Indigenous history, culture cut

Update: The South Dakota working group's draft recommended including Oceti Sakowin stories in kindergarten to studying tribal banking systems in high school, but the state education department cut many of those recommendations

Chairman Harold Frazier of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe.

 (AP Photo/Cliff Owen, File)

UPDATED:AUG 12, 2021

ORIGINAL:AUG 10, 2021
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Stephen Groves
Associated Press

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — Teachers, educators and other South Dakota citizens charged with crafting new state social studies standards said Tuesday that Gov. Kristi Noem’s administration deleted many elements intended to bolster students’ understanding of Native American history and culture from their draft standards.

Members of the working group — appointed by the Department of Education to review and update the standards — said they were caught by surprise on Friday when the department released a document with significant changes. New standards are released every seven years. They said changes made to the draft they submitted in late July gave it a political edge they had tried to avoid, instead aligning with the Republican governor's rhetoric on what she calls patriotic education.

The working group's draft recommended including Native American culture from Oceti Sakowin stories in kindergarten to studying tribal banking systems in high school, but the department cut many of those recommendations.

The Forum News Service and South Dakota Public Broadcasting first reported the changes.

In this 2019 photo, South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem gives a budget address to lawmakers at the state Capitol in Pierre, S.D. (AP Photo/James Nord, File)

“Here we are again; the Native population is not worthy of being taught,” said Sherry Johnson, the education director with the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate and a member of the working group. “I feel it’s important for all students to learn. This is how you combat racism and you build resiliency.”

She joined the group after trying unsuccessfully for years to get the state government to implement a greater emphasis on Indigenous history and culture in public schools. Johnson said she was one of two tribal members on the 46-member working group, but felt encouraged by the draft they submitted.

When the revised draft was released, she watched in real-time as Native American history was erased. The Department of Education cut in half the number of references to Indigenous Native Americans, tribal, or Oceti Sakowin — the Sioux Nation tribes located in the region.

“We don’t show up for great periods of time. It’s like we don’t exist,” she said.

Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Chairman Harold Frazier issued a strongly worded statement on Wednesday.

"Unfortunately, the bureaucrats and politicians who commissioned the workgroup gutted the portion of the curriculum regarding our Indigenous people," Frazier said. "Removing the important lessons of who we are, where we came from and why things are the way they are, robs every young mind of the necessary understandings to overcome the hurdles of conflict, genocide, and historical trauma."

The Department of Education said in a statement that it “relied heavily on the recommendations ” from the workgroup but that the proposed standards put a greater emphasis on learning about the experience of Native Americans in South Dakota than the previous set of standards.

“The department made certain adjustments before the release of the draft to provide greater clarity and focus for educators and the public," the department said. “The draft standards provide a balanced, age-appropriate approach to understanding our nation’s history, government, economy, and geography, including opportunities to teach about the experiences of all peoples.”

Rosebud Sioux Tribe President Rodney Bordeaux told KELO that he disagrees with the removal.

“All South Dakota citizens need to be taught what’s going on in the state and throughout the country,” he said. “You shouldn’t gloss over it — I think our citizens deserve better. They need to know the true history so they know what they’re dealing with.”

Rosebud Sioux Tribe President Rodney M. Bordeaux


NDN Collective, an Indigenous-led advocacy organization based in the state, responded "to the blatant erasure of Indigenous people."

“The consistent and active erasure of our people is demonstrative of a larger social and systemic issue of white supremacy, racism and clear lack of cultural proficiency that can only be addressed when we begin to be inclusive of the narratives that have been absent and excluded from our education system," Sarah White, NDN Collective director of Education Equity, said.

The response also included a statement from NDN Collective President and CEO Nick Tilsen.

Paul Harens, a retired teacher and another member of the working group, said the changes subverted their work. He said they worked hard to build a consensus on the draft and tried to make the standards “apolitical.”

“The new document takes sides,” he said. “They have turned it into a political football.”

While the preface submitted by the workgroup explained their purpose was to “prepare students to be active, aware, and engaged citizens of their communities, state, country, and world,” the Department of Education released an entirely new preface. It places more emphasis on the “framers of our nation’s constitution,” and references Noem's effort to create a state history and civics curriculum for K-12 students.

The revised preface states: “The founders of our nation emphasized the important role education played in equipping people for the knowledgeable practice of their responsibilities and the respectful enjoyment of their liberties, realizing the common good, and understanding other points of view and cultural beliefs are all equally protected.”

The department will hold public hearings on the proposed standards throughout the school year, and the Board of Education Standards will adopt the final standards in March. The standards are widely followed by school districts but are not mandatory.

Harens predicted the revisions from the Department of Education would stoke divisions at school boards across the state as they wade through a wider political debate on how history and racism are taught.

“All of a sudden you have a political agenda,” he said.

Indian Country Today contributed to this report. It has been updated to include more statements from tribes and Native organizations.

A shameful history

Native historians are compiling what we know about boarding schools, a piece of history unknown or forgotten by many in the United States, and Canada, though Native communities know it well

Left to right, Linda Grover; Brenda Child; Denise Lajimodiere. (Courtesy photos via Minnesota Reformer)

Colleen Connolly
Minnesota Reformer

AUG 16, 2021

Since 2006, Denise Lajimodiere, an enrolled citizen of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa in North Dakota, has spent hours hunkered down in archives searching for records of Native American boarding schools.

“It is tedious,” she said. “It is dusty work.”

And grueling and traumatic. The records are incomplete, but what researchers like Lajimodiere have uncovered reveals a shameful history. Children were often abused, separated from their families and stripped of their culture and language. The records contain stories of both loss and resistance, but they are also important for what’s missing. Many children disappeared and never made it home.

For Lajimodiere, this work is extremely personal, and that’s one reason why she does it.

“I wasn’t sent to boarding school,” she said. “But my parents and grandparents were. My story is the story of millions of Native people and the intergenerational trauma and the historical trauma. We are still in that unresolved grief.”

(Related: Little justice for child sex abuse victims in Indian Country)

The archives are scattered across the country — in government offices, church basements, historical societies and museums. Some records don’t exist at all, at least not formally. Lajimodiere, 70, found out about one school in Wisconsin only after her grandchildren went dumpster diving following the death of a 100-year-old neighbor. The woman’s family threw out many of her possessions, and the kids found an old scrapbook that mentioned a boarding school Lajimodiere had never heard of: Bethany Indian Mission in Wittenberg, Wisconsin.


To date, Lajimodiere has counted 406 boarding schools in the United States, some run by the federal government, both on and off reservations, and some run by religious organizations. In addition to identifying schools, she has also interviewed boarding school survivors and their descendants — including people in her own family — and recorded many of their stories in her book “Stringing Rosaries: The History, the Unforgivable, and the Healing of Northern Plains American Indian Boarding School Survivors.”

Lajimodiere is one of the many Native researchers and historians who have been compiling information about boarding schools for decades. They’ve often had to advocate for the importance of their research in academia, working with limited funds. After Lajimodiere retired from North Dakota State University, where she taught, she applied for grants to continue her work in the archives, but was always denied.

The boarding school era, which ran from roughly 1879 to the 1930s — or longer depending on whom you ask — is a piece of history unknown or forgotten by many in the United States, though Native communities know it well. The federal initiative announced earlier this summer by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland to look into the legacy of boarding school policies has brought sudden national attention to the issue, and for the first time, researchers like Lajimodiere and their tribes might receive significant government support and funding to continue their vital work.


Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, Laguna Pueblo, speaks during a press briefing at the White House, Friday, April 23, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Lajimodiere is one of the founders and a past president of the Minneapolis-based National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition, representing tribes across the country. In 2016, the coalition filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the Bureau of Indian Education to try to find out the names of all federal boarding schools and the children who died or went missing when they were students.

Their request was denied. The bureau said they didn’t have the information.

Today, the coalition is pushing Congress to pass a bill first introduced by Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Haaland last year to create a truth commission similar to the one in Canada that helped bring to light the history of atrocities at boarding schools there. The recent initiative announced by Haaland set a target date of April 2022 to submit a report of their findings, which the coalition believes is not enough time, considering how difficult it has been to track down documents. The commission, they hope, will continue the work.

It’s not yet clear what the federal initiative will be able to accomplish, but for Brenda Child, who is Red Lake Ojibwe and a professor of American studies and American Indian studies at the University of Minnesota, it’s vitally important to get the history right so the government can respond to it appropriately.


When Child first began her research into Native American boarding schools as a history student in the 1980s, she had to push against a lot of the scholars at the time, who argued that boarding schools weren’t very relevant after 1905. She argued that boarding schools were actually an important part of Native Americans’ lives for a few decades more, into the Great Depression and the passage of the Indian Reorganization Act. That law sought to stop the allotment of tribal land and end Native American cultural assimilation policies, including boarding schools. But Child says there’s more to the story.

“Boarding schools were about dispossessing Indians,” Child said. “By the 1930s, the big land grab was over. White Earth had lost 92 percent of their reservation land by then, so there’s no need for boarding schools anymore. Indians can go to public school.”

Like Lajimodiere, Child has spent hours digging through archives to find stories of boarding school students. As a history student writing her dissertation, Child was told she wouldn’t find much in the National Archives, but she went anyway and found loads of letters from students and parents. In addition to stories of loss, illness and death, she also found stories of resistance — something she finds missing in a lot of coverage of the topic today. Much of what she found is documented in her book “Boarding School Seasons: American Indian Families, 1900-1940.”


A federal initiative won’t be able to return the stolen childhoods to boarding school survivors and victims. But Child says there are other things they can — and should — return to atone for the era.

“Land can be returned to Indians. The United States doesn’t have a practice of returning land to Indians, but look, we’re out there dealing with land around the Mississippi and protecting our water right now,” Child said, referring to the Native-led efforts to halt construction of the Enbridge Line 3 tar sands oil pipeline in the northern half of the state. “There’s all kinds of ways to make amends.”

Scholarships and free tuition to state universities would be another obvious way, she said.

Linda Grover, a professor emeritus of American Indian studies at the University of Minnesota-Duluth, says there is a through-line that connects the boarding school experience with Native American children’s education in public schools today.

Early in her career as a historian, Grover researched and wrote about the Vermilion Lake Indian School, a federal boarding school on the Bois Forte Reservation where her grandparents met. She found that recruiters used coercion to convince parents to send their kids to the school. They would argue “the futility of efforts to continue living the Indian way.” The boys were forced to cut their hair, and all students had to wear military-style uniforms. Punishments included spanking and whipping.

Decades later, when Grover was attending graduate school at UMD, she told her aunt she was taking a history class. Her aunt responded: “Don’t let them push you out of there.”

Grover said her aunt’s generation had to fight fiercely from being excluded. “From her generation that’s how she saw things,” Grover said. “To have that feeling that this is your place as much as anybody else’s and to be really proud of who you are as a Native person is so important.”

Grover’s feeling of Native Americans being ostracized from education, however, has lingered. In the early 2000s, Grover worked as the director of Indian education for Duluth Public Schools. There, she witnessed other barriers to education for Native students. When the No Child Left Behind Act was passed, she was told they couldn’t use any of the money for educational programs connected to Native cultures.

Today, she said, things are improving. Her grandkids can learn the Ojibwe language in school if they want to. But the memories of the recent past are fresh.

One of the most lasting impacts of the boarding school era is the intergenerational trauma in families who survived. In addition to identifying boarding schools and their students, the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition also works with communities to ameliorate their trauma and find a way forward. In an op-ed in The Washington Post, Haaland said this is an important part of the initiative as well: “The first step to justice is acknowledging these painful truths and gaining a full understanding of their impacts so that we can unravel the threads of trauma and injustice that linger.”


Lajimodiere hopes that part of the initiative will include sending resources and funds to tribes to pay for therapy and counseling, including from medicine people. Though she is relieved by the attention that boarding schools are finally receiving, she worries about how it might re-traumatize survivors and their families. She has personally grappled with the impact of boarding schools and understands how difficult it is to break the cycle of trauma.

“We need to research how to talk to the next generation and pass on the truth in ways that are age-appropriate and aren’t re-traumatizing, as much as possible,” she said. “We need to know about it, learn about it and understand colonialism. But it also needs to be accompanied by resilience, strength and hope.”

The Minnesota Reformer is an independent, nonprofit news organization dedicated to keeping Minnesotans informed and unearthing stories other outlets can’t or won’t tell.

Legal group backs review of US boarding schools

'Putting a light on what is occurring here is so critical because we know that if we do not learn from this history, we are doomed to repeat it'


The Native American Women's Color Guard salutes as members of the Sicangu Youth Council help provide a formal burial on July 17, 2021, at the Rosebud Sioux Tribe Veteran's Cemetery for six ancestors who died at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in the 1880s. The remains were finally returned to the homelands after 140 years, wrapped in buffalo robe bundles and placed in cedar boxes. (Photo by Vi Waln for Indian Country Today)


AUG 10, 2021
SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN, AP WRITER
Associated Press

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The American Bar Association’s policymaking body has voted in favor of a resolution supporting the U.S. Interior Department as it works to uncover the troubled legacy of federal boarding schools that sought to assimilate Indigenous youth into white society.

The resolution, adopted Monday by delegates at the bar association’s annual meeting, calls for the Biden administration and Congress to fully fund the initiative and provide subpoena power to the Interior Department as it gathers and reviews reams of records related to the schools.

The measure also supports legislation that would create a federal commission to investigate and document all aspects of the boarding school system in the U.S., including issuing reports regarding the root causes of human rights abuses at the schools and to make recommendations to prevent future atrocities.

“Putting a light on what is occurring here is so critical because we know that if we do not learn from this history, we are doomed to repeat it,” Mark Schickman, a San Francisco-based attorney who serves as a special adviser with the bar association, said as he introduced the resolution.

RELATED STORIES:
—'We won't forget about the children'
—Opinion: Healing from boarding school trauma will take time
—Deb Haaland addressing legacy of Indigenous boarding schools
—'Punched in the gut': Uncovering the horrors of boarding schools

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, a citizen of Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico and the first Native American to lead a Cabinet agency, announced the boarding school initiative following news that hundreds of bodies were being discovered on the grounds of former residential schools for Indigenous children in Canada.

Experts say the initiative will be difficult because records are scattered across jurisdictions — from the bowels of university archives to government offices, churches, museums and personal collections.



Interior Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, Laguna Pueblo, speaks during a press briefing at the White House, Friday, April 23, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

“The department is compiling decades of files and records to begin a proper review that will allow us to organize documents, identify available and missing information, and ensure that our records system is standardized,” said Melissa Schwartz, a spokeswoman for the Interior Department.

