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PBI-Canada offers overview of Canada-Colombia economic relationship at public forum with Berenice Celeita

By
Brent Patterson
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On October 30, Association for Research and Social Action (Nomadesc) president Berenice Celeita spoke at the Amnesty International Canada office in Ottawa/Algonquin territory. The Peace Brigades International-Colombia Project has accompanied Nomadesc since 2011 and Berenice Celeita since 1999.

Brent Patterson of Peace Brigades International-Canada offered these comments at the public forum:

Canada has an enormous economic relationship with Colombia. Canadian companies hold $8 billion of energy assets there and about $1.1 billion of mining assets.

In 2021, about 25 Canadian mining companies had operations in Colombia, and of the 69 oil and gas exploration blocks granted by the Duque government between 2019 and 2021, 39 of those blocks went to four Canadian companies.

PEACEBUILDING

The figures vary, but the Government of Canada says it has contributed about $40 million through its Peace and Stabilization Operations Program (PSOP) since the 2016 Peace Agreement to support peacebuilding efforts in Colombia.

But notably, between 2012 and 2020, Canada has exported a greater amount, more than $47 million, in “military goods” to Colombia. It has also just announced a $418 million contract – almost half-a-billion dollars – to sell 55 Light Armoured Vehicles (LAVs) to the Colombian army. Those LAVs, the same model that Canada sold to Saudi Arabia, will be manufactured by General Dynamics Land Systems in London, Ontario.

We already know that at least one of the Toronto, Ontario-manufactured INKAS armoured vehicles sold to the National Police in 2014 was used by in July 2021 to stop activists en route to a peoples assembly in Cali during the national strike.

And we know that Mirabel, Quebec-manufactured Bell 407 helicopters sold to the police in 2013-14 were used to surveil national strike protests in Cali in 2019.

Furthermore, briefing notes in July 2022 for then Defence Minister Anita Anand indicate that Canada wants to sell more weapons to Colombia and that it was interested in “opportunities related to a new naval base and military headquarters building”.

CANADA-COLOMBIA FREE TRADE AGREEMENT

Despite opposition from Canadian and Colombian civil society, the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement has been in force since August 2011. There is also an agreement to produce an annual report on the human rights impacts of the agreement.

Notably though, this human rights assessment omits investment – significantly in mining and oil and gas – and focuses only on the impacts of tariff reductions.

As such, this report consistently says: “No human rights impacts which could be directly associated with Canada’s tariff reductions.”

Even there with tariff reductions, the Government of Canada does not acknowledge the impacts of increased exports to Colombia and the expansion of the port in Buenaventura that has displaced Afro-Colombian communities.

With respect to investment, Canadian mining companies have USD $1.7 billion in pending investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) claims against Colombia.

And notably, if fracking is prohibited in Colombia, the Calgary, Alberta-based company Parex Resources could launch an additional ISDS challenge given it signed an “exploration and production” contract in September 2014 with the National Hydrocarbons Agency (ANH) for Block VMM-9 in the Magdalena Medio region.

EXPORT DEVELOPMENT CANADA

Since 2012, Export Development Canada has provided $1.4 billion in financing to oil and gas in Colombia. Notably, that support has gone to companies include Parex, Gran Tierra, Canacol and Ecopetrol. Parex received six loans totalling up to $475 million.

Concerns about Parex operations in Colombia have been expressed in relation to the Ibagué aquifer in Tolima, by residents in Cumaral, Meta, and its Aguas Blancas oil field in Simacota, Santander. Canadian oil companies have also been implicated in at least 92 oil spills in Colombia between 2015 and June 2022. Those include Frontera Energy/Pacific Rubiales (56), Gran Tierra (26) and Parex Resources (10).

Export Development Canada now says it will adhere to the Glasgow Statement and that it has ended “new direct financing to international fossil fuel companies”.

However Environmental Defence has raised the concern that the phrasing “international fossil fuel companies” may not close the door on “domestic companies involved in international fossil fuel trade and operations”.

The Government of Canada has also used the word “unabated”, meaning support can still go to fossil fuel companies using carbon capture technology.

While some of this is still unclear, there is still very much the need to be vigilant in the monitoring of EDC support for the extractivist sector in Colombia.

The level of Canadian investment in mining and oil and gas (notably the 39 new exploration blocks), the continued and now increasing sale of Canadian manufactured “military goods”, the corporate rights enshrined in the “free trade” agreement, and the role of Export Development Canada means that we need to continue looking at the intersection points between Canada and human rights violations in Colombia.

The Network in Defence of Indigenous Territories of Sierra Tarahumara (REDETI) and PBI-Mexico visit Ottawa

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo: Manuel Jabonero (PBI-Mexico), Mariana Villarreal (REDETI) and Brent Patterson (PBI-Canada) remember Julián Carrillo on Parliament Hill, October 24.

This past week, Mariana Azucena Villarreal Frías, the Chihuahua-based coordinator of the Network in Defence of Indigenous Territories of Sierra Tarahumara (REDETI), was in Ottawa. She was accompanied by Manuel Jabonero Prieto, the Mexico City-based advocacy coordinator with the Peace Brigades International-Mexico Project.

