[PETITION] INDIA: Priyanka Chopra WITHDRAW from VEDANTA’s ‘Our Girls, Our Pride’ Campaign

“We, ask you to withdraw as Ambassador from ‘Our Girls, Our Pride’, a discredited and damaging campaign and not lend your name to it , when its partner , Vedanta has a terrible record on human rights and the environment,they are destroying the lives of thousands of girl children in Odisha, Chhattisgarh and other states of India and its crimes have been exposed across India and internationally. Vedanta’s interests are directly opposed to those of India, its people and particularly the girl children from poor communities it claims to be helping. Countless children’s life chances have been affected by the deaths and serious injuries sustained by their parents who are workers in Vedanta’s mines, factories and other processing operations.Let them not use you and your name for cause that’s a sham and a PR exercise, for a brand like vedanta which has soaked their hands in blood of tribals of Niymagiri, including girl child.”

 

SIGN THE PETITION HERE AT AVAAZ.ORG.

Why this is important

India: Urgent call to halt Odisha mega-steel project amid serious human rights concerns

GENEVA (1^st October 2013) –Construction of a mega-steel plant in Odisha in Eastern India should be halted immediately, United Nations independent human rights experts* have urged, citing serious human rights concerns. The project reportedly threatens to displace over 22,000 people in the Jagatsinghpur District, and disrupt the livelihoods of many thousands more in the surrounding area.

“The construction of a massive steel plant and port in Odisha by multinational steel corporation POSCO must not proceed as planned without ensuring adequate safeguards and guaranteeing that the rights of the thousands of people are respected,” the group of eight experts stressed.

While India has the primary duty to protect the rights of those whose homes and livelihoods are threatened by the project, the experts underlined that “POSCO also has a responsibility to respect human rights, and the Republic of Korea, where POSCO is based, should also take measures to ensure that businesses based in its territory do not adversely impact human rights when operating abroad.”

INDIA: A public hearing in Tamnar against the public

SUVOJIT BAGCHI

• 
  The HinduWomen rallying at Tapranga village in Tamnar block in Raigarh against a public hearing to acquire a coal block by the JSPL. Photo: Suvojit Bagchi

It is an exercise by State government to hand over 350 hectare of land to JSPL

Standing on the edge of a monstrous, black gorge, 72-year-old Kaniram, a Birhor tribal, stretched his left hand to point at the mud thatched house that he had in the hill slope. However, one could only see waves of unending charcoal coloured hills in the backdrop. The area — definitely not less than a few hundred square kilometres — looks grey but Kaniram found the whole thing funny. “We never thought there is so much coal under our house, but it was,” he smiled and added, “…wished there was less coal in the hills.”

PHILIPPINES: Mining the Last Frontier

Lucrative mining projects backed by foreign investors are destroying forests and threatening indigenous tribes who live off the land in the Philippines’ Palawan. Aljazeera’s 101 East explores if a balance could be struck between development and local interests.

PHILIPPINES: Any new Executive Order on mining must affirm IPS rights over their ancestral domain

Published : Wednesday, March 07, 2012 Written by : Gualberto B. Lumauig

COMMENTARY

Former governor and congressman of Ifugao

As major players in the mining industry debate their respective social responsibilities in the exploitation of our country’s vast mineral resources, they should not lose sight of the rights and concerns of the indigenous people over their ancestral lands and domains.

We need a reaffirmation from our government and the mining industry stakeholders that our indigenous peoples’ occupation, possession and propriety rights over their ancestral domains are their exclusive birthright and privilege that should seriously be taken into account when government, through its licensing mandate, starts allowing developers and investors to encroach on these ancestral territories.

PAPUA: World Council of Churches concerned about human rights violations in Papua

[Abridged in translation by TAPOLBintang Papua, 6 March 2011Photo at head of article: Rev. Dr Sae Nababan, President of the World Council of Churches

Jayapura: The World Council of Churches is very concerned about the violation of human rights  in Papua , said the Rev. Nababan in a discussion with Bintang Papua on Tuesday, 6 March. He said that the WCC was very concerned about the many injustices being suffered by the Papuan people.

The World Council of Churches  has registered its concerns and has informed the Indonesian government of this as well as churches around the world.

Philippines: Indigenous Peoples Solon Notes Rejection Of Mining At Local Level

“We’re seeing a wave of local ordinances declaring their corresponding jurisdictions as mining-free zones and asserting moratoriums on open pit mining, which can only mean that at the local level, people are rejecting mining.”

Thus remarked Cong. Teddy Brawner Baguilat (Lone District, Ifugao) at the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) Forum last Tuesday at Intramuros, Manila.

Baguilat observed that Davao City, Capiz, Zamboanga Sur, Romblon, Nueva Vizcaya, and a number of other local governments, are passing ordinances banning mining in their territories.

PHILIPPINES: Indigenous Peoples’ Group Challenges Aquino Regime: ‘Stop Foreign Mining And Plunder Of Resources’

Indigenous peoples under the progressive partylist KATRIBU, together with various environmental groups, called on the Aquino administration to halt foreign mining operations and defend national resources from plunder, in a protest action at Mendiola earlier today.

More than 600 people from KATRIBU and other groups held the protest in commemoration of the 17th anniversary of the passage of the Philippine Mining Act, which liberalized mining in the country and encouraged foreign investments in the industry.

Protesters decried Aquino’s policy on mining as subservient to foreign interests, and burned an effigy of a foreign puppeteer controlling a marionette of the Philippine president in a backhoe during the program to symbolize their condemnation.

PHILIPPINES: Conference renews push for Peoples’ Mining Bill

PUBLISHED ON MARCH 2, 2012

By MARYA SALAMAT
Bulatlat.com

MANILA – “A hundred years after exporting our precious timber, have we become rich?” This is the question Kabataan Partylist Rep. Raymond Palatino threw to the participants of the 3rd Peoples Mining Conference happening until today in Tagaytay City.

The conference has drawn nearly 200 environmentalists from all over the Philippines who, in an earlier regional sharing of mining updates, have already detailed how, on the contrary, most ordinary citizens are becoming poorer and more miserable with every operation of huge mining corporations because of massive resource extraction in their midst.

INDIA: Vedanta’s PR campaign backfires as Bollywood celebs pull out

5 March

The Dongria Kondh reasserted their pledge never to leave the Niyamgiri Hills, at a festival in February. © Bikash Khemka/Survival

A bid by British mining giant Vedanta Resources to repair its tarnished international reputation has backfired after two major Bollywood celebrities withdrew from a film competition supposed to show the ‘happiness’ the company creates.

Renowned filmmaker Shyam Benegal and Bollywood actress Gul Panag were both part of a judging panel, which had until the end of this month to pick a winning film out of the 38 submitted.

The films were all shot by ‘budding film-makers’, who were escorted by Vedanta around villages where it has a presence.

The objective of the competition was to show the ‘happiness’ Vedanta brings to local communities where it works.

Vedanta’s reputation was irreversibly damaged when it ignored the rights of the Dongria Kondh tribe, whose sacred mountain it sought to mine for aluminum ore.

Due to the mounting tribal protests and international criticism of their actions in Orissa, India, Vedanta initiated a PR offensive extolling their virtues. But this short film reveals how easily their lies and manipulations can be debunked.

Gul Panag, who was crowned Miss India in 1999, was only made aware of Vedanta’s involvement when it was brought to her attention via social media.

She tweeted, ‘My bad. Just got full details. I wasn’t aware that the competition was part of Vedanta glorification/PR. Have pulled out.’