1 01:00:38:01
For this post right here,
2 01:00:40:25
For this they're going to take my life.
3 01:00:42:21
For this!
4 01:00:43:22
They just about cut my head off.
5 01:00:46:23
But they couldn't cut it off
because her head was like this.
6 01:00:50:26
I said 'Stop!'
7 01:00:52:15
He thought he could cut with the machete like this,
but her head was in the way.
8 01:00:57:04
[You are not afraid?]
9 01:00:58:16
Why would I be afraid?
10 01:01:01:10
If they want to come and mess with me?
11 01:01:03:21
I'll smack 'em.
12 01:01:05:05
I'll hit them.
13 01:01:06:23
My land is mine.
14 01:01:08:09
[You would fight for your land?]
15 01:01:09:28
Of course I would.
16 01:01:11:06
Because my land...
17 01:01:13:01
I could never leave my land.
18 01:01:22:29
What's this worth right now?
19 01:01:24:18
That's worth a little over two million dollars.
20 01:01:27:01
-Two million dollars.
-Right.
21 01:01:28:17
-Can I touch it?
-Certainly.
22 01:01:30:00
Ah, this is really nice.
So heavy.
23 01:01:38:27
The last few years have made people more worried
about the potential of a major crisis,
24 01:01:43:06
then they have gold as a protection.
25 01:01:44:29
The stock market has just closed,
there has been a massive sell-off.
26 01:01:49:08
Wall Street hasn't seen two days this bad...
27 01:01:52:01
This has been a global bloodbath.
28 01:01:54:15
Our urgent mission has to be
getting this economy growing faster...
29 01:01:58:11
Natural disasters, recession, depression, you name it.
30 01:02:01:21
Things like buying gold, to me,
seem like common sense.
31 01:02:07:24
There's a movement brewing in America today
that seeks to restore the gold-backed dollar.
32 01:02:11:27
Gold is selling at a record high price.
33 01:02:13:24
Gold could soar to $1,000 an ounce.
34 01:02:16:04
Gold prices jumped to the highest in nearly 11 weeks.
35 01:02:19:03
Now is the time to root through
your coin collections and jewelry boxes.
36 01:02:22:18
They want everybody to get so scared
they run to a cave with gold.
37 01:02:25:16
They want people to be as afraid as they are.
38 01:02:31:10
Gold keeps going up and up, driven by a sense that the world
is out of whack and gold can somehow keep us safe.
39 01:02:38:06
The price of gold set a brand new record this week,
$1500 an ounce.
40 01:02:42:12
Thousands of miners are joining an Amazon gold rush...
41 01:02:44:24
The destructive lure of gold...
42 01:02:46:26
The poorest of the poor throughout West Africa
are rushing to primitive gold pits...
43 01:02:51:16
Attention is turning us to who will be next
to be swept up in mining fever.
44 01:04:17:27
-Want some?
-Yep.
45 01:04:27:07
The company got its tentacles into San Miguel
in the late '90s before people even knew what was going on.
46 01:04:33:25
People are coming from around the country,
sort of community to community exchanges and seeing the mine,
47 01:04:38:13
they're reading about the harms, and they're saying,
"We don't want this in our communities."
48 01:05:43:17
I'm standing in front of
Goldcorp's Marlin Mine,
49 01:05:46:16
and this is one of the first areas where
they started the open-pit mining.
50 01:05:50:09
And they're still di--as you can see, they're still digging
even deeper down into what used to be a mountain.
51 01:06:01:13
What color do you prefer?
52 01:06:11:27
Thanks.
53 01:06:13:07
They're wasting our time, I told her.
54 01:06:15:26
It wastes our time instead of
doing other things that benefit the fight.
55 01:06:19:16
We're dedicating time to these little problems
between us.
56 01:06:22:04
No. Forget about them.
57 01:06:24:14
Yes, they are real and we should discuss them.
[Right.]
58 01:06:26:28
But that's between us.
59 01:06:28:14
The underlying problem
is this economic model.
60 01:06:31:13
The underlying problem is the government.
The underlying problem is the company.
