Earth First! groups blockade Tennessee Dept. of Transportation

Two women chained inside a car help other Earth First! members blockade the entrance to the Tennessee Department of Transportation (T-DOT), in Strawberry Plains, Tennessee, Aug. 27, 2001.

By Ela and Leslie Ware

Knoxville, Tennessee, Aug. 27— Today, in front of the Strawberry Plains Regional Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) Headquarters, approximately 18 activists from Earth First! formed a blockade as part of an ongoing campaign to stop the building and expansion of Tennessee roads. According to activist Vesna Plakanis (Gatlinburg, TN), if Tennessee linked all of its roads end to end, they could circle the earth three times. TDOT’s web site boasts that Tennessee is home to more roads per capita than any other state in the country.

For Tennessee more roads means increased air pollution and environmental destruction, as well as budget cuts to public service programs such as education. According to protesters, State department budgets have been slashed across the board while TDOT’s budget remains untouched, as it has for years. Activists reported that Tennessee ranks 45th in education funding and third in air pollution. Meanwhile TDOT is spending $36 million to expand 2.6 miles of Highway 321 (between Gatlinburg and Cosby), when typically $4 million is spent per mile.

Area activists and taxpayers continue to show their discontent as TDOT continues to construct the three-mile expansion. TDOT is operating without the appropriate permits and without having performed an environmental impact assessment.

“In proceeding with construction without permits, TDOT is violating federal law and disregarding federal agencies,” said John Johnson of Katuah Earth First!.

The expansion of Highway 321 is destroying the northern boundary of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, the most endangered park in the United States. The key contributor to the endangerment is poor air quality due to the coal plants and traffic. One third of the sulfate emissions that lead to problems associated with the ozone and acid rain come from the four million vehicles that drive through the park every year.

With the expansion of Hwy 321 will come increased traffic, which means increased air pollution and increased sprawl, according to Eric Plakanis of Gatlinburg. He noted that the rain that falls on Clingman’s Dome, the highest peak in the park, can be as acidic as vinegar.

Last year, ozone readings in the area were 126 parts per billion; 20% over levels considered damaging to human health. The environmental stress caused by pollution is responsible for parasites such as the Balsam Wolly Adelgid killing off the forests of the Smokies. Johnson drew the following analogy, “It’s as if the forest has AIDS due to air pollution and acid rain; its immune system has been compromised and the bugs that are attacking the trees are the death sentence.”

According to Earth First!, DTOT is carrying out that sentence by aiding in the destruction of the Great Smoky Mountain National Park.

The purpose of today’s direct action by activists from both Katuah Earth First! And French Broad Earth First! was to protest TDOT’s misuse of public funds and destruction of Tennessee’s environment. Activists arrived at TDOT headquarters at 6:15 am and positioned a slogan-ridden, broken down car in the middle of the entrance road to block admission to the building. In response to employee attempts to go around the car by riding up on the grass around the road, activists formed a human barricade holding signs that read slogans such as “NO NEW ROADS” and “Citizens Demand TDOT Stop Destroying Our Land.” As some activists held the barricade, others were busy assisting Kathy Snead of Asheville, NC and Debbie Shumate of Knoxville, TN in locking down inside the car. The two women were chained in to a lock box coming up through the back seat, thus making the car immobile.

As the lock down was being stabilized TDOT officials began confronting the activists. One man threatened “you see that ‘dozer’ over there, I’ll get it and move that car out the road.” Bill of Katuah Earth First! responded by alerting the man to the harm that would be caused to the women locked down inside. The TDOT official said “they better get out” as he left and awaited the arrival of local law enforcement.

The police showed up at 6:40am and while acknowledging the right to protest, told protesters that they had to move the car as it was interfering with people getting to work. Once informed that the car was unable to be moved, police threatened arrest for all activists on TDOT property claiming it was an unlawful public assembly. Following dialogue between Earth First!, police support, and the authorities, those protesters not locked down retreated to the intersection just up the road. After being threatened with pepper spray, Snead and Shumate unlocked from the vehicle at approximately 7:00am.

At this point at least 12 police cars, a fire truck, and two ambulances were on sight. Traffic was backed up almost the distance of the TDOT entrance road. After the women unlocked, the car was hoisted onto a tow truck. Protesters continued to line the intersection with signs and pass out literature until after 8:00am.

Two arrests were made, both Snead and Shumate were charged with obstruction of justice, criminal trespass, and disorderly conduct. Bond was set at 10% of bail, $361 for Snead and $211 for Shumate.

UN conference on racism, US walks out

Compiled by Sean Marquis

Sept. 4— Speaking at the UN World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance (WCAR) and several smaller conferences, the leaders of nations and non-government organizations (NGO’s) described the devastating impact of slavery on Africa, the US ‘war on drugs’ and other policies, and the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The issue of reparations for slavery is one of the most contentious at this week-long conference, which opened Friday in Durban, South Africa. Western countries and corporations fear being subjected to lawsuits from descendants or representatives of the estimated 11 million African slaves who were shipped to North and South America. This concern is one reason the Bush administration decided not to send a high-level delegation to the conference.

