THE HUMANIST MOVEMENT RESOLUTION
 SUPPORTING THE DINEH (NAVAJO) 
 AMERICAN INDIANS 

 

The Humanist Movement places the human being as the highest value 

and is committed to preserve and protect all people, their families

and descendants, their traditional cultures and systems of belief as a right.

Therefore, we:

 

 

SUPPORT the protection and preservation of the human rights of the Dineh

People, including their civil and political rights, their health, safety,

welfare, livelihood and preservation of their cultural values, traditional

forms of self-government, and their natural resources;

 

 

CALL FOR the enforcement of all rights embodied in Indian treaties and

agreements with the United States, and all other rights to which they are

entitled under the Constitution of the United States;

 

 

CONDEMN the forced eviction of the Dineh (Navajo) people living in 45

resisting communities in the Black Mesa region of northeastern Arizona

commenced by the US government to clear the region for expansion of the

worldís largest coal mine, which has resulted in the displacement of over

12,000 Dineh with thousands dead and thousands more homeless;

 

 

DENOUNCE the violations of the religious rights of the Dineh People. The

Dineh matriarchs and People have submitted testimonies to the United

Nations detailing desecration and destruction of sacred sites, shrines and

ceremonial hogans - homes that have been bulldozed - and religious

ceremonies violated. They are required to obtain highly restrictive

permits to conduct religious ceremonies done on a daily basis and to

dismantle ceremonial arbors needed to return to the earth. They are denied

the right to bury their dead;

 

 

DEPLORE the denial of all services including access to water. Their water

wells have been fenced off, capped off and dismantled while Peabody Coal

Company pumps 1.4 billion gallons of pristine water, from a sole source

aquifer each year, and surface springs and washes run dry;

 

 

DEPLORE the denial of the right to housing and to repair their homes which

has been denied for 31 years, and the maintenance of dirt roads that school

buses travel on.

THE HUMANIST MOVEMENT RESOLUTION

SUPPORTING THE DINEH (NAVAJO) AMERICAN INDIANS

 

 

Because the Dineh people have exhausted all remedies available in the US

legal system; the prime site for relocation, the "New Lands", is

contaminated from the Rio Puerco uranium spill in 1979 - the largest

radioactive spill in US history - and is not fit for people and future

generations to live there; we:

 

DEMAND the establishment of a committee to investigate gross and systematic

violations of the Dineh peoples' human, civil, constitutional and religious

rights, and the suffering they have endured to protect and remain on their

ancestral lands. We demand enforcement of all international laws

protecting Indigenous people and their rights to their land and that this

matter receive the urgent attention of the United Nations, specifically the

Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of

Minorities, the Commission on Human Rights, the Commission on the Status of

Women, the Commission on Sustainable Development and all international forums;

 

DEMAND a moratorium on evictions, threats of eviction and the bulldozing of

homes, ceremonial hogans, sacred sites and shrines. The moratorium must

include bans on livestock confiscation and other methods used by local

administrations to harass and intimidate the Dineh;

 

DEMAND the return of all those displaced both internally and externally

living in the New Lands, border towns and homeless.

 

The Dineh people should be honored and respected. Their teachings about

living as caretakers of the Earth provides a unique insight and should be

an inspiration to all as we strive to protect our global ecosystem. By

sanctioning the destruction of these Indigenous communities, the government

impoverishes itself and compromises the civil rights of all its citizens.

The Dineh People should be protected as living treasures and their land

designated a national heritage site.

 

Resolved by the Membership of the Humanist Movement

January 1998

 

 

E. Anthony Marquez

The Humanist Movement, Council K, New York City

Humanist Neighborhood Center, 210 West 83rd Street, Lower Level, NYC, NY 10024

The Humanist Movement is an international, all volunteer, multi-cultural

network of organizations that develops grass-roots activities in over 300

cities in 76 countires around the world. The aim of the Humanist Movment

is to apply in practice, at the neighborhood and city levels, the ideas and

propositions of Universal Humanism, promoting active non-violence and

non-discrimination in front of fanatacism and violence.

 

NGOs