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By Beth Geglia
As part of an international campaign in solidarity with the communities affected by the Marlin mine and in defense of their human rights, Maudilia Lopez and Carmen Mejia of the FREDEMI coalition traveled to Canada in December of 2009. The tour was coordinated by the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) a Washington DC-based human rights and environmental organization, with the support of various other human rights and solidarity groups and NGOs from Canada and the U.S.
Complaint against Goldcorp Inc: The main objective of the trip was to present a complaint against the company Goldcorp to Canada’s National Contact Point, established under the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. These Guidelines state that Canadian companies must comply with, among other requirements, the human rights obligations of the host countries where they operate. In this case, the complaint was brought against Goldcorp for not complying with the Guatemalan government’s obligation under international treaties to respect communities’ right to free prior and informed consent, as well their rights to property, health, and a clean environment.
By Allan Lissner
In the Department of San Marcos, in the western highlands of Guatemala, the Marlin Mine is located along the border between the municipalities of San Miguel Ixtahuacán and Sipakapa. The Marlin Mine, which has both open-pit and underground operations, is fully owned by Vancouver-based Goldcorp Inc., one of the worlds biggest gold companies. The mine is operated by Montana Exploradora, a subsidiary fully owned by Goldcorp.
Someone Elses Treasure is an ongoing multimedia project which brings to light some of the experiences of people around the world whose lives have been impacted by the global mining industry including communities in the Philippines, Tanzania, Papua New Guinea, Australia, Chile, Canada, and now Guatemala.
THREE GENERATIONS
At the end of the year someone told me: "It does not matter that the company has lots of money. We have patience, patience and time. The license will expire. We resist, our kids will and the kids of our kids will. Our fight is for life, and you always fight."
With the beginning of a new year, human beings as usual set new goals and objectives that will help us reach our final goal. Same thing happens with the Oak. The problems in San Marcos and our work go beyond helping the mining resistance. The struggle in San Marcos and the Western Highlands is for the recovery and management of the territory. Mining is not the only threat, and that´s the reason why now officially the Oak will no longer be an informative on mining issues in San Marcos, but will inform on the struggle for recovery and management of the territory.
In this new number, we talk about mining effects from the perspective of Allan Lissner´s lens, a photojournalist who visited San Marcos at the end of last year. Then there´s an article that presents Union Fenosa, to understand better all the problems related to electric energy. The next explains the things that happened in Malacatan at the end of last year and beginning of this one.
As usual we have the section “We invite you to read” where we present the most relevant news from traditional and alternative media. And for this year we added a new section: “Image of the resistance” from where we´ll be sharing with you the saying “an image says more than a thousand words”.
During last November, Copae work together with NCA (Norweigan Church Aid) to help international photojournalist Allan Lissner, with his project “Someones Else´s Treasure”. He had spent the last 3 years visiting countries and communities affected by gold mining. He visits the communities to learn about their reality first hand; how the mine affects them, what are their hope and wishes and how do they keep on going?
He started in the Philiphines, Asia in 2007 where he spent 3 months with the indigenous people affected by 3 mines. He also spent 4 weeks in Tanzania, Africa, in 2008 and his visit to Guatemala is the first to Latin America.
Allan has lived in several countries, studied in Canada and lives there; the idea for this projet is to show the truth to Canadians. He explained to Subchal, Chilive and Las Escobas, (San Miguel Ixtahuacan communities) that 75% of the mining companies around the world have their headquarters in Canada, because the rules and mining requirements are easy to fulfill (or evade).
aka Union Feroza, Union Tramposa, Union Mañosa or Union Penosa
Por Alejandro Alfaro Santiz
If you belong to the lucky ones with Internet access I challenge you to make an experiment: go to the search page of your preference (mine is blackle) and type “Union Fenosa News” Hit enter and you´ll get an interesting mix of news from the company and news about the company. The first pages (with 10 results per page) talk about its operations worldwide and how good they are doing. The last pages talk about the effect this transnational Spanish company has in the life of hundreds of thousands of human beings. Now type “Union Fenosa Problems”… different isn´t it?
But…Who is Union Fenosa?
Union Fenosa is a large Spanish company dedicated to the production and distribution to end users of gas and electricity. It started on November 23, 1982 with the name Union Electrica Fenosa after the fusion between Union Electrica, created in 1912 as Union Electrica Madrileña and Fuerzas Electricas del Noroeste S.A. (FENOSA) company created in 1943 by Pedro Barrié de la Maza, Fenosa Count. It´s origins therefore are in Madrid as in Galicia.
By Alejandro Alfaro Santiz
San Marcos: 250 arrest warrants, 5 municipalities without electric energy, 3 State of prevention, 2 murders and one transnational (known for its actions in Latin America) working very closely with the “Mayan face” government. Before getting into detail of what´s happening in San Marcos it´s necessary to learn the context in which things are happening. For that I´ll use information from the Flacso publication, by Victor Ferrigno, “Guatemala the Dark business of Light” 2009.
Guatemala has the highest electric bill in Central America; demand of the service had almost equaled the offer; electric generation depends mostly in hydrocarbons, provoking high index of pollution; expenses are socialized and profits are privatized; and the legal frame that regulates the process, from generation to commercialization is lacks transparency and allows a series of privileges that the consumers have to pay.
