[News] Activists Disrupt Department of Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke at Closed Conference

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2018/07/santa-ana-pueblo-activists-disrupt.html 



  SANTA ANA PUEBLO -- Activists Disrupt Zinke at Closed Conference

July 24, 2018
Press contact:
Julia Bernal, Pueblo Action Alliance , julia.f.bernal at gmail.com 
<mailto:julia.f.bernal at gmail.com>, puebloactionalliance at gmail.com 
<mailto:puebloactionalliance at gmail.com>,
Rebecca Sobel, WildEarth Guardians, rsobel at wildearthguardians.org 
<mailto:rsobel at wildearthguardians.org>,
Video: 
https://www.facebook.com/puebloactionalliance/videos/1567266396914452/ 
<https://www.facebook.com/puebloactionalliance/videos/1567266396914452/>
Photos to be posted: https://www.flickr.com/photos/wildearth_guardians/ 
<https://www.flickr.com/photos/wildearth_guardians/>


SANTA ANA PUEBLO, NM, US: The annual Convention of Western Attorneys 
General Conference (CWAG) scheduled Fireside chat with Department of 
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke was met with disruption from activists who 
demanded the Secretary finally listen to public concerns regarding his 
administration's crusade to hand over America’s public lands and 
resources exclusively to fossil fuel industries.

Closed to the public and the press, the event was meant to avoid citizen 
engagement, a theme of Zinke’s tenure at the Department of Interior. 
 From reducing public comment periods and condemning scientific and 
social analyses to gutting National Monuments and Endangered Species 
protections, the Trump administration and Secretary Zinke have shown 
time and again that industry voices are more important than public 
health and safety, clean air and water, indigenous sovereignty and 
tribal consultation, our environment, and our increasingly warming climate.

New Mexico has been a recent target for industrialized fracking, 
climbing the ranks of oil and gas producing states, as more and more 
public lands in iconic areas of Greater Chaco and Carlsbad Caverns are 
sold to the oil and gas industry for as little as $1.50 per acre. 
Failing to acknowledge unprecedented  public and tribal opposition, 
Zinke continues to auction off more land in Northeast and Southwest New 
Mexico for unfettered fracking. His administration's systemic efforts to 
ignore public engagement have compelled activists today to bring their 
input directly to the Secretary.

Wearing #NoNewLeases t-shirts, two Indigenous activists attempted to 
infiltrate the meeting during Zinke’s presentation, unfurling a banner 
that read “Stop the Genocide” and reciting key policies to remind the 
Secretary of the duties he is meant to uphold, before being escorted out 
of the room by hotel security and Santa Ana police.

Statement from activists:
“Today’s event is evidence of the extreme efforts Secretary Zinke will 
take in order to avoid any public engagement or accountability. That 
Indigenous people are not welcome on our own land while Zinke’s 
administration freely sacrifices our future generations to feed the 
greed of corporate cronies in the fossil fuel industry is not only 
disrespectful, it’s deplorable. We may have been escorted out today, but 
we will not stop in our efforts to hold this administration accountable 
in its duties of protecting public health, our environment, and the 
rights of Indigenous peoples. Respect Existence or Expect Resistance.”

Statement read by activists:

The Department of the Interior protects and manages the Nation's natural 
resources and cultural heritage; provides scientific and other 
information about those resources; and honors its trust responsibilities 
or special commitments to American Indians, Alaska Natives, and 
affiliated island communities.
The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples 
Article 32 states Indigenous peoples have the right to determine and 
develop priorities and strategies for the development or use of their 
lands or territories and other resources.
Article 19 States shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the 
indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative 
institutions in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent 
before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures 
that may affect them.
Environmental justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement 
of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with 
respect to the development, implementation and enforcement of 
environmental laws, regulations and policies.
Fair treatment means no group of people should bear a disproportionate 
share of the negative environmental consequences resulting from 
industrial, governmental and commercial operations or policies.

Santa Ana police stationed a checkpoint two miles away from the hotel, 
turning back citizens who wanted to peacefully demonstrate at a planned 
event in the hotel parking lot. Relegated to the corner of Hwy 550 and 
Tamaya Blwvd, close to 50 activists rallied with signs and banners to 
call on stronger leadership from Zinke’s Interior.

Additional Quotes:

“Ninety one percent of available public land in Northwest New Mexico has 
already been leased for the extractive operations. Over 500 new 
horizontal wells have been approved without proper planning, accurate 
cultural assessments or analysis. And while this activity is continually 
occurring, Tribal voices and all Tribal Nations who have spiritual and 
cultural claim to the land have not been heard. Zinke thankfully 
deferred a lease sale scheduled for March 2018 due to the need for 
additional analysis of these cultural resources, but this analysis has 
not yet occurred and new drilling continues.”
- Reyes Devore, Pueblo Action Alliance

“Secretary Zinke shouldn’t be surprised at his unwelcome greeting in New 
Mexico. The Secretary has continuously disrespected and disregarded 
tribal concerns and public input regarding his administration’s intent 
to allow extractive industry to run roughshod over our public 
resources.  Despite being physically removed today, we will continue to 
demand the Secretary hear the voices of the public as loud as industry 
insiders and we will be relentless in holding him accountable to 
representing the American people instead of corporate interests.”
- Rebecca Sobel, WildEarth Guardians Climate and Energy Senior Campaigner

“We are here to reassert our demands directly to the Secretary related 
to Greater Chaco Landscape protection. We still demand a moratorium on 
fracking pending completion of adequate Resource Management Plans that 
consider the health and social impacts on communities and plans to 
justly transition to more sustainable local economies. We still demand 
that BLM engage in Tribal Consultation and most importantly, obtain 
free, prior, informed consent from ALL tribal nations who have spiritual 
claim to the region. We demand #NoNewLeases across the Greater Chaco 
Landscape, to retire non- producing and expired leases and begin to 
restore the balance for this sacred region.”
Julia Bernal, Pueblo Action Alliance

“350NM demands a fast and just transition to 100% clean renewable energy 
and to spend not one penny more for coal or gas fired electricity.  We 
call to strictly regulate and stop methane leaks from natural gas 
production and stop sacrificing indigenous and rural communities, like 
the Greater Chaco area, to fracking."
Delese Dellios, 350 New Mexico, 505-688-5343
-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 https://freedomarchives.org/
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