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Limón Indanza – On Saturday February 12 in the district of Limón in the Morona Santiago province, the 25th Dialogue for Life will take place. This event is organized by the National Coordinator for the Defense of Life and Sovereignty (CNDVS) and its affiliate organizations in the region: the Association of Campesinos of Limón Indanza ACLI, The Women Protectors of the Amazon and the Coortinadora Campesina Popular CCP. The event will take place in the Cancha Cubierta located at the beginning of the main street of Limón. The organizers announced the participation of local communities and delegates from other provinces who will be present to oppose mega mining projects which are proposed in their regions with support of government.
They also announced the participation of music and dance groups, including the well-known Quito singer Jaime Guevara who will perform for the first time for the people of Limón. The artist will be present in this act of solidarity thanks to his commitment to the environment, health and sovereignty of the people. There will also be a community lunch with produce from local farmers.
The Dialogues for Life are spaces of expression established by communities and organizations, joined under the National Coordinator for Defence of Life and Sovereignty CNDVS, who came together to fight against mining projects that pose a grave threat to local communities.
The Dialogues for Life are direct spaces where organizations and participating communities discuss and determine the direction of resistance to large mining companies and the negative social and environmental impacts they cause. They also discuss more general themes such as environmental defense, water and campasino rights.
The CNDVS has had 24 dialogues in different parts of the country where it has supported initiatives related to problems posed by mining. From this participation they have developed strategies of resistance to mega-mines and contamination of ecosystems. It has also been a space for art and culture which develops from such resistance.
The goal of this 25th Dialogue for Life in Limón is to strengthen campasino communities in the region affected by the mining project Pananza-SanCarlos-Cóndor Mirador of the Chinese-Canadian company Corriente Resources. It seeks to inform that the majority of campasinos and residents in the region reject the presence of this company that in recent years has created permanent conflict and division in the communities.
Other topics will also be discussed such as the rejection of the criminalization of popular protest, the defense of earth and taxes. The resolutions that are taken will be publically announced, both locally and nationally. |
In the last few weeks some politicians and analysts have strongly questioned this “finding”, and they have all the reason to do so, being the article written by the sociologist Salas, one of the most potent ones regarding this subject. Regardless of this, some of the 23 congressmen mentioned have had the nerve to declare that such support from the mining companies would not oblige them to anything, as their trajectory itself would demonstrate.
The multinational Río Tinto Alcan wants to build an aluminium foundry that will consume 1,100 megawatts of energy, 60% of Paraguay’s total requirement (1,900 MW), and wants to negotiate the price to its own advantage. Only 20% of the investment will be used for contracting local companies. For the construction of its facilities Río Tinto needs a special law that will grant it guarantees to mitigate the risks attendant upon the investment and the connection to hydroelectric power sources. The incentive of employment is certainly not lacking: they are talking about fourteen thousand direct jobs.
It has taken the journalist and documentary filmmaker, Constanza Fernandez, 5 years to finish her documentary “Perpetual Banks, the Life Behind the Pascua Lama”, the second part to “Feet of Gold” by the same filmmaker. The contention and self-management, that has characterized the productions regarding this mining conflict, will be released in Santiago at the Women’s Film Festival on March 20th at 17:00 in the Centro Cultural Gabriela Mistral (Ex Diego Portales) in the conference room 2.
Venezuela