61 01:06:35:25
We're in the small village of Agel,
and we're going to the home of Gregoria Perez.
62 01:06:43:06
It's Gregoria Perez, verdad?
63 01:06:45:18
Gregoria Crisanta Perez.
64 01:06:47:29
She's one of the women in the community of Agel
that has most spoke out with dignity
65 01:06:52:20
and consistently about all the harms
and violations being caused by the mining.
66 01:06:58:09
And she's suffered a lot of sort of direct
and indirect repression because of her dignified stance.
67 01:07:07:21
The miners eat thanks to our gold.
68 01:07:10:18
We eat thanks to our land.
69 01:07:14:00
We depend on corn, beans
and what Mother Earth provides.
70 01:07:21:27
I've been affected by the mining company.
71 01:07:25:07
We are witnesses to what has happened.
72 01:07:30:07
Our wells and springs have dried up
73 01:07:33:21
because of the drilling and the tunnel
74 01:07:36:17
and because they use the water to wash the gold.
75 01:08:05:09
We're in resistance here in San Miguel.
76 01:08:09:23
For many reasons.
77 01:08:11:24
We're fighting in defense of our land.
78 01:08:14:04
In defense of water.
79 01:08:16:05
In defense of health.
80 01:08:20:13
And this is why the company has
denounced us so much.
81 01:08:29:10
She wants candy.
82 01:08:30:21
She asked me for a little cookie.
83 01:08:33:11
I have 7 children.
84 01:08:35:18
I am 41 years old.
85 01:08:38:23
I'm married.
86 01:08:41:22
He's my husband.
87 01:08:46:01
We've been married for 20 years.
88 01:08:50:06
[Do you work?]
89 01:08:51:16
I work here. [In your house?]
Yes.
90 01:08:54:08
[So you have seven jobs?]
91 01:08:56:23
[And this is one.] Yes.
92 01:09:02:16
I'd like to tell you my whole story.
93 01:09:05:05
But I think the whole world knows my story.
94 01:09:16:23
These are the electric lines for the company.
95 01:09:21:18
When I came to see that they
had put up these posts in my land
96 01:09:26:00
I was enraged
97 01:09:29:00
because I hadn't given them permission.
98 01:09:33:15
We have a custom.
99 01:09:35:07
What one says and only that. Right?
100 01:09:38:19
But there, they took advantage.
101 01:09:41:14
I didn't want money, I didn't want anything.
102 01:09:43:25
What I wanted was for them to
take the posts out. Nothing more.
103 01:09:47:14
We just tied up one of the strings and
threw it over the cable
104 01:09:51:12
and with that we shut off the power.
105 01:09:54:13
And after we cut off the electricity,
106 01:09:57:17
the company sent the police.
107 01:10:22:10
We're planning right now
on exploiting this area.
108 01:10:26:16
And we transport the mineral
on a road for heavy machinery.
109 01:10:31:10
We have opportunities to expand
110 01:10:36:20
in almost every direction.
111 01:10:39:24
There won't be any problem with that.
112 01:10:43:26
You will be the miners.
113 01:10:46:18
You, the community members,
will be the ones who work in the mines.
114 01:10:52:02
So, the development of the mine
is going to bring development to you.
115 01:11:06:21
Do you want the mine here?
116 01:11:08:14
No.
117 01:11:09:22
It will bring much sickness.
118 01:11:11:20
We don't want the mine here.
119 01:11:14:21
But why not?
120 01:11:16:09
Because the mine brings destruction everywhere.
121 01:11:40:19
In our worldview,
122 01:11:43:18
this practice of creating an economy,
of making money, is completely illogical.
123 01:11:50:08
It's illogical because it destroys nature.
124 01:11:53:06
If you destroy nature,
you basically destroy the person's soul.
125 01:11:58:12
and what follows is basically that
the person's life is destroyed.
126 01:12:01:28
We are very close to nature.
It means a great deal to us.
127 01:12:08:00
We are part of the whole.
128 01:12:20:12
The conflict witnessed in the highlands
started when the Montana Mining Company
129 01:12:26:00
attempted to transport an enormous metal cylinder
to San Marcos via the Pan American Highway.