At a series of meetings, Mariana spoke about the situation of Indigenous peoples in the mountainous Sierra Tarahumara region in the state of Chihuahua in northern Mexico. This includes the Mexican government granting gold and silver mining concessions to Canadian companies without consultation, the ongoing environmental implications of the TC Energy Encino-Topolobampo gas pipeline, and illegal logging, while experiencing forced displacement and the violence of organized crime.

Mariana highlighted the importance of laws that would uphold the Indigenous right to free, prior and informed consent, recognize title to ancestral territory, as well as address forced internal displacement and support those who have been displaced.

Here is an initial overview of their visit to Ottawa:

TUESDAY OCTOBER 24

Mariana and Manuel arrived in Ottawa that afternoon.

Early that evening we were joined by Amnesty International Canada on Parliament Hill to remember Rarámuri land defender Julián Carrillo Martínez.

On that same day, PBI-Mexico accompanied the Sierra Madre Alliance (ASMAC), a member group of REDETI, at the commemoration in Mexico of Julián Carrillo and his fight for land and territory. ASMAC says: “He who fights for life never dies”

Mariana, Manuel and Pat Davis of PBI also commemorated the memory of Julian earlier that day in Washington, DC.

Julian was killed on October 24, 2018. El Heraldo de Chihuahua reported on this anniversary: “In the Sierra Tarahumara, 22 people have been murdered as a result of the defense of the forest, water and natural resources, according to Alianza Sierra Madre, of which 15 are from [the community of] Coloradas de la Vírgen.”

The El Heraldo article also notes: “Despite the fact that on March 12, 2021, one of the perpetrators of the murders of Julián and his son Víctor was sentenced to 48 years in prison, the mastermind and the rest of the perpetrators have still not been captured.”

WENESDAY OCTOBER 25

On this morning we met with the Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE), an independent human rights agency formally established by the Government of Canada in May 2019 to examine complaints of alleged human rights abuses committed by Canadian companies operating outside Canada.

The Canadian enterprises that may contribute to exacerbating the human rights situation in the Sierra Tarahumara include the mining companies Vancouver-based Orogen Royalties and Prospero Silver Corp. and Toronto-based Mammoth Resources, as well as the Calgary-based pipeline company TC Energy.

While REDETI is interested in the opportunities presented by this mechanism, they are also aware of the cautions outlined by Canadian civil society.

That afternoon, we met with Kathy Price, the Latin America coordinator for Amnesty International Canada, who is based in Toronto.

Price has previously written: “The assassination [of Julián Carrillo] came just a week after he spoke out against the environmental impacts of a mining concession awarded by authorities to a Canadian mining company without the free, prior and informed consent of the Indigenous people whose lands would be impacted.”

This was a concern also raised by REDETI and other organizations in this statement: “Four mining concessions were granted without guaranteeing the people’s right to their ancestral lands and to consultation: three to individuals and the fourth to the mining company Evrim S.A. de C.V., which belongs to the Canadian group Evrim Resources Corp.”

Evrim merged with Renaissance Gold, Inc. in June 2020 to form Orogen.

THURSDAY OCTOBER 26

On this morning we met with officials from the federal government minister Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada.

We met with them because of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) they signed earlier this year with the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples (INPI) in Mexico.

INPI, established in December 2018, is recognized as “the authority of the Federal Executive in matters related to indigenous and Afro-Mexican peoples”, creating, defining, executing and coordinating policies and programs to guarantee their rights.

The MOU highlights as an objective: “enabling information-sharing between the Participants and Indigenous Peoples in their respective countries that will facilitate the development of policies, programs, projects and strategies which seek to ensure the exercise and implementation of the rights of Indigenous peoples in their respective countries.”

That afternoon, we met with Leah Gazan, the New Democratic Party (NDP) Member of Parliament (MP) for the riding of Winnipeg Centre. Gazan is a recognized and vocal defender of Indigenous rights, particularly the right to free, prior and informed consent.

There was also the opportunity that evening to have dinner and meet with Peace Brigades International-Canada Board members Ed Bianchi and Meera Karunananthan to update them on the meetings that had taken place.

FRIDAY OCTOBER 27

Then we met with officials from Global Affairs Canada (GAC) at their office in the Lester B. Pearson Building at 125 Sussex Avenue.

REDETI asked Global Affairs Canada if it could raise with the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs the importance of the Mexican government passing a law to prevent, attend to, and provide comprehensive reparations for internally displaced persons. Mexico’s Congress passed this law in September 2020, but it is currently stalled in the Senate. In 2022, UN Special Rapporteur Cecilia Jimenez-Damary urged “the Mexican government to legislate human rights guarantees for internally displaced persons and to allocate adequate funding for their protection and durable solutions.”

Then in the afternoon, we met with NDP Member of Parliament Lori Idlout. We met with her via Zoom because she was in her home riding of Iqaluit, Nunavut. Idlout is the NDP Critic for Indigenous Services; Northern Affairs; Crown-Indigenous Relations.

We also took a moment to stop outside Export Development Canada (EDC),

EDC is a Crown corporation wholly owned by the Government of Canada. It provides financing to Canadian companies operating abroad (and uniquely within Canada as well). EDC has extensive relationships with close to 20 of the largest Mexican corporations, including Pemex and the Comisión Federal de Electricidad (FCE). It is headquartered in Ottawa and has operated a regional office in Mexico since 2000.

