Black Looks

An important and thoughtful post from Haitian blogger,  Ezili Danto who raises a number of serious questions around why the earthquake happened at this time – the first in 239 years.

In the Mining Haiti’s Riches interview, I recount how there were areas in Haiti hidden behind UN guns, fenced off where Haitians knew nothing about what these soldiers were doing.

Then the earthquake hit. What remains is unimaginable. The rescue and recovery process was and is inhumane. The relief from pain and hunger is still not in place. And, as I think about the process of rebuilding, I started checking whether digging for gold, iridium, copper, uranium, coal, marble, diamonds, oil and gas could trigger an earthquake. And the answer I found sent chills up my spine. Made me sick to my stomach. Can this really be?

From what I’ve read, drilling deep into the earth, digging and mining may trigger earthquakes.

And, drilling either for fossil fuels or renewable energy exploration may cause earthquakes. Both geophysicists and oilmen agree that natural-gas drilling trigger earthquakes. One oilman stated that “there is not the slightest doubt” that gas production caused the temblors.” (See, At Fault: Does Drilling Cause Earthquakes?)…… Continue reading here……….

Bhopal – 23 years on the site has still not been cleaned up.

Oil spills in Oloibiri

Dumping toxic waste in Nairobi

Lesotho – GAP/ Levi factory dumps chemical waste

Trafugura dumped on Abidjan

Today is the start of a landmark court brought by four farmers from the Niger Delta against Shell Oil.

The Nigerian farmers and fishers, who lost their livelihoods after oil from leaking Shell pipelines streamed over their fields and fishing ponds, are claiming compensation from the Anglo-Dutch oil giant. They also want Shell to clean up the oil which remains in the land, so that they can return to farming and fishing.

The four victims of the leaks are from three Nigerian villages.

They have subpoenaed both Shell’s subsidiary in Nigeria and Shell’s Dutch headquarters. They allege that as the result of Shell’s negligence, agricultural lands have been devastated, drinking water polluted, fish ponds made unusable and the environment and health of local people harmed.

Continue reading the case here

Links: Shell Guilty

Most of us probably havent even heard of cassiterite – the mineral used in electronics especially laptops.  There was a time when laptops used to be hugely expensive. Now you can pick up one for a couple of hundred pounds.  I dont know whether there is a relationship between the cheap price of laptops and the slave mining of cassiterite but it is quite possible.

At a remote mine in central DRC, workers with torches and pick axes hack at the ruddy earth. They are mining cassiterite, a mineral vital in the production of laptops and mobile phones. But dispersed among the miners are Congolese Government troops — in plain clothes for the camera — literally forcing most workers to work at gunpoint. ‘The soldiers always steal everything. They even come to shoot people down the mineshafts,’ complains Regina Maponda. Western greed for cassiterite is fuelling the boom — at an airfield near the mine, soldiers jealously guard their loot as it makes it way to Japan and the West. Conflict mining is a curse, and it is difficult to see what the G8 leaders can do. [Ota Benga]

There is much the G8 can do where mining feeds conflict.  Oil bunkering in the Niger Delta is made much easier through the low intensity war taking place between militants and the Nigerian army.  Both are involved as well as politicians – there are huge amounts of money to be made.  Like with diamond mining in Angola , copper and cassiterite in  the DRC, oil from the Niger Delta are all traded on the London and New York stock exchange.   Buyers, sellers always claim they know nothing about the conditions of the mining but that cannot be true. Some named multinationals involved in the trade of  mineral  in the DRC are Anglo-Gold Ashanti [financial support to armed groups in exhange for concessions] Belgian company Sogem and the UK’s Afrimex though not named in human rights violations, its hard to imagine they dont know the conditions  in which the mining takes place since they,  Afrimex,  buys the cassiterite in it’s raw form.      Across the border in Rwanda in the town of Gisenyi there is a cassiterite smelting plant owned by Metal Processing Association which is owned by South Africans.

This comment speaks on a video produced by Journeyman speaks to what the G8 could do if there was a will – after all the minerals end up being shipped,  traded and made into electronics by G8 countries.

Another white man sailing up the wrong river. Instead of sailing up the Congo, he should be sailing up the Thames, which is where Coltan is traded – at the London Metals Exchange. And who owns these concessions? Who is the plunderer? HOW does coltan end up in London? Start acting like a journalist and do your job for a change.

Here’s how the supply chain works.