130 01:12:37:22
These are some of the scenes from what happened
yesterday in the west of the country.
131 01:12:42:00
When about 1000 police officers
and 300 members of the army
132 01:12:46:26
confronted hundreds of farmers from
various villages in the region.
133 01:12:51:01
It is reminiscent of the
armed internal conflict in the 1980s.
134 01:13:09:12
I mean, Central America has had a--has gone through real horrors
in the last decades, but Guatemala was the worst of them.
135 01:13:19:14
Hundreds of thousands of people
were murdered and disappeared.
136 01:13:24:13
A million of them were displaced from their homes.
137 01:13:26:26
How do they stand up against a modern army?
138 01:13:30:06
A hundred thousand of them died in 1982,
the year that General Rios Montt
139 01:13:34:19
mounted a scorched earth policy
and really devastated hundreds of Mayan villages.
140 01:13:40:29
We are in a war.
141 01:13:42:10
We have been saying that...
142 01:13:45:24
Guatemala is marvelous!
143 01:13:47:10
But we need a change.
144 01:13:49:28
and the change consists precisely of...
145 01:13:53:09
imposing your will over others.
146 01:13:56:21
Reagan was praising the worst killer as a--
in the most effusive terms. Rios Montt.
147 01:14:04:11
Rios Montt had close ties to the United States,
who gave him aid to fight against the guerillas.
148 01:14:09:04
The wounds that were inflicted by that conflict have continued
to fester, clearly, and that has contributed to the current situation.
149 01:14:16:19
The repression of any type of economic change
really created the kind of poison politics that they have now.
150 01:14:23:22
There's links to the mining story here
because our mining companies dealt with these parties.
151 01:14:27:17
You can't say they're responsible for the Rios Montt slaughter,
but they're benefitting from the structures
152 01:14:34:08
that were left in place after those many years
of savagery and violence and repression.
153 01:14:59:20
Hey, you been behaving yourself?
154 01:15:03:12
Yes, I've been resting.
155 01:15:08:21
We're in the municipality of San Miguel Ixtahuacán
here in the aldea of Maquivil,
156 01:15:14:10
which is just sort of on top of where the Goldcorp mine is.
157 01:15:18:07
And so we're gonna follow the road down by the mine
and visit with a woman named Diodora Hernandez.
158 01:15:25:00
Doña Diodora
159 01:15:28:21
certainly has legitimacy.
160 01:15:31:21
Well, first of all in
defense of her rights.
161 01:15:34:20
What she is defending is her land.
162 01:15:37:05
She has refused to sell her plot of land to Goldcorp because
they were hoping to expand their mine through her plot of land.
163 01:15:48:02
Doña Diodora is a woman of great courage.
164 01:15:54:03
Yes.
165 01:16:15:10
Some nights we eat beans, some nights meat.
166 01:16:17:29
Look what's down behind you!
167 01:16:21:19
Sometimes we grill a pig, she says.
168 01:16:26:15
Look at the pig.
We have a bunch of pigs over there.
169 01:16:30:02
[How many pigs do you have?]
Five.
170 01:16:33:04
[And what are they called?
What are their names?]
171 01:16:35:22
Pig.
172 01:16:37:01
They don't have names.
173 01:16:38:09
Fernando?
174 01:16:40:02
Rigoberto? No?
175 01:16:43:17
This pig's name is Grahame.
176 01:16:51:24
[How long have you been with Diodora?]
177 01:16:54:21
About 35 years now.
178 01:16:56:25
[of marriage?]
Yes.
179 01:16:59:12
[You've never worked in the mine?]
180 01:17:00:27
No, I never worked a day in the mine...
181 01:17:06:12
[Why didn't you work in the mine?
Didn't they offer you a job?]
182 01:17:10:12
No.
183 01:17:11:24
No, because we didn't want to get in
with the miners because...
184 01:17:18:06
these people are destroying
everyone's health around here.
185 01:17:23:27
I'm involved with the fight,
so is my husband.
186 01:17:27:12
He says, "It's great that we fight,
but how do we get them to leave?"