We had asked for a meeting with them but were declined. REDETI still hopes to be able to meet with them to be able to share concerns about the financing they provide and the ramifications this may have on Indigenous rights in the Sierra Tarahumara.

Given Export Development Canada has identified Mexico as a “priority market” and given its stated commitment to “human rights risk management [includes gathering] feedback from stakeholders to continue to strengthen our practices”, we trust there will the space at some point for REDETI to share its input with them.

In the coming weeks, we hope to be able to meet with MiningWatch Canada, as well as Members of Parliament Heather McPherson (the NDP Critic for Foreign Affairs) and Laurel Collins (the NDP Critic for the Environment and Climate Change) to continue these conversations. We have also been invited to share information with Green Party Member of Parliament Mike Morrice.

PBI-Canada will continue to follow all these issues raised by REDETI and PBI-Mexico in Ottawa.

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Further reading

PBI-Canada to help REDETI commemorate the 5th anniversary of the murder of Rarámuri land defender Julián Carrillo (October 13, 2023)

PBI-Canada to host the Network in Defense of Indigenous Territories of Sierra Tarahumara (REDETI) in Ottawa (October 10, 2023)

PBI-Canada seeks meeting with Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada on MOU with Mexico (October 21, 2023)

What has been the environmental impact of the TC Energy Encino-Topolobampo pipeline in Chihuahua, Mexico? (October 20, 2023)

PBI-Canada seeks meeting with Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada on MOU with Mexico

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo: “Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard and Minister Melanie Joly signed an MOU for the protection of the native peoples of Mexico and Canada” on January 12, 2023. At the same time, the Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs of Canada (CIRNAC) and the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples (INPI) of the United Mexican States (Mexico) appear to have signed this MOU.

Mariana Azucena Villarreal Frías of the Network in Defense of Indigenous Territories of Sierra Tarahumara (REDETI) will be in Ottawa next week (October 24-29). She will be accompanied by Manuel Jabonero from the Peace Brigades International-Mexico Project.

Photo: Prior to coming to Ottawa, Mariana and Manuel are meeting with Senators and members of the US Congress in Washington, DC.

REDETI is made up of thirteen Raramuri and Ódami communities and three organizations, including the PBI-Mexico accompanied CONTEC.

REDETI supports these communities to achieve legal recognition of their ancestral territories in the Sierra Tarahumara region in the state of Chihuahua and self-determination over the natural resources on those lands.

Photo: This Tuesday October 24 will mark the 5th anniversary of the killing of Raramuri land defender Julian Carrillo who resisted illegal logging and the mining concession granted to Vancouver-based Evrim Resources/Orogen Royalties.

REDETI believes the situation for Indigenous peoples in the Sierra Tarahumara would be improved through four key actions:

1- Reform of the Law on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and Afro-Mexican Peoples

Holland & Knight has explained: “On April 20, 2021, the House of Deputies of Mexico voted on, and approved, a bill to enact the General Law of Consultation of Indigenous and Black Mexican People’s Law and submitted the proposed bill to the Senate for review and voting. The purpose of the law is to establish the right to prior consultation in favor of indigenous and Black Mexican people and communities in the face of governmental measures that may affect such groups, their ways of life, their social, political, economic and cultural organization, and the integrity of their lands, territories and natural resources.”

The civil society organization Fundar (Analysis and Research Center) has also noted: “In 2021, as part of ALDEA [the Alliance for Free Determination and Autonomy], we were successful in getting our recommendations included in the initiative of the General Law of Consultation of Indigenous and Afro-Mexican Peoples and Communities. Even though it still has room for improvement, the approval by the Chamber of Deputies of this initiative has been a crucial step toward respecting and guaranteeing the right to the prior, free, and informed consent from Indigenous peoples and communities toward continuing to promote the Indigenous Constitutional Reform.”

REDETI says that the Law should acknowledge full autonomy and self-determination for Indigenous peoples over their ancestral territories and uphold the right to free, prior and informed consent established in ILO Convention 169 and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, both of which Mexico has endorsed.

2- Passage of the Law to Prevent, Attend to, and Provide Reparations for Forced Internal Displacement

In September 2020, the lower house of Mexico’s Congress passed the Law to Prevent, Attend to, and Provide Reparations for Forced Internal Displacement.

The Comprehensive Regional Protection and Solutions Framework (MIRPS) has also noted: “On September 29th, 2021, the Chamber of Deputies unanimously approved the bill for the General Law on Forced Internal Displacement and passed it for the review of the Senate. Pilot programs have begun to support internally displaced families.”

In October 2022, PBI-United Kingdom commented: “Following her visit to Mexico in September, the UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of internally displaced persons urged the Mexican government to legislate human rights guarantees for internally displaced persons and to allocate adequate funding for their protection and durable solutions. PBI echoes CONTEC’s call for the law to be passed, for the Mexican government to properly resource its implementation, and for the international community to support those human rights defenders currently risking their lives to support the victims of enforced displacement.”

The passage of the law would provide guarantees for the rights of internally displaced persons and create a national mechanism to explicitly address forced internal displacement.