“Reparations need to be made in the name of Africa and of those millions of our ancestors who were brutally ripped from their homes and shipped to the new world,” said President Gnassing be Eyadema of Togo. He urged the conference to adopt a plan that considered the cancellation of African debt to Western-based international creditors.

President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria said slavery and colonialization led to the “poverty, underdevelopment and marginalization” that still plague much of Africa. But he argued that although apologies are due from countries that “practiced and benefited from slavery,” demanding financial compensation could “further hurt the dignity of Africa” and exacerbate international tensions.

Germany, which briefly controlled modern-day Tanzania, Namibia and Togo until World War I, did offer an apology to countries that were victims of slavery and colonial exploitation. Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said a recognition of guilt was the way to restore to the victims and their descendants “the dignity of which they were robbed.”

Cuban leader Fidel Castro said his country, which benefited from generations of African slave labor on sugar plantations, supports reparations as an “unavoidable moral duty.”

“The irrefutable truth is that tens of millions of Africans were captured, sold like a commodity and sent beyond the Atlantic to work in slavery,” he said. “The rich, free-spending industrialized world certainly possesses the . . . resources necessary to pay back what is due mankind.”

As a form of reparation, some African countries consider the cancellation of their foreign debts to international financial institutions to be preferable, arguing that the massive amounts owed constitute a crushing burden on poverty-stricken nations and that forgiving such debt would be a just recompense for the “debt” of the West to generations of slave labor.

“The external debt burden is unbearable and renders null and void the capacity of our economies to take off,” said Prime Minister Pascoal Mocumbi of Mozambique.

US and Israel pull out of conference

The United States and Israel pulled out of the WCAR on Monday, denouncing efforts to condemn Israel in the meeting’s proposed draft declaration.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell, who had remained in Washington and was not part of the US delegation, denounced the draft declaration’s “hateful language.”

Powell issued a statement from Washington calling the US delegation home citing the draft language regarding Israel as the reason.

Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres announced in Israel that the Jewish state was also pulling out of the conference because of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic comments.

Peres said Israel had been unfairly labeled as a colonialist nation by members of the conference and charged that the Arab League had led a concerted effort to single out Israel and blame it in unacceptable terms for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

South Africa’s governing African National Congress repeatedly has parried US and Israeli insistence that the conference steer clear of Palestine. “People are dying. We must talk about it,” Deputy President Jacob Zuma said last week.

New York-based Human Rights Watch said the US decision would make a comprehensive package on rights more difficult to agree on and make binding on governments.

“This conference can still be successful but it’s going to be harder,” said Reed Brody, a director at Human Rights Watch.

“This is going to be a big disappointment for victims of racism everywhere in the world. The United States is using a political smoke screen to avoid dealing with the many very real issues at this conference,” said Brody.

The US walk out sparked a string of protests at the conference center, with Washington accused of being racist.

“The Bush administration went home but the people are still here,” said Alicia Young, an African-American anti-racism campaigner who denounced Washington’s exit.

Posters read “Absolute power is hidden behind the Bush. Have you got an axe?” and “Shame on the USA.” Crowds, surrounded by a cordon of police, chanted “All around the world, stop US racism.”

“The United States government is hiding behind the Zionism issue to avoid a democratic discussion on reparations to the African world for slavery and exploitation,” said a leaflet distributed by the US-based International People’s Democratic Uhuru Movement.

The draft WCAR document recognized with “deep concern the increase of racist practices of Zionism,” and said Zionism “is based on racial superiority.” Israel is the only country mentioned specifically in the document, which accuses the Jewish state of “practices of racial discrimination.”

The debate over referring to Israeli practices and Zionism, the movement that founded the Jewish state, has threatened to overwhelm the conference.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson, attending the conference as a member of the Black Leadership Forum, said he was disappointed that President Bush allowed the debate over Israel to determine whether the United States would participate.

“In many ways, the American delegation never walked in,” Jackson said.

On Friday the Palestinian delegation agreed to drop criticism of Israel and Zionism in a final declaration for the UN conference.

Following a three-hour meeting with Yasser Arafat, Jackson said the Palestinian leader had agreed to oppose efforts to criticize Israel and Zionism, and to recognize the Holocaust as the worst crime of the 20th century.

Jackson presented reporters with a handwritten draft of the document signed by Arafat in which he said he did not want the UN conference to derail over criticism of Israel.

Shortly after making the announcement, Jackson spoke to Secretary of State Colin Powell by telephone to explain the statement Arafat had signed.

On Monday Jackson criticized Washington’s “low-profile delegation and high-profile pull-out."

Arab states have dropped clauses equating Zionism with Racism from the final document, but want “foreign occupation” — a veiled reference to Israeli actions in Palestinian territories — to be branded as a new kind of apartheid.

Describing the Holocaust, in which some six million Jews were killed by the Nazis in World War Two, as “the ultimate abomination,” UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Israel could not use the tragedy as an excuse never to examine its own behavior.

