Trinidad & Tobago Celebrates First Peoples Heritage

Trinidad & Tobago (UCTP Taino News) – Under the theme “exploring heritage, consolidating traditions, and creating a legacy” First Peoples Week was celebrated in Trinidad and Tobago from October 11-19, 2013. The celebrations raised the visibility of Trinidad’s Indigenous Peoples, as well as other Indigenous Peoples from around the Circum-Caribbean region. 

The events began with an international conference held at the University of Trinidad and Tobago (UCTT) and continued through the week with several cultural events in Arima, home of the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community. The activities were co-sponsored by the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community, the University of Trinidad and Tobago (UTT), the Ministry of National Diversity and Social Integration.

Invited participants to this year’s celebrations included delegates of Indigenous Peoples of Guyana, Suriname, Belize, Venezuela, Dominica, St Vincent, Puerto Rico, El Salvador, Ecuador, Canada and the USA. Among the various issues presented during the week, the Santa Rosa First People’s Community is calling for a national holiday to honor the island’s Indigenous Peoples. 

The final day of the scheduled activities included a meeting of the Caribbean Organization of Indigenous Peoples (COIP). The meeting was held at the newly expanded Santa Rosa First Peoples Community Center in Arima. During the historic proceedings COIP officially welcomed its newest member, the United Confederation of Taino People. 

 UCTPTN 11.01.2013

CARICOM SG: Chavez a true friend of Caribbean Community

CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana - Secretary-General of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Ambassador Irwin LaRocque has described the late President of Venezuela Hugo Chavez as a “true friend” of the Community.

In a message of condolence to the Government of Venezuela, the Secretary-General said that the late President Chavez, who died on Tuesday following a battle with cancer, “demonstrated solidarity with the Governments and People of the Caribbean Community throughout his tenure and created avenues for co-operation and strengthening relations with the Governments and improving the lives of the people.”

President Chavez with Jamaica Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller
photo by Jamaica Gleaner

Following is the full text of the Secretary-General’s message:

“It is with deep sadness that the Caribbean Community has learnt of the passing of a true friend, His Excellency Hugo Chavez, President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

President Chavez demonstrated solidarity with the Governments and People of the Caribbean Community throughout his tenure and created avenues for co-operation and strengthening relations with the Governments and improving the lives of the people.

His vision of bringing together the people of Latin America and the Caribbean was driven by his deep sense of concern for the well-being of the disadvantaged in society, not only in his own country but in the wider region.

His struggle with the disease that finally claimed his life epitomised the heart and spirit which he brought to bear in his attempts to raise the standard of living of the less fortunate in his homeland, in the Caribbean and the wider region.

I extend, on my own behalf and on that of the Caribbean Community, deepest condolences to the family of President Chavez and to the Government and People of Venezuela. I am confident that the strength and spirit of the Venezuelan people, so strikingly exemplified by President Chavez, will sustain the country in its time of grief.

May he rest in peace.”

Source: Overseas Review

Curacao herbalist preserves traditional Caribbean cures

By Brian Ellsworth

CERRO GRANDE, Curacao (Reuters): For years Dinah Veeris ignored the traditional Caribbean medicine of her native Curacao, but while recovering from an operation she found only her mother's teas eased her stomach pains.

Casual chats with her mother about the herbs in her garden turned into a five-year study of herbal medicine that took Veeris from the island of Curacao through the mountains of nearby Aruba and Bonaire isles, just north of Venezuela.

"There was so much knowledge that I started to do an investigation with older people. They went with me to the mountains to teach me how to use the plants," she said.

Veeris, a former teacher, also collected native plants threatened by Curacao's economic development. In 1994 she opened a garden outside the capital of Willemstad to preserve herbal medicine and the traditions of an island of 130,000 residents that is a self-governing part of the Netherlands.

"When we were young if we were sick we wanted to go to the doctor, we didn't want to have anything to do with herbs," she said. "We were losing these traditions, that's why I wanted this garden that would have all the knowledge in one place."

The garden, called Den Paradera, now draws Curacao residents seeking natural cures, and tourists attracted by the bastion of tradition on an island increasingly populated by shimmering glass offices and glitzy tourist resorts.

On twice-daily tours, handfuls of foreign tourists or larger school parties wander through the maze of plants. The garden is home to species such as the Calabash, a tree with dense wood and gourd-like fruits, used to treat stomach aches, hypertension and breathing problems.

Another plant called Silik Cotton has green pods filled with cotton-like fiber whose aroma helps cure insomnia, while its leaves help ease headaches.

