MILITARY & GEOGRAPHERS MAP DISPOSSESSION OF INDIGENOUS

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The three colonies of Canada, US and Mexico are forming a political block to better control Indigenous labor and to seize our resources.

In 1973, Henry Kissinger in effect said that depopulation should be the highest priority of foreign policy towards the less developed countries because the US needs to steal their resources. [www.findsomequotes.com/henry-kissinger-new-york-times-oct-28-1973].

The greatest resistance to global control by international banker thugs are indigenous communities. We assert autonomy, self-determination and human rights when we communally hold our territory. This creates an obstacle to theft of our land and resources by US political and economic interests.

The US military and geographers have a plan to prey on and dissolve indigenous communities and resistance.

In 2005, the US Department of Defense gave Kansas University $500,000 to map communally-held indigenous land in the Mexican states of San Luis Potosi and Oaxaca. The professors and the US Foreign Military Studies Office FMSO at Fort Leavenworth are implementing the “Mexico Indigena” program to privatize Indigenous lands which are presently held communally.

The Officers are trained in land and resource theft at the US Army School of the Americas which also teaches torture and sets up death squads in Latin America.

The plan is to get rid of Indigenous autonomy and self-determination to get our territory and resources. Propaganda is being spread that our communities are breeding grounds of crime and insurgency and must be done away with.

Land data and military strategy was carried out in Colombia [Mapping Colombia: Land Data and Strategy]. While collecting data, the FMSO assessed so-called guerrilla armies, terrorist organizations and Indigenous defenses.

In 1992 the Mexican President revoked Article 27 of the constitution which had turned communal land grants over to Mexico’s indigenous people in 1912. The North American Free Trade Agreement NAFTA revoked this.

The day NAFTA went into effect, on January 1, 1994, the Zapatistas captured a third of the state of Chiapas, who continue to resist and inspire human rights struggles elsewhere.

Oaxaca State is extremely wealthy in natural resources. It is a site for NAFTA based mega industrial projects known as Plan Puebla Panama such as highways, railways, ports, wind energy, mines, agribusinesses, and maquiladora-style assembly plants. Indigenous communities are pushed off their land, used for cheap labor or robbed of their livelihood because they are considered non-viable.

A geographer at the University of the Earth in Oaxaca City saw the danger of these mapping junkets. They were combined with talks for US military aid known as the Merida Initiative. The military planned to displace Indigenous communities, remove hot spots and control the region. Natural and mineral resources could then be stolen by the government and its transnational allies.

On June 14, 2006 a teacher’s union strike in Oaxaca City blew up into a popular Indigenous uprising of farm workers, teachers, students, housewives, and laborers. The people wanted traditional forms of land tenure and self-governance.

The Oaxacan People’s Popular Assembly APPO took over the state’s capitol city for six months. It became the de-facto government, organized under the Indigenous principle of leading by obeying the people. Organizing was done by consensus.

APPO members occupied state, local, and federal government offices throughout the city and took over food, water, transportation and communication. The state retaliated with murder, disappearance, rape, torture and police led drive-by shootings. The social movement was eroded for a while.

During this resistance, the “Mexico Indigena” mapping project moved its operation to a biologically diverse and mineral-rich region in Oaxaca.

Territory and culture are together in daily life for the indigenous of southern Mexico. Free Trade forces a loss of identity and tradition. There is constant propaganda that devalues Indigenous culture. Mannequins in Oaxaca City are tall, skinny, and very white. The most prevalent cosmetic product sold to indigenous women is skin bleach. We obviously need to reclaim our autonomy, territory and natural identity.

Negating communal land holding is to deny indigenous culture, life and identity. The US knows that our relationship with the land is the biggest threat to the capitalists. Our identity and our birthright is the land. International law dictates that changes can only be made with our full knowledge and consent, which we’ll never give. Removing the artificial borders between Canada, US and Mexico is for the immigrants and foreigners, not us.

Kahentinetha MNN Mohawk Nation News, www.mohawknationnews.com kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Note: Your financial help is needed and appreciated. Please send your donations by check or money order to “MNN Mohawk Nation News”, Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0. Or go to PayPal on MNN website. Nia:wen thank you very much. Go to MNN “WORLD” category for more stories; New MNN Books Available now!
Left Turn July/Aug 2009, Simon Sedillo www.elenemigocomun.net,