“We cannot expect Palestinians to accept this (the Holocaust) as a reason why the wrongs done to them — displacement, occupation, blockage, and now extra-judicial killings — should be ignored, whatever label one uses to describe them,” he said.

“If we leave here without agreement we shall give comfort to the worst elements in every society,” Annan said.

Women’s testimony

Individuals and women’s groups gave testimony of racism and sexism in front of an audience of 2,000 people attending the World Court of Women Against Racism, held just before the WCAR opened.

Naomi Kipuri of Kenya’s Arid Land Institute described the discrimination and rights violations affecting Kenya’s indigenous Masai people, who she said have been moved out of protected forests, wildlife sanctuaries and game reserves, including Serengeti National Park.

“People have been evicted and they do not receive the benefits of the natural resources,” she said,, adding that income from tourism was not used for the benefit of the Masai, who are instead “left to sink into abject poverty."

Native American Pamela Kingfisher of the Cherokee tribe described how many of her people had been pushed off their land in the United States.

The government, she adds, passed laws against their matriarchal system, which enabled land to be passed from mother to daughter. “They outlawed our prayers and religions and sent children to boarding school where they weren’t allowed to speak their own language. They cut off the girl’s braids and put them in a box of braids.”

“I’ve lost my language because my mother was put in a boarding school,” she said, adding that even the fishing rights of their community have been taken away.

Reparations remain a big issue for Native Americans, Kingfisher said. “Our land claims have been on the books for a couple hundred years.”

Kim Jon-in from the Japan-based Association of Korean Human Rights said more than 600,000 Koreans are suffering in Japan because their children are assaulted, cursed and threatened — especially Korean girls who wear their traditional dress.

Conference rejects Mexico’s new Indian law

The WCAR-NGO Forum rejected Mexico’s Indian law on Tuesday, qualifying it as “racist, discriminatory and exclusionary.”

The NGO forum stressed its solidarity with Mexico’s Indian communities and labeled the Indian rights law of Mexican President Vicente Fox “illegitimate,” the Mexican Academy for Human Rights (AMDH) said in a press release on Tuesday.

Last February a coalition of Mexico’s indigenous peoples, lead by the rebel Zapatista Army for National Liberation (EZLN), presented a list of demands in the form of a proposed law, to the Mexican government. The Mexican government rejected those demands and passed its own watered-down version of the law, a version which Mexico’s indigenous peoples say is “unacceptable.”

According to the NGOs, the law, approved by the Mexican Congress last April, violates an International Labor Organization convention that establishes equal human rights for indigenous people.

The NGO Forum emphasized that the law failed to address demands made by both the EZLN and most Indian communities: the acknowledgment of Indians as citizens with rights, autonomy over certain cultural and traditional practices and the right to the natural resources found within Indian territories.

Report slams US border policy

Migrant deaths and human rights abuses in communities near the US border with Mexico have risen as the United States has tried to seal the border to illegal immigrants, according to a report to the United Nations racism conference.

Prepared by the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, the report said the 2,100-mile (3,380 km) US-Mexico border has become a militarized zone

With an increased law enforcement and military presence the number of migrant deaths increased from 231 in 1999 to 369 last year, according to the report, to be presented on Sept. 3.

“This report makes it clear that the United States has not eliminated immigrant-related racism by any stretch of the imagination,” said Arnoldo Garcia, who directed the report.

A documentation campaign conducted last year in the Juarez/El Paso area, which straddles the border, showed that 71 percent of those mistreated by US officials were American citizens of Mexican extraction, or legal immigrants, the report stated.

A spokeswoman for the US Immigration and Naturalization Service, Leti Zamarripa, declined comment on allegations in the report, saying she had not reviewed it. However, she questioned the research methods used to compile it. “We don’t even know where these reports come from. We don’t know that the people making them even exist,” she said.

[Editor’s note: See Commentary]

Condemnation for US ‘war on drugs’ “We don’t want to see the United States continue to get off the hook on this,” says Deborah Small of the Lindesmith Center-Drug Policy Foundation, one of the US NGO delegates to the conference. “There has been a lot more attention about racial profiling and to the death penalty internationally than to the drug war. But there is no other public policy in the US that affects so many people detrimentally.”

According to the Washington-based Sentencing Project, African Americans are 13 percent of drug users but represent 35 percent of arrests for drug possession, 55 percent of convictions and 74 percent of prison sentences.

Jenni Gainsborough of the Sentencing Project notes: “If you’re white middle-class and your kid is on drugs, you call the treatment center. In the inner city, there’s no treatment. Your first port of call is the criminal-justice system -- and it escalates. Once you have a record, every interaction leads to a stronger sanction.”

“Drug prohibition has become a replacement system for segregation,” says Ira Glazer, director of the American Civil Liberties Union. “It has become a system of separating out, subjugating, imprisoning ... substantial portions of a population based on skin color.”

Sources: Agencia EFE S.A., IPS, Reuters, Associated Press, Washington Post, Seattle Times