3- Approval of an Action Plan to Stop Illegal Logging in Chihuahua

REDETI has asked Mexico to approve an Integral Action Plan to Stop Logging in Chihuahua (Plan de Acción Integral para Frenar la Tala en Chihuahua).

The National Network of Civil Human Rights Organizations “All Rights for All” (Red TDT) in Mexico has highlighted: “It is urgent to stop illegal logging in the Sierra Tarahumara of Chihuahua due to environmental damage, forced internal displacement, murders and multiple and irreparable violations of human rights such as autonomy, self-determination, and free, prior and informed consultation.”

They have demanded that Mexico “develop a comprehensive action plan to stop illegal logging in the Sierra Tarahumara”, take “urgent actions to stop illegal logging immediately, such as the implementation of permanent operations, the review of timber processing centers and illegal timber commercialization networks”, and to ensure “that displaced persons’ right to a dignified and safe return to their communities be guaranteed.”

4- Respond to IACHR requests for information on cases in the Sierra Tarahumara

REDETI has also urged Mexico to respond to requests for information on pending cases from communities in the Sierra Tarahumara.

The REDETI website notes: “Given the lack of security conditions and the violence generated in Choréachi in February 2014, the IACHR was asked to provide collective precautionary measures for the community and for the staff of Alianza Sierra Madre A.C. (ASMAC), which accompanies the legal proceedings before the courts. In October 2015, the IACHR decided to grant the request for precautionary measures in favor of Prudencio Ramos Ramos (nephew of Socorro Ayala Ramos) and Ángela Ayala Ramos (widow of Jaime Zubias Ceballos).”

The IACHR describes itself as “a principal and autonomous organ of the Organization of American States (OAS) whose mission is to promote and protect human rights in the American hemisphere.” The Government of Canada has noted: “After 28 years as an observer, Canada became a member of the OAS on January 8, 1990.”

Photo: PBI and REDETI at the OAS in Washington, DC this past week.

Canada-Mexico Memorandum of Understanding

In January 2023, Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Melanie Joly signed an MoU on Indigenous rights with Mexico’s Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard.

The National Indigenous Times reports: “Mexico’s Secretary of Foreign Affairs Marcelo Ebrard and Canadian Minister for Foreign Affairs Mélanie Joly signed the bilateral agreement to modernise cooperation on addressing issues facing Indigenous communities.”

Global Affairs Canada also highlights: “Canada and Mexico recognize the opportunity to jointly build platforms to allow Indigenous Peoples to share best practices, lessons learned, and address common issues in building inclusive societies with Indigenous communities that favour self-reliance, prosperity, and well-being in the region to achieve social justice.”

At the same time, Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada also appears to have signed this Memorandum of Understanding on Indigenous rights with the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples, the governmental authority on matters related to Indigenous and Afro-Mexican people in Mexico.

Seeking meeting

While PBI-Canada has been able to schedule a meeting with Global Affairs Canada, Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada has not yet replied to our email (dated October 11, 2023) requesting a meeting to discuss the Memorandum. We continue to seek this meeting between REDETI and CIRNAC.

Photo: PBI-Mexico accompanied a REDETI convened gathering of Indigenous Rarámuri and Ódami communities in the Sierra Tarahumara on October 6-8, 2023.

What has been the environmental impact of the TC Energy Encino-Topolobampo pipeline in Chihuahua, Mexico?

By
Brent Patterson
-

Photo: Mariana Villarreal of REDETI and Manuel Jabonero of PBI-Mexico are in Washington, DC this week before travelling to Ottawa.

Mariana Azucena Villarreal Frías of the Network in Defense of Indigenous Territories of Sierra Tarahumara (REDETI) will be in Ottawa next week. She will be accompanied by Manuel Jabonero from the Peace Brigades International-Mexico Project.

One of the issues Mariana will discuss is the environmental impacts of the Calgary-based transnational TC Energy’s Encino-Topolobampo pipeline.

When the San Elías Repechique Forest community opposed the project in February 2014, that created sufficient pressure for a consultation.

The Chihuahua-based human rights organization Technical Community Consultation (CONTEC) was one of the organizations that supported them.

CONTEC is accompanied by PB-Mexico and is a REDETI member group.

Journalist Martha Pskowski writes that when the consultation began in November 2014, “Rarámuri communities voiced concerns that construction would impact their water sources, cause deforestation, and affect their farmlands.”

She adds: “The community of Repechike maintained that they wanted the pipeline route to be re-drawn so it would not cross their territory.”

By February 2015, the community decided to end the “dialogue” in this consultation process because TC Energy subsidiary Noreste Natural Gas Transporting corporation (TGNN) had not taken into consideration this request to redraw the pipeline route.

In a report about the consultation, CONTEC commented: “The logic of the state is to impose the project at the lowest social cost possible. That’s how the consultation is used as rhetoric, as discourse, without its real meaning.”

Proposed route. Image from the report El Gasoducto El Encino–Topolobampo: El derecho a la consulta a los rarámuri (June 2016).

Pskowski notes: “[TransCanada] eventually agreed to modify the route to avoid Repechike’s territory. However, in other communities where construction started before the consultation got underway, it was impossible to turn back the clock.”

By December 2018, the pipeline was operational.

