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Aboriginal and Inuit Mining and Oil/Gas

Perry Bellegarde, fiery new AFN grand chief, will ‘reach out’ for larger share of resource revenues – by Mark Kennedy and Richard Warnica (National Post – December 11, 2014)

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

Perry Bellegarde, elected grand chief of the Assembly of First Nations on Wednesday and the now the most powerful native politician in Canada, has spent the last 16 years honing a single, unambiguous message.

To paraphrase another prairie politician who hit it big on the national stage, in Mr. Bellegarde’s view, the First Nations want in.

A career politician and longtime regional chief from Saskatchewan, Mr. Bellegarde has long argued for a broader interpretation of treaty rights, one that would see First Nations earn a much larger share of resource revenues and jobs.

In a fiery first speech as grand chief Wednesday, Mr. Bellegarde doubled down on that theme. “To the people across this great land, I say to you, that the values of fairness and tolerance which Canada exports to the world, are a lie when it comes to our people,” he said.

“Canada will no longer develop pipelines, no longer develop transmission lines, or any infrastructure, on our lands as business as usual. That is not on.”

His final remarks drew one of the loudest responses from the crowd: “Canada is Indian land,” he said. “This is my truth and this is the truth of our peoples.”

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Congress’ budget crunch yields blessings & miseries for U.S. mining – by Dorothy Kosich (Mineweb.com – December 9, 2014)

http://www.mineweb.com/

RENO (MINEWEB) – As Congress worked on a $1.1 trillion measure to keep the U.S. government operating past midnight Thursday, two mining company land exchanges impacting Arizona and Nevada projects had been attached to the Department of Defense budget scheduled to be reviewed by the U.S. Senate, perhaps, as early as today.

Sen. Carl Levin, D-Michigan, told reporters that he expected the full Senate to take up a joint fiscal year 2015 defense policy bill late today. The House had already passed the $585 billion defense authorization bill on December 4th.

More than 60 lawmakers are either retiring, lost their elections, or will assume new elected offices in January 2015.

In its present form, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) funds not only the Defense Department but also includes the largest public lands package since the Omnibus Public Land Management Act in 2009. Title 30 of the measure (the “National Resources Related General Provisions”) “would give landscapes deemed sacred by Native American tribes to a foreign-owned mining company,” complained environmental groups in letters sent to the U.S. Senate.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Energy and Environment Director, Myron Ebell, called the package “a backroom deal that would lock up use of hundreds of thousands of acres of land.

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Congress Raids Ancestral Native American Lands With Defense Bill [Resolution Copper] – by Michael McAuliff (Huffington Post – December 3, 2014)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/politics/

WASHINGTON — When Terry Rambler, the chairman of the San Carlos Apache Tribe, woke up Wednesday in Washington, D.C., it was to learn that Congress was deciding to give away a large part of his ancestral homeland to a foreign mining company.

Rambler came to the nation’s capital for the White House Tribal Nations Conference, an event described in a press announcement as an opportunity to engage the president, cabinet officials and the White House Council on Native American Affairs “on key issues facing tribes including respecting tribal sovereignty and upholding treaty and trust responsibilities,” among other things.

Rambler felt things got off to an unfortunate, if familiar, start when he learned that the House and Senate Armed Services Committee had decided to use the lame-duck session of Congress and the National Defense Authorization Act to give 2,400 acres of the Tonto National Forest in Arizona to a subsidiary of the Australian-English mining giant Rio Tinto.

“Of all people, Apaches and Indians should understand, because we’ve gone though this so many times in our history,” Rambler said.

Rambler knew there was a possibility that supporters of the move — which failed twice on the House floor last year — would slip the deal into the must-pass legislation, but aides and officials involved had declined to reveal it. Even Tuesday evening, when Republicans and Democrats on the House Armed Services Committee released summaries of the bill, the land deal was left out.

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Prospector suing Manitoba government for $5 million – by Kristin Annable (Winnipeg Sun – December 3, 2014)

http://www.winnipegsun.com/

A local mining prospector is suing the provincial government for $5 million after five years of waiting for consultations with First Nations communities cost him key investors.