The agency also is building a framework for how it will partner with outside organizations to guide the next steps of the review.

Consultations with tribes are expected to begin in late fall. Schwartz said those discussions will be focused on ways to protect and share sensitive information and how to protect gravesites and sacred burial traditions.



This July 8, 2021 image of a photograph archived at the Center for Southwest Research at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, New Mexico, shows a group of Indigenous students who attended the Ramona Industrial School in Santa Fe. The late 19th century image is among many in the Horatio Oliver Ladd Photograph Collection that are related to the boarding school. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)


In the United States, the Indian Civilization Act of 1819 and other laws and policies were enacted to establish and support Native American boarding schools nationwide. For over 150 years, Indigenous children were taken from their communities and forced into boarding schools that focused on assimilation.

The discoveries in Canada and the renewed spotlight in the U.S. have stirred strong emotions among tribal communities, including grief, anger, reflection and a deep desire for healing.

Patricia Lee Refo, president of the American Bar Association, said the resolution adopted Monday was born from her visit to the Navajo Nation in July. She met with tribal President Jonathan Nez, the speaker of the tribal council and the all-female Navajo Nation Supreme Court.

Nez has said the troubling history of Indigenous boarding schools deserves more attention to educate people about the atrocities experienced by Native Americans and the intergenerational effects of the boarding school experience.

The Native American Bar Association last year adopted a resolution calling on Congress to introduce legislation focused on reparations for the treatment of American Indians and Alaska Natives.

The resolution adopted Monday by the American Bar Association includes language in support of legislation that would establish the first formal commission in U.S. history to investigate, document and acknowledge past injustices of the federal government’s cultural genocide and assimilation practices through its boarding school policy.

Brad Regehr, a citizen of the Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation in Saskatchewan and the first Indigenous person to serve as president of the Canadian Bar Association, spoke Monday at the American Bar Association meeting. Choking up, he said he and his grandfather were survivors of Canada's residential school program.

Between the 1880s and 1990s, he said 150,000 Indigenous children in his country were forcibly removed from their families and placed in schools far from home. As many as 25,000 children, including toddlers, never returned, he said.

The remains of 215 children were found buried at the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School, shown here on May 27, 2021, on Tk'emlups te Secwépemc First Nation in Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada. (Photo by Andrew Snucins/The Canadian Press via AP)

Regehr talked about the calls to action crafted following nearly a decade of work by Canada’s truth and reconciliation commission and the ongoing discoveries of children's remains.

“That has hit me hard, and it hits and it continues to hit many Indigenous people hard,” he said, “but it’s also hit many Canadians hard for the first time ever."

A trauma going back centuries
Child sexual abuse in Indigenous communities is rooted in a history of violent colonization and US assimilation policies, including federal boarding schools throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries





Children from the Quechan tribe stand in lines outside the federal government Indian School in Yuma, Ariz., in this historical photo taken circa 1900. (Photo by C.C. Pierce, University of Southern California Libraries and California Historical Society via Howard Center for Investigative Journalism)

AUG 16, 2021

McKenna Leavens, Allison Vaughn, Anne Mickey, Rylee Kirk, Brendon Derr and Leilani Fitzpatrick
Howard Center for Investigative Journalism

Child sexual abuse is such an age-old problem that it’s explained in many Native American communities with a parable known as the Story of the Moon and the Sun.

As retold by child psychologist Dolores Subia BigFoot, a citizen of the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma, the story is about a brother and sister who have lost their parents and many relatives and have only each other.

The sister longs for companionship and tells her brother of her “desire to share her life with someone,” the parable goes.

One night, a man comes to her in the darkness of their camp. She cannot tell who he is, but he’s kind and makes her laugh and, over time, they become lovers. Ultimately, the girl learns that the stranger is her brother, and they are devastated.

“He became the MOON who does not shine except in the darkness of night and she became the SUN. You can still see his shame because he never shines brightly when the sun is out,” the parable says.

(Related: Little justice for child sex abuse victims in Indian Country)

BigFoot directs the Native American Programs at the Center on Child Abuse and Neglect at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center. She says some version of this parable has been shared among different tribes for generations.




Child psychologist Dolores Subia BigFoot retells the Story of the Moon and the Sun, which has been passed down verbally in Native communities for generations as a resource to help people learn about child sexual abuse and its prevalence. (Courtesy of Dolores Subia BigFoot via Howard Center for Investigative Journalism)

Barbara Bettelyoun is a citizen of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe in South Dakota and the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community of Minnesota with doctorates in child development and child clinical psychology. She runs Buffalo Star People, a South Dakota-based organization specializing in healing historical and childhood traumas in Native communities. She and her husband, Francis, speak nationally on child sexual abuse in Native American communities.

“I don't think that there's an Indigenous family who has not been touched by this,” Bettelyoun said, pausing. “I don't think there's one; I don't know of one.”

Rape has historically been used as a weapon of war, and that was true when settlers colonized Native American lands. According to Bettelyoun and other experts, this learned abuse has been passed down through generations, creating intergenerational trauma.

U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, a citizen of the Pueblo of Laguna and the first Native cabinet member in U.S. history, noted the “long-standing intergenerational trauma” and its “cycles of violence and abuse” when she announced in June a federal investigation into the legacy of Indian boarding schools.




Studio portrait of 15 Native American students wearing their school uniforms at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania, circa 1888. (Photo by David Ewens, Library and Archives Canada via Howard Center for Investigative Journalism)

Christian churches and the U.S. government established the schools in the 19th century to forcibly assimilate Native children into American culture. The children were taken from their families and sent — sometimes thousands of miles away — to boarding schools, where their long hair was cut short and they weren’t allowed to speak their own languages, wear traditional clothing or practice their religions.

“The intent was so that when the children came back to their own families and villages, they would be ashamed of being Indigenous,” Bettelyoun said. “They did that by raping our children and molesting our children and abusing them in horrific ways.”

(Related: Rosebud ancestors buried in emotional ceremony)

The remains of hundreds of children have already been found on the former grounds of Canada’s largest Indigenous boarding school.

A 2012 study by researchers from the University of Washington found that “former boarding school attendees reported higher rates of current illicit drug use and living with alcohol use disorder, and were significantly more likely to have attempted suicide and experienced suicidal thoughts in their lifetime compared to non-attendees.” The survey of 447 American Indian, Alaska Native and First Nations adults from urban areas who self-identified as LGBT, Two-Spirit or having engaged in same-sex behavior also found that those who were raised by someone who attended boarding schools were more likely to have attempted suicide and experienced suicidal thoughts in their lifetime.




Dr. Renée Ornelas stands outside the Tséhootsooí Medical Center in Fort Defiance, Ariz., on the Navajo Nation on July 8, 2021, where she is a child abuse pediatric specialist. She said the lack of prosecution of child sexual assault cases allows suspects to re-offend. (Brendon Derr / Howard Center for Investigative Journalism)

Dr. Renée Ornelas, a child abuse pediatric specialist for 30 years who works at Tséhootsooí Medical Center in Fort Defiance, Arizona, said the Native children sent to boarding schools were physically, sexually and spiritually abused. And the cycle of violence continued when these children, who were never parented, returned home and became parents themselves.

