A high court in Guatemala has ruled against HudBay Minerals, a partner with Aquila Resources on the Back Forty open pit gold-zinc metallic sulfide mine, in Menominee County, Michigan. The company was charged for burning the local community out of their homes and may soon be charged for the murder of a local schoolteacher and for gang-raping local women.
According to Mines and Communities:
Guatemala’s highest court has made a precedent-setting decision in favor of a small Maya Q’eqchi’ indigenous community of Agua Caliente in Izabal province, by recognising their right to land that is occupied by Canada’s HudBay mining company.
Since 2004, when nickel mining was revived in eastern Guatemala, there has been a series of brutal forced evictions and other human rights violations (including killings and gang rapes).
HudBay Minerals also faces charges, in Canadian courts, related to the 2009 killing of Adolfo Ich (a Mayan Qeqchi community leader), and the 2007 gang rape of 11 Mayan Qeqchi women from the Lote 8 community (as part of an illegal, brutal forced eviction). See: Victims of gang-rape in Guatemala sue Canadian mining company
Until now, the land claims have been denied by the governments of Guatemala and Canada, and by a succession of nickel mining companies, including INCO, Skye Resources as well as HudBay Minerals.
Now that this company has been told it doesn’t have mining rights over the Mayan Qeqchi community of Lote 9 (Agua Caliente), it is highly likely that all the other Maya Qeqchi communities in the region will enjoy valid prior claims to their territories.
LSMN
Eve Divine
doncorvette