Jim Campbell set out in 2009 to develop and explore the Godslith Claim, a lithium deposit approximately 365 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg.

According to Campbell, the Ministry of Mineral Resources left the company in the lurch for five years as they waited for permit approval, forcing their investors to pull $1.3 million they intended to invest in the project.

The land sits on the ancestral land of the Manto Sipi Cree Nation, who staunchly oppose the development. According to court documents, consultation with the First Nations is still ongoing.

Campbell blames the ministry for being unable to reach an agreement with the First Nations community. “We haven’t really told any reason, other than their consultations (with First Nations) have not concluded, which is of course their duty to consult with the First Nations — but they haven’t after five years,” he said. All allegations have yet to be proven.

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Show us the Ring of Fire plan, says Rickford to province – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – December 4, 2014)

Established in 1980, Northern Ontario Business provides Canadians and international investors with relevant, current and insightful editorial content and business news information about Ontario’s vibrant and resource-rich North. Ian Ross is the editor of Northern Ontario Business ianross@nob.on.ca.

Federal Natural Resources and FedNor Minister Greg Rickford remains optimistic about the future prospects for the Ring of Fire despite the slow exit of Cliffs Natural Resources from Ontario.

But the Kenora MP stuck to the federal government’s line that the province must identify “focussed infrastructure projects” before Ottawa is prepared to spring for any dollars to help the Wynne government develop a transportation corridor to reach the stranded chromite and nickel deposits in the James Bay region.

“I remain confident that the province will come to understand that that’s what Northern Ontarians expect on this legacy resource development project.”

Rickford was in Sudbury Dec. 4 to announce the Community Investment Initiative for Northern Ontario, a FedNor program that sets aside $3 million for small towns and remote First Nations to hire economic development officers to advance local projects in their communities.

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Ring of Fire needs urgency, warns Ontario Chamber of Commerce – by Lisa Wright (Toronto Star – December 4, 2014)

The Toronto Star has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.

Preliminary report card on the stalled mineral belt in Northern Ontario says “progress on development has been slow” and “major steps” are required soon to reap economic benefits.

Ontario needs to move quickly on development of the stalled Ring of Fire mineral belt or risk losing huge economic benefits for the province when metal prices bounce back again, warns a preliminary report card by the Ontario Chamber of Commerce.

“Despite the tremendous economic and social opportunities the Ring of Fire affords Ontario, progress on development has been slow,” says the consultation paper obtained by the Star Wednesday.

The future of the highly-touted, mineral-rich region in the James Bay lowlands has been put in doubt by a severe downturn in the global mining industry. And Cliffs Natural Resources, the largest land claim owner in the Ring, has pulled out of the area, and its new chief executive says there is “zero chance” a mine will ever be built there with all the red tape in the way.

“Unfortunately, in the last few months, the tone of the conversation surrounding the Ring of Fire has turned net negative,” says the document, which provides a preview of the chamber’s official report card on the Ring’s progress expected in February.

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Yukon miners fear ‘uncertainty’ following Peel decision (CBC News North – December 03, 2014)

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north

 People in the mining industry are questioning Yukon’s land use planning process in the wake of yesterday’s Peel court decision.

“The way it’s currently being undertaken is creating uncertainty for industry,” says Samson Hartland, executive director of the Yukon Chamber of Mines.

Yukon Supreme Court Judge Ron Veale ruled yesterday that the government must return to the planning process for the Peel watershed, a wilderness the size of Nova Scotia and home to four First Nations.

In 2011, the Yukon government rejected the final recommendations from the Peel Watershed Planning Commission, which called for 80 per cent of the area to be protected from development, in favour of its own plan, which provided protection for less than 30 per cent of the area.

But if the government’s aim was to create certainty for industry, it’s not working. Marc Blythe is the president of Tarsis Resources, which has more than a dozen properties in Yukon, including some claims in the Peel. He says the Peel process raises concern for those who’ve invested in the territory about what’s going to happen next.