“All these things that you learn as you're growing up about how to be safe, nobody ever taught them,” Ornelas said, adding that nine of 10 caregivers who bring their child to her clinic for sexual abuse have been abused themselves.

In addition, she said, the modern-day version of boarding schools are now seeing cases of children abusing other children. “What we know now is that if you're growing up in a home where there's domestic violence, you can learn sexual abuse. You can do that to other children, not for sexual gratification, but to cause humiliation, embarrassment, bullying.”

Tom Torlino, a citizen of the Navajo Nation, before and after his stay at a federal Indian boarding school, circa 1882. (Photo by J.N. Choate, courtesy of the Richard Henry Pratt Papers, Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library)


The trauma of childhood sexual abuse doesn’t just create lifelong emotional turmoil, it can lead to long-term physical problems, such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease, said Debra Kaysen, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University.

Speaking of boarding school survivors, Kaysen said, “What you get is somebody who is highly traumatized, who's sent back to a community, often without coping strategies for how to manage their distress.”

Francis Bettelyoun, a citizen of the Oglala Lakȟóta and Yankton Sioux Tribe, is an Indigenous liaison to Winona State University in Minnesota. He is descended from boarding school survivors and says he was sexually abused as a child.

“I deal with this every day. I can't not separate myself from the trauma that happened. My dad was in boarding school, his dad, my grandfather as well, and the two generations before dealt with this, as well,” Francis Bettelyoun said. “To get through this, it needs to be recognized that this isn't something that goes away and will go away through time. This is something that needs

to be addressed by those who have done it and those that are part of it now.”

Chiricahua Apache Indians in 1886, four months after arriving at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania. (U.S. National Archives via Howard Center for Investigative Journalism)

-----

Researchers Grace Oldham and Rachel Gold contributed to this story. It was produced by the Howard Center for Investigative Journalism at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, an initiative of the Scripps Howard Foundation in honor of the late news industry executive and pioneer Roy W. Howard. 

For more see https://azpbs.org/littlevictims 

Contact us at howardcenter@asu.edu or on Twitter @HowardCenterASU.


BY HOWARD CENTER FOR INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM

'Rights of nature’ lawsuits hit a sweet spot

UN climate change report could help bolster tribe’s claims against Enbridge Line 3

Cass Lake is one of many lakes in Minnesota where wild rice or manoomin grows. Cass Lake, Minnesota 2019 (Photo by Mary Annette Pember)

AUG 15, 2021
MARY ANNETTE PEMBER
Indian Country Today

It’s all about strategy and timing in Indian Country, especially in the legal system.

Shortly after a groundbreaking lawsuit was filed in the White Earth Nation’s tribal court defending the rights of wild rice to fight the construction of Enbridge’s Line 3 pipeline, the United Nations released its 6th Assessment on Climate Change.

The UN report includes an entire chapter dedicated to the powerful role that Indigenous knowledge can play in global development of adaptation and mitigation strategies aimed at addressing climate change.

According to the report, recognition of Indigenous rights, governance systems and laws are central to creating effective adaptation and sustainable development strategies that can save humanity from the impacts of climate change. In this first of three climate change reports, the working group focused primarily on physical science, providing evidence that a climate crisis caused mostly by human activities is upon us.

Boom. The report’s release created the perfect public moment to exert tribal sovereignty and advance the legal theory that nature itself, in this case wild rice, has the right to exist and flourish even in the face of the construction of a massive infrastructure transporting fossil fuel.


The so-called “rights of nature” argument recognizes that nature has rights just as human beings have rights; rather than treating nature as property under the law, rights of nature cases contend that nature, rivers, forests and ecosystems have the right to exist, flourish, maintain and regenerate their life cycles. Further, humans have a legal responsibility to enforce those rights.

According to the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature, Indigenous cultures recognize the rights of nature as part of their traditions of living in harmony and recognition that all life is connected.

(Related: ‘Code Red’ on Indigenous People’s Day)

For Ojibwe, wild rice or manoomin, “good berry” in the Ojibwe language, is like a member of the family, a relative. Manoomin is more than food, it is a conveyor of culture, spirituality and tradition. Therefore, legally designating manoomin as a person in the White Earth Nation’s lawsuit against the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources aligns with the Ojibwe world view.

Manoomin is considered an indicator species; it is sensitive to changes in water levels and flow reflecting changes in the local climate. The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources reports that the 2021 wild rice harvest in the state’s waterways should be average this year but that low water levels caused by drought will make access difficult. Rice is harvested from a canoe.


Frank Bibeau, attorney for and citizen of the White Earth Nation, blames the Enbridge pipeline construction for exacerbating the lower water levels in neighboring rivers.

Frank Bibeau, citizen of and attorney for the White Earth Nation discusses his legal strategy at gathering at the Shell City campground in Wadena County, Minnesota, June 2021. (Photo by Mary Annette Pember)

“We are seeing rivers along Line 3 that are now essentially dry bottoms with rice growing out of the mud. We can’t get our canoes in to harvest,” he said.

On Aug. 6, manoomin was named as a plaintiff, along with several White Earth tribal citizens and Native and non-Native water protectors who have demonstrated against Line 3, in a complaint filed in White Earth Nation Tribal Court against the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.

It is only the second “rights of nature” case to be filed in the U.S. and the first to be filed in tribal court. Several tribes, however, have incorporated rights of nature into their laws.

The lawsuit accuses the department of failing to protect the state’s fresh water by allowing Enbridge to pump up to 5 billion gallons of groundwater from construction trenches during a drought that itself is tied to climate change, which

increases the pace of extreme weather swings and contributes to lags in the jet stream that keep heat waves, cold snaps and rain in an area for longer periods.


The suit also claims that the department has violated not only the rights of manoomin but also treaty rights for those who hunt, fish and gather wild rice off-reservations in ceded lands. The lawsuit seeks to establish the rights of manoomin, stop the extreme water pumping by Enbridge and stop arrests of water protectors opposing the pipeline at construction sites.

Juli Kellner, communications specialist for Enbridge, wrote an email responding to Indian Country Today’s request for the company’s reaction to the lawsuit.

“Line 3 construction permits include conditions that specifically protect wild rice waters. As a matter of fact, Enbridge pipelines have coexisted with Minnesota's most sacred and productive wild rice stands for over seven decades,” she said.

“The current drought conditions in Minnesota are concerning to everyone. In response, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources has suspended the use of some water sources due to low flow in specific watersheds. We are focused on protecting, conserving and reusing water on the Line 3 project. More than 50 percent of pipeline sections being tested on Line 3 by reusing water. We continue to work with agencies on next steps during these drought conditions.

“Enbridge has demonstrated ongoing respect for tribal sovereignty,” she wrote.


Department of Nature Resources spokesperson Gail Nosek said the agency is reviewing the lawsuit and had no comment.

‘Gaining traction’

Exerting tribal sovereignty by filing the lawsuit in tribal court rather than in state or federal court and advancing the legal theory of the rights of nature are unique, according to legal scholars.

“The rights of nature is quickly gaining traction in American legal law,” said Elizabeth Kronk Warner, dean of S.J. Quinney College of Law at the University of Utah. Warner is a citizen of the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians.

“It’s already established in some other countries; the rights of nature is definitely a burgeoning area of law and I think we’ll continue to see it develop,” Warner said.