Pskowski further comments: “Experiences like the El Encino-Topolobampo pipeline have soured many Indigenous communities and human rights lawyers to the state-run consultation process.”

She has also noted that the murder of Raramuri land defender Julian Carrillo and other acts of intimidations “discouraged some Rarámuri people from speaking out when the energy company TransCanada began building a natural gas pipeline through the area.”

Other TC Energy pipelines in Mexico

One month ago, on September 21, we held a webinar featuring Carlos Beas Torres of the Union of Indigenous Communities from the North of the Isthmus (UCIZONI) that is opposing the TC Energy Southeast Gateway (Puerta al Sureste) pipeline.

And this past week, we co-organized a visit to Ottawa of Wet’suwet’en land defenders opposed to the TC Energy Coastal GasLink pipeline on their territory in British Columbia, Canada and Otomi land defender Don Salvador Aparicio Olvera who is opposed to the TC Energy Tuxpan-Tula pipeline on his ancestral lands in Mexico.

TC Energy is the largest Canadian investor in Mexico.

Secwépemc launch Unceded Law Response Group (ULRG), determine C-IRG is committing war crimes on Indigenous territories

By
Brent Patterson
-

Photo: Unceded Law Response Group Chief Commissioner April Thomas, Associate Commissioner Shawna Knight, Commissioner Mike McKenzie.

IndigiNews reports: “Following years of violent arrests at industry injunction sites throughout the province [of British Columbia], Secwépemc leaders have launched a response group that is dedicated to preventing harm against the land and its defenders.”

“The Unceded Law Response Group (ULRG) officially went live this month, announcing it would utilize Indigenous law and related policies to uphold sovereignty on unceded lands and provide resources for those on the front lines.”

That article adds: “The group’s mandate pushes back against the colonial legal system and how it’s been weaponized against Indigenous land defenders — with B.C. Supreme Court-ordered injunction orders that protect corporate interests and the RCMP’s Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG) using force to protect resource extraction projects.”

The ULRG website notes: “[A Secwépemc] delegation reviewed extensive evidence presented from both sides to the public, establishing a chain of events leading to a preliminary verdict, so [Commissioners] Mike [McKenzie], April [Thomas], and Shawna [Knight] inherently determined, in their opinion, that the RCMP C-IRG involvement at the Fairy Creek Blockade, Ada’itsx, among other illegal activities by government and police forces, is a harmful and illegal occupation by a foreign and paramilitary organization committing war crimes on unceded and unsurrendered Indigenous territories.”

The IndigiNews article further explains: “[McKenzie says the ULRG will] serve as a space to fill in that gap for land defenders to find resources, legal assistance and connect with other Indigenous land defenders when the support from chief and council isn’t there.”

“The group’s website has a resource menu that lists a number of services that people can access, everything from RCMP complaints [through the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission], legal aid, Indigenous law documents and more.”

The article also highlights: “The group is also in the process of launching a foundation so that they can receive charitable status, and they received consent from the Law Society of B.C. to use the word ‘law’ in the foundation’s name.”

The home-page can be found at Unceded Law Response Group.

Ojibwe water protector Tara Houska arrested resisting the Mountain Valley Pipeline that is financed by Canadian banks

By
Brent Patterson
-

Photo by Appalachians Against Pipelines.

Native News Online reports: “On Monday [October 16], Ojibwe attorney Tara Houska was arrested for criminal trespassing, a misdemeanor in Virginia, after she locked herself to construction equipment at a Mountain Valley Pipeline construction site in Elliston, Virginia [400 kilometres south-west of Washington, DC].”

“Houska told Native News Online that she was released on Tuesday [October 17] after posting $2,000 cash bail for criminal trespassing in Montgomery County.”

The article by Darren Thompson adds: “[Houska and two others, Emily Adamski and Louisa Kornblatt] locked themselves to construction equipment at sites along the Mountain Valley Pipeline route and halted drilling under the highway and train tracks next to the Roanoke River for the day.”

Appalachians Against Pipelines highlighted: “We also take action today to name the connection between MVP & the genocide unfolding in Gaza. MVP would supply gas to the Pentagon and the Radford Army Ammunition Plant, which is operated by BAE Systems – a corporation that supplies Israel with white phosphorus & other weapons.”

Photo by Appalachians Against Pipelines.

Human Rights Watch has stated that Israel’s “use of white phosphorus in densely populated areas of Gaza violates the requirement under international humanitarian law to take all feasible precautions to avoid civilian injury and loss of life.”

After she was released, Houska stated: “Chi-miigwech to every person around the globe marching for Palestine, giving their hearts and their love, refusing to look away and be complicit.”

She further commented: “We cannot succumb to powerlessness. The real power I have encountered in this world is in the people, in nature. We will not back down when we stand with truth and love in our hearts. For the earth, for our children. End apartheid. Free Gaza. Stop Mountain Valley Pipeline.”

Canadian banks finance Mountain Valley Pipeline

Banking on Climate Chaos and others have collaboratively noted that American banks are financing the pipeline and ask: Will US banks become the next target for activists fighting the Mountain Valley Pipeline? (August 24, 2023).

We further note that Canadian banks are also financing the companies behind the pipeline, a joint venture of EQT Midstream Partners (45.5%); NextEra Energy Resources (31%); Con Edison Transmission (12.5%); WGL Midstream (10%) and RGC Midstream (1%).