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Peel watershed: Yukon court strikes down government land use plan (CBC News North – December 01, 2014)

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north

‘A great victory for First Nations, environmental organizations, and all Yukoners,’ says Thomas Berger

In a historic ruling this morning, Yukon Supreme Court Justice Ron Veale found that the Yukon government’s modifications to the Peel land use plan did not respect the land use planning process set out in the territory’s final agreements with First Nations.

In a written judgment, he says the remedy is for the Yukon government to return to consultations on the final recommended land use plan. The decision also scolds the Yukon government for pursuing a “flawed process” for two years, instead of revealing more detail about its proposed modifications in February 2011.

“I think it’s a total victory,” says Jeff Langlois, who represented the Northwest Territories’ Gwich’in Tribal Council, an intervener in the case. “It’s what Tom Berger was seeking entirely.”

Langlois says the ruling essentially orders the Yukon government to return to the final plan as recommended by the planning commission, and make modifications from there.

“I still don’t understand in this case whether Yukon still has the ability to reject that final recommended plan but if they do not, and that was certainly an argument Tom Berger made, then I believe the land use plan for the Peel is going to closely resemble the final recommended plan.”

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Cheap Quebec power proposed for Ring of Fire – by Norm Tollinsky (Sudbury Mining Solutions Journal – December 1, 2014)

This article was originally published in the December 2014 issue of Sudbury Mining Solutions Journal.

Mushkegowuk Council First Nations study rail, energy and seaport corridor to James Bay

The eight First Nation communities of the Mushkegowuk Council in Ontario’s Far North are proposing a rail, energy and seaport infrastructure corridor connecting the province’s massive Ring of Fire chromium deposits to James Bay.

The idea is still in the very earliest stage of development, and hinges on importing cheap electricity from Quebec on a First Nation-owned grid free from having to charge Ontario’s much higher regulated electricity rates.

Three of the Mushkegowuk Council’s member First Nations are already in the electrical transmission business as owners of Five Nations Energy Inc.’s 270-kilometre Western James Bay Transmission Line, which runs from Moosonee to Attawapiskat and supplies energy to De Beers’ Victor Mine.

The proposed infrastructure corridor would include a seasonal seaport on James Bay, a transmission line to the Ring of Fire and an electrified rail line.

The transmission line would also be extended to supply electricity to the isolated Matawa First Nations most immediately affected by the Ring of Fire development and currently dependent on diesel power.

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Alaskans fear environmental, industrial threats from B.C. mines – by Dirk Meissner (Canadian Press – December 3, 2014)

http://www.canadianmanufacturing.com/news/

Alaskan environmental, aboriginal groups say unchecked development threatens salmon and tourism industries

VICTORIA—British Columbia’s ambition of opening new mines in the province’s north has raised fears in neighbouring Alaska where environmental and aboriginal groups say the unchecked development threatens their salmon and tourism industries.

Tribal leaders and salmon-protection advocates gathered at a Bureau of Indian Affairs conference in Anchorage, and high on the agenda was the impact of B.C. mineral developments on the multi-billion-dollar Alaskan industries.

Conference delegates called on the United States State Department to use the 1909 Boundary Waters Treaty to activate the International Joint Commission, hold boundary dispute hearings and discuss the important salmon waterways, the communities they support and the risks they face from potential mine contamination.

“We’re asking the U.S. federal government to elevate this issue to the International Joint Commission,” said Guy Archibald, a spokesperson for the southeast Alaska Conservation Council.

Archibald said conservation and aboriginal groups have formed the Salmon Beyond Borders coalition to lobby their government to pressure Canada and B.C.

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The problem isn’t aboriginals as Stephen Harper suggests. It’s us – by Haroon Siddiqui (Toronto Star – November 30, 2014)

The Toronto Star has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.

The Harper government is behaving in colonial ways towards our indigenous peoples.

“When the school is on the reserve, the child lives with his parents who are savages; he is surrounded by savages and though he may learn to read and write, his habits and training and mode of thought are Indian. He is simply a savage who can read and write.”

That was our first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, speaking in the House of Commons in 1883, rationalizing the residential schools where aboriginal children were consigned to be cleansed of their Indian-ness.