Courts in Bolivia, Columbia, Ecuador, India and New Zealand have litigated cases based on rights of nature.

The first “rights of nature” case filed in the U.S. came in April in Orange County, Florida, when the state’s waterways filed suit against a housing developer and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. The suit says that a proposed residential development will destroy acres of wetlands.

But tribal courts have no authority to order the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources to rescind its water permit to Enbridge, according to Matthew Fletcher, a citizen of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians and a law professor who is director of the Indigenous Law and Policy Center.


Fletcher agrees, however, that establishing the rights of manoomin as a legal entity in tribal court is a sound strategy.

“Those rights likely would not be recognized on their own in state or federal court; this suit may be a valuable exercise,” Fletcher said.

Attorneys chose to file the suit in White Earth’s tribal court as a means to quickly get the case heard in federal court. Tribal court civil cases involving non-Natives are permitted by consent of the defendant.

Legal scholars say that in this case, the state government would typically seek to have the case removed to the federal courts.

Bibeau said that the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources has already asked to file a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction in the case. Although states and their agencies have their own sovereign immunity from lawsuits, Bibeau thinks that the department won’t be able to dodge the suit even if federal courts return the case to tribal court. The key is asking for a declaratory judgment and injunctive relief rather than monetary damages.

“I don’t think the state has immunity from declaratory judgment,” Bibeau said.

A declaratory judgment declares the rights of the plaintiff without any specific action or award for damages. Injunctive relief restrains a party from engaging in certain actions or requires them to do the actions in a certain way.


“I think that declaratory relief is within the boundaries of tribal court,” Bibeau said.

After the tribal court issues its order, regardless of the state’s participation, it will have created case law to which the federal court can refer when deciding to hear the case or return it to tribal court.

Manoomin or wild rice is more than food for Ojibwe; it conveys culture and tradition. 2020. (Photo by Mary Annette Pember)

“I don’t think anybody has tried to sue a state from a tribal court but I don’t think there’s any federal statute against it,” Bibeau said.

“They (the DNR) won’t be able to stop the tribal court order. When we go to federal court based on the simplicity of water and wild rice, we can go a long way because we already have those rights as a sovereign nation,” he said.

Either scenario, according to Bibeau, is a win for plaintiffs.

Looking ahead

Bibeau’s legal strategy, however, is not without pitfalls.

Treaties signed between the Ojibwe and the federal government in 1837 and 1854 guaranteed tribes the right to hunt, fish and gather on ceded lands. The 1855 treaty or Treaty of Washington, however, conspicuously lacks language spelling out this right. The bulk of the Line 3 pipeline runs through 1855 treaty lands.


In 2019, the Minnesota Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the state regarding 1855 treaty rights to hunt, fish and gather on ceded lands. Two Ojibwe men were cited by the state for illegally taking fish from Gull Lake located on off-reservation lands in the 1855 Treaty area. One judge, however, offered a dissenting opinion in the case saying that rights apply to treaties as the Indians at the time would have understood them.

Bibeau represented one of the defendants in this case. “There is nothing in the 1855 Treaty that relinquished rights to hunt, fish and gather on ceded lands,” Bibeau said.

This is known as the reserved rights doctrine; treaties describe the specific rights tribes gave up, not those they retain. In many cases, the federal court has interpreted treaties using the reserved rights doctrine.

The elements of White Earth’s lawsuit that depend on rights to hunt, fish and gather on ceded lands within the 1855 Treaty area are contingent on these rights being affirmed. For instance, plaintiffs claim that the state deprived them of their civil rights by charging them with trespass and other crimes as they protested Line 3 construction; they argue that they were lawfully engaged in exercising their treaty rights.

Minnesota treaty map. Courtesy Mitchell Hamline School of Law


Establishing that the 1855 treaty should be interpreted to include hunting, fishing and gathering rights on ceded lands could be a challenge, according to treaty scholars. At least one scholar, who preferred to be quoted anonymously, cautioned that each treaty is different.

Although Warner agreed that establishing treaty rights in this case might not be an easy argument, it would be consistent with existing Indian treaty law.

“Tribes have been having a lot of success in the current Supreme Court; all of the cases relying on treaty rights have been successful,” Warner said.

She pointed to the McGirt case in Oklahoma and the Boldt decision in Washington.

Most of these decisions have been led by Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch. Although considered a conservative, Gorsuch has demonstrated a keen understanding and appreciation of tribal sovereignty and treaty rights expressing respect for the reserved rights doctrine. During his tenure, Gorsuch has ruled in favor of important treaty rights cases such as Herrera v. Wyoming, rejecting past theories of state sovereignty and Washington State Department of Licensing v. Cougar Den affirming the state’s obligations to tribes. Gorsuch served as federal judge on the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals where he gained extensive experience in Indian law.


“The interesting thing would be if White Earth’s right to nature claim could be incorporated into or run parallel to a treaty right,” Warner said.

The release of the UN’s climate report alongside White Earth’s lawsuit could be auspicious for both treaty rights claims and the rights of nature, according to Warner.

“The urgency of the UN findings make this litigation and advocacy work so much more important now because we literally have a window of time in which to make changes,” Warner said.

BY MARY ANNETTE PEMBER
a citizen of the Red Cliff Ojibwe tribe, is a national correspondent for Indian Country Today.

The Wrap: Pueblo Revolt
Headlines for Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021
INDIAN COUNTRY TODAY

Po’pay, an Ohkay Owngeh leader, led the pueblo nations in a successful revolt against the Spanish in 1680. A seven-foot-high statue of him can be find in the United States Capitol visitors center. (Photo by Architect of the Capitol

The first true American revolution

Public schools regularly teach about the American Revolution, when the colonies stood up to the throne and overthrew British rule of the so-called “new world.” However, long before that revolution, Pueblo people staged a successful revolution against Spanish colonizers.

The Pueblo revolt took place on August 10, 1680, and has been referred to as the first true American revolution.

Conroy Chino, Acoma Pueblo, a former journalist, explains to Indian Country Today how his ancestors took part in the Pueblo revolt.

WHY MIGRANTS ARE AT THE US BORDER

Survivors of Guatemalan mudslide face death or emigration

'Those of us who had time to flee could only carry our children on our backs'


AUG 12, 2021
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

A student writes in her notebook as she crouches against a wall on the muddied floor of a shack serving as a schoolhouse which was inundated by heavy rains the night before, in the makeshift settlement Nuevo Queja, Guatemala, Tuesday, July 6, 2021. UNICEF donated a new school to the community, but it has been closed for five months because no one could find the key to open it. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

Alberto Arce and Rodrigo Abd
Associated Press

NUEVO QUEJA, Guatemala — The day before he left for the United States was a busy one for Victor Cal. He went from relative to relative, collecting money to buy food during the journey north.

His mother was disconsolate. "I begged him not to go, that we could live here," she said, again and again, "but the decision had already been made".

He and his parents shared a small lunch -- a couple of chiles with sesame seeds -- in silence. His mother's gloom weighed upon him; he announced he had to find somewhere to charge his phone. "to receive calls so the coyote can tell me where and when we will finally meet."

He set off on a bumpy, dirt road, looking to hitch a ride to any place with electricity. A motorbike pulled over and drove him to the nearest outlet, miles away.

___

This story is part of a series, After the Deluge, produced with support from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.

