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| Photo courtesy Deanna Taylor -- Western Shoshone and members of the American Indian Movement of Colorado, Tonatierra and the Indigenous Environmental Network, joined by other supporters, continued their protest of the ''Divine Strake'' detonation at the Nevada Test Site over Memorial Day weekend. The detonation has been halted. Some 45 people were arrested after they crossed the boundary onto the test site. The group is calling for a return to the sacred on aboriginal Western Shoshone land at the Nevada Test Site. |
MERCURY, Nev. - The ''Divine Strake'' detonation has been halted, but Western Shoshone continued their protest at the Nevada Test Site over Memorial Day weekend to demand respect for Western Shoshone land rights at the site, as stated in the Treaty of Ruby Valley of 1863.
Carrie Dann, Western Shoshone grandmother, was among 45 people arrested after they crossed the boundary onto the Nevada Test Site in an act of civil disobedience. Security from the site and Nye County sheriff's deputies arrested them and placed them in a holding facility.
''Enough is enough,'' Dann told the crowd before being arrested, which resounded the ''Ya basta!'' (''Enough is enough!'') battle cry of the Zapatistas fighting for indigenous rights in Mexico.
Glenn Morris, attorney, university professor and member of the Colorado Chapter of the American Indian Movement, was arrested. Morris told officers that they were in violation of the Treaty of Ruby Valley and the U.S. Constitution.
''This is treaty land,'' said several Western Shoshone as they were arrested. Non-Western Shoshone received permits to be on the land from the Western Shoshone Nation Council.
Julie Fishel, attorney and advocate for the Western Shoshone Defense Council, and Steven Newcomb, Indian Country Today columnist, were among the 30 women and 15 men arrested.
The women formed a circle in the detention area and sang a warrior song, receiving applause from some officers.
''It doesn't have to be hostile, it can be done in a good way,'' Fishel told Indian Country Today. She said it was the first time she was arrested and as an attorney considered the choice carefully. She said her decision was based on the lawlessness in this country and the United States' refusal to honor decisions of the United Nations, while continuing to violate Western Shoshone and indigenous human rights.
Western Shoshone spiritual leader Corbin Harney, Tom Goldtooth, of the Indigenous Environmental Network, and Tupac Enrique, of Tonatierra in Phoenix, led the day's events, which centered on tradition and respect for mother earth. Several hundred people attended the protest and march to the Nevada Test Site. The 45 arrested were cited and released.
The 700-ton explosion named Divine Strake was halted after Western Shoshone filed a lawsuit in federal court and 42 national and international organizations joined forces, including environmental justice, environmental, political, nonproliferation activists, peace activists and indigenous groups.
The ''Not so Divine Strake Protest'' turned into a victory celebration for Western Shoshone, environmental activists and downwinders May 28 at the Nevada Test Site. Downwinders, those who could be affected by the release of radioactive particles from previous blasts, celebrated in Western states including Utah, Idaho and Montana.
''Now, we'll call it a victory party,'' said Peggy Maze Johnson, executive director of Citizen Alert, the Nevada-based environmental justice organization.
The Nevada Site Office of the National Nuclear Security Administration announced it would withdraw its Finding of No Significant Impact related to the environmental assessment.
''This action is being taken to clarify and provide further information regarding background levels of radiation from global fallout in the vicinity of the Divine Strake experiment. Atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons by several countries in the 1950s and 1960s resulted in the dispersion of radioactive fallout throughout the northern hemisphere,'' the NNSA said.
Attorney Robert Hager earlier assembled a national and international team of attorneys and professionals who filed affidavits on behalf of Western Shoshone plaintiffs to halt it.
''We owe so much to these people, who have such incredible knowledge that when the government saw the strength of their credentials, [it] blinked,'' Hager said.
Two Western Shoshone tribes and individual Western Shoshone Indians and downwinders from Nevada and Utah asked a federal judge in Las Vegas for a second time to stop the huge aboveground explosion. The blast was first scheduled for June 2, then cancelled and rescheduled for June 23 after the lawsuit was filed on April 20.
Radioactive fallout from the blast was predicted that would result in cancers. Children were the most likely victims.
Experts filing documents in the case include Dr. Thomas Fasy, member of the executive committee of the New York City Chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility, and Richard Miller, a toxic exposures expert from Houston, who authored the five-volume U.S. Atlas of Nuclear Fallout, according to a written statement by the plaintiffs.
Fasy wrote that ''to a reasonable degree of medical and scientific certainty ... the Divine Strake explosion would disperse large amounts of radioactive particles into the atmosphere.''
He stated that millions of citizens living downwind are at risk of inhaling particles.
''It is virtually certain that this inhalation of radioactive particles would result in an increased frequency of a variety of cancers in the exposed populations,'' Fasy said. ''Moreover, the increased risk of developing cancers would be borne disproportionately by the children living downwind.''
Miller described the Department of Energy's ''insufficient research regarding the health effects of many of the potential radioisotopes possibly buried in the soil that may be entrained in the dust cloud as a result of the Divine Strake event.''
Miller and Fasy warn that entire communities may be exposed to radioisotopes, including alpha emitters such as americium-241 - an acknowledged carcinogen.
Hager also asked federal District Judge Lloyd George to find that the planned blast would violate the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the congressional ban on the development of new nuclear weapons.
John Burroughs, executive director of the New York City-based Lawyers' Committee on Nuclear Policy, filed a declaration in support.
Burroughs said the Divine Strake test ''reflects a doctrine of war fighting in which nuclear weapons could be used first, against states not possessing nuclear weapons, in an integrated fashion with non-nuclear forces.''
Burroughs said this ''is wholly inconsistent with a 'diminishing role for nuclear weapons in security policies' agreed by the United States in 2000 and a central element of compliance with the disarmament obligation.''
Hager criticized Bechtel, of Nevada, and the federal Departments of Defense and Energy for ''procedural genuflection'' by filing papers in a thinly disguised attempt to comply with environmental administrative procedures.
Hager claimed that the government agencies and Bechtel have engaged in ''junk science'' and have ''intentionally failed'' to conduct proper sampling of the soil, and has asked the court to halt any further ''testing'' by Bechtel and government agencies based on alleged conflict of interest.
Nye County Sheriff's Office officials did not return phone calls for comment by press time.
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