Peruvian Army Sent to Suppress Peaceful Indigenous Protests Against Resource Extraction in Amazon Basin

Amazon Watch: Oil Production Interrupted as Peru Sends in Army to Suppress Peaceful Indigenous Protests


LIMA, Peru, May 19 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Peruvian government Saturday authorized the intervention of armed forces in the Amazon to crack down on growing indigenous protests against new decrees aimed at facilitating the entry of oil, mining, logging and agricultural companies into indigenous lands without prior consultation or consent.

On Monday, sustained protests led the state oil company, Petroperu, to shut down its main oil pipeline. This shutdown comes after a month of protests by more than 30,000 indigenous peoples. Indigenous communities have engaged in peaceful actions and blockades of roads and rivers throughout the Amazon protesting new legislation passed to facilitate the Free Trade Agreement with the USA that undermines their rights.

Videos and photos available on http://www.amazonwatch.org/ show police beating peaceful protesters and firing rubber bullets to break up peaceful Awajun and Huambis demonstrators last week when they blockaded the Corral Quemado Bridge near the northern town of Bagua, resulting in dozens injured and one person missing, who is feared dead.

In a statement, Alberto Pizango, president of the national indigenous rights organization AIDESEP who was criminally charged today for his role in the nationwide protests, stated: "The extraction of gas and oil, logging and the dredging of rivers in search of gold are destroying in a few years social structures, indigenous customs and coexistence strategies that date back thousands of years."

International and Peruvian human rights organizations are widely criticizing the Peruvian government's backward policies on indigenous peoples. In a recent statement President Alan Garcia said that every Peruvian should be entitled to benefit from the nation's natural resources, and not just a "small group of people who had the fortune to be born there."

Atossa Soltani, who heads the human rights and environmental organization Amazon Watch, commented, "Indigenous Peoples are asserting their collective right to determine how and under what conditions 'development' is carried out on their traditionally owned and legally recognized homelands."

"The Garcia Administration is clearly out of step with international conventions on indigenous rights that have been ratified by Peru, not to mention aspects of country's own Constitution. We urge the government of Peru to use restraint and avoid bloodshed, seeking meaningful dialogue to resolve the conflict instead."
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Indigenous People Demand Voice in Climate Talks

November 28, 2008
Haider Rizvi, OneWorld US

UNITED NATIONS, Nov 28 (OneWorld) - Calls for greater participation of the world's indigenous leaders are on the rise as another round of talks on global climate change opens in the Polish city of Poznan next week.

It is incomprehensible how governments believe they can discuss the effects of climate change and agree targets without the input of those who already face [its] impacts," said Mark Lattimer of the London-based Minority Rights Group International (MRG).

In a study released last week, MRG researchers warned that a new climate change agreement would be "seriously compromised" if policymakers continued to shut out the voices of those most affected by global warming.

More than 8,000 delegates from around the world are expected to participate in the meeting at Poznan. The two-week meeting is supposed to hammer out further international commitments to fight climate change, including climate-related financial assistance for developing countries.

UN officials hope the meeting will prove to be a "milestone on the road to success" for the negotiation process launched at past conferences, because it is tasked with setting the agenda for next year's final talks on a climate change treaty.

But in Lattimer's view, the UN process is deeply flawed, because it does not allow the communities that have first-hand experience of dealing with climate change to participate in the negotiations.

For one, official delegates in Poznan are expected to set targets on carbon emissions from deforestation, but forest-dwelling communities who are mostly indigenous people may not be included in those discussions.

According to MRG's new report, the impact of climate change hits indigenous communities hardest because they live in ecologically diverse areas and their livelihoods are dependent on the environment.

To cite some examples of climate change impact on indigenous communities, the report refers to unprecedented levels of ice-melt in the Arctic region, droughts in east Africa, and a rapid fall in crop yields in Vietnam.

Minorities, according to the report, are often among the poorest and most marginalized communities and are most likely to face discrimination when disasters occur during climate changes.

"There has been a lot of attention paid to the damage climate change is doing to the environment and the loss of certain plant or animal species, but we aren't sufficiently recognizing its impact on people," said Farah Mihlar, the report's author.

"There are entire communities that could be lost," she added in a statement. "Cultures, traditions, and languages could be wiped off the earth."