Veeris' treatments are a mixture of remedies used by indigenous Arawak Indians and African slaves, who had been brought to the island by the Dutch. Much of the Indian and African spirituality and medicine was banned by Roman Catholicism, Curacao's primary religion.

"It was forbidden to practice herbal medicine so people did a lot in secret. To this day you hardly talk about it because some people see it as negative," Veeris, 69, explained.

Twice a week she has consultations with Curacao residents seeking help for ailments and emotional or spiritual problems.

Den Paradera, which means "where people feel at home," is an additional attraction to the island's tropical beaches and historic Dutch architecture.

Veeris said tea made with oregano can improve digestion and relieve ear aches. Tropical sage can help women cope with menopause. Her remedies are meant to complement Western medicine.

"A lot of people go to the doctor and it doesn't help so they go to a spiritual healer or to an herbalist," she said.

Herbal medicine has become increasingly popular in the United States and Europe as people seek alternative treatments for problems such as chronic back pain and the side effects of chemotherapy.

Den Paradera also works to preserve island traditions such as digging wells by hand. The tour of her garden includes a well about 60 feet deep, dug in the 1920s. Visitors are also shown the Curacao tradition of trying to revive dying plants by singing to them while rocking them in hanging pots.

Children from the island's schools tour the garden's traditional huts where healers stored their medicines.

"This garden helps remind me that if you use your own herbal medicine, you don't need very much to live," said Veeris. "Once a year I do my medical exams, but if I have a headache, I still use my herbs. I feel very strong."

Taino and Arawak Works on Display at UN Headquarters

United Nations (UCTP Taino News) – Contemporary Taino artists Reina Miranda, Mildred Mukara Torres Speeg and John Aguilar Marrero were among the indigenous artists whose selected works were featured at the opening of the United Nations Art exhibition entitled “Spirit of Our Ancestors”. The exhibition was launched in conjuction with the 7th Session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues and the opening took place on Tuesday, April 22nd 2008 at United Nations headquarters in New York. A testament to Caribbean indigenous survival, the paintings and their accompanying explanatory text have the potential to educate thousands of international visitors daily. Marrero and Miranda are members of the Cacibajagua Taino Cultural Society. Torres-Speeg is a UCTP representative in the state of Georgia. Also on display are three wood sculptures by Foster Simon, an acclaimed Lokono Arawak from Guyana. Mr. Simon’s works are also featured in the Presidential collections of Guyana, Venezuela, and Bolivia. This special exhibition is free and open to the public during weekdays for a limited engagement closing on May 18, 2008.

Photo: Taino women at the opening of the "Spirit of Our Ancestors" exhibition at the United Nations. From left: Leenda Bonilla; Mildred Karaira Gandia, Maria Itomacunana Diaz, and Reina Miranda

UCTPTN 04.23.2008

VENEZUELA: Treasure Island

By Humberto Márquez

CARACAS, Apr 14 (IPS) - Cubagua, a 24-square-kilometre island off of Venezuela’s northern Caribbean coast, is uninhabited but guards the archaeological testimony of three stages of human history and prehistory in the Americas.

"The oldest archaeological findings date back 3,000 to 3,500 years. They reflect the passage through the area of paleo-indigenous groups -- nomads, explorers and harvesters of shellfish -- perhaps on their way to populating other parts of South America or the Caribbean," anthropologist Carlos Martín told IPS..

On his desk in the Central University of Venezuela’s School of Anthropology, Martín spreads out shells collected in Cubagua. Only at closer inspection would a lay person notice that they have been cut or carved to serve as tools.

"What looks like archaeological garbage is actually gouges and tools used to open shellfish, obtain food and carry out rudimentary woodwork" on rafts or primitive boats used to explore the Caribbean region.

Cubagua, some 300 km northeast of Caracas, is halfway between Venezuela’s northeastern shoreline and the resort island of Margarita. There are no surface sources of fresh water, and the landscape is sand and rock, with a few scattered thickets.

It is the smallest of the three islands making up the Venezuelan state of Nueva Esparta, along with Margarita and Coche islands, and is located 16 km north of Araya Peninsula, the closest mainland area. It is home to only a few itinerant fishing camps, which shrink and grow depending on the season.

"A second group of carved objects were left by indigenous peoples of the Carib or Arawak languages, who passed through Cubagua as nomads since at least 1,500 or 2,000 years ago," said Martín. "They are the artifacts of people who already used knives or other tools made of stone, shells or wood on the mainland or on Margarita Island."

German-Spanish Historian Enrique Otte found remnants of pottery and cooking hearths, as well as signs of what may have been religious rituals.