187 01:17:32:19
I ask God for them to leave.
188 01:17:35:27
I want it to be left in peace.
189 01:17:39:29
My granddaughter is used to being with me.
190 01:17:47:27
I cry when I think about her life.
191 01:17:54:09
What would have happened to her
if they had killed me?
192 01:18:20:21
Hello, and welcome to Face to Face.
193 01:18:23:01
Today we're going to be talking
about the issue of mining.
194 01:18:26:07
We're talking with Grahame Russell
of the group Rights Action.
195 01:18:30:24
Well, thanks for having me in.
196 01:18:32:04
What I've been doing with Rights Action
for the last 16 years is two main things.
197 01:18:35:12
One is we are a direct funder of grassroots struggles
in these countries, environmental defense struggles,
198 01:18:41:16
and then the second thing we do
is we focus a lot of attention
199 01:18:43:23
on how Canada or the United States
are often part of the problem in Central America.
200 01:18:48:25
So, but here's the plan. Today I may or may not have to go pick
up Lucas and drive him, after soccer, home to his mom's.
201 01:18:55:13
That's it, he's still with his mom.
202 01:18:57:15
He's on the JV team, but did get invited up
to join the varsity team for the year-end tournament.
203 01:19:27:17
No...
204 01:19:32:13
Health coverage, lapsed.
205 01:19:36:11
Hope nothing happens today.
206 01:19:39:01
Raul, it's Grahame.
207 01:19:42:17
I'm calling to say hi and also we've gotten
$4,000 of support for German.
208 01:19:51:18
[Thanks for calling me.]
OK, talk to you soon.
209 01:19:56:06
[Best wishes.]
You too.
210 01:19:59:10
Well, this is the guy, Raul, I was talking with on the phone.
211 01:20:01:18
Yeah, he took a bullet in his neck
when the van they were all traveling in
212 01:20:04:17
and the community leaders were shot up by machine gun men
at three in the morning.
213 01:20:08:29
Highly likely linked to their work in defense
of indigenous rights in their communities.
214 01:20:13:11
So this is just another mining-related struggle
we're involved with.
215 01:20:46:11
As opposed to saying, educating on a trip like this,
"We're here to learn about Guatemala's problems,"
216 01:20:51:29
this becomes a trip where we're learning, actually,
about how Canada and the United States,
217 01:20:57:07
historically and on an ongoing basis today,
these are parts of our problems.
218 01:21:02:03
They decided before construction that they would build
their dike there, so they basically closed off a valley.
219 01:21:07:29
There's housing for the mine workers,
some of the process plant's there,
220 01:21:11:22
some of it's hidden behind that hill over there,
and then there's a whole complicated processing plant.
221 01:21:18:06
The gold here, it's a very low concentration.
222 01:21:20:28
You know, you're probably holding gold
when you pick up this earth right here.
223 01:21:25:09
This is the cheapest form
of gold mining,
224 01:21:27:12
it's the most destructive
because you're getting one gram of gold for one tonne.
225 01:21:31:04
Some of the estimates
are one gram of gold for seven tonnes.
226 01:21:33:27
And because of the cost of gold internationally,
and because of the low cost of the mining operation,
227 01:21:37:26
it's worth their while to just clear-cut
the whole freakin' mountain.
228 01:21:41:03
They have an endless mine in sight.
229 01:21:43:00
There's no doubt that the gold is as far as the eye can see.
230 01:21:47:05
Two of the big gold guns are teaming up.
231 01:21:49:18
Goldcorp has announced an 8.6 billion dollar
U.S. friendly takeover of Glamis Gold.
232 01:21:55:00
And it'll be the lowest cost, fastest growing,
unhitched gold mining company in the world.
233 01:21:59:07
The Goldcorp/Glamis combination would pump out
about three million ounces of gold a year,
234 01:22:04:05
making it the fifth biggest producer in the world.
235 01:22:06:24
And in terms of market cap,
it would rank number three.
236 01:22:09:23
We just reported earnings that were up 72% year-on-year
while we saw the gold price go up 30%,
237 01:22:16:04
so very pleased with that exposure
that we provide to gold.
