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INDIGENOUS INVADE THEIR OWN LANDS TO FIGHT MINING USURPATION.

Article Excerpt
Mining companies operating in Guatemala face increasing resistance as residents of lands encroached by the companies have begun to occupy and hold the sites. The occupation tactic was in times past used to protest and refute the ownership of vast tracts of productive territories while local subsistence farmers went landless. In urban areas, occupation was a tactic to obtain housing, a few square meters to put up a flimsy shelter. Now it is being used to prevent the degradation of environments where entire communities have lived for generations and to preserve claims to properties the communities have paid for. In September, hundreds of families from different communities of the municipalities of El Estor and Los Amates in Izabal, and Panzos and Santa Maria Cahabon in Alta Verapaz, took over lands where companies have government-allocated concessions.

In Izabal, about 2,000 Q'eqchi Mayans moved into three separate areas of the mining complex owned by Skye Resources, a Canadian company. As has been the case elsewhere in the country where mining threatens the environment and local way of life (see NotiCen, 2006-03-16), the actions are supported by the Catholic Church. In this instance, it is longtime activist Father Dan Vogt who is involved in the movement. "They got fed up and decided to take action. There were about 350 families--around 2,000 people," said the priest. "They are still there, building houses. The company has told me they are not willing to negotiate until they move."

Support also comes from international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) for the local action. Grahame Russell of the Canadian organization Rights Action said, "Skye Resources is just one more example of what North American companies are doing through Latin America. The patterns are being repeated everywhere, and the problems go from A to Z. It starts with a complete absence of consultation with local communities, which they have a legal right to. Before people know anything about it, they are in the back door with a mining-exploration license."

A recent report from Oxfam, an international NGO, read, "Rigorous strip-mining has already degraded the fragile ecosystem, eroding the thin topsoil in mountain passes inhabited by Mayan communities. The mountainsides have been deforested, causing landslides and a litany of environmental hazards. In addition to the environmental threat, there is a long history of political violence between the mining companies and the indigenous communities who resist."

The Q'eqchi communities are supported by these organizations, but are certainly not led by them. A delegation of representatives from the communities appeared before the congressional Energy and Mining Commission in concert with the movement onto the mining areas. They came to press legal rights based on their having bought the land from the Instituto Nacional de Transformacion Agraria (INTA) for which they had never received titles. They...

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