Of the 150,000 who suffered that fate, many were sexually abused. Many were starved to be used as guinea pigs for nutrition experiments. Not until 2003 did Ottawa acknowledge the horror. In 2008 it formally apologized. More than 100,000 former residents have since been compensated from a $1.9-billion fund. A Truth and Reconciliation Commission has been hearing from survivors and examining 3.5 million documents, earlier withheld by Ottawa.

Thatgenocidal practice was but one element of a vast infrastructure of racism designed to keep “the white people, pink people, at the top,” writes John Ralston Saul, author, philosopher and Canada’s pre-eminent public intellectual.

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Canada’s unfinished business with First Nations is an economic failure – by Diane Francis (National Post – November 29, 2014)

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

“The great themes of Canada are as follows: Keeping the Americans out, keeping the French in, and trying to get the Natives to somehow disappear.” – Will Ferguson, humorist and 2012 Giller Prize winner

Ferguson’s acerbic quote also summarizes the great unfinished business of Canada which is to reconcile the rights and create a role for the country’s 614 First Nations and their 700,000 members. The failure to have done this after centuries not only impedes national economic development, but is at the root of much of the misery and squalor on and off reserves.

The United States did not make deals, but conquered its Native Americans and, under international law, has only been required to compensate them. But here, Britain signed sovereign deals with aboriginals, catapulting them under international law to the rights and privileges of nation-states. Thus they call themselves First Nations. Australia has a similar history, but, unlike here, Canberra has fully addressed the issues.

Canada must now do the same. A recent, landmark Supreme Court of Canada ruling has fully, and radically, defined “aboriginal rights.” Justices unanimously decided that lands in the British Columbia interior, the size of Greater Vancouver, belonged to the Tsilhqot’in Nation, a band with 400 members. They now own and must manage the lands in perpetuity, rights they can relinquish only if they sign ownership over to a government.

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NEWS RELEASE: David Suzuki Foundation supports call for moratorium on mining permits in northern Ontario’s Ring of Fire November 27, 2014

TORONTO — The David Suzuki Foundation has told the Ontario government it supports First Nations’ requests for a moratorium on mining exploration permits in the Ring of Fire. The Neskantaga and Nibinamik First Nations have asked the provincial government to enact an immediate moratorium on mining exploration permits in the region — the biodiversity-rich boreal forest and Hudson’s Bay Lowlands, more than 500 kilometres north of Thunder Bay.

The David Suzuki Foundation is working with the communities to help strengthen their capacity to engage in present and future policy, planning and land use decision-making processes, based on the shared objective of maintaining healthy landscapes that support traditional ways of life and provision of ecological services.

In September, Neskantaga and Nibinamik were two of nine Matawa communities calling for a moratorium on granting future and pending permits until First Nations and the Ontario government develop a regional protocol to address the issue, as they believe adequate consultations are not taking place.

“We agree that proceeding with development decisions while negotiations are under way is counterproductive,” said Rachel Plotkin, Ontario science projects manager at the David Suzuki Foundation. “The David Suzuki Foundation strongly believes that before mineral exploration begins, sufficient investments must be made in the social capital of the affected communities, such as investments in community services, so they can successfully engage in government-to-government decision-making processes.”

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David Suzuki Foundation wants “social capital” invested in the Ring of Fire – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – November 27, 2014)

Established in 1980, Northern Ontario Business provides Canadians and international investors with relevant, current and insightful editorial content and business news information about Ontario’s vibrant and resource-rich North.

The David Suzuki Foundation is siding with two northern First Nation communities in requesting a moratorium on mining exploration permits in the Ring of Fire.

The Toronto and Vancouver-based environmental organization has been working with Neskantaga and Nibinamik to build the remote communities’ policy and decision-making capacity toward making planning and land-use decisions that are in keeping with their traditional way of life.

Last September, Neskantaga and Nibinamik were two of nine Matawa tribal council communities that called for a moratorium on granting permits for mineral exploration until First Nations and Queen’s Park finalized a regional consultation protocol to address development in the James Bay lowlands.

The chiefs accused the province of moving forward on permitting companies which have not consulted with area First Nations. They insist it breaks the spirit of a regional framework signed last March that was supposed to guide future mining and infrastructure development in the Far North.

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