238 01:22:20:13
Do you have a production of where gold goes
from for the next, let's say, year?
239 01:22:23:26
I would say it could certainly get to $2,000.
240 01:22:26:14
$2,000 an ounce.
241 01:22:28:02
And there are 400 ounces in these gold bars.
242 01:22:30:28
I'm just gonna tilt it, they're probably--you know what?
It's almost too heavy to tilt.
243 01:22:34:11
-How much does this weigh?
-About 35 pounds.
244 01:22:37:21
It's too heavy.
245 01:22:50:21
Gold, it's the world's most precious metal,
246 01:22:53:28
and no one in the world is more passionate
about mining it than Goldcorp.
247 01:23:01:16
Goldcorp is one of the world's
largest gold companies,
248 01:23:04:21
operating some of the most successful
mining operations in the world.
249 01:23:08:13
We want justice, investors divest!
250 01:23:11:00
We want justice, investors divest!
251 01:23:14:24
The people of Guatemala are here today to demand Goldcorp
to clean up their mess, to get out of Guatemala.
252 01:23:20:14
You're poisoning our children, our family,
our future generations.
253 01:23:23:28
We don't need your economic support,
we do just fine without your resources.
254 01:23:27:26
We do just fine living off our land!
255 01:23:39:25
Oh, yeah, you're the guys who lie about Goldcorp, yeah.
256 01:23:42:14
-Oh, actually, I mean--
-I've done a lot of research.
257 01:23:44:19
Feel free to confront me on any lies.
258 01:23:46:17
Who are receiving death threats and attacks
for the work that they're doing.
259 01:23:49:05
And they shouldn't, unquestionably
shouldn't be receiving death threats and attacks.
260 01:23:51:15
and they certainly aren't from Goldcorp.
261 01:23:53:06
You know what, if you guys would learn
what's really going on, you could help them more.
262 01:24:09:04
They put them in at noon.
263 01:24:11:09
They also put them in at midnight.
264 01:24:14:11
And sometimes in the afternoons
at five in the afternoon.
265 01:24:17:28
They put in the explosives.
266 01:24:21:21
When the company starts the explosions then...
267 01:24:29:05
The ground starts to shake.
It feels like an earthquake.
268 01:24:35:19
It starts like this, small.
269 01:24:41:07
Later it starts to open up.
270 01:24:46:21
The company says that
these are lies that we're saying.
271 01:24:53:10
But these are not lies.
272 01:24:56:15
It's a reality that the houses here are cracking.
273 01:25:16:19
Excuse me, sir. He was talking to me.
274 01:25:20:05
Look, sir, here's what I say.
275 01:25:22:28
You want to talk shit with women. Cut it out.
Say it to me. I'm a man.
276 01:25:32:23
You just have to let this...
277 01:25:36:21
If you all do a good job...
278 01:25:40:07
If Montana leaves, if you get them out.
279 01:25:45:22
It creates jobs.
280 01:25:48:13
It creates jobs.
281 01:25:51:01
You only want to chase away the money.
282 01:25:54:29
And we're the assholes.
No, that doesn't bother me.
283 01:25:59:15
My support isn't for the company.
284 01:26:02:07
My support is for my life.
285 01:26:07:11
So they make good money?
286 01:26:09:29
I want to make money to support my life.
287 01:26:19:19
I think that there are two groups.
288 01:26:22:03
There is one group who says,
289 01:26:23:24
they say, precisely and openly, "no to mining."
290 01:26:27:13
There is another group who says,
291 01:26:29:09
"Yes! The mine is good."
292 01:26:31:12
And there's a lot of divisions in their own communities
'cause some people have jobs in the mine, et cetera.
293 01:26:36:10
Having said all that, the people in San Miguel themselves
are trying to resist by starting to carry out their own consultations.
294 01:26:42:21
Indigenous peoples have engaged in their own processes
of expressing their views about these projects,
295 01:26:51:25
and they have called these processes Consultas de Bueno Fe,
good faith consultations.
296 01:26:57:00
And thus far, uniformly, that view has been in opposition to, uh,
development projects like mines on their territories.