These were the indigenous people encountered by the Spaniards who arrived at these shores in the late 15th century. On his third voyage, in August 1498, Christopher Columbus reached Cubagua, where he discovered riches that whetted Europe’s appetite: pearls.

Thus began the third population wave in Cubagua: the Spaniards, who brought Guaiquerí Indians over from Margarita Island and made them dive for oysters. Forced to dive for up to 16 hours a day, many of them died of overwork. The rich pearl fisheries led to the establishment in 1500 of the first Spanish settlement in what is now South America: Nueva Cádiz.

The settlement on the northeastern shore of the island gained the formal status of a town in 1528, when it was home to 1,000 European inhabitants along with an unknown number of indigenous people and, later, groups of black slaves. Fresh water was brought in from the mouth of the Manzanares river, on the nearby mainland.

But by 1537, the oyster beds were basically wiped out, as was the native population as a result of European diseases and brutal exploitation. The town was abandoned as a permanent settlement in 1539 and destroyed by a tidal wave in 1541. The ruins were burnt by French pirates in 1543.

Nueva Cádiz "was an L-shaped city that was walled in to protect itself from pirates. It had streets, houses, two churches, a city hall, a convent and a cemetery. Outside the walls lived the Indians and blacks, in rudimentary huts and shacks," archaeologist Jorge Armand, who is carrying out work in the ruins, told IPS.

Armand and his team found and cleared the ruins of one of the churches, the Ermita de Nuestra Señora, which measured 30 by eight metres and had outside walls one metre thick and a flagstone floor. "The ruins coincide with Otte’s research and an old French map," said the archaeologist.

The Ermita "was the first Catholic church in South America, the first where the Virgin of the Valley -- the patron saint of fishermen and sailors in Venezuela -- was venerated, and it shows the importance that the Spaniards placed on Nueva Cádiz," said Armand.

The Venezuelan Institute of Cultural Patrimony is studying the possibility of building a museum in Cubagua, for students of archaeology and history, as well as tourists.

"The essential thing is conservation," said Martín. "An on-site museum is a wonderful idea, but tourism must be accompanied by education and controls, in order for it to be responsible, because we are not only talking about archaeological treasures, but also an island with a fragile environment."

Cubagua "represents three key phases of human development in the Americas. First, the passage of primitive (in the archaeological sense) groups, who could have been ancestors of the Carib Indians. Second, the organised indigenous peoples who lived on the mainland and visited Cubagua seasonally for fishing and possibly for holding rituals," said the anthropologist.

And, finally, "the Spaniards, who founded the first colonial city built on an island, over 500 years ago," until the town was wiped out "by the forces of nature and greed," he said.

"At times there is a tendency to look down on Venezuela’s prehispanic history and patrimony, because it is compared to the monumental history of Mexico, Peru or Central America. But the roots could have begun to take shape here, on this island, millennia ago, in something as basic and marvellous as the first inhabitants of the new world carving a rock that was used to pry open a clam or cut wood," said Martín. (END/2008)

Source: http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=41980

Arawak Master Woodcarver Names Son After Bolivian President

Pakuri Territory, Guyana (UCTP Taino News) – Internationally renowned master woodsculptor, Foster Simon of Pakuri Lokono Arawak Territory (St. Cuthberts Mission) celebrated the September birth of his newborn son by naming the child “Evo” Simon after President Evo Morales Ayma of Bolivia.

President Morales is hailed as the hemisphere’s first “full-blooded” indigenous Head of State in over 450 years of the European and neo-colonial occupation of the Americas. Many Indigenous Peoples throughout the Caribbean and the Americas consider President Evo Morales to be “their President”; he is a well-respected and revered personage among First Nations of the Hemisphere.

Foster Simon’s wooden sculptures form part of the Presidential collections of Guyana, Venezuela, and Bolivia. One of Simon’s most recent art works was presented to Bolivian Ambassador Reynaldo Cuadros who received the unique piece on behalf of President Morales. The work was gifted to the Ambassador by Simon’s brother-in-law, Damon Corrie (Arawak), who was invited to make the special presentation at the Presidential Palace in La Paz during a session of the Organization of American States held there in April 2007.

