#NuclearColonialism v. #RedPower
"The world has no shortage of #PoliticalPrisoners – or of environmental martyrs and heroes– but 80-year-old #LeonardPeltier, a #Lakota and #Anishinaabe AIM member, is arguably the most famous, the legal lynching he underwent so outrageous, and his incarceration in a 'maximum security' prison so protracted. Even former FBI agents have themselves essentially contended that Pelter was scapegoated by the FBI for the lethal shooting of two agents–Jack Coler and Ronald Williams– on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Michael Apted’s 1992 documentary Incident at Oglala, narrated by Robert Redford, is a good place to start if you’re new to this history. But if you’re looking for insights into the role that #UraniumMining played in the conflict, you’d be better off checking out #PeterMatthiessen’s book #InTheSpiritOfCrazyHorse: Leonard Peltier and the #FBI’s War on The #AmericanIndian ovement. To hear a first-hand account, check out Peltier’s memoir #PrisonWritings: My Life Is My Sun Dance.
"Despite well-documented prosecutorial misconduct powerfully depicted in Apted’s documentary, Peltier’s conviction has yet to be overturned. And in the face of decades of global, high-profile pleas for clemency for Peltier, including by James Reynolds, a “senior US attorney who was involved in [his] prosecution,” no president up until now has been willing to free Peltier. Given that he’s in increasingly poor health, time is running out, and the same president who just pardoned his own son may be Peltier’s last shot at clemency. If you haven’t yet done so, check out the Amnesty International petition– and Amy Goodman’s and Denis Moynihan’s recent column–making the case for his release. The Red Nation media collective also has an extensive playlist of podcasts focused on Peltier’s case and the long struggle to free him.
"Peltier, arguably the world’s most visible casualty of nuclear colonialism, was only three years into his sentence when Santee Dakota organizer John Trudell, his contemporary in AIM, delivered a searing 1980 speech at the Black Hills International Survival Gathering. As Zoltan Grossman has documented, 'Multinational mining companies, such as #UnionCarbide and #Exxon, proposed the development of the #BlackHills for energy resources, including #coal mines, #uranium mines, and coal slurry #pipelines.' The Black Hills gathering brought together a global convergence of more than 10,000 Indigenous activists and non-Native allies to hold the line against a repeat of the 1950s, which, per Grossman, had 'result[ed] in the extensive irradiation of the southern Black Hills community of #Edgemont.'"
Read more:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/12/11/tis-the-season-to-talk-climate-collapse-nuclear-colonialism-and-freeing-leonard-peltier/
#FreeLeonardPeltier #ClemencyForLeonardPeltier #ACAB #AmnestyForLeonardPeltier #SilencingDissent #NoUraniumMining