297 01:27:05:17
And the communities aren't saying
the owners of Goldcorp are mean people and evil devils,
298 01:27:10:19
they're just saying, "We don't want your companies here."
299 01:27:30:16
Of 100 Quetzales that come from the mine...
300 01:27:34:05
50 cents stays in San Miguel
301 01:27:37:11
and 50 cents will stop in the hands
of the central government
302 01:27:42:12
and 99 Quetzales is for them.
303 01:27:45:26
Of 100.
304 01:27:47:12
This kind of business is totally
unfair for the community.
305 01:27:53:01
It's a robbery practically.
306 01:27:55:12
But who plays an important role in this robbery?
307 01:27:58:08
It's our government officials. Right?
308 01:28:01:22
The mine has said that it has generated
a lot of development for San Miguel.
309 01:28:06:24
But the truth is that the development
that they have created is an increase in violence.
310 01:28:11:21
There are more than 48 bars in San Miguel.
311 01:28:16:07
There is prostitution here in San Miguel.
Everything.
312 01:28:21:04
So we don't see any development.
313 01:28:23:22
No real change that the mine
has created for this town.
314 01:28:27:19
Big buildings in the communities,
profitable projects,
315 01:28:31:11
and whatever else that could be done
with so much money.
316 01:28:34:04
These things don't really exist.
317 01:28:37:21
It's a lie when they say there's a big change.
318 01:28:40:07
It doesn't exist. There's nothing, really.
319 01:28:45:17
My poor country,
320 01:28:48:00
My poor country, oh, my poor country.
321 01:28:52:03
It's only the few who became rich
with our wealth...
322 01:29:08:16
The economic models that we were bringing into countries like
Guatemala were really about making rich people richer elsewhere.
323 01:29:17:00
You know, to take a step back and look
sort of academically at the Chixoy Dam,
324 01:29:20:20
why it's such a perfectly awful case.
325 01:29:23:21
You start with this community
that's a millennial community,
326 01:29:26:15
indigenous people who have been living in this valley
for at least a thousand years,
327 01:29:30:29
so to have this project dumped
on top of their heads like this
328 01:29:33:20
was just a classic sort of top-down imposition
of a so-called development project.
329 01:29:40:19
Selling development projects that really hugely indebted
countries made profits for the World Bank
330 01:29:48:10
and didn't necessarily deliver a lot
for the poor who maintain those burdens.
331 01:29:53:02
And the World Bank was aware of the violence
being used to displace these people.
332 01:30:02:02
Hello, you listen to me?
333 01:30:03:07
You can not take a picture, okay?
334 01:30:05:07
Why not?
335 01:30:06:14
Why not?
336 01:30:08:09
It's forbidden to take the picture.
337 01:30:10:21
If you are taking by force, I will call police.
338 01:30:13:14
You are listening to me?
339 01:30:14:23
Similar process to what happened with the gold mining story,
there was a complete lack of consultation with the communities,
340 01:30:20:28
they were given no option
as to whether they would need to move or not.
341 01:30:24:15
The whole series of structural rules that were imposed
on Guatemala and many other countries
342 01:30:31:19
through the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank
with leadership from the United States.
343 01:30:37:06
A pattern throughout Guatemala
of large scale development projects,
344 01:30:41:28
mining, hydroelectric dams, and so forth,
within indigenous territories,
345 01:30:47:15
but without, in many cases,
even minimal consultation.
346 01:30:51:02
Well, clearly,
Guatemala is in a desperate economic situation.
347 01:30:55:13
Absolutely right.
348 01:30:57:02
What we're wrong to do is say,
349 01:30:59:08
"Therefore, any kind of economic development
from the outside is going to be a benefit."
350 01:31:05:10
Their only purpose is to extract as much money as possible
to feed in to the global financial system.
351 01:31:15:24
We are part of a geopolitical economic system
that's extremely exploitative.
352 01:31:23:29
I would argue that the legacy of mining is precisely that--
that it has some short-term economic benefit,
353 01:31:29:26
most of those economic benefits accrue into investors, and has
a long-term ecological consequence that is very negative for the--
354 01:31:38:15
for the ongoing development prospects of the region.