Photo: Proud Arawak parents, Margaret and Foster Simon with new

baby "Evo Simon" in Pakuri Territory, Guyana

===============

See related stories at:

Caribbean and North American Indigenous Peoples present sacred gifts for

President Evo Morales Ayma of Bolivia.
http://uctp.blogspot.com/2007/04/caribbean-and-north-american-indigenous.html

Bolivians mark Columbus Day and Indians' return to power
http://uctp.blogspot.com/2006/10/bolivians-mark-columbus-day-and.html

President of Bolivia Meets with Indigenous Leaders in New York
http://uctp.blogspot.com/2006/09/president-of-bolivia-meets-with.html

Puerto Rico Issue to Be Included in UN Agenda

United Nations, Jun 14 (Prensa Latina) The Special Committee on Decolonization requested for the first time that the UN General Assembly review the case of Puerto Rico in a comprehensive way, after approving 25 fruitless resolutions on the issue over the past 30 years.

That request implies that discussions on the situation of that Caribbean island under US rule would get out of the narrow framework of the Special Committee on Decolonization to be debated at the United Nations.

The upgrade of the Puerto Rico issue is contained in a declaration presented by Cuba and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and passed by consensus on Thursday at the Special Committee on Decolonization, which is attached to the UN General Assembly.

Cuban Ambassador to the UN Rodrigo Malmierca said the inclusion of the Puerto Rico issue in the General Assembly's agenda is an urgent matter due to its growing importance.

"Most Puerto Rican forces agree on that," pointed out Malmierca when presenting the resolution.

The Cuban diplomat noted that despite more than 30 years of efforts and 25 resolutions and decisions on the issue at the Committee, the Puerto Rican people cannot exercise their legitimate right to genuine self-determination.

"At the same time, the United States is trying by all means to strengthen its economic, political and social power on this brother Latin American and Caribbean people," he added.

In addition to the request to the General Assembly, the resolution approved on Thursday also called US authorities to create the conditions to allow the Puerto Rican people to fully exercise their right to free determination and independence.

Of Pearls and Doing the Right Thing…

To: Blue Water Ventures

Greetings,

I read with great interest the Internet article about your Margarita shipwreck pearl find. My wife, Rose Powhatan (Pamunkey/Tauxenent ), and I gave a lecture at the Natural History Museum of New York on Powhatan and Caribbean Pearls. I would like you to consider the following:

The pearls found in this shipwrecked galleon's site were probably from the Caribbean Peal Trade located in the pearl beds off the Venezuelan island of Margarita . The sunken ship had the appropriate name since it was from its namesake island's waters that the pearls (that came to rival the old Eastern pearl trade) were harvested.

Lucayan Taínos (conch divers from the Bahama Islands) were among the first unfortunate souls used in this deplorable enterprise that helped to deplete the Bahamas of its indigenous people and the Caribbean of its ancient pearl beds. Aside from pearls found in conchs, Spanish explorers may have first encountered Indigenous American pearl trade among the mainland peoples of South America .

Father Bartholomew de las Casas reported the horrible conditions of these divers, "who once looked like men but now appeared as deformed dogs", and who were forced to dive at very deep depths from canoes by their cruel Spanish masters. He reported that if a diver surfaced too early he was pushed underwater by his master in the canoe. At the pearl diver's campsites they suffered from the bends, unhealed sores, starvation and diseases so that European royalty, nobility and merchants could have the luxury of wearing clothes dripping with excessive amounts of Caribbean pearls (See paintings of European royalty of this period). The only "positive" story to have come out of the Caribbean Pearl trade was that of an enslaved Caribbean "Indian" who was given his freedom by his master for finding the largest famous pearl named "La Peregrina" or "The Orphan" (So named because the diver found the pearl out of its shell).

The current owner of the re-hung "La Peregrena" is actress Elizabeth Taylor who was given the pearl by her late husband actor Richard Burton. La Peregrina was briefly lost in her rug; her poodle appeared with it in its mouth. Maybe both the pearls found at the Margarita's site and La Peregrina should be donated to a museum for display that would also acknowledge the holocaust-like history of the Caribbean Pearl Trade, the first European slave trade in the Americas and of the brutal early enslavement of the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean.

One Love,
Michael Auld (Yamaye Taino descendant)

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Thousands of pearls found in shipwreck

KEY WEST, Fla. - Salvagers discovered thousands of pearls Friday in a small, lead box they said they found while searching for the wreckage of the 17th-century Spanish galleon Santa Margarita. Divers from Blue Water Ventures of Key West said they found the sealed box, measuring 3.5 inches by 5.5 inches, along with a gold bar, eight gold chains and hundreds of other artifacts earlier this week.

They were apparently buried beneath the ocean floor in approximately 18 feet of water about 40 miles west of Key West.

"There are several thousand pearls starting from an eighth of an inch to three-quarters of an inch," said Duncan Mathewson, marine archaeologist and partner in Blue Water Ventures.

