Photo by Keri Pickett at the Mississippi Headwaters during Line 3 HDD drilling which had frac outs.
September 1, 2021 – Anishinaabe Territory within Minnesota – The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) has taken the extraordinary measure to request a response from the United States regarding allegations of human rights violations against the Anishinaabe associated with the Enbridge Line 3 pipeline construction.
On March 29, 2021, Honor the Earth and Giniw Collective submitted a Request for Early Warning Measures to CERD as part of an international strategy to elevate the human rights violations perpetuated by the U.S. and the state of Minnesota as to construction of the Enbridge Line 3 pipeline. This petition requested immediate intervention from CERD and detailed the continuing violations of Indigenous Peoples’ rights, including the right to free, prior, and informed consent; the right to health; the right to culture; and the right to security and to be free from violence.
HAUT-COMMISSARIAT AUX DROITS DE L’HOMME • OFFICE OF THE HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS PALAIS DES NATIONS • 1211 GENEVA 10, SWITZERLAND www.ohchr.org • TEL: +41 22 917 9000 • FAX: +41 22 917 9008 • E-MAIL: registry@ohchr.org
REFERENCE: CERD/EWUAP/104th session/2021/CS/ks
On August 31, CERD published a letter to the U.S. Government dated August 25, requesting that the U.S. respond to these allegations. The letter notes, among other things, that these rights violations would amount to a violation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), which the U.S. has signed and ratified.
The letter requests that the U.S. Government provide information on how it guarantees the right to free, prior, and informed consent; prevents adverse impacts of the pipeline on the Anishinaabe and their culture, health, and environment; guarantees the right to an effective remedy to these rights violations; and prevents violence against Indigenous women and excessive force against protestors.
Giving focus to treaty rights violations – a first for CERD in engagements with the U.S. – the Committee also requested that the U.S. “provide details on the status of the treaties concluded between the Anishinaabe indigenous peoples and the Government of the United States of America and on measures adopted to guarantee the respect of the rights of the Anishinaabe under such treaties,” specifically usufructuary rights upheld by the Supreme Court’s ruling in Minnesota v. Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians. CERD asked that the U.S. respond to its query by October 15, 2021.
“We are grateful that the United Nations has responded to our request and recognized the incalculable harms from the Line 3 expansion to the Anishinaabe people, treaty territory and the manoomin wild rice,” said Winona LaDuke, Executive Director of Honor the Earth.
“We hope that the United States takes the CERD inquiry seriously and meets the deadline for the response. Support for Line 3 from the Biden Administration and the State of Minnesota has led to a worsening situation for people, water, land and our sacred wild rice.”
Since the petition was submitted in March, over 600 arrests and citations have been made to those peacefully protesting the expansion (with some reporting as many as 800), there have been increased reports of human rights violations and violence against Indigenous women around Line 3 construction, and a preliminary report from Enbridge shows at least 28 spills during construction, affecting 12 river crossings with leaks of up to 9,000 gallons.
Following a meeting in August with the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, Tara Houska, founder of Giniw Collective, stated, “Enbridge threatens Anishinaabe cultural survival, the drinking water of millions, and the public’s trust. Since the U.S. government is yet again failing Indigenous people and future generations, we turn to the international community. The world is watching.”
“When U.S. policy inadequately considers the rights of Indigenous Peoples, international mechanisms such as the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination are crucial to prevent the devastating impacts that cannot be undone once they occur,” said Kate Finn, Executive Director of First Peoples Worldwide, which filed the petition on behalf of Honor the Earth and Giniw Collective.
“The letter from the Committee plainly articulates the allegations of rights violations attendant to Line 3 and the ways in which the actions of the U.S. Government fail to respect those rights and, in turn, perpetuate racial discrimination.”
Despite support of the Line 3 project by the Administration and recent affirmation of permits from Minnesota courts, the White Earth Band of Ojibwe is moving forward a rights of nature lawsuit to protect the sacred manoomin wild rice.
“The construction of these pipelines is threatening to burn our wild rice and to destroy our delicate wetlands as we speak. This is our land. We have no place to move,” wrote LaDuke in The Hill.
“The new Line 3 pipeline… is going to carry three times more oil than its predecessor. While called a replacement, it’s really a new line, torn through the heart of the Anishinaabe territory that was designated in the 1855 treaty, lands protected by the Supreme Court and by U.S. government agreements with our ancestors. Despite this protection, our rivers and rice face a potential threat by the construction of Enbridge Line 3.”
