Destruction of Country

The planned closure of more than 100 of WA's remote communities will have severe consequences, the Premier Colin Barnett said, but added his hands were tied. Barnett said this after a backlash was sparked in some of the First Nations communities, with elders leading a protest outside state parliament over the plans. His talk of high rates of suicide, poor education, poor health, no jobs are references to the economic, social and health issues that he will use as a tool to dump people on the streets. [node:read-more:link]

Be careful what you pray for. By proposing to strip away protection for Aboriginal people's heritage across the board, and throughout the State, the Barnett Government appears to have unwittingly conjured up a strong, united and angry Aboriginal coalition which is now mobilising against the AHA amendments.

Written Dr Stephen Bennetts, who is a consultant anthropologist that has worked with Aboriginal people in Northern Australia since 1994. [node:read-more:link]

Ancient rock paintings, standing stones and scattered artefacts had once been protected by their remote location, but mining activity that ramped up in the early 1960s had triggered "fears for the safety of sites of importance". Today the landscapes of the Pilbara and Kimberley regions are being extensively reconfigured in the era of GPS, aerial exploration and fly-in, fly-out workforces. Evidence of Aboriginal occupation is still scattered across those landscapes, lying in the path of planned roads, railways and mines. One mining tenement can hold thousands of such artefacts. The only plan the gov't has is to water down existing legislation. [node:read-more:link]

The men at the forefront of the Aboriginal tent embassy at Airds are frustrated their site was valdalised on Saturday night. Tents were torn in half and banners were burnt when the site was unattended for just one hour on Saturday when the incident occurred.

The tent embassy was established local indigenous men to highlight their concerns over the protection of land and wildlife in Airds as part of the Airds Bradbury Renewal Project. [node:read-more:link]

Many people in Australia are in the hunt for millions of dollars as the government searches for a place to dump 14 tonnes of nuclear waste, just for starters

The waste the government is 'talking up' will be returned to Australia by the end of next year following treatment in France and the UK.

It has been reported that some First Nations people in the NT are squabbling over hosting the nuclear waste in their land. [node:read-more:link]