At the climate change conference held in Bali, Indonesia, last December, indigenous rights activists held a series of demonstrations against their exclusion from the official talks.

Among them, many had come from the communities living in the tropical forests of the world. At the conference, they expressed worries about plans by governments and international financial institutions to control forest degradation.

At the conference, they particularly expressed their concerns about the World Bank's Carbon Partnership Facility, which is likely to provide large-scale incentives for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation.
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"Indigenous peoples have for centuries adapted to changing environments and would be able to contribute substantially to adaptation strategies the UN is trying to include in a new climate change treaty."- Mark Lattimer, Minority Rights Group International

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The tropical and subtropical forest, the subject of the Facility, is home to 160 million indigenous people who are seen by many scientists as custodians and managers of forest biodiversity.

"While the Facility can be a good thing, we are very apprehensive on how this will work," said Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, chairperson of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, "because of our negative historical and present experiences with similar initiatives."

The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples recognizes native groups' right to control their lands and resources, including forests, but many governments and corporations continue to abuse the rights of forest communities.

"We remain in a very vulnerable situation," said Tauli-Corpuz, "because most states do not recognize our rights to these forests and resources found therein."

Last year, a report released by an international advocacy group raised similar concerns about the role of governments and corporations.

In its report, London-based Survival International named and shamed countries where the violations of tribal peoples' rights are most egregious, including Botswana, Brazil, New Zealand, Malaysia, Paraguay, Peru, and the United States.

The report entitled, "The Terrible Ten: Key Abusers of Tribal Peoples' Rights in 2007," said tribal people in West Papua were suffering abuses at the hands of the Indonesian army and that their native lands were often exploited by the government and foreign companies.

In Botswana, Bushmen were forcibly prevented from returning to their homes in the country's diamond-producing area, despite a court ruling that declared their 2002 eviction "unlawful and unconstitutional."

According to Survival, Guarani Indians in Paraguay continued to lose their lands as a result of violence perpetrated by cattle ranchers. A number of natives were killed and raped as well.

In the Peru-Brazil border region, which is home to half of the world's about 100 still uncontacted tribes, indigenous populations faced land grabs by oil companies and loggers backed by the government.

And similar cases also took place in other indigenous territories across the world. The UN Permanent Forum's Tauli-Corpuz demanded that governments and corporations obtain the "free and prior" consent of indigenous peoples before taking any initiative on forest protections.

"I imagine that donors and the private sector would not like to put their resources in high-risk projects which will not genuinely involve indigenous and other forest-dwellers," she said. "If there is an acceptance of the Facility, indigenous peoples must have a representation in [its] governance."

In contrast to the UN negotiation process on climate change issues, indigenous communities enjoy relatively participation in international discussions on preserving biodiversity. The secretariat of the UN treaty on biodiversity has established a working group to ensure for this.

Meanwhile, MRG has gathered a series of testimonies from the world's indigenous leaders in which they express "deep frustration" at their exclusion from the negotiations on climate change.


In a statement, the group called for the United Nations to set up a mechanism, similar to that of the treaty on biological diversity, so that indigenous communities could be able to have their voices heard at the international level.

"Indigenous peoples have for centuries adapted to changing environments and would be able to contribute substantially to adaptation strategies the UN is trying to include in a new climate change treaty," said Lattimer.
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OneWorld.net: Latest News, Groups Working on Indigenous Rights and Climate Change
OneClimate.net: Join in the UN Talks Without Leaving Home




Native Rights News is making this OneWorld.net material available in accordance with the Fair Use Doctrine codified at Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107: This article is distributed without charge or profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information. Distribution of this material is for research and educational purposes that will promote social and economic justice and benefit society.