355 01:31:43:18
It wouldn't surprise me at all if many of you,
directly or indirectly, are invested in Goldcorp,
356 01:31:49:22
through a pension fund, through a trust fund, through an endowment,
through a little bit of savings you have,
357 01:31:54:10
you're probably invested in Goldcorp and dozens
of mining companies that are operating around the world
358 01:31:59:27
and contributing to harms to one degree or another.
359 01:32:09:06
These two cows came to have a drink here.
360 01:32:12:20
And first this one fell down.
361 01:32:16:17
Meanwhile the other one had a drink
and fell down too.
362 01:32:20:24
I was taking care of that one
and the other one fell here.
363 01:32:24:18
There's always water here.
364 01:32:26:10
But when it rains more comes
out from up by the mine.
365 01:32:33:05
It's an illness called
something like sudden death.
366 01:32:35:25
When they can't go any longer,
they die instantly.
367 01:32:39:28
It's not because they drank the water.
368 01:32:42:25
I'm more than 50 years old.
369 01:32:45:28
But have I ever seen an animal like this?
370 01:32:48:22
Never.
371 01:32:50:10
It's a shame. But I've been a veterinarian
for 40 years.
372 01:32:54:10
I've seen it.
[But on the other side.]
373 01:32:55:28
But it's Guatemala!
374 01:33:07:03
The Marlin Mine has used
millions and millions of liters of water.
375 01:33:11:09
Water that no longer flows now.
376 01:33:12:28
The amount of water that one family uses
in twenty years, or more,
377 01:33:17:22
the mines are blowing through in one hour.
378 01:33:33:28
My livestock died since I
had to come and live here.
379 01:33:38:01
I crossed the wooden bridge
and my animal went to have a drink.
380 01:33:42:04
What happened?
My cow died.
381 01:33:48:04
So they don't have water year-round?
It's dry most of the year.
382 01:33:50:28
She has two calves.
383 01:33:55:14
And there's no water in her taps either.
384 01:34:08:27
There is a clash of cultures
in the way that the Goldcorp uses water
385 01:34:13:07
as just another resource to...
in its extraction processes,
386 01:34:17:12
and to the Mayans
who really regard it as central to life.
387 01:34:20:01
The water is completely dirty, it's contaminated,
and it's no longer fit for humans.
388 01:34:26:06
You say there's no pollution. So where does
the poison go when you're done with it?
389 01:34:31:07
To process the gold?
Where does it go?
390 01:34:34:17
And if it's not contaminated,
we're asking you...
391 01:34:38:05
let's go to the tailings dam
and you have a drink.
392 01:34:41:23
Drink it then!
393 01:34:43:11
She was 3 months old
when these lesions first appeared.
394 01:34:49:14
They say it's not from the pollution,
395 01:34:53:07
but it's from bad hygiene.
396 01:34:55:04
But when we grew up,
we didn't suffer from this disease.
397 01:35:01:06
This company is going to exterminate us,
with all this illness that it's generating.
398 01:35:18:15
A three-part collaboration between
Montana Exploradora, the municipality,
399 01:35:20:13
and the ministry of health.
400 01:35:22:01
The permanent hospital will benefit
the people of San Miguel Ixtahuacán.
401 01:35:26:16
We had a commitment to contribute
402 01:35:29:22
to improving and expanding
health services in the region.
403 01:35:34:21
The only thing they've made is a lot of propaganda.
It's the only thing.
404 01:35:40:18
But over there that's just an empty building...
405 01:35:44:08
The only people who work there are the
same employees from the health center.
406 01:35:50:16
There's no advanced medical care. No medicine.
407 01:35:55:07
Essentially, it's just a building.
408 01:35:57:03
So they built the hospital, took some photos,
and published that...
409 01:36:01:17
in San Miguel there is a health center,
a hospital, care for the sick...
410 01:36:06:03
But there is not.