James Sinclair, archaeologist and conservator consulting with Mel Fisher's Treasures, Blue Water's joint-venture partners, said the pearls are very rare because of their antiquity and condition. Sinclair said pearls don't normally survive the ocean water once they are out of the oyster that makes them.

"In this instance, we had a lead box and the silt that had sifted into the box from the site of the Margarita, which preserved the pearls in a fairly pristine state," he said.

An initial cache of treasure and artifacts from the Santa Margarita was discovered in 1980 by pioneering shipwreck salvor Mel Fisher.

The ship was bound for Spain when it sank in a hurricane in 1622. The pearls will be conserved, documented and photographed in an archaeological laboratory above the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum in Key West.

"Until they're properly cleaned and conserved we don't know their value, but it would seem they would be worth upwards of a million dollars," Mathewson said.

Taino and Other Caribbean Indigenous Peoples Engage the United Nations System

United Nations, NY (UCTP Taino News) – After a two week working session from May 14-25, the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues came to a close at United Nations headquarters in New York. Over a thousand participants from around the world participated throughout the session, which concluded in the form of a report containing recommendations to governments and United Nations agencies.

Highlighting the session’s theme “territories, lands, and natural resources,” the Permanent Forum recommended that Governments adopt, in relevant national legislation, the principle of “free, prior and informed consent” of indigenous peoples regarding potential development projects or other activities carried out on their lands.

“It is […] clear that most local and national indigenous peoples’ movements have emerged from struggles against policies and actions that have undermined and discriminated against their customary land tenure and resource-management systems, expropriated their lands, extracted their resources without their consent and led to their displacement and dispossession from their territories,” the Forum stated in one of eight sets of draft recommendations and three draft decisions approved by consensus at the close of its sixth session.

The Permanent Forum, a 16-member subcommittee of the Economic and Social Council, is mandated chiefly to provide expert advice on indigenous issues to the Council and the United Nations system; raise awareness and promote the integration and coordination of activities relating to indigenous issues with the United Nations system; and prepare and disseminate information on indigenous issues.

Amid the diverse delegations of Indigenous Peoples highlighting the complex issues associated with land, territories, and natural resources, Caribbean Indigenous Peoples were actively presenting sound advice to Governments and intergovernmental organizations about how to meet their needs for survival. Working together in the form of the Indigenous Caucus of the Greater Caribbean (IPCGC), indigenous representatives from throughout the region presented their collective views on such topics as urban Indigenous Peoples and migration, the Second Decade of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, and future work of the Forum.

Chief Reginaldo Fredericks of the Lokono Arawak Community of Joboshirima noted the importance of the session and looked forward to receiving more Indigenous delegates from the Caribbean at next year’s session, which will focus on climate change. “We need to be at these sessions to support each other and highlight what is happening in our communities” stated Chief Fredericks. “We need to strengthen our ancestral connections and working together as a Caucus can help us achieve these goals.”

Mildred Gandia, a Boriken Taino and a representative of the United Confederation of Taino People (UCTP) stated “We, Caribbean Indigenous Peoples made a big impact on this session and there were Taino here from Boriken, Kiskeia (Dominican Republic), and even Jamaica as well as Lokono Arawaks from Venezuela and Guyana and Garifuna from Honduras .”

Gandia continued stating “Our views were presented at the plenary sessions via the IPCGC, on panel discussions focusing on climate change, our artists were highlighted in the United Nations Art Exhibition, and we stood in solidarity with other Indigenous Peoples in supporting the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People.”

The Permanent Forum strongly urged the General Assembly adopt during its sixty-first session the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the fate of which remains unclear some six months after it was approved by the Geneva-based Human Rights Council. The Declaration, which was initially opposed by countries such as Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States, is now being further endangered by proposed amendments submitted a group of Africa countries. The African Group’s proposal was roundly rejected by Indigenous leaders as “unacceptable and inconsistent with international human rights law”.

With the exception of Dominica and Haiti, countries from the Caribbean region including Guyana, Belize, and Suriname are expressly supporting the African Group’s amendment proposals, which will in fact critically weaken the Declaration adopted by the Human Rights Council after 20 years of negotiation.

Why Caribbean countries that in the past have seemingly been supportive of indigenous rights would promote a proposal inconsistent with international law is related to politics and trade arrangements. Caribbean Community leaders have recently announced that a significant new “Unity Alliance” for trade, economic, and political co-operation between Africa, South America, with Caribbean involvement, has been established. One of the highpoints of the “Abuja Declaration and Plan of Action on Peace, Security, and Development” include the creation of a permanent “Africa-South America Co-operative Forum that is to meet every two years. According to news sources the summit leaders are “anxious to demonstrate the seriousness of their collective commitment”. In light of these relations, it would appear that opposition to the rights of Indigenous Peoples is a pre-requisite for demonstrating Caribbean solidarity with Africa.