Jake Fire Would Have Joined the National Day of Action

Thursday, May 29, 2008

The following letter by a Mohawk youth is being posted on the Day of Action:

Mohawk Nation News
Letter to the editor:

Jake Fire Would Have Joined the National Day of Action! Canadians are seeing the gruesome power of police officers. They have been given the right to carry deadly weapons as part of their arsenal to use during arrests. They carry 50,000 volt tasers, which recently caused the death of an immigrant at the air port in Vancouver, British Columbia. The Canadian public should be very concerned about that incident, since it was not an isolated one. On May 1, 1899, an Akwesasne Mohawk, Saiowisakeron, also known as “Jake Fire”, faced the barrel of a gun in the hands of an RCMP officer. The RCMP had been sent to arrest the Akwesasne traditional chiefs. Standing up for what was right, an unarmed Jake Fire was shot and killed by the RCMP officer. The RCMP officer shooting and killing Jake Fire is the kind of violence and aggression that the colonists use when dealing with Indigenous Peoples asserting our rights. Jake Fire was killed because he supported the traditional Iroquois government and though it was best for his people. At the time, the federal government wanted to impose the colonial band council system of governance. When the Mohawks of Akwesasne resisted the colonial band council style of government, they were coerced into obedience. This pattern has been followed over the centuries when Indigenous got in the way of the immigrants who were swarming all over Turtle Island. In the United States, whenever the settlers came against opposition from the Indigenous, the army was called in. Indigenous resisters were pushed onto uninhabitable areas of Turtle Island. In 1922 the RCMP raided the Six Nations as part of an Indian Affairs plot to overthrow the traditional govenrment. [Order in Council PC 1629, Sept. 17, 1924]. The Iroquois have always resisted being bulldozed into obedience by land developers, governments and police agencies. The most recent example of this brutal method to attempt to control Indigenous occurred in 1995 when an OPP sniper killed an unarmed Indigenous, Dudley George, at Ipperwash, Ontario. Canada and the provincial governments refuse to talk peacefully with the Indigenous people. Instead they arrest and jail, especially the youth. Jailing our people means that Indigenous across Canada are forced to take a back seat to ancestral land and resource theft. We are presently seeing the fast pace of urban development coming into conflict with the Indigenous. Land developers see no problem in going onto disputed Indigenous land to put up housing complexes and explore for oil that destroy the land. Reserves are the only lands left where the non-native are not supposed to encroach. This has not been stopping the developers from trying to enter them too. On May 29, 2008, the Indigenous are asking the Canadian public for support to inform the government that Indigenous Peoples must be dealt with fairly and equitably. This will be the second annual National Day of Action, and Indigenous will show the world that we still care about our rights. Support the cause since it is the future of Indigenous and non-natives alike that will be affected by the federal and provincial government’s response to Indigenous concerns.

Kanatase Horn
Mohawk Akwesasne
Kanatase_18@hotmail.com

Posted by MNN Mohawk Nation News, May 29, 2008. http://www.mohawknationnews.com/

Mayan Indians Risk Reprisals by Insisting on Right to Control Mining on Their Land