___

At age 26, Cal felt he had no choice but to leave. The makeshift town where he lived, born of disaster, offered only hunger and death. It seemed the U.S. was the only way out.

Eleven men from his town have gone north in 2021. American authorities say they have stopped more than 150,000 Guatemalans at the border this year, four times the number in 2020.

Many were like Victor Cal, famished and impoverished. He had served in the army, mustering out as a corporal. An indigenous Mayan who speaks Pocomchí, he failed to find work in Guatemala City. When the pandemic hit, he joined thousands who fled the capital to return to their agricultural hometowns in the mountains.


His father's land in Quejá, with its coffee, cardamon, corn and beans, sounded like a safe place. At least there will be food, he thought.

He was wrong.

In his worst nightmare, he could not imagine that a hurricane's rains could bring a mountain down and destroy it all -- house, land, town. He and his parents were left destitute by a fierce hurricane Eta, displaced and dependent on relief from international organizations in a desperately shabby settlement called Nuevo Quejá.

Now, he was hours away from leaving it behind. His phone charged, he returned home after sunset. A group of friends awaited him, but he was in no mood for goodbyes.

He packed quickly. Not too many things fit in a small yellow backpack: a shirt, a sweater, jeans and a pair of extra shoes. He lost pretty much everything else when the landslide buried his house.

___

It had been raining for 25 days. The people of Quejá had been cooped up in their homes for 10 days; access roads had been cut off by flooding.

Without electricity, all the telephones were dead. Nobody told the villagers that the rain that fell over the previous 24 hours had been five times the average monthly amount; no one told them they were at risk, and they should leave.


It was lunchtime last Nov. 5 when the first trees fell and the hillside began to melt. The townspeople left their food on the fire and ran.

"Those of us who had time to flee could only carry our children on our backs" says one of the survivors, Esma Cal, 28, an energetic, articulate woman who would assume a role as a community leader in the aftermath. (Many of the people of Quejá share the same last name, Cal, though it is not always clear how they might be related.)

Fifty-eight people disappeared in seconds. Most of the bodies will never be recovered. Forty homes were buried under tons of mud and dozens of others were left inaccessible.

Crossing torrents of water on ropes, the survivors walked to the nearest town. Residents shared with them their remaining food and put them up in schools and at the market. Due to the isolation, no trucks could arrive with supplies. When helicopters finally arrived, "some of us had been without food for almost two days," said Esma Cal.

Quejá was never an affluent place. But there had been hard-earned progress over the decades, and it was wiped out in minutes.

Erwin Cal, 39, explained that Quejá was founded a hundred years ago, when a group of families got access to a coffee plantation. "My grandfather was a slave. They had to harvest without pay before they were allowed to build their shacks and use some plots of land for their own fields."


There were corn and beans to eat. Then, coffee and cardamom for the market.

In time, they started earning some extra money so they could afford to buy the land.

In the '80s, some men started venturing out of their region and joined the Guatemalan army. At the turn of the century, riding the wave of violence that has plagued the country, they hired on as private guards.

Shacks turned into colorful cement houses with tiles, big windows, refrigerators. "I had a laptop, a sound system and cable TV," said Erwin Cal. All gone.

___

By January, Esma Cal, Erwin Cal, childhood friend Gregorio Ti and others organized a local development council. By February, they had founded a temporary settlement on a third of their agricultural land, close to their buried homes. Perhaps it was not safe from another landslide, but it was accessible.

Thus was born Nuevo Quejá, home to about 1,000 survivors.

"We know how to work," said Ti, 36. He lost his pregnant wife, his 2- and 6-year-old sons and his mother in the mudslide; his surviving daughters, 11 and 14 years old, cling to his side.

The toil is constant, and back breaking. There are no animals to share the burden -- all day long, men, women and children cut and transport wood and clear land with their machetes.


The shacks are constructed with zinc sheets donated by a priest and wooden planks made from pine trees the villagers cut down. Some have big stones on the floor. Holes in the roofs allow rainwater to pour inside; holes between the wall planks are patched with rags, including U.S. flags that turn up among donations of second-hand clothing.

Esma Cal's 37-year-old uncle, Germán Cal -- who returned to Quejá after 20 years in Guatemala City to breed chickens, only to lose all his savings in the mudslide -- is trying to bring electricity to Nuevo Quejá.

It's an almost impossible task -- because officially, the town does not exist.

The government of Guatemala has never been much help to these people. And after the mudslide, it declared the new settlement uninhabitable. If officially, Nuevo Quejá does not exist, it is not eligible for electric poles or road repairs or improved water supply.

"Apart from declaring the place uninhabitable," said Esma Cal, "the government of Guatemala has been absent. Period."

The townspeople have received some help from non-governmental organizations that drew funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development -- some of it useful, some of it less so.

One gave them wheelbarrows, picks and shovels and brought two psychologists to play with the kids, reminding them how to clean their teeth. A second visited to ensure that donations of water and sanitation kits were used correctly. A third spent two days in mid-July on a family needs assessment.


Mirrors donated by USAID hang inside every ramshackle house. The purpose: to elevate self-esteem.

UNICEF donated a new school to the community, but it has been closed for five months because no one could find the key to open it. It turns out that UNICEF gave the key to a teacher who resigned and left with it. A second copy was given to a community member who denied having it.

So instead, school was held in the shack next door, in chairs donated by the European Union. But like every other shack, it leaks, and the floor is often flooded and muddy. The furniture rots.

The school serves 250 children. Of the 12 teachers who worked there before the storms, four remain to teach despite a lack of a permit from the education ministry. Their materials are in Spanish; the students speak only Pomachi, said a teacher who spoke on condition of anonymity, for fear of consequences.

"None of them will go to high school. They already lost years. School failure is total," the teacher said.

___

César Chiquin, 39, is the head nurse in charge of the area. At least once a month, he visits Nuevo Quejá; mothers bring their children and wait on a patio as the nurse lays out his scale and tape measure.


Children cried in fear when they were placed on the scales. The mothers were silent, looking at Chiquin as if he was doing magic.

The results are bad. "Malnutrition has doubled. One in three are stunted," he said.

He does not have many options. "The only thing I can do is to give them some vitamins and advice they are not ready to follow. Even if they want, most of them cannot do it because they lack the resources."

Before the hurricane, the children were healthier. "Today, it is rare for a child to have the correct weight and height. Virtually all are at risk. Their families are not in a suitable place to harvest. They have lost sustainability."

This is the central plight of the people of Nuevo Quejá. Struggle as they might, they can't raise enough food to sustain themselves. Part of the problem is timing. Having lost last year's crops to the hurricanes, "We arrived in Nuevo Quejá too late for planting properly," Esma Cal says.

They also have just a third as much land as they did before the storms. And a lot of the soil has been degraded -- torrential rains wash away the topsoil, black and fertile, and leave behind orange clay.

"We harvested two times a year, now we have only one much smaller harvest, a very small portion of our needs. We are starting again below zero." Esma Cal says.


There are so many obstacles: Seeds and fertilizer are twice as expensive as before, roads are dangerous and easily collapse when it rains. But the lack of good land trumps them all.

The local council has done the calculations. They need about 75 acres more. But they have no money to buy them.

The government has a land trust. Someday they could be awarded the land they need but, according to Guatemalan law, it does not have to be in the same region -- and they cannot even contemplate such a move. Most do not speak Spanish, and a move would obliterate their culture.

