When Canadian mining companies operate overseas, their work is overseen by local authorities, not by the Canadian government. Some activists want the federal government to regulate those operations in order to protect Indigenous peoples in those countries.
Guatemala has decreed a state of emergency in El Estor, an eastern town of mainly indigenous people in conflict with a Swiss-owned nickel mine they accuse of polluting their lake.
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The inhabitants of El Estor, a town of mostly indigenous Mayans in eastern Guatemala, are living under a "state of siege", watched over by armed soldiers after their years-long fight against a nickel…
The inhabitants of El Estor, a town of mostly Mayans in eastern Guatemala, are living under a “state of siege,” watched over by armed soldiers after their years-long fight against a nickel mine took an ominous turn.
El Estor’s subsistence fishers, mainly of the Mayan Q’eqchi’ community, say that the Fenix mine is polluting Lake Izabal, diminishing stocks of fish that were abundant just a generation ago.
The mine’s owners deny the allegation, saying that adequate environmental protections are in place.
Frustrated, residents mounted a protest against the mine on Sunday that was put down by security forces using tear gas.
The confrontation left