Peltier Tribunal begins today, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2013, on Oneida land in Wisconsin

Peltier Tribunal begins today, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2013, on Oneida land in Wisconsin
By Brenda Norrell

GREEN BAY, Wisconsin -- The Leonard Peltier Tribunal on the Abuse of Indigenous Peoples Rights begins today in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Lakotas will begin the testimony this morning at the Radisson Conference Center, on Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2013.

The Tribunal, available on Earthcycles livestream, begins with testimony by William Means, Lakota and founder of the International Indian Treaty Council.

"Black Hills, from Creation to Annexation to Reclamation," begins the Tribunal. Means is scheduled to speak with Charlotte Black Elk, Oglala Lakota activist and scholar, and Leonard Crow Dog, Lakota spiritual leader.

Speakers this morning on the Wounded Knee Massacre include Edgar Bear Runner. "Wounded Knee 1973" speakers include Dennis Banks, Clyde Bellecourt, Madonna Thunder Hawk and Larry Leventhal.

The US versus Leonard Peltier, and Peltier's incarceration, trials and appeals, will be discussed during the three day Tribunal before a panel of human rights judges on Oneida Indian land here in Green Bay, Oct. 2 --4.

Tribunal issues will cover a wide range of human rights violation in Indian country, including the Cold War genocide of uranium mining on Indian lands, where radioactive contamination remains on Pueblo, Navajo, and other lands across Indian country.

The theft of American Indian children by the current US foster system and the historic genocide and abuse of Indian children in boarding schools will be exposed by longtime American Indian Movement activists.

The toxic genocide in Indian country, from radioactive dumping targeting Western Shoshone lands, to the dirty coal fired power plants on the Navajo Nation, will also be exposed.

Lenny Foster, Navajo, was among the first to arrive for the Tribunal and will discuss the violations of Native American spiritual rights in US prisons.  Foster is the program supervisor for the Navajo Nation Corrections Project in Window Rock, Arizona. Foster, who has given support to Peltier in prison, has been a volunteer traditional spiritual advisor for American Indian adults and juveniles in the state and federal prisons for more than 30 years.

 Peltier said:

 "The goal of our Tribunal is to document our many struggles with the U.S. government. The government was involved in outlawing every freedom we valued, from the way we talked to the Creator with our ceremonies to the way we parented our children. Don’t ever forget the spiritual, emotional, physical and mental damage that came from ripping Native children as young as 3 and 4 years old from the arms of their parents and putting them into the hands of cold, hard matrons in the boarding schools. Men who normally provided for their families by fishing and hunting found themselves on the wrong side of the law and hunger became common. Acres and acres of beautiful gardens in Native homelands were destroyed for the harvest of uranium flowing through the veins of our Sacred mother earth." See Peltier statement.

The Tribunal is sponsored by Dorothy Ninham and Wind Chases the Sun.

Read more, watch the livestream, and follow live coverage at Censored News: http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/10/peltier-tribunal-live-oct-2-4-2013.html