Goldcorp Inc. & The Danger of Democracy

Written by Grahame Russell

Monday, 23 June 2008

In unison, hundreds of Mayan Mam community leaders raised their hands in the Gimnasio Municipal (municipal gym) of San Miguel Ixtahuacan (SMI), Guatemala on April 30. These hundreds of raised hands indicated a "yes" vote for the municipality of SMI to hold a legally binding community consultation concerning whether or not to permit mining. I had come to SMI with a delegation of 14 Canadians and Americans, investigating the many negative impacts of Goldcorp Inc.’s open pit, cyanide leeching mining operation. I feel honored to witness this decision. After months of education work, planning and deliberations, this decision represents a rare act of democracy in a very undemocratic country. This decision is courageous in a country where the economic and political elites consistently respond to expressions of democracy with repression. It is no small matter for the generationally impoverished Mayan Mam people of SMI to publicly say that they want control over their lives. This decision is galling and threatening to the powerful political and economic interests backing the open-pit, which include the Canadian and Guatemalan governments and the World Bank. Since 2005, Goldcorp has been operating its open-pit, cyanide leaching "Marlin" mine in SMI, making multi-million dollar profits for far-away owners, shareholders and investors at the expense of local communities’ health and human rights. The impoverished people of SMI are going to do what the Guatemalan government ought to have done before giving Goldcorp its licenses to explore and exploit mineral resources, and what the government of Canada, the World Bank and Goldcorp Inc. company ought to have insisted that the government of Guatemala do – consult with the people! Basic Legal Requirement National and international law requires that governments consult with and obtain the consent of peoples and communities, particularly indigenous peoples, who will be affected by economic enterprises (like mining). In Guatemala, the government has never abided by this requirement. Foreign governments (like Canada), institutions (like the World Bank) and companies (like Goldcorp Inc.) with major economic interests in Guatemala, never insist on it; they know that their "development" projects (mining, hydro-electric dams, resource extraction, large-scale tourism complexes) will likely be rejected by the populations that will be harmed; or, at a minimum, the local populations will demand stringent environmental, human rights and profit sharing conditions that global companies rarely, if ever want to agree to. Why consult, when you can get "permission" from a few politicians behind the backs of the population, and begin your "development" project before anyone knows what is happening. Acting Democratically is Dangerous This act of democratic empowerment increases the risk of serious repercussions. Acts of repression have already been committed in association with Goldcorp Inc’s "Marlin" mine. During the December 2004 – January 2005 road blockade of a huge piece of equipment destined for Goldcorp’s processing plant in San Marcos, the pro-mining government of President Oscar Berger ordered 1000 anti-riot police and soldiers to break up the protest leaving 2 dead and 20 hospitalized. In March 2005, a security guard in the pay of the company left a bar one night and shot and killed a local bus driver. In February 2007, hundreds of special police forces illegally and violently entered the homes of poor SMI farmers and detained 21 of them, based on trumped-up criminal charges related to a peaceful protest against the mine a month earlier. Local communities had organized road blocks around the mine site because the company refused to dialogue with them about providing compensation for a list of harms caused by the mining operation: forced sale of lands at shamefully low prices, damaged homes due to use of explosives, lung problems due to dust; water contamination and depletion due to mining, labor issues for mine workers, etc. After the company refused to even discuss their grievances, company security forces attacked the community leaders (the very ones illegally detained weeks later) with rocks and sticks, firing shots over their heads. Though these attacks were properly denounced to the competent authorities—with eyewitness testimonies—no charges were filed against Goldcorp’s security guards. The legal system is a tool of repression used, in this case, to defend the company’s interests. Thus, it is not surprising that the people of SMI told our delegation they feel more afraid after their vote to hold a community consultation; they are equally clear that they have no choice, given the extensive and continuing environmental and health harms and human rights violations that they mining operation is causing. Much of the environmental and health harms and human rights violations have been documented in "Investing in Conflict", a report by Dawn Paley with Mining Watch and Rights Action, as well as in many other news articles and reports. Denying Democracy Over the past few years, many indigenous communities have held legally binding community consultations throughout Guatemala. Every time, the people have massively voted ‘no’ to large scale mining and hydroelectric dam projects in their regions. Every time, the government of Guatemala, along with the companies, investors and shareholders, have ignored the results. The politically corrupted Constitutional Court ruled that indigenous communities have the right to carry out community consultations with respect to "development" projects and that the results are not binding! That’s like saying you have the right to vote and the results are not binding. Like saying that murder is against the law and if someone is murdered, the law prohibiting it cannot be applied. Contentious Consultation The SMI community consultation promises to be contentious. Elsewhere, community consultations have been held before mining or dam projects were constructed and operating. Even then, there has been repression associated with some of these consultations. The people of SMI will carry out their community consultation while the mine is in full operation and wealthy people and powerful institutions in North America and Guatemala are making huge profits. The price of gold is at record highs. There are millions of dollars of incentives to block or delegitimize SMI’s community consultation. The date and details of the SMI consultation have yet to be decided. People and groups that Rights Action works with are in the planning and discussion stages with their own communities. The Traditional Indigenous leadership of SMI will play the key role in this process. Support Needed Firstly, funds and technical support are needed to pay for and plan the consultation process in the 59 rural villages of SMI. Rights Action has a full proposal available for institutions that might be able to provide funding. Secondly, human rights accompaniers and international delegations will be needed as an international presence, in the weeks and months leading up to the consultation. The risk of tension and repression is high and international attention is crucial. Thirdly, observers will be invited the day of the consultation to witness and report on the results. If indeed the people of SMI vote ‘no’ to mining in their territories, it is predictable that the company and governments of Guatemala and Canada will try and delegitimize the process and results, or ignore them altogether. Part of the responsibility of observers will be to help publish the results of the community consultation and bring pressure to bear in North America on our companies and governments to ensure respect for the democratic will of the people of San Miguel Ixtahuacan. Grahame Russell works with Rights Action. Rights Action funds and works with community-based Indigenous, development, environment and human rights organizations in Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and southern Mexico (Oaxaca, Chiapas); and educates about and is involved in activism related to global development, environmental and Indigenous and human rights struggles. Photos by Miguel Iriondo.

