Native people to share about ravages of unfettered trade

San Diego Chapter Border Committee

As members of the Sierra Club, our main goal is to protect the natural environment. One of the top threats to the preservation of wilderness is the enactment of corporate-driven international trade agreements that supersede environmental and human rights protections at both the national and local level.

We need look no farther than the California desert to find a prime example of the effects of these trade agreements. Glamis Gold, a mining company with operations in several countries, attempted to construct an open pit/leach gold mine on public land sacred to the indigenous Quechan people near the Algodones sand dunes, within the California Desert Protection Area. The Quechan people were able to stop the construction of the mine, with the support of the Sierra Club, utilizing California laws protecting sacred sites and requiring the full cleanup of mining wastes. But Glamis refused to accept the legitimacy of California's laws, filing a lawsuit under the North American Free Trade Agreement against the United States government.

In the highlands of Guatemala, indigenous Mayan communities are facing the destruction of their lands, their forests, and their rivers by this same company. With the passage of the Central American Free Trade Agreement, Glamis is poised to stop any challenges to its environmental destruction there. Members of Mayan communities who have attempted to protest the construction and operation of the Glamis mines have been threatened, assaulted, raped, and even killed, according to human rights group Rights Action and a report from Mayan exiles living in Los Angeles.

In March 2006, Sierra Club members will have a unique opportunity to meet people from both the Quechan and Mayan communities, to celebrate their cultures with them, to learn about their struggles against this multinational corporation and to see how we as environmentalists can offer our support. The San Diego and Angeles chapters, in conjunction with the Sierra Club Responsible Trade Program, will co-sponsor a weekend car camp hosted by Quechan elder Preston Arrow-weed at his ranch across the Colorado River from Yuma. Activities will include Mayan and Quechan ceremonies, a wildflower hike, discussion of the effects of flawed trade agreements on the lives of indigenous peoples and on our environment, and an opportunity to attend an annual powwow/exhibition at the Quechan high school.

Proceeds from an $85 donation, which covers fees and food, will serve as a contribution for Guatemalan victims of Hurricane Stan. See Calendar for more information.