The Mountain Valley Pipeline received its Certificate of Convenience and Necessity from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on October 13, 2017, and construction began in early 2018.

Equitrans Midstream Corp. (ETRN) was reportedly spun off of EQT Corp. in 2018, but EQT retains shares in ETRN.

Figures from the Banking on Climate Chaos 2023 report indicate that since 2018, Canadian banks have provided USD $3.197 billion to EQM Midstream Partners.

Since 2016, Canadian banks have also provided USD $1.27 billion to the other partners in the consortium building the pipeline.

That includes RBC providing $303.48 million to NextEra Energy Capital Holdings Inc., $9.29 million to NextEra Energy Operating Partners LP, and $88.27 million to WGL Holdings Inc. The Toronto-Dominion Bank (TD) provided $46.22 million to NextEra Energy Capital Holdings Inc., $9.10 million to NextEra Energy Operating Partners LP, and $238.32 million to WGL Holdings Inc. The Bank of Montreal provided $116.74 million to NextEra Energy Capital Holdings Inc. Scotiabank provided $331.16 million to NextEra Energy Capital Holdings Inc. and $23.59 to NextEra Energy Operating Partners LP. And the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) provided $104.65 to NextEra Energy Capital Holdings Inc.

In 2016-17, EQT Corp. received USD $299.33 million from RBC. In subsequent years, as a holder in shares in Equitrans Midstream, Canadian banks have provided an additional USD $2.257 billion in financing to EQT Corp.

We continue to follow this situation.

Mexico City police injure ten displaced Otomi demanding their right to housing be upheld

By
Brent Patterson
-

Photo by Zone Docs.

Courthouse News reports: “A clash between police and Indigenous activists occupying government offices in Mexico City late Sunday [October 15] left 10 people wounded, including teenage girls as young as 13, according to organizers of the occupying group.”

Video: Police attack Otomi occupation.

“The activists — many of them displaced members of the indigenous Otomi population — have occupied the offices of the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples [INPI] for three years to demand their constitutional right to decent affordable housing. They celebrated the third anniversary of the taking of the offices last Thursday [October 12].”

On that day they began a blockade of Mexico-Coyoacán Avenue, the street where the INPI offices in Mexico City are situated.

The article also notes: “After taking the offices in October 2020, activists renamed the space the House of Indigenous Communities and Peoples: Samir Flores Soberanes, in honor of a water rights activist from Morelos who was murdered in 2019.”

Samir was a Nahua land and environmental defender resisting the controversial Morelos Integral Project (PIM) that includes a 171-kilometre gas pipeline across the states of Tlaxcala, Puebla and Morelos.

Photo: Samir Flores Soberanes was killed on February 20, 2019.

The Otomi occupying the offices were originally from the state of Querétaro. The Otomi population of about 667,038 people is situated in the states of Querétaro Guanajuato, Michoacán, Mexico and Tlaxcala as well as Veracruz, Puebla and Hidalgo.

This past week Otomi land defender Don Salvador Aparicio Olvera was in Toronto and Ottawa to express opposition to the yet-to-be completed Tuxpan-Tula pipeline being built by the Calgary-based transnational TC Energy.

He stated: “We have thus far been able to stop the Tuxpan Tula pipeline by TC Energy. But we know that this fight is not over, there are more threats every day. They see our resources as only a commodity but we are here to defend our forests.”

Photo: Salvador Aparicio speaking at protest in front of the Global Affairs Canada office in Toronto against the Tuxpan-Tula pipeline, October 14.

The TC Energy pipeline would extend from Tuxpan, Veracruz through Puebla to Tula, Hidalgo.

There is a concern that the 58 kilometres of this pipeline yet to be built would detrimentally impact Otomi, Mixtec and Nahua peoples and could contribute to their displacement into a situation like that of the Otomi from Querétaro.

More about this pipeline in this 7-minute video: La Lucha de la Sierra Norte de Puebla Ante el Gasoducto Tuxpan-Tula.

The video says: “Among the multiple threats posed by the construction of this pipeline is the impact of the mountain forest and aquifer system, in particular the communities highlights the damage to their springs. They also warn of health problems, insecurity and conflicts between communities generating divisions among them and displacement.”

Still from video.

We continue to follow this situation.

PBI-Mexico accompanies REDETI convened gathering of Indigenous Rarámuri and Ódami communities in the Sierra Tarahumara

By
Brent Patterson
-

Raichali (which means “word” in the Rarámuri language) reports: “More than sixty members of the Rarámuri and Ódami Indigenous communities of the Sierra Tarahumara met with members of the Tsotsil and Ch’ol communities of Chiapas to exchange experiences on their own processes of autonomy, use of natural resources, organization for the defense of the territory and strengthening of their culture.”

“This meeting was convened by the Indigenous communities and civil associations that are members of the Network for the Defense of Indigenous Territory in the Sierra Tarahumara (REDETI) and took place in Corarayvo, municipality of Guazapares, between October 6 and 8, as a follow-up to the meetings held year after year to strengthen the ties between these communities and strengthen their struggles.”

The article then highlights: “Some of these communities face problems of lack of recognition of their territory, siege by local chieftains, forced displacement events and constant threats for their forest defense activities.”