"Our community is under collapse and we need a permanent solution. This place is not fit to live in and for the moment we have no way out," said a frustrated Esma Cal. "Our real problem is that we have no land and we are dependent.

"We, as a farming community, need land."

___

The people of Nuevo Quejá are well acquainted with death. They escaped a disaster in which 58 of their neighbors and loved ones died almost instantaneously, and they know it could happen again.

Still, they need wood for their stoves, so they are again deforesting the mountainside, setting the stage for more mudslides as the autumn and winter rainy season approaches.


"But for the moment we have no choice," Gregorio Ti said.

They have designated Julio Cal, 46, to monitor rain and the mountain. There is an evacuation plan: On a pine tree forest over a small hill, they have built a bigger shack where hundreds of people could stay. But few believe this is Nuevo Quejá's salvation.

"We know we can't be here," Julio Cal said. "At any moment that mountain could come crashing down and we all die. We know that. The government has to relocate us on permanent land."

In the meantime, people are dying in the squalor of this settlement, one by one.

In July, 17-year-old Flor Maribel Cal lay in bed with a tumor on her right leg the size of a soccer ball. She was in intense pain, vomiting, malnourished. Months earlier, when the community raised money to send her to the hospital, doctors said amputation was her only hope.

Her mother refused. Her husband and two other children had died in the mudslide, and she is silent and in despair. She does not have the strength to take care of a daughter who will not be able to fend for herself, so she declined treatment. The girl died, on July 22.

Death is one of only two ways out of Nuevo Quejá. The other is emigration to the United States.


Ask any man, and he would say he wants to go. Stay, and you might earn $4 for a full day's work of clearing land, harvesting coffee or cutting wood, Victor Cal said -- hardly enough to support a family. He had heard that you could earn $80 a day in the U.S.

And moving to Guatemala City wasn't an option. There were no jobs in the pandemic, and the deck is stacked against Mayans like Victor Cal who lack Spanish skills.

Most of them say the only thing that prevents them from emigrating is that they cannot afford it.

Víctor Cal contacted a distant cousin who has been in Miami for years. He agreed to advance the $13,000 to buy a coyote package that offers two attempts to enter the U.S.

Optimistic, Cal was convinced he will be able to earn enough to repay his cousin.

It was four in the morning when Victor Cal took a scrap of paper and wrote his number and the number of the coyote who would take him to the Arizona desert.

He left it on the table, one of the few pieces of furniture in the dirt-floored shack. "My objective," he repeated, as if to convince himself, "is to be able to send money so my parents have a real house again and some land."


He added: "If I had a choice, I wouldn't go. I will be back as soon as possible"

He said goodbye without looking back at Nuevo Quejá.

 

Royal Navy Pays Tribute to WWII Arctic Convoys on 80th Anniversary

Merchant vessels under way in ice on an Arctic convoy run (Lt. J.A. Hampton / Royal Navy)

PUBLISHED AUG 16, 2021 10:55 PM BY ROYAL NAVY NEWS

 

Eighty years to the day that sailors left Liverpool on "the worst journey in the world," wartime allies paid tribute to the merchant mariners of the WWII Arctic convoys.

Representatives from the UK, United States, Canada and Russia gathered in St Nicholas’ Parish Church to remember nearly 3,000 sailors who sacrificed their lives to deliver vital aid to the Soviet Union between 1941 and 1945.

They ran the gauntlet of Nazi sea and air power and faced horrendous weather conditions – snow, ice, sub-zero temperatures, weeks of perpetual darkness in winter and little hope of rescue if they went in the water – to reach the ports of Murmansk and Archangel.

The mission – which began on August 12 1941 with the first convoy, Operation Dervish, sailing from the Mersey – was dubbed "the worst journey in the world" by Winston Churchill.

The heavily-guarded Dervish convoy reached northern Russia without incident – it caught the Germans by surprise and they made no efforts to attack it. But they did attack many of the subsequent 77 convoys which came within range of U-boats and German bombers based in occupied Norway.

Sixteen Royal Navy warships were lost and 1,944 Senior Service personnel were killed, while 85 of the 1,400 merchant ships which took part in the Arctic runs were sunk, a loss rate 17 times higher than in the Atlantic campaign. More than 800 merchant sailors died.

“In a war of national survival, the operational and logistical challenges for the Arctic Convoys were tremendous and we should all admire the courage of both the Merchant Fleet and the Armed Forces as they faced the harshest conditions imaginable,” said Lieutenant Colonel Guy Balmer RM, the RN’s Deputy Regional Commander.

The Royal Navy’s senior engineer Rear Admiral Jim Higham, Defence Minister Baroness Goldie, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office Minister Wendy Morton, and military representatives from Russia, the USA and Canada took part in the ceremony. After the service wreaths were laid at the Arctic Convoys Memorial in the church grounds before participants moved to the nearby Western Approaches Museum, from where the battle against the U-boat was directed for most of World War 2. Commemorations concluded at Liverpool’s town hall with a reception for 150 people, with two Arctic veterans the guests of honour.

“Those who sailed on the convoy displayed exceptional bravery in some of the most challenging circumstances in World War 2,” said Minister Morton. “Today, on the 80th anniversary of the first convoy’s departure from Liverpool, we honor all those who served and pay tribute to their heroism and sacrifice. They played a major role in the shared history between the UK and Russia – and the ultimate Allied victory.”

Their sacrifice was not in vain. Over four years, they delivered four million tonnes of supplies to the Soviet war effort – about one quarter of the total aid they provided to the USSR between 1941 and 1945. The 7,000 aircraft and 5,000 tanks, plus trucks, cars, fuel, medicines, metals and other raw materials helped the Soviets to defeat the Germans on the Eastern Front.

 

Incidents Against Ships Declined Significantly in Asia in 2021

Singapore Strait is one area of concern reporting the only increase in crime in 2021 (file photo)

PUBLISHED AUG 13, 2021 6:41 PM BY THE MARITIME EXECUTIVE

 

The number of incidents against ships in Asia declined significantly in the first half of 2021 falling to the second-lowest level in the past fourteen years. The six-month report on piracy and armed robbery against ships in Asia released by the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia (ReCAAP) highlights the decline in serious crime while reporting five incidents, including one where a crew member was threatened with “an improvised gun,” in July.

“The total number of incidents of armed robbery against ships in Asia reported during January-July 2021 has deceased compared to 2020,” ReCAAP reports. “However, of concern is the persistent occurrence of incidents in the Singapore Strait and the continued threat of abduction of crew in the Sulu-Celebes Seas and the waters off Eastern Sabah (Indonesia).”

On the five incidents reported to ReCAAP last month, one however included a higher level of violence. It happened on July 17 in the anchorage in Manila. The duty watcher aboard the Maersk Nussfjord containership encountered an unidentified person at the forecastle of the vessel who pointed “an improvised gun at the back of the duty watcher’s head.” During the incident, the perpetrator took the watchman’s two-way radio and tied him to the railing of the ship. Seven other unidentified persons then boarded the ship, broke the padlock of the boatswain mate locker, and took away one roll of new spare rope mooring line. After they left, the watchman untied himself from the railings and reported the incident.