September 3, 2021
Press Contact: Cassidy DiPaola, cassidy@stgresults.com, 401-441-7196
In Case You Missed It: Indigenous, Environmental and Community Leaders Call on U.S to Respond to UN Letter About Human Rights Abuses of Indigenous People and Line 3
“We believe that good nations should uphold their treaties and good countries should not wage war on Indigenous peoples.”
*LISTEN TO CALL HERE*
(Washington, DC) -- Today, Friday, September 3rd, Winona LaDuke, Tara Houska and Kate Finn hosted a press call in response to the recent letter sent from the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) to the United States regarding allegations of human rights violations against the Anishinaabe associated with the Enbridge Line 3 pipeline construction.
[LISTEN TO THE FULL CALL HERE]
On August 31, CERD published a letter to the U.S. Government dated August 25, requesting that the U.S. respond to these allegations. The letter notes, among other things, that these rights violations would amount to a violation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), which the U.S. has signed and ratified.
The letter requests that the U.S. Government provide information on how it guarantees the right to free, prior, and informed consent; prevents adverse impacts of the pipeline on the Anishinaabe and their culture, health, and environment; guarantees the right to an effective remedy to these rights violations; and prevents violence against Indigenous women and excessive force against protestors.
In addition to this event, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) and Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) will visit with Indigenous leaders at the construction site of Line 3 to discuss the impacts of the oil pipeline on their community.
On Friday, September 3, the Congresswomen will participate in a press conference in Minneapolis to discuss the purpose of the visit to Line 3. On Saturday, September 4, the Congresswomen and tribal leaders will participate in a roundtable to discuss treaty violations and the lack of tribal consent. Later, they will visit the Mississippi Headwaters and hear from Indigenous leaders on the impact the pipeline will have on their land and the environment.
Events will be livestreamed in various places including Rep. Omar’s official Twitter and Facebook pages.
The following are portions of the speakers’ statements from today’s call:
Tara Houska, Founder of the Giniw Collective
“Governor Walz and President Biden have said nothing as unarmed, non-violent water protectors have been hit with rubber bullets, mace, and been subjected to so-called “pain compliance” in the past month. I’m one of those water protectors. As I sit with scars caused by rubber bullets paid for by a tar sands company called Enbridge and my friends tend to potentially permanent facial paralysis, elected officials continue to tout themselves as climate leaders. You can’t allow one of the largest tar sands infrastructure projects in North America through Indigenous lands and the Mississippi River headwaters and be a climate leader. Their silence is appalling. Stop Line 3, now.”
Winona La Duke, Executive Director, Honor the Earth
“What we have seen over the past seven years is the Enbridge corporation, with the cooperation of the Canadian and now the United States government, succeeding in violating our rights consistently; not only to free prior and informed consent, but also our human rights in terms of sex trafficking, violations of our rights in terms of police brutality and injuries that have occurred as rubber bullets have been shot at our people by Minnesota law enforcement and paid for by Enbridge. We've seen the destruction of our rivers, we've had 28 frac-outs which have burned our wild rice and our rivers, and we've had 5 billion gallons of water taken from our people, in a time of the worst drought in the history of Minnesota.
Here we have a Canadian multinational corporation that is not only a climate criminal in a time of climate chaos, but a corporation and a country which is now promoting violence against Indigenous peoples, a total denial of our rights to continue food security, existence, environmental eco-side damage, and certainly the violation of treaty rights and all agreements under our laws and and under international laws.
We are grateful that the United Nations is asking questions to the United States and we believe that good nations should uphold their treaties and good countries should not wage war on Indigenous peoples.”
Kate R. Finn, Esq., Executive Director, First Peoples Worldwide, University of Colorado
“Now that the United Nations committee has responded to the petitions sent by Honor the Earth and the Giniw Collective, the United States is in a position to respond. These kinds of petitions and requests are sent to the UN all of the time, and the committee doesn't often have the opportunity to respond to all of them, but it responded here.
It responded here and plainly stated a number of the human rights concerns including the failure to consult with the Anishinaabe people, the failure to secure free prior and informed consent, and the ways that there are adverse impacts of the pipeline to culture, health, and environment. Should none of these allegations be taken seriously or be responded to seriously, they could amount to violation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of racial discrimination.”
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