“Considering that Indigenous Peoples are mentioned in the Abuja Declaration only in the context of cultural cooperation and tourism, it is clear that Caribbean governments still do not understand the aspirations of the region’s first nations” stated Roberto Mucaro Borrero, the President of the UCTP Office of International Relations. Borrero noted that the IPCGC’s third plenary presentation at the Permanent Forum highlighted the Abuja Declaration and called for the inclusion of Caribbean Indigenous Peoples in its follow-up mechanisms.

Summing up the Permanent Forum’s work this year, Johan Schölvinck, Director of the Division for Social Policy in the Department of Economic and Social Affairs called the Forum a “celebration of the world’s cultural diversity”, in that it had seen extremely rich participation from some 1,500 representatives from indigenous peoples’ organizations, non-governmental organizations and academia, some 30 United Nations system and other intergovernmental organizations, about 70 Member States and some 30 indigenous parliaments. The Permanent Forum was not just an event; rather “a tribute to our human efforts of partnership” that offered the opportunity for inspiration, he said.

As per the recommendation of the final draft report, the Forum’s 2008 session will focus on the theme of climate change and there will also be sessions devoted to the Pacific region and to the protection of the thousands of threatened indigenous languages.

------------------

To review the Abuja Declaration visit:
http://www.africa-union.org/root/au/Conferences/Past/2006/November/SummitASA/doc/en/DECLARATION.doc

To review statments of the IPCGC visit: http://indigenouscaribbeancaucus.blogspot.com/

Two-Week Session on Indigenous Issues Opens at United Nations

New York, NY (UCTP News) - As delicate ecosystems supporting millions of lives hang in the balance, indigenous representatives from around the globe began a two-week session of discussions on Monday, May 14 with top United Nations officials, Government representatives and members of civil society to highlight the struggle to defend their rights to access and use the land and natural resources in their territories.

The sixth session was opened with an invocation from Tracy L. Shenandoah, Chief of the Onondaga Nation, Eel Clan. Acknowledging “red willow” as the leader of medicines, Shenadoah said the “ the Creator had planted medicines, including berries, for people to use." He also gave thanks to the birds, especially the eagle, and to the “three sisters of all foods: corn, beans and squash.” Shenandoah also gave thanks to the waters for their help in creating peace. His statement was followed by a performance by the Laihui cultural group from Manipur, India.

Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, Chairperson of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, addressed those gathered by stating “without access to and respect for the rights over their lands, territories and natural resources, indigenous peoples’ distinct cultures -- and the possibility of determining their on development -- become eroded.”

Highlighting new developments, Tauli-Corpuz stated that one of the major thrusts for 2007 would be to press for the General Assembly’s adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, approved by the Human Rights Council last year. Indigenous peoples worldwide had been “deeply disappointed” by the Assembly’s decision to defer action on the Declaration last year. Noting that amendments had been made to the text in the meantime, she said that every effort should be made to ensure that what was put before the Assembly was the Council-approved version, not one “which mangled the Declaration beyond recognition.” “The fate of this Declaration is in your hands and the Governments who are here today,” she said.

Among the many expert presentations and reports by representatives on United Nations agencies and Funds, Erica-Irene A. Daes, of Greece, an elected member of the Working Group on Indigenous Populations and Special Rapporteur on Indigenous People’s Land Rights, said one of the most acute and complex situations facing the world’s indigenous peoples was the refusal by certain Governments to promote and protect their rights to land and natural resources. To understand the profound relationship of indigenous peoples to their lands and natural resources, cultural differences between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples should be recognized.

The doctrines of dispossession that had emerged in developing modern international law, particularly the concepts of “terra nullius” and “discovery”, had well-known adverse effects on indigenous peoples, she continued. Other problems included the State’s failure to acknowledge indigenous rights to territories lands and resources; to demarcate indigenous lands; to enforce or implement laws protecting indigenous lands; and the State’s expropriation of indigenous lands for national interest without the prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples. Also, the principle of permanent sovereignty over natural resources and the scope of indigenous peoples’ right to own, develop and manage their territories, lands and resources, should be reviewed, she added.

