuana since 2010, started the Change.org petition to reinstate Sisley, which had nearly 28,000 signatures Tuesday night. "The university must reinstate Dr. Sisley, providing her with the necessary space and resources she needs to conduct her research," Pereyda wrote in the petition. "Her study could mean life or death for many veterans.

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