The meeting held last year was in the Indigenous community of Coloradas de la Virgen that has experienced the murders of its community leaders, including Rarámuri land defender Julián Carrillo on October 24, 2018.

Mariana Azucena Villarreal Frías of the Network in Defense of Indigenous Territories of Sierra Tarahumara (REDETI) will be in Ottawa on October 24 and plans to commemorate the fifth anniversary of Carrillo’s death.

Photo: Mariana Azucena Villarreal Frías (REDETI) and Manuel Jabonero (PBI-Mexico) met with Mary Lawlor (UN Special Rapporteur) in Washington, DC prior to their visit to Ottawa.

Kathy Price of Amnesty International Canada has noted: “The assassination [of Julián] came just a week after he spoke out against the environmental impacts of a mining concession awarded by authorities to a Canadian mining company without the free, prior and informed consent of the Indigenous people whose lands would be impacted.”

In December 2019, Mariana’s organization signed this statement that says: “In Chihuahua, in the Rarámuri community of Coloradas de La Virgen, located in the Sierra Tarahumara, four mining concessions were granted without guaranteeing the people’s right to their ancestral lands and to consultation: three to individuals and the fourth to the mining company Evrim S.A. de C.V., which belongs to the Canadian group Evrim Resources Corp.”

The Evrim Resources Cerro Cascaron project is located in Chihuahua. Initial drilling for gold and silver at this site began on October 4, 2018. In June 2020, Evrim Resources Corp. merged with Renaissance Gold, Inc. to form Orogen Royalties Inc. headquartered at 1015–789 West Pender Street in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

We continue to follow this situation.

Further reading

PBI-Canada to help REDETI commemorate the 5th anniversary of the murder of Rarámuri land defender Julián Carrillo (October 13, 2023)

PBI-Canada to host the Network in Defense of Indigenous Territories of Sierra Tarahumara (REDETI) in Ottawa, October 24-29 (October 10, 2023)

Wet’suwet’en and Otomi land defenders unite against the TC Energy Coastal GasLink and Tuxpan-Tula pipelines

By
Brent Patterson
-

Over the past four days in Ottawa and Toronto, PBI-Canada, along with allies including Above Ground and the Mining Injustice Solidarity Network, have accompanied and sought to amplify the resistance of Wet’suwet’en and Otomi land defenders to the Coastal GasLink and Tuxpan-Tula fracked gas pipelines being built on their territories without consent by the Calgary-based Canadian transnational TC Energy.

The Coastal GasLink pipeline route traverses about 190 kilometres of Wet’suwet’en territory in northern British Columbia, crossing wetlands, cultural sites and the Wedzin Kwa river. The Tuxpan-Tula pipeline is a 287-kilometre project (of which 58 kilometres has not yet been constructed) that crosses Indigenous lands and communities beginning in Tuxpan, Veracruz to Tula, Hidalgo northwest of Mexico City.

Saturday October 14

March in Toronto

We participated in a march in Toronto that included stops at TC Energy (200 Bay Street, 24th Floor, Royal Bank Plaza – North Tower) and the Alberta Investment Management Corporation/AIMCo (First Canadian Place, 100 King Street West).

In December 2019, almost a full year after the first militarized RCMP Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG) raid on Wet’suwet’en territory, AIMCo, “on behalf of certain of its clients, and in partnership with KKR”, acquired a combined 65 per cent equity interest in the Coastal GasLink pipeline from TC Energy.

Outside the TC Energy office, Wet’suwet’en land defender Sleydo’ told the hundreds gathered on Bay Street: “Seeing all of you here today is inspirational to me. It helps us keep going, even in the face of the kind of repression that we are experiencing in our own territories, in our own homes, in our own ancient village sites. We have to stand with our relatives across Turtle Island and around the world. An attack on one is an attack on all.”

Monday October 16

Meeting with Export Development Canada in Ottawa

Then in Ottawa, we accompanied with Georgina Alonso of Above Ground and Anna Zalik from York University, Otomi land defender Don Salvador Aparicio Olvera, Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chief Na’Moks, Wet’suwet’en land defender Eve Saint, along with Dr. Eliana Acosta Marquez and Clarissa Torreblanca of the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) to a meeting with Export Development Canada (EDC).

An analysis by The Globe and Mail newspaper found that EDC, a Crown corporation wholly owned by the Government of Canada, has provided TransCanada Pipelines (now TC Energy) with a minimum of $1 billion in funding between 2001 and the end of 2020.

Notably, EDC signed an agreement with TC Energy to lend between $250 million and $500 million for the Coastal GasLink pipeline. At that time, EDC spokesperson Jessica Draker said that the loan was approved after a “rigorous due diligence review.”

EDC also approved the financing despite acknowledging “the project continues to be opposed by a group of hereditary chiefs from the Wet’suwet’en First Nation, who claim to be the legitimate decision-makers of this nation, not to have been duly consulted and not to have consented to the project.”

EDC also stated: “[EDC believes TC Energy] has demonstrated a great ability to manage environmental and social risks.”

Subsequently, TC Energy has been fined by provincial authorities more than $800,000 for non-compliance with environmental regulations. Most recently, TC Energy was fined $340,000 was issued for “deficiencies with erosion and sediment control measures” and $6,000 for “providing false and misleading information”.

