The Rights of Mother Earth: Bolivia Births a New Revolution

Posted by Brenda Norrell – April 5, 2010 at 11:32 am

By Brenda Norrell

With the World’s Peoples Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, Bolivia, less than two weeks away, the movement for the Rights of Mother Earth is giving birth to a new revolution. In defense of Mother Earth and honoring the sacredness of life, Indigenous Peoples are ready to hold governments and corporations responsible that poison the earth.

While Indigenous Peoples focus on the defense of the earth, the issues of destruction of the earth, and the targeting of Indigenous Peoples lands for mining, power plants and development, are among the most censored issues in the world media.

In the Climate Summit workshop titled “Referendum” online, the focus is on reestablishing harmony with Mother Earth and recognizing its Rights. Further, it proposes a change of over-consumption of the waste model of the capitalist system.

In its draft document, the Referendum workshop proposes the domestic reduction and absorption of the developed countries greenhouse gases in order to prevent temperature increases of no more than 1º C. It further proposes the transfer of all war expenditures to fund climate change.

The workshop guidelines further ask: “Are you in accordance to create a Climate Justice Tribunal to judge who destroys Mother Earth?”

Conference participants, who are registered, are already at work in workshops online.

Otto Mendoza Portocorrero, president of ONAPROS in Peru, said it is the animals, as well as humans, who suffer because of so-called developed nations. The statement calls for renewable energy and the protection of forests while decreasing greenhouse gases.

The Rights of Mother Earth, and the destruction of Mother Earth, are currently among the most censored issues of Indigenous Peoples. In the US, prisoner rights, border rights and control by the puppet masters are most often censored.

Ofelia Rivas, founder of O’odham VOICE Against the Wall, was selected by the organization Borderlinks in Tucson in March, along with Teresa Armenta Mendez, to receive this year’s award for Women on the Border.

While the Tohono O’odham elected leaders have been coopted by the US Border Patrol and Homeland Security, absorbing wealth while the O’odham people live in desperation, Rivas has been a voice for truth. In her homeland at the border on O’odham land, she has been falsely arrested, abused and held at gunpoint by tribal police and US Border Patrol. Rivas was nominated for the Borderlinks award by Censored News publisher Brenda Norrell.

“Ofelia repeatedly risks her life for the purpose of truth and justice. She has been the voice of grass-roots people on the border and struggled to protect ceremonies and sacred pilgrimage routes that have been divided by the border. She was the lone voice that exposed the destruction of the graves of O’odham ancestors by the construction of the border wall. Most recently, Ofelia served four days in jail in Chiapas for her support of the indigenous rights movement of the Zapatistas.”
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2010/03/women-on-border-awards-ofelia-rivas-and.html

The testimony of Lenny Foster, Navajo, to the United Nations, delivered to the US State Department in the so-called “Listening Sessions,” regarding the imprisonment of Leonard Peltier and religious freedom and spiritual practices of American Indians in US prisons, is currently among the most censored issues.
http://censored-news.blogspot.com/2010/03/lenny-foster-indian-religious-freedom.html

Kahentinetha Horn, publisher of Mohawk Nation News, writes in her latest column, “Stop the Trains,” about the agents and methods of destruction targeting Indigenous Peoples, including the band councils and tribal councils that are puppets of the Canadian and US governments.
“If the band and tribal councils do not help their masters, there will be unorganized chaos and less of us will be killed or affected. They will discourage resistance, sabotage rescue attempts and coerce us to re-settle. Our lands and properties are probably being promised to them. In the end, they will be put on the same trains with us. The Apache trackers who helped the US army capture Geronimo were all sent to the same prison in Florida.”
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2010/04/mohawk-nation-news-stop-trains.html

Mohawk activist Splitting the Sky and Former US Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney deserve an award for being the most censored in the should-be news department.
McKinney was detained by Canadian immigration enroute to the trial of Splitting the Sky in March. Splitting the Sky was arrested as he attempted to make a citizens arrest of George W. Bush for war crimes. McKinney was unable to testify because of the delay. The trial ended abruptly and Splitting the Sky is now awaiting sentencing. McKinney also spent time in an Israeli jail during her humanitarian efforts to Palestine in 2009.
Watch McKinney’s video interview and read more:
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2010/03/border-patrol-halts-cynthia-mckinney.html

Aboriginal elders are in Rome holding the Pope responsible for the sexual abuse, torture and murder of Indian children in church-operated residential schools in Canada.
“Lillian Shirt of the Cree Nation and Charles Cook of the Anishinabe-Ojibway Nation will gather with Rev. Kevin Annett and other members of The Friends and Relatives of the Disappeared (FRD) and Italian supporters at a memorial service outside the Vatican in St. Peter’s Square on Easter morning, Sunday April 4 at 11 am.
Both of the native elders survived incarceration in Catholic Indian schools in Canada, and witnessed the deaths of other students. ”
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2010/03/rome-aboriginal-elders-hold-pope.html

Back to those so-called US State Department Listening Sessions. Russell Means, Lakota, warns not to be duped by the smokescreen.
“Once again, the occupation government of the United States of America has trotted out its dogs and ponies to provide a smokescreen and diversion from its continuing crimes against the indigenous peoples and nations of the Western Hemisphere. The reason for today’s media spectacle is supposedly for the US State Department to ‘listen’ to input from indigenous peoples and nations for inclusion in the U.S.’s report to the United Nations Human Rights Council, universal periodic review process.”
http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2010/03/russell-means-un-listening-session-is.html

World’s People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth: Draft Declaration on the Rights of Mother Earth
http://pwccc.wordpress.com/2010/02/07/draft-universal-declaration-of-the-rights-of-mother-earth-2/#more-661

Also see: ICE out of control and Obama’s empty promises:
http://www.thesouthernshift.com/news/2010/04/ice-out-control-people-are-calling-it-rogue-agency

Source: Narcosphere