Read more…

Current TV – Sahara Reporters

An interactive map of the Niger Delta by the Financial Times showing  oil fields and conflict zones -See MAP

The following article is published in Pambazuka News and is written by Sokari Ekine and Firoze Manji

“And as I was going, I was just thinking how the war have spoiled my town Dukana, uselessed many people, killed many others, killed my mama and my wife, Agnes, my beautiful young wife with J.J.C and now it have made me like porson wey get leprosy because I have no town again.
And I was thinking how I was prouding before to go to soza and call myself Sozaboy. But now if anybody say anything about war or even fight, I will just run and run and run and run and run. Believe me yours sincerely” Ken Saro Wiwa, Sozaboy

Thirteen years ago, Ken Saro Wiwa Jr and the families of the 8 other Ogoni men who had been murdered by the Nigerian state in 1995 , together with two other Ogonis, began three separate law suits against Royal Dutch Petroleum, Shell Petroleum Development Corporation and Brian Anderson former CEO of the SPDC. The plaintiffs accused Shell of human rights abuses against the Ogoni people, arming the Nigerian army and of being complicit in the extrajudicial killing of the Ogoni 9 in 1995. The trial against Shell was due to start on the 26th of May but was then delayed indefinitely. On Tuesday 9 June 2009, we learned that Shell had settled the case out of court for a sum of $15.5 million which included a $5 million contribution to a trust for the Ogoni people. The settlement was offered with no admission of liability from the defendant. While the settlement is being seen as a victory for human rights, it does raise a number of worrying issues in law suits by local indigenous communities against multinationals who are committing human rights violations and environmental crimes.

It is impossible to separate the actions of the oil multinationals operating across the Niger Delta from the actions of the Nigerian government in the region. The relationship between the two, though complex, is based on profit over and above any other consideration. In exchange for the oil that is removed from the Niger Delta, the oil companies with the support of the Nigerian state, have left behind an ecological disaster, whole towns and villages reduced to rubble, death by fire, pollution and the guns of the Nigerian military. Shell and the other oil companies in the region have one of the worst environmental records in the world. This includes pollution of the air and drinking water, degradation of farm land, damage to aquatic life, disruption of drainage systems, oil fires which have left people dead and with horrific burn injuries and no medical care. The causes of the damage to the environment are oil spills from pipelines and flow stations, many of the former running through villages and in front of peoples homes; gas flaring which produces toxic gases and poisons into the atmosphere.
Read more…

The case has been settled out of court with $10 million going to the 10 plaintiffs and $5 million being gifted to the Ogoni people. Details of the settlement are here and here. Below is part of the statement from the lawyers in the case. I will be writing more on this in Pambazuka News later this week.

“The agreements reached today comprise one of a handful of successful settlements in corporate cases brought for human rights violations under the Alien Tort Statute, a 1789 statute that allows victims of human rights abuses from around the world to sue the perpetrators in U.S. courts. Since 1997, in Doe v. Unocal, the courts have made clear that multinational corporations can also be sued for human rights violations such as extrajudicial execution, torture and crimes against humanity, as charged in this case.

The settlement represents one more step towards holding corporations accountable for complicity in human rights violations, wherever they may be committed. We hope that this settlement provides another building block in the efforts to forge a legal system that holds violators accountable wherever they may be and prevents future violations. ”

The trial has been delayed over and over and finally well we thought finally it was due to start on the 26th May and then 27th May. Another cancellation and now we learn that both the trial and the pre-trial conference have been delayed indefinitely. What is going on? Steve Kretzmann Han Shan speculates on the Shell Guility Blog on what could be causing the delay and comes up with four possibilities:

1) A new pre-trial conference and trial is round the corner – Possible but why say indefinitely if this is the case.

2) A settlement is being negotiated – Though Kretzmann Shan like the rest of us would prefer to see the trial go ahead he is sympathetic to a settlement. I am not and I think many progressive thinking Nigerians would agree. The trial is now bigger than the Ogoni 8, the Ogoni people. The whole Niger Delta and Nigeria for that matter wants to see Shell exposed and hopefully the Nigerian government as well. Why come this far only to end up settling? More of a shame than a victory.

3) Delayed to broaden the case. Like Kretzmann Shan this is the best possible scenario though like him I am not sure what it means. Maybe to include other crimes by Shell?

4) Finally a “technical” reason based on whether or not Shell or Shell Nigeria can fall under the jurisdiction of the US courts – complicated so you may need to read Kretzmann’s Shan’s explanation!

“They bombed everywhere and everything. They don’t have feelings at all. I was lucky to have my children and husband alive. My neighbour lost his pregnant wife in the incidence. She was my friend too.” – Evelyn Emmanuel”

On May 14, 2009 at about noon, Gbaramatu Kingdom,Delta State, was in a festive mood. There had been an influx of guests into the community from far and near. They all came to witness the presentation of the Staff of Office to the Pere of Gbaramatu Kingdom, His Royal Majesty Ogie the third. The palace located in Oporoza was filled with well- wishers as the day also marked the King’s one year anniversary. Suddenly, three low flying helicopters were seen approaching the Kindgom. The community people initially thought they were flying dignitaries to the ceremony or that they were part of the glamour for the ceremony. They were wrong. Dead wrong!

The three choppers were actually gunships of the Joint Military Task Force, on a mission to mow down the Gbaramatu Kingdom. Suddenly the gunships started bombing everywhere, the King’s palace inclusive. The JTF, ostensibly on a mission of searching for militants and rescuing hostages, embarked on massive military assault on Gbaramatu Kingdom made up of 163 communities, villages and hamlets. The military deployed its most sophisticated weaponry against the hapless residents of the community The military machines unleashed on the communities include four helicopter gunboats for aerial bombing, two Naval Ships; NNS Obula and NNS Nwanba and large troop of soldiers.
Read more…