With a potential to generate 13,000 MW with renewable sources (Ministry of Energy and Mines - MEM) enough to provide electricity to Central America, we had converted into energy buyers, irrefutable evidence of the big failure of the national energetic model.
VIDEOS
Goldcorp demuestra poco respeto por poblaciones indigenas(Spanish with English subtitles)
Goldcorp shows Little respect for indigenous populations (Spanish with French subtitles)
Empresarios mineros retenidos en Nebaj, El Quiche (Spanish)
Conflicto minero en El Salvador (Spanish)
Testimonio de Albertino. El Estor, Izabal (Spanish)
NEWS
Supreme Court of Canada gives public a voice on major industrial projects. Court ensures meaningful environmental assessments across country
By Cameron French
TORONTO, Dec 9 (Reuters) - A coalition of Guatemalan community groups has filed a complaint with the Canadian government requesting an investigation into alleged human rights violations at Goldcorp's (G.TO) Marlin mine, located in the Central American country.
The complaint was filed under the guidelines of the Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development, of which Canada is a member, and to a Department of Foreign Affairs committee that accepts complaints from communities harmed by Canadian industries operating abroad.
An investigation by aid agency CAFOD and Canada’s Development and Peace has uncovered documents showing water contamination at a Honduras mine owned by multi-million dollar mining company Goldcorp.
Original press release by CAFOD.
An investigation by aid agency CAFOD and Canada’s Development and Peace has uncovered documents showing water contamination at a Honduras mine owned by multi-million dollar mining company Goldcorp.
The tests carried out by the Honduran authorities on water in the mine site which flows out into a local stream should have been acted on by the government and the company but instead the evidence of high acidity and metal concentrations were left undisclosed.
CAFOD and Development and Peace have handed the evidence of pollution by Goldcorp over to the Environmental Prosecutor in Honduras.
CAFOD’s Extractives Policy Analyst Sonya Maldar said: “Despite Goldcorp’s continual denial, this new information provides irrefutable evidence that the San Martin mine has caused pollution in Honduras. This is the latest in a long list of problems at the mine. Goldcorp must clean up its act so that the people of Siria Valley are not left with a toxic legacy when the company leaves Honduras at the end of the year.“
Canadian mining firms face abuse allegations
HudBay could take on partner for Fenix project
HudBay Minerals will consider taking on a joint venture partner to help finance construction of its Fenix nickel project in El Estor, eastern Guatemala, which could get the go-ahead by the middle of next year, the company's CEO said on Wednesday.
Proposed Canadian law would police miners abroad
Canada's top mining companies have lined up against a proposed law that would withhold federal investment dollars from companies found in violation of social responsibility standards in foreign countries. Goldcorp called the bill "unnecessary and damaging to Canadian business".
Read more
Based on the experience of struggle in the department of San Marcos, in relation to the problem of mining and the community consults developed in Comitancillo and other municipalities, Priest Helio Gijón Estrada presented a study about Territorial Ethics to the leaders of ADIMAM (the Association for the Integral Development of the Municipalities of the San Marcos’ Highlands).
We are providing a link to the text of his presentation (in Spanish):
Read presentation in Spanish
On June 16, 2009, local authorities in San Miguel Ixtahuacán had arranged for a meeting of the municipal mayor and his council to discuss the problems related to mining. On the same day nearly one-thousand employees of the Montana company marched in the streets of San Miguel, wearing white shirts.
The recent, tragic publicity of Lake Atitlán is filling us with consternation and, at the same time, inciting us to continue proclaiming to the four winds about our research, alerting us to the contamination of the waters surrounding the Marlin Mine. For several years, various environmental and ecological groups have warned about the contamination of Lake Atitlán. They were branded a wide-range of names, from the funny “eco-hysteric” to compromising nickname “eco-terrorist.” What are the people who first believed that these people were exaggerating about the reality and the consequences of the lake’s contamination saying now?
We will continue our peaceful struggle to resist, calling attention to this topic in San Marcos, hoping that we don’t have to wait to reach a point of near catastrophe in a few years for the situation to make national news in order to be taken seriously in our call for reform.
Goldcorp, Inc. boasts of being the gold company with the fastest growth and the most economic mine in production: least inversion, most earnings. (Website) By means of the Marlin Mine, Montana Exploradora, subsidiary of Goldcorp, Inc. has extracted 241,300 ounces of gold in 2008 alone. But they don’t include the costs of contaminated water and cracked houses around the Marlin Mine in their promotions.
The second week of November, the team of engineers from UUSC and members of COPAE visited communities to present the cracked-houses report.
In San Miguel approximately 300 people met in the church’s meeting room. Members of different communities that surround the mine who suffer from the cracks in their homes gave their testimonies.
One habitant of San Miguel began to question a group of women who had given their testimony arguing that what they said were lies and that because they had sold their lands to the mining company they should now deal with the consequences. Although there was a heated moment, the call to calm by the leaders was heard and the individual chose to step down. In the end, it was clear that the resistance movement to mining is peaceful and must not fall to the provocations of people who only want to create chaos and problems in San Miguel.
Robert Robinson, the leader of the engineering team presented the report in English; Alejandro, of COPAE, translated it to Spanish and Ricardo, from the San Miguel parish, translated it to Maya Mam.
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