by: Brenda
Norrell, Southwest Staff Reporter
Indian
Country Today
19 March 2004
PHOENIX
- The United States is attempting to keep secret an
international ruling that affects American Indians and
property rights. The ruling, in the case of the Western
Shoshone, calls for a review of all U.S. law and policy
regarding indigenous peoples and in particular the right
to property.
On
Indigenous Peoples Day, Western Shoshone Carrie Dann
said, "The U.S. was found to be in violation of
international law—found to be violating our rights to
property, to due process, and to equality under the law.
"They
have been told to remedy this situation and to review
all law and policy relating to indigenous peoples in the
United States."
The
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, Organization
of American States issued its final report in the case
of Dann v. U.S. It is the first judicial review of the
United States law and policy regarding indigenous
peoples within its borders.
Julie
Fishel, attorney for the Western Shoshone Defense
Project, said the United States does not want American
Indians to learn about the ruling.
"They
are nervous about this," Fishel said.
The
OAS ruling focuses on the Dann’s right to their
ancestral land and the violation of their human rights.
In her statement on March 11, Dann said the U.S. is
violating the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley.
"They
tell us our lands are federal lands," Dann said,
speaking of the ranch where her family has lived for
generations in Crescent Valley.
Western
Shoshone have lived on the land, now called Nevada, for
more than 4,000 years. However, Western Shoshone land is
being seized for open pit cyanide leach gold mining and
the Nuclear Waste Repository at Yucca Mountain, a
mountain that Shoshone hold sacred.
Dann
said, "At the Nevada Test Site, the current
administration wants to reopen nuclear testing and are
conducting biological and chemical testing and
development at the new Federal Counterterrorism
Facility."
"As
we see it, these activities are done only for the
benefit of the multinational corporations, not for the
benefit of the people. On our lands alone, companies
such as Placer Dome, Newmont, Barrick, Halliburton,
Bechtel and Lockheed Martin are poisoning our air and
water and ripping apart our Mother Earth."
Hundreds
of the family’s livestock have been seized by the
Department of Interior under military-style attacks.
"We
are placed under constant surveillance by armed federal
rangers and helicopter flyovers. We remain on the land
of our ancestors.
"The
U.S. Congress and the corporations are waving money and
other deals under the noses of our people." Dann
said it is the responsibility of the people to preserve
life for the future generations.
Carrie
and her sister Mary have fought the United States all
the way to the Supreme Court. After 10 years of legal
proceedings, the Organization of American States ruled
in favor of the Western Shoshone.
The
OAS report came on Jan. 9, 2003, 10 years after sisters
Mary and Carrie Dann filed a petition for redress.
During the proceedings, several other Western Shoshone
communities joined the petition in amicus curiae
briefings. The Western Shoshone Nation Council, the
traditional governing body, filed a supporting brief.
The
case states that the U.S. argued to the Indian Claims
Commission that Western Shoshone had lost their land due
to "gradual encroachment" of whites, settlers
and others. The Western Shoshone argued that the U.S.
claim was in violation of its own laws and international
human rights laws to which the U.S. is bound as a member
of the OAS.
The
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights agreed with
the Western Shoshone. The final report found the United
States in violation of the right to property, right to
due process and right to equality under the law.
The
final report issued two recommendations to the United
States. The first was to remedy the situation of the
Western Shoshone, either legislatively or by providing a
hearing on the issue of title.
The
OAS also recommended that all U.S. law and policy
regarding indigenous peoples, in particular the right to
property, be reviewed.
Dann
said, "We will never give up our resistance. We
cannot. It is not for us but for those yet to
come."
Seated
on the grass at the Nahuacalli, the Indigenous Embassy
and community center of Tonatierra, Carrie Dann was
asked what she wanted most.
"Liberation,"
Dann said.
"I’ve
been waiting all my life to be liberated from the
federal government."
Recalling
President Bush’s words, she said, "Bush said, ‘We
are not the conquerors, we are the liberators.’
"I’m
still waiting for the day when the indigenous will be
liberated from the control of the United States
government."
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