Chief Ominayak's Letter to Jailed Indigenous Leaders

[Editor's Note: On the Ontario Appeals Court ordered the release of the six person Chief and Council of KI First Nation, who had been held in prison since on civil contempt charges for refusing to allow the exploitation of the Nation's traditional homelands by a mining company in cahoots with the Ontario Provincial government in violation of the Canadian Law and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Although these tribal leaders have been released, the letter written in their support and in support of their actions by Chief Ominayak of the Lubicon Indian Nation is both eloquent and instructive for those who are unaware of the continued theft of Indian resources and oppression of Indian leaders when they speak out and act to protect their lands, peoples and ways of life. The letter, then is and will continue to be timely. --Perry Chesnut, Editor, Native Rights News.]

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April 17, 2008

Yesterday Lubicon Chief Bernard Ominayak wrote to the Chief and Council of the Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (KI) First Nation at the prison in which they are being held. His letter is reproduced below.

On March 17, 2008, an Ontario Superior Court judge sentenced 6 Aboriginal protesters to six months of jail for peacefully defying a court order that would allow Platinex, a mining-exploration company, to drill for minerals on their traditional lands in northern Ontario, Canada. The Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (KI) First Nation fears that mining activity will jeopardize hunting and burial grounds and argues that the Ontario government awarded the mining permits without consulting and accommodating their people, a violation of aboriginal rights and Canadian law.

The individuals jailed include the Chief and four Councilors of the (KI) First Nation.

KI First Nation continues to recognize its Chief and Councilors as leaders in exile and as prisoners of conscience. It has also declared that a 2001 community declared moratorium on exploration and development will continue to be enforced in KI traditional territory, pending resolution of a treaty land entitlement claim and fulfillment of the Government of Ontario’s legal obligation to consult and accommodate.

We are encouraging Lubicon supporters to also lend their support to the KI First Nation and its leaders. More information on how you can help is included below Chief Ominayak’s letter.

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April 16, 2008

Chief Donny Morris
Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug First Nation

C/O Thunder Bay Correctional Centre
Highway 61 South
PO Box 1900
Thunder Bay ON
P7C 4Y4

Dear Chief Morris;

We have been following closely the Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug First Nation’s efforts to protect your land from the onset of mineral exploitation, both in the courts and on the ground.

When Platinex took your Nation to Court for opposing their proposed exploratory drilling project, we asked our supporters to join in protesting this attempt to use the courts to silence your leaders and lay claim to your lands, because we saw parallels with our own peoples’ struggle to survive and the attempted use of the courts to keep us quiet while they stole everything of value from our lands.

When the Court told Platinex to meet with your Nation to determine how mineral exploration should be allowed to proceed, lawyers across the country trumpeted the decision as a victory for aboriginal rights because it demonstrated that consultation is a requirement under Canadian law. We knew, as I’m sure you did too, that this was not a real victory for our people, because we knew from our own hard experience that having the right to be consulted is not the same as having the right to say no. And we knew from our own hard experience that without the right to refuse a project that will destroy our lands and damage our communities, we will be unable to meet our responsibility to protect our lands and people.

When the company later returned to Court – aided and abetted by the provincial government and its lawyers – to argue that it should be allowed to proceed because it had already met the “duty to consult”, it was no surprise to us or to you that the Courts agreed, and instructed your people to stay out of their way.

When you and your Council stood in the way of Platinex regardless of what the Courts and the provincial government said, we took heart that there are leaders like yourselves who are willing to stand up and demonstrate that we, as aboriginal people, will not sit idly by while outside governments and companies destroy everything we value – the land, the air, the water, and our way of life.

When you were offered the chance to apologize and accept the exploitation of your lands in exchange for your freedom, we took heart that, as real leaders, you and your Council refused. And now this letter finds you in jail, where they hope to destroy your spirit and that of your community by taking you away from your people and your land, and threatening others that they will face the same fate if they don’t allow Platinex to proceed.