Among the participants attending the meeting, Chief Reginaldo Fredericks of the Joboshirima Lokono Arawak Community of Venezuela noted the importance of meeting stating “it is critical for us as Indigenous Peoples to follow-up on the recommendations made and report on these activities to our peoples.”

Chief Fredericks is a member of the Indigenous Peoples Caucus of the Greater Caribbean, which forms annually at the UN meeting to lobby Caribbean indigenous issues.

Caribbean indigenous delegates also participated along with indigenous representatives of other regions at a rally in support of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Speaking on behalf of indigenous leaders from Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Dominica, Trinidad, Guyana, Venezuela, and Barbados, UCTP President and Chairman Roberto Mucaro Borrero reaffirmed their support of the Declaration as adopted by the Human Rights Council in June 2006.

Also in attendance at the session, Taino artists John Marrero and Reina Miranda joined UCTP delegates Mildred Gandia and Borrero at the opening of the special art exhibition, which would run through the Forum. Selected works of Marrero and Miranda were on display along with various works of Lokono and Taino artists: George Simon, Mildred Torres-Speeg and Naniki Reyes Ocasio.

The Forum’s sixth session will run through 25 May and will consider solutions to end the senseless exploitation of traditional lands and natural resources, a key issue at the heart of indigenous people’s efforts to gain recognition of their rights.


UCTP delegates at the UN, (from left to right) Reina Miranda,

Roberto Borrero, Mainaku Borrero, John Marrero,

and Mildred Gandia. (UCTP Photo)

VENEZUELA: The Gift of Native Tongues, On the Air

by Humberto Márquez

CARACAS, May 4 (IPS) - Eiker García and Nelson Maldonado took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly, producing a long "mmm" sound, following the instructions of the professional radio presenter who was giving them breathing and elocution lessons.

García and Maldonado are young Ye'kuana Indians from the Watamo and La Esmeralda communities in the Amazon rainforest some 800 kilometres south of Caracas, where one of eight indigenous community radio stations, networked with the public Venezuelan National Radio (RNV) station, is to be installed later this year.

"We're learning to overcome our fear of the microphone and how to conduct interviews," García told IPS during a break in the lessons. He was still enjoying the excitement caused by his first airplane flight.

Maldonado told IPS that very few of their people were qualified for this work. "The community sent us on this first course because we are cultural promoters back home," he said.

Twenty-one young people from 10 different indigenous groups, nearly all of them from remote border regions, participated in the short introductory course on radio broadcasting in late April, in preparation for the installation of the radio stations next October.

The course was provided by the National Telecommunications Commission (CONATEL).

"CONATEL will assign the frequencies and provide the transmitters and other necessary equipment to instal eight FM stations, and will also give support in technical and management aspects to guide those responsible for the facilities," general services manager for CONATEL Wilfredo Morales told IPS.

RNV director Helena Salcedo said the public station has carried out trial broadcasts in indigenous languages, using its repeaters in border zones.

"The new stations will help indigenous people recover and preserve their culture, and to recognise it and value it for themselves," Salcedo told IPS.

Some parts of the country do not receive any Venezuelan radio signal at all.

Maldonado said that in the backwater of La Esmeralda, where his community is located, people can only tune in to Radio Casiquiare (the name of a river in the Amazon region), which retransmits broadcasts from government radio stations and is operated by members of the military.

In Páez, a municipality in the extreme northwest of Venezuela, between the gulf of Venezuela and the Colombian gulf of Guajira, "you can easily pick up Colombian television channels, but not Venezuelan ones," María Alejandra González, a young Wayúu woman who is studying journalism and took the CONATEL course, told IPS.

"Throughout the Guajira peninsula (most of which falls within Colombian territory but a small part of which belongs to Venezuela) we can listen to the Fe y Alegría radio station, which transmits in Wayunáiki (the language of the Wayúu, or Guajiro, people) and their news programmes cover events on both sides of the border," said González.

Fe y Alegría is a Catholic organisation, with radio stations in several parts of both Colombia and Venezuela.

González believes that the new indigenous radio station, further south where the Bari, Yucpa and Japreira peoples live, will be able to profit from the existing experience of Fe y Alegría's indigenous language radio station, especially the way it has taken up the concerns, claims and proposals of the indigenous communities.

"We also want to follow their example by creating an Indigenous Radiophonic Institute, like Fe y Alegría's but based on the new indigenous community radio stations," said Wayúu activist Anairú Canbar, who is part of the team leading the recently created Indigenous Peoples Ministry.

The eight radio stations "will begin by broadcasting in the languages of the communities where they are based, but later there will also be programmes to reach other communities within broadcasting range, in their own languages, as far as possible," Canbar said.