Despite this, EDC continues its relationship with the company.

Meeting with the CORE

That afternoon, the delegation also met with two representatives from the Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE).

The CORE says: “We review complaints about possible human rights abuses by Canadian companies when those companies work outside Canada in the garment, mining, and oil and gas sectors.”

The situation with the Tuxpan-Tula pipeline was raised in the meeting, as was the Coastal GasLink pipeline on Wet’suwet’en territory (within Canada, but a sovereign nation).

The Canadian Network on Corporation Accountability has advised impacted communities to “approach with caution” the CORE (which the delegation did).

And Tavia Grant from The Globe and Mail recently reported: “In seven of the eight preliminary reports the CORE has released so far – all of which focus on the alleged use of forced labour in China – the assessments show the companies in question have either given incomplete answers, not responded, failed to respond to meeting requests, or stopped engaging in the process altogether.”

That article quotes Georgina Alonso from Above Ground who comments: “We know that voluntary regulatory mechanisms don’t really work in the pursuit of corporate compliance and accountability.”

Public Forum

And that evening, the delegation spoke at a public forum that took place at the University of Ottawa. Close to 100 people had pre-registered for the in-person event, with another 75 people registering for the online Zoom presentation of the forum.

The event included an opening by Algonquin Elder and University of Ottawa Chancellor Claudette Commanda who shared the struggle of her people against a radioactive waste disposal site proposed by Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL) to be located 190 kilometres northwest of Ottawa on Algonquin territory.

Video clips shown at the forum included excerpts from Invasion and La Lucha de la Sierra Norte de Puebla Ante el Gasoducto Tuxpan-Tula.

Tuesday October 17

Meeting with Global Affairs Canada

In the morning, the delegation met with two representatives of the Responsible Business Conduct (RBC) unit at Global Affairs Canada (GAC).

GAC RBC liaises with the Canadian Embassy in Mexico.

And yet when the Mexican government raised concerns in August 2019 about seven pipelines, including the Tuxpan-Tula pipeline, former Canadian ambassador Pierre Alarie commented: “I am deeply concerned by the actions of the CFE (Federal Electricity Commission) and the signal they send that … Mexico will not respect the gas pipeline contracts.”

The Canadian Embassy in Mexico has also been implicated in the assassination of land defender Mariano Abarca on November 27, 2009.

Abarca had led peaceful protests against the environmental impacts of a barite mine in Chicomuselo, Chiapas operated by Calgary-based Blackfire Exploration Ltd.

MiningWatch Canada says: “The Abarca family believes that the role of the Canadian embassy in Mexico, including to pressure Chiapas authorities on behalf of Blackfire to quell protests when Canadian officials knew that Mariano was being criminalized and threatened, put his life at greater risk.”

Furthermore, Canada has exported more than $18.9 million in military goods to Mexico over the last five years (2018 to 2022). This is in a context where there have been 322 attacks against human rights defenders in Mexico between January 2015 and December 2022 and where 31 land and environmental defenders were killed in 2022 alone. Mexican security forces have been implicated in violence against human rights defenders.

Meeting with Mike Morrice, MP

And that afternoon, the delegation met with Green Party Member of Parliament Mike Morrice (Kitchener Centre) on a picnic bench outside his Confederation Building office just next to the Parliament Buildings.

Morrice was familiar with the Wet’suwet’en struggle and asked for more information about the resistance to the Tuxpan-Tula pipeline. We will be sending him a package of information, that will include this 7-minute video “La Lucha de la Sierra Norte de Puebla Ante el Gasoducto Tuxpan-Tula” (with English narration).

We will continue to follow closely the resistance of the Wet’suwet’en and Otomi (and Nahua and Mixtec) to TC Energy pipelines on their territories.

For more, please see:

United Against TC Energy: Hundreds in Toronto Stand With Wet’suwet’en, Nahua, Otomi and Mixtec Land Defenders Resisting Colonial Violence (World Beyond War, October 15, 2023)

Wet’suwet’en and Otomi land defenders to speak in Ottawa about their resistance to TC Energy pipelines (PBI-Canada, September 30, 2023)

Social media overview

We gratefully acknowledge the work of everyone in organizing this advocacy intervention, notably Anna Zalik who initiated this collaboration.

Wet’suwet’en and Otomi land defenders, October 16

By
Brent Patterson
-

This coming Monday October 16, we are co-organizing a public forum with allies that will feature Wet’suwet’en and Otomi land defenders who are resisting TC Energy fracked gas pipelines on their territories in Canada and Mexico.

This event will be held in Ottawa – but if you live outside of Ottawa, you can join the public forum via Zoom.

Register here.

The public forum/webinar will feature Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chief Na’Moks, Wet’suwet’en land defender Eve Saint, Otomi land defender Don Salvador Aparicio Olvera, and Dr. Eliana Acosta Marquez of the National Institute of Anthropology and History.

The webinar will have Spanish-English simultaneous translation.

If you live in Ottawa, you can register for the in-person event here.

Hope you can join us!

Brent

Further reading: Wet’suwet’en and Otomi land defenders to speak in Ottawa about their resistance to TC Energy pipelines.

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