And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
X-Originating-IP: [156.106.192.32]
From: "gazer elk" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Toxics and Indigenous Peoples. Indigenous Environmental Network at Geneva.
This message is sent by Tom Goldtooth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3rd Session of the United Nations Environmental Programme Intergovernmental
Negotiating Committee for an International Legally Binding Instrument for Implementing
International Action on Certain Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs), 6-11 September
1999, Geneva, Switzerland.
[The following statement is being submitted today as an oral and written intervention
by Ms. Rebecca Sockbeson, a tribal member of the Penobscot Nation, Maine, and on
behalf of IRATE, a Penobscot tribal citizen group.]
September 8, 1999
Thank you, Mr. Chairperson. I speak to you today as an indigenous citizen of the
Penobscot Nation, USA. I wish to respectfully offer a statement on behalf of
Indigenous Resistance Against Tribal Extinction (IRATE) with support of the Indigenous
Environmental Network, on behalf of the indigenous children of my nation and those who
have yet to be created and finally on behalf of our worldwide Mother, the Earth.
Today in this room my ancestors are with me-We implore you to draft a treaty that not
only upholds our land use rights to hunt and fish as sovereign nations, but even more
importantly, insures the mental and physical health of the Penobscot children, and a
treaty that assures the future existence of my people.
Allow me to present a series of facts that describe the devastating impact of
dioxin in my community:
-My nation of nearly 500 live on an island in the river, where seven (7) pulp
and paper mills dwell both upstream and downstream from us
-Dioxin is a by-product of the chlorine bleaching process in making paper,
discharged from all 7 of these mills
-Dioxin is a highly potent toxic chemical that causes cancer and other
devastating health effects that is being poured into the river daily
-My people have survived on the fish from this river, now we are dying from it
-Neither dioxin or cancer is indigenous to the Penobscot people, however they
are both pervasive in my tribal community
-My people face up to 3 times the state and national cancer rate, moreover,
those that are dying of cancer are dying at younger and younger ages, our reproductive
generation. This means that unless you take action to eliminate dioxin and other
persistent organic pollutants (POPs), there will be no Penobscots living on the island
by the end of the next century.
Finally, as a breast feeding mother the only way to rid my body of this
multi-generational dioxin exposure is to nurse my baby, in turn this lowers my risk of
breast cancer. However, at the same time, we nursing mothers are being told by
experts in the field that even with this knowledge, out of the two evils, formula
versus breastfeeding, that the breastfeeding is more beneficial for our babies,
ultimately shedding our bodies of the dioxin into our future generations.
With this, I humbly, respectfully and desperately urge you to draft a treaty
that insures the existence of the Penobscot and other indigenous peoples who are so
disproportionately impacted by dioxin. That the breast and spoon we feed our babies
with is not filled with cancer, diabetes, learning disabilities, and attention
deficit. That we may have the basic human right to provide to our children the same
foods our ancestors provided with a clear conscience, not the present knowledge that
we as mothers are party to their future cancer and diseases.
Today, you have been blessed with the unique world power to warrant the
survival of the Penobscot people and indigenous peoples all over the world.
We ask that you please at this moment, think of your mothers, daughters, sisters, and
grandmothers and find the courage to use this unique world power to take action to
eliminate dioxin and POPs creating a promise that I may look upon my great-grand
children on our common mother, the earth, as my ancestors look upon me now in this
room.
Woliwon, Thank you
Sent by:
Indigenous Environmental Network
PO Box 485, Bemidji, Minnesota 56619 USA
Tel: 218.751.4967
Fax: 218.751.0561
e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
www.alphacdc.com/ien
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html doctrine
of international copyright law.
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit)
Unenh onhwa' Awayaton
http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/
UPDATES: CAMP JUSTICE
http://shell.webbernet.net/~ishgooda/oglala/
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