García is one of those preparing for the multilingual phase of the radio stations. His mother tongue is Ye'kuana, but he also speaks the language of a neighbouring indigenous community, the Yanomami people.

"We want to identify and train indigenous information workers in all the communities, to work as journalists and send their reports by radio, or by telephone to the radio stations, to provide material for indigenous newscasts, which will then interact on the network," Canbar said.

Funding for setting up the indigenous radio stations is being provided by the Information Ministry, as part of its programme for supporting community radio. CONATEL has registered 192 community stations so far. The Information Ministry also has oversight of the Venezuelan National Radio station.

CONATEL's Morales did not mention specific figures, but he said that "the investments are neither large nor costly in comparison with the service they will provide by empowering indigenous communities."

That is what young people like García and Maldonado are learning new skills for. "Get ready to project your voice," said their instructor as he gave them the microphone. "All Venezuela is listening to you now." At least a part of it will be listening, when the first of the indigenous community stations comes on air.

The planned date for this event is October 12, in many countries officially known as Columbus Day, but now celebrated by original peoples as Indigenous People's Resistance Day.

Taino is Nominated for UNPFII Membership 2008-2010

New York, NY (UCTP News) - The Secretariat for the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) has received over 35 nominations from indigenous organizations for UNPFII membership for the period 2008-2010. The deadline for nominations was 1 February 2007 deadline.

New UNPFII members will be appointed by the President of ECOSOC towards the end of April 2007. Further information will be posted at the Forum's web page as it becomes available.

Nominations for UNPFII members for Central and South America and the Caribbean include Mr. Roberto Mucaro BORRERO (Taino), President and Chairman of the United Confederation of Taino People. Support for Mr. Borrero’s nomination was received from indigenous organizations from Puerto Rico, Dominica, Barbados, Venezuela, the Dominican Republic, and the United States.

The Permanent Forum is comprised of sixteen independent experts, functioning in their personal capacity, who serve for a term of three years as Members and may be re-elected or re-appointed for one additional term.

Eight of the Members are nominated by governments and eight are nominated directly by indigenous organizations in their regions.

Columbus Statue Toppled in Caracas

CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Supporters of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez celebrated Columbus Day on Tuesday by toppling a statue in Caracas of the explorer whom Chavez blames for ushering in a "genocide" of native Indians.

Police firing tear gas later recovered parts of the broken bronze image, which was dragged by the protesters to a theater where the Venezuelan leader was due to speak.

Two years ago, Chavez rechristened the Oct. 12 holiday -- commemorated widely in the Americas to mark Christopher Columbus' 1492 landing in the New World -- "Indian Resistance Day."

The new name honored Indians killed by Spanish and other foreign conquerors following in the wake of the Italian-born Columbus who sailed in the service of the Spanish crown.

As the left-wing nationalist president led celebrations on Tuesday to honor Indian chiefs who resisted the Spanish conquest, a group of his supporters conducted a mock trial of a statue of Columbus in central Caracas.

They declared the image guilty of "imperialist genocide," looped ropes around its outstretched arm and neck and heaved it down from its marble base. No police or other authorities intervened as the protesters drove off in a truck yelling, "We've killed Columbus!"

"This isn't a historical heritage. ... Columbus is the symbol of a conquest that was a globalization by blood and fire, a cultural massacre," said Vitelio Herrera, a philosophy student at Venezuela's Central University.

Outside the Teresa Carreno theater, the protesters hung the statue from a tree and then let it fall to the ground. Police arrested several of them.

Chavez has called Latin America's Spanish and Portuguese conquerors "worse than Hitler" and the precursors of modern-day "imperialism" he says is now embodied by the United States, the biggest buyer of his country's oil.

The base of the toppled statue was daubed with slogans such as "Columbus = Bush. Out!"

The protesters, many who wore red T-shirts with slogans supporting Chavez, repeated the Venezuelan leader's fierce criticism of the U.S.- led occupation of Iraq.

"Didn't they tear down the statue of Saddam Hussein, the dictator of Iraq? For me, (U.S. President George W.) Bush represents barbarity and Chavez represents civilization," said 57-year-old Orlando Iturbe.

Some passersby were shocked. "I don't agree with this," said Jose Luis Maita, who watched with his wife and small daughters.

Venezuelan demonstrators use ropes to topple a Christopher Columbus statue in Caracas, October 12, 2004. Demonstrators protested during Columbus Day, a date which Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has christened as the 'Day of Indian Resistance' to commemorate the Indian people who fought the Spanish colonizers.

Source: http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=6482069