Native America
Native American land has been targeted for decades for uranium mining and, more recently, for radioactive waste dumps. Native Americans have disproportionately been affected by the serious health consequences from uranium mining and have struggled for compensation and restitution. The Navajo Tribe has now banned uranium mining on their land.
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September 17, 2021WATER IS LIFE: Standing in solidarity with Indigenous Water Protectors
Beyond Nuclear's radioactive waste specialist, Kevin Kamps, took part in the September 4th "Float Out" at the Mackinac Bridge, between the Lower and Upper Peninsulas of Michigan. Dozens of kayakers joined a traditional Indigenous long boat to raise banners on the Straits of Mackinac, between Lakes Michigan and Huron, protesting Enbridge's Line 5 Canadian tar sands crude oil pipeline nearby. (Kamps hails from Kalamazoo, MI, where in July 2010 Enbridge Line 6 leaked 1.4 million gallons of diluted bitumen into the river, the largest inland oil spill in U.S. history.) Kamps also staffed an anti-nuclear information table at the Water Is Life Festival in Mackinaw City. The events, held in traditional Odawa and Ojibwe territory, were Anishinaabe led.
Winona LaDuke Among 7 Women Arrested Today at the Shell River; ENBRIDGE TO DRILL LINE 3 UNDER THE SHELL RIVER IN ANISHINAABE TREATY LANDS
Winona "No Nukes" LaDukeAs reported by Honor the Earth.
For a very long time now, Winona "No Nukes" LaDuke (pictured) has worked with Beyond Nuclear, NIRS, and others to block high-level radioactive waste dumps targeted at Native American reservations and treaty lands, such as Skull Valley Goshutes in Utah, Mescalero Apache in New Mexico, and Yucca Mountain on Western Shoshone land in Nevada. See the NIRS/Public Citizen backgrounder about the targeting of Native American communities and lands for high-level radioactive waste dumps.
This threat may well be rearing its ugly head again, as President Biden's Energy Secretary, Jennifer Granholm, has recently spoken repeated about "financial incentives packages" to entire "Native American tribal governments" to consider "consent-based siting" for high-level radioactive waste consolidated "interim storage" facilities on their lands. As Keith Lewis, environmental director for the Serpent River First Nation, said in the mid 1990s, "There is nothing moral about bribing a starving man with money." Serpent River was ravaged by the radioactive and toxic contamination resulting from a half-century of uranium mining and milling near Elliot Lake, Ontario, Canada.
Decades ago, LaDuke did groundbreaking work in opposition to uranium mining and milling on Indigenous lands, and has exposed the nuclear power industry's targeting of Native sacred sites for facility construction and operation.
Last January, Beyond Nuclear's Kevin Kamps traveled out to northern Minnesota, after Winona LaDuke put out the call for folks to stand in solidarity with the Water Protectors.