If there were any way to turn back the clock and stop the very first oil and gas companies from entering our lands – before the hundreds that followed made it all but impossible to reverse the environmental destruction they brought to our lands – I believe our people would gladly do so. For that reason, I’m sending this message now to encourage you and express our support for the principled stand you are taking, so that the lands of the Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug First Nation don’t have to suffer the same fate our lands suffered after the first resource exploitation companies opened the door for the many that followed.

We hope you keep close to your families, your people and your lands in spirit, despite being taken away to a remote jail, and that you continue the struggle from inside with the same devotion and courage you have shown so far. There may be many forces allied against us as aboriginal people, and those who want to take everything from the land have a great deal of power and influence, but there are some things they can never take away from us. One of those is our spirit, our courage, and our determination to carry out our responsibility to protect the lands the Creator gave to us.

Sincerely,

Bernard Ominayak
Chief, Lubicon Lake Indian Nation

cc

Deputy Chief Jack McKay

Councillor Samuel McKay

Councillor Darryl Sainnawap

Bruce Sakakeep, Lands & Environment Director

Head Councillor Cecilia Begg

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More information

http://kitchenuhmaykoosib.com/

http://lubicon.ca

Email: fol@tao.ca

Portland Public Transit System Bans Kurok Indian Tribe's Ads to Save Klamath River Salmon

ACLU Files Free Speech Lawsuit Against TriMet

FEBRUARY 20, 2008 – The ACLU of Oregon today filed a lawsuit against Tri-County Metropolitan Transportation District of Oregon (TriMet), alleging the public bus company has violated federal and state constitutional free speech protections in its rejection of an advertisement it deems “political.”

The lawsuit was filed this morning in Multnomah County Circuit Court, on behalf of the Karuk Tribe of California and Friends of the River Foundation, who had sought to place an ad on TriMet buses regarding the damage done to salmon runs by electricity-generating dams, owned by Portland-based Pacific Power, on the Klamath River. The ad depicts three salmon facing a wall of electrical sockets, along with the caption, “Salmon shouldn’t run up your electric bill. They should run up the Klamath River.” The ad then directs the public to a website – http://www.salmonforsavings.com/ – for more information.

TriMet’s Advertising Standards Committee rejected the proposed ad on the grounds that it did not constitute an “advertisement” and that the public transit agency did not want its buses or property “to become a public forum for the dissemination, debate, and/or discussion of public issues.” The ACLU appealed the committee’s decision to TriMet’s general manager, who in a letter dated Jan. 18, 2008, upheld the rejection.

The ACLU contends that both rejections represent an unlawful restriction on speech in violation of Article 1, section 8, of the Oregon Constitution and the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. In filing its Petition for Writ of Review, the ACLU is asking the court to review these administrative decisions and determine whether TriMet’s advertising policies are unconstitutional.

“TriMet’s policies discriminate on speech based on its content, and we believe that is unconstitutional,” said David Fidanque, Executive Director of the ACLU of Oregon. “A public agency should not place itself in the role of deeming some speech acceptable and some speech objectionable. TriMet’s job is to transport riders, not to override free speech protections.”

The Karuk Tribe and Friends of the River seek to restore healthy salmon populations to the Klamath River. Their objective is the removal of PacifiCorp’s lower four Klamath River dams, allowing salmon to access more than 300 miles of their historic habitat.

“The Karuk Tribe has as much right to buy advertising space on publicly owned buses as anyone else,” said Leaf Hillman, Vice Chairman of the Karuk Tribe. “Our ad simply promotes a website with information about Pacific Power’s Klamath dams and how they impact the river as well as power rates. Refusing to run this ad is discriminatory and illegal.”

The Karuk Tribe and Friends of the River cite economic studies by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the California Energy Commission that show removing the dams and purchasing renewable replacement energy would save Pacific Power ratepayers about $100 million.

“We are trying to get the word out to Pacific Power’s customers that dam removal could save them a significant amount of money,” said Kelly Catlett, Hydropower Reform Policy Advocate for Friends of the River. “It’s unfortunate TriMet thinks that is a message that needs to be censored.”

The writ demands that TriMet turn over to the court, within two weeks, its documentation of the refusal of the ad. A court hearing then would follow.

Thomas M. Christ of Cosgrave Vergeer Kester LLP is ACLU’s cooperating attorney on this case.

See http://www.karuk.us/ , http://www.friendsoftheriver.org)/ and http://www.salmonforsavings.com/ for more information.