The other reports in July included two further boardings both in the eastbound lane of the Singapore Strait, which is a continuing area of concern for ReCAAP with a total of 22 reports in the first six months of the year. In one case, five people armed with knives were seen aboard a bulk carrier but left without stealing anything, and another sighting was of a single individual also armed with a knife who was discovered and left without taking anything. There were also two other incidents where equipment was stolen ranging from fire hose couplings to power tools and a welding machine in anchorages in Manila and Indonesia.

Despite these reports, overall incidents in Asia were down by a third in the first half of 2021 versus 2020. According to ReCAAP, it is the second-lowest level between January to July from 2007 to 2021. They further reported that there were no incidents of piracy and no crew were abducted in 2021. Currently, ReCAAP is not aware of any cases where crew members are being held in captivity in Asia.

Beyond the increase in incidents in the Singapore Strait, ReCAAP says the majority of reports were from the Philippines and Indonesia. There were only three reports in Indian and two in Vietnam, while there were none in Bangladesh, the South China Sea, or the Sulu-Celebes Seas in the first half of 2021.

Of the 41 total incidents reported this year, in nearly two-thirds the perpetrators were not armed, often fled when they were discovered, and no crew was harmed. 

ReCAAP credits the ongoing patrols and law enforcement efforts as well as reporting. They however cautioned that until the perpetrators are arrested incidents are likely to continue and that heightened vigilance must be maintained.

Robbery and Piracy Declines in 2021 Except in the Singapore Strait

Robberies are down in Asa except in the Singapore Strait (file photo)

PUBLISHED JUL 19, 2021 6:07 PM BY THE MARITIME EXECUTIVE

 

The regional organization that coordinates efforts to combat piracy and armed robbery against ships in Asia, ReCAAP, has once again issued a warning about the level of activity in the Singapore Strait and in particular in one zone near Bintan Island, Indonesia. ReCAAP reported two additional incidents on July 17, while the organization reported a decline in overall activity during the first half of 2021.

The latest incident alert reports that there were two unauthorized boardings both on July 17 while each ship was underway off Tanjung Pergam, Bintan Island, Indonesia. The two incidents occurred approximately 30 minutes apart and in the same area of the Singapore Strait in the eastbound traffic lane. In both cases, the boarders were spotted by the crew members that reported that the boarders were armed with knives. In one incident they were seen in the engine room and the other in the steering gear room. In both cases, they fled once they were discovered and both ships reported that their crew was unharmed and nothing had been stolen.

“The ReCAAP ISC is concerned with the persistent occurrence of incidents in the Singapore Strait, particularly a cluster of incidents off Tanjung Pergam, Bintan Island, Indonesia,” the alert said. “Since January 2021, a total of 22 incidents occurred in the Singapore Strait, with 18 incidents occurred off Tanjung Pergam.”

 

 

ReCAAP is again warning ships to increase their safety efforts and lookouts, especially at night when most of the boardings have occurred. In half of the incidents, the boarders were armed with knives and in six cases engine spare parts were stolen. In two of the incidents, the crew was also assaulted.

News of the latest boardings came just after ReCAAP issued its six-month report during which time it says armed robbery against ships in the region declined by more than a third versus 2020. While there were 35 incidents and two attempts, there were no reports of piracy, only pretty crimes, and 20 of the incidents detailed in the six-month report were in the area of the Singapore Strait. That represented a 25 percent increase in reported incidents over 2020 in the Strait. 

Overall, the severity of the incidents also declined during 2021. In more than two-thirds of the reports, the perpetrators were not armed, and no crew was harmed. In addition, there were no abductions of crew in the Sulu-Celebes Seas and the waters off Eastern Saba, with the last incident in January 2020. Further, the four crew members abducted in January 2020 were rescued in March 2021 by the Philippine authorities. 

While incidents are down overall in the region, ReCAAP highlights that there have also not been arrests to disrupt the gangs that have carried out some recent boardings of ships. As such, they repeated the call for cooperation and reporting warning ships to remain on guard at all times. 
 

IMB: Piracy and Armed Robbery at 27 Year Low in 2021

(file photo)

PUBLISHED JUL 12, 2021 3:03 PM BY THE MARITIME EXECUTIVE

 

The ICC International Maritime Bureau (IMB) reported that the incidents of piracy and armed robbery are at their lowest levels in 27 years. The organization, which was founded in 1991, said that during the first half of 2021, it received the lowest number of reported incidents for the first half of any year since 1994. They, however, cautioned, that the risks remain for seafarers and especially in certain regions of the world.

IMB’s latest global piracy report details 68 incidents of piracy and armed robbery against ships during the first six months of 2021 compared to 98 incidents during the same period last year. The IMB’s Piracy Reporting Centre (PRC) highlighted that in 91 percent of the incidents, 61 vessels, the ships were boarded. In addition, four attacks were attempted, two vessels were fired upon, and one vessel was hijacked since January 2021. Despite the overall decline in reported incidents, violence against crews continued with 50 crew kidnapped, incidents where crew were threatened, taken hostage, or assaulted, and one crew member was killed and another injured.

The Gulf of Guinea continues to be particularly dangerous for seafarers, with 32 percent of all reported incidents taking place in the region, according to IMB. The region accounted for all 50 kidnapped crew and the single crew fatality during the first half of 2021.

The number of kidnappings recorded in the Gulf of Guinea, however, during the most recent quarter was the lowest since the second quarter of 2019. IMB warns that the pirates continue to target all types of vessels operating in the region and that fishing vessels have been hijacked in the Gulf of Guinea and later used as mother ships to target other merchant vessels.

“Whilst IMB welcomes reduced piracy and armed robbery activity in the Gulf of Guinea, the risk to seafarers still remains,” said IMB Director Michael Howlett. “By reporting all incidents to the Regional Authorities and IMB PRC, seafarers can maintain pressure against pirates. Bringing together maritime response authorities through initiatives – like Nigeria’s Deep Blue Project and Gulf of Guinea Maritime Collaboration Forum – will continue and strengthen knowledge sharing channels and reduce risk to seafarers in the region.”

As with other security organizations, the IMB is also warning that the pirates in the Gulf of Guinea are carrying out attacks further from the coast. For example, in early June, a bulk carrier was approached by a skiff with six pirates while approximately 210 nautical miles off the coast of Lagos, Nigeria. In that instance, the vessel was able to prevent the armed pirates from coming onboard, but it illustrates the distances at which the pirates are threatening vessels.

IMB also highlights the dangers of operating in the Singapore Strait, similar to the numerous reports of boardings and thefts from ReCAAP. Sixteen incidents were reported to the IMB center in the first six months of 2021. This was up from 11 reported incidents during the same period in 2020 in the Singapore Strait. According to IMB, these attacks are considered opportunistic, but in seven of the incidents, the perpetrators were armed with knives. In three separate incidents, seafarers were reported to have been either threatened, assaulted, or injured.

The report also highlights an increase in incidents in Peru’s Callao Anchorage. There were four reports in the second quarter of 2021 with knives reported in three of these attacks. In comparison to the first half of 2019 and 2020, IMB reports that this represents a two-fold increase in the number of incidents, with nine incidents reported in total for 2021. Perpetrators in the region possess the capacity to carry out violent attacks, with two separate incidents of crew being taken hostage and assaulted occurring in the first six months of 2021.

Vessels are also advised to take precautionary measures while anchored in Manila Bay, Philippines. IMB recorded four incidents during the second quarter of 2021.