Ecuador: indigenous anti-mining activist killed on eve of Lima meetings

Published by MAC on 2014-12-08
Source: Statement, Guardian, EJOLT

Anti-mining activist killed on eve of Lima meetings

Joint Press Release

4 December 2014

On December 3, the body of anti-mining activist José Isidro Tendetza Antún was identifed. José Isidro was a member of the Shuar community of de Yanúa, the district of El Pangui, province of Zamora. He had disappeared on November 28 on his way to an Assembly convened by the Shuar Association of Bomboíza, where they were to discuss themes related to mining exploitation in the province. José never arrived at the meeting.

On December 2, a group of miners found the body of this Indigenous leader in the Zamora River and brought it by boat to Yanzata where it was buried by the Prosecutor’s office. According to his son, Jorge Tendetza, who identified his body in photographs taken by the police, José Tendetza had been tied up with a blue rope, suggesting that he was assassinated.

The death of this leader occurred in the context of increasing violence related to the presence of mining operations in the area. To date, three Indigenous leaders, members of the Shuar nationality, have lost their lives defending their territory. Before this terrible incident, Bosco Wisum was assassinated in September 2009 during a mobilization in defense of water. Later, in November 2013, Fredy Taish was assassinated during the military incursion of Piuns while with his family on the Zamora River.

The mining company Ecuacorriente filed a complaint against Indigenous leader José Tendetza on November 2013 in an effort to displace him from his land. Together with other members of his community, he had refused to leave his land and to renounce his ancestral rights. Ecuacorriente, controlled by the China Railway Construction Corporation (CRCC) and Tongling Nonferrous Metals, is currently operating the Mirador project which is located on Shuar territory.

Subsequently, there have been a string of systematic harassments and threats by those supporting the mine towards others in the regions, according to family members.

José Tendetza was an active defender of his territory:
• He was one of the plaintiffs in the case of violations of the rights of nature against the Ecuadorian state which was brought before national authorities in January 2013.
• He was one of the plaintiffs in a case brought before the InterAmericann Commission on Human Rights in January 2014.
• He was one of the signatories to an investigation into the conduct of six Chinese banks financing the Mirador Project in February 2014
• He was planning to present a complaint against the company Ecuacorriente at the Tribunal on the Rights of Nature at the Peoples' Summit in Lima, Peru on December 5.

Saramantas Warmiuna
Mujeres Amazónicas y Andinas afectadas por proyectos petroleros y mineros
Domingo Ankuash Miembro de la Asociación Bomboiza Pueblo Shuar

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Ecuador indigenous leader found dead days before planned Lima protest

Shuar leader José Isidro Tendetza Antún missing since 28 November

Activists believe death linked to opposition to state-Chinese mine project

Jonathan Watts, Latin America correspondent, and Dan Collyns in Lima

The Guardian

6 December 2014

Tiputini River and rainforest, Yasuni National Park, Amazon, Ecuador, Ecuador plans to drill for oil in the Yasuni Amazon reserve, as president Rafael Correa seeks to exploit his country’s resources, in part to pay off debts owed to China. Photograph: Pete Oxford/Corbis

The body of an indigenous leader who was opposed to a major mining project in Ecuador has been found bound and buried, days before he planned to take his campaign to climate talks in Lima.

The killing highlights the violence and harassment facing environmental activists in Ecuador, following the confiscation earlier this week of a bus carrying climate campaigners who planned to denounce president Rafael Correa at the United Nations conference.

The victim, José Isidro Tendetza Antún, a former vice-president of the Shuar Federation of Zamora, had been missing since 28 November, when he was last seen on his way to a meeting of protesters against the Mirador copper and gold mine. After a tip-off on Tuesday, his son Jorge unearthed the body from a grave marked “no name”. The arms and legs were trussed by a blue rope.

Other members of the community said Tendetza had been offered bribes and had his crops burned in an attempt to remove him from the area.

Domingo Ankuash, a Shuar leader, said there were signs Tendetza had been tortured, but the full facts had yet to come to light. He said the family were extremely unhappy with the investigation and what they said was the reluctance of the authorities to conduct a timely autopsy.

“His body was beaten, bones were broken,” said Ankuash. “He had been tortured and he was thrown in the river. The mere fact that they buried him before telling us, the family, is suspicious.”

Tendetza had been a prominent critic of Mirador, an open-cast pit that has been approved in an area of important biodiversity that is also home to the Shuar, Ecuador’s second-biggest indigenous group.

The project is operated by Ecuacorriente – originally a Canadian-owned firm that was brought by a Chinese conglomerate, CCRC-Tongguan Investment, in 2010. According to the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador, the project will devastate around 450,000 acres of forest.

“This is a camouflaged crime,” said Ankuash. “In Ecuador, multinational companies are invited by the government and get full state security from the police and the army. The army and police don’t provide protection for the people, they don’t defend the Shuar people. They’ve been bought by the company.

“The authorities are complicit in this crime,” Ankuash claimed. “They will never tell us the truth.” He added: “[Tendetza] was not just anyone. He was a powerful leader against the company. That’s why they knocked down his house and burnt his farm.

“The government will never give us a response, justice belongs to them. They will call us terrorists but that doesn’t mean we are not going to shut up.”

Several other Shuar opponents of Mirador have died as a result of the conflict in recent years, including Bosco Wisum in 2009 and Freddy Taish in 2013, according to Amazon Watch.

An initial autopsy said the circumstances of Tendetza’s death were unclear. Harold Burbano, of the human rights organisation INREDH, said there was a suspicion that the killing was related to his work as a land defender.

“There has been a rise of conflicts since the transnational mining company entered the area, significantly increasing the risks faced by community leaders,” he said.

Tendetza had planned to condemn the project at a Rights of Nature Tribunal organised by NGOs at the climate talks which are taking place this week in the Peruvian capital.

Luis Corral, an advisor to Ecuador’s Assembly of the People of the South, an umbrella group for indigenous federations in southern Ecuador, said that if Tendetza had been able to travel to the COP20 it would have put in “grave doubt the honorability and the image of the Ecuadorean government as a guarantor of the rights of nature”.

“We believe that this murder is part of a pattern of escalating violence against indigenous leaders which responds to the Ecuadorean government and the companies’ need to clear the opposition to a mega-mining project in the Cordillera del Condor,” he said.

“The state through the police and the judiciary is involved in hiding this violent crime because of the elemental irregularities in the proceedings. The body was buried without informing the family. They weren’t allowed to see the second autopsy.”

Tendetza’s killing highlights the risks facing environmental activists in Ecuador. Earlier this week, a group of campaigners travelling in a “climate caravan” were stopped six times by police on their way to Lima and eventually had their bus confiscated.

The activists said they were held back because president Correa wants to avoid potentially embarrassing protests at the climate conference over his plan to drill for oil in Yasuni, an Amazon reserve and one of the most biodiverse places on earth.

Once lauded for being the first nation to draw up a “green constitution”, enshrining the rights of nature, Ecuador’s environmental reputation has nosedived in recent years as Correa has put more emphasis on exploitation of oil, gas and minerals, partly to pay off debts owed to China.

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Death of a Shuar leader resisting Ecuador’s Mirador mine

By Domingo Ankuash

http://www.ejolt.org/2014/12/death-shuar-leader-resisting-ecuadors-mirador-mine/

8 December 2014

On 3 December the dead body of anti-mining leader José Isidro Tendetza Antun, trustee Shuar Community Yanúa, El Pangui Canton province of Zamora, was found.

He had been missing since Friday 28 November in circumstances where he was going to participate in the meeting convened by the Shuar Association Bomboiza to discuss issues related to mining in the province. Joseph never came to the meeting place.

On 2 December a group of miners found the body of indigenous leader in the Zamora River. The body was taken by boat to Yanzatza where he was buried by the Prosecutor’s Office. According to the versions of his son, Jorge Tendetza in the photographs presented by the police for identification of the body they confirmed that Joseph Tendetza “had his body tied with a blue rope” suggests it was murder.

The death of the leader is given in the context of increasing violence due to mining presence in the area. This presence has so far claimed the lives of three members of the Shuar leadership in defence of their territories. Wisum Bosco was killed during the demonstrations in defense of water in September 2009; and then the murder of Fredy Taish occurred in November 2013 by armed military in Piuns, whilst he was performing daily activities with his family on the Zamora River.

The mining company Corriente filed in November 2013 a complaint against the now dead leader José Tendetza, in order to move him from his land. He along with members of their community and other communities in the area flatly refused to leave their lands. They refused to waive their rights to ancestral possession of land.

Corriente, controlled by the China Railway Construction Corporation (CRCC) and Tongling Nonferrous Metals Group operate the Mirador project based on Shuar territory.

Families in the area talk of subsequent systematic harrasement from the mining company.

José Tendetza was an active supporter in the defense of his territory:

He was one of the plaintiffs in the action of violation of the Rights of Nature given by the Ecuadorian state Constitution and brought before the National Authorities in January 2013.

He was one of the plaintiffs, as affected, to the IACHR (Inter-American Commission on Human Rights) in January 2014

He was one of the signers of questions put to six Chinese banks financing the Mirador Project in February 2014

On 5 December 2014, José Tendetza was expected to file a complaint against the company Corriente before the International Tribunal Court for the Rights of Nature, in the Peoples’ Summit in Lima Peru