411 01:36:16:17
One of the easiest duties of corporations is to become
much, much, much more transparent,
412 01:36:22:24
and to actually take process seriously
in a way that isn't simply a public relations game
413 01:36:29:03
or isn't simply designed to manipulate or play the system.
414 01:36:34:07
A CEO of a corporation is not rewarded
for being a good citizen in the world.
415 01:36:39:05
They're not rewarded even for treating their employees well.
416 01:36:42:06
They're rewarded for the bottom line
of the return to the shareholders.
417 01:36:45:20
Whether you are a Goldcorp employee
or shareholder,
418 01:36:48:17
you have a right to know that the company you work for
or invest in conducts their business in an ethical, fair manner.
419 01:36:55:12
Recognizing this, in 2008, Goldcorp agreed to a human rights
impact assessment of the Marlin Mine in Guatemala.
420 01:37:02:29
Goldcorp's new corporate human rights policy puts particular
emphasis on recognizing the rights of indigenous peoples,
421 01:37:10:01
and this policy isn't just words on a page.
422 01:37:12:21
The only lesson becomes, tell everybody let's pat Goldcorp
on the back for having done "the right thing,"
423 01:37:18:29
and now let's just turn away from this
or now let's just trust Goldcorp.
424 01:37:22:28
Then you have a report, like, On Common Ground
that is trying to portray Goldcorp as they are trying to listen.
425 01:37:32:23
I get very upset at those reports.
426 01:37:35:04
The mining industry and other global industries,
they do not want hard binding law,
427 01:37:40:02
so they come up with all of these self-regulating codes,
voluntary codes of conducts.
428 01:37:44:24
And I think they're fundamentally problematic.
429 01:37:47:02
This is all well and good, let me congratulate you,
but look at what it says.
430 01:37:52:01
So much of what, um,
NGOs and communities and individuals have been saying
431 01:37:57:15
have been validated by your own process.
432 01:38:20:25
On behalf of Montana Exploradora and Goldcorp,
433 01:38:25:22
we are committed to being in
San Miguel Ixtahuacán
434 01:38:30:17
with a vision, a long-term vision.
435 01:38:34:19
We feel part of this beautiful municipality.
436 01:38:39:03
We feel like part of the family of
San Miguel Ixtahuacán.
437 01:38:42:27
Today that has been confirmed.
438 01:39:01:14
At first we didn't know
if it was a gold mining company or a mine.
439 01:39:05:13
We didn't know, nobody knew anything.
440 01:39:08:23
The workers said,
we are growing orchids, a flowers company.
441 01:39:15:15
That's what we understood.
442 01:39:19:21
They started to look for me and when they
found me they asked me to sell my land.
443 01:39:27:21
I said no.
444 01:39:30:25
Because I didn't want to sell this land.
I wasn't thinking of selling.
445 01:39:36:05
So when they started working on the road
they were going to open up...
446 01:39:41:10
So it occurred to me that I should go
take a look at my land.
447 01:39:46:23
The machines were working on my land.
448 01:39:49:28
They were making the highway!
449 01:39:52:09
[As if the property was theirs?]
Yes.
450 01:40:19:01
The government isn't supposed to grant licenses
without the consent of the communities.
451 01:40:29:00
And that's what's been violated in San Miguel.
452 01:40:34:26
Before, we were not aware.
But now the people are awake.
453 01:40:42:24
The company got us one by one.
That's how people sold their lands.
454 01:40:48:17
The company wouldn't have
been able to come in.
455 01:40:53:22
We're starting to figure out what's going on.
456 01:41:10:02
No to mining, yes to life!
457 01:41:14:17
Do you think there's a future with Montana?
458 01:41:19:13
NO! Out with Montana!
Out with Montana!
459 01:41:25:16
Montana lied to us from the start
saying that mining was life
460 01:41:30:27
They're dividing up their earnings.
461 01:41:34:21
And in San Miguel...
462 01:41:36:17
the people are dying in San Miguel Ixtahuacán!
463 01:41:42:02
We ask the government to listen.
We are the legitimate owners of our lands!
464 01:41:53:27
Today, fast, white steam ships
travel across the Caribbean.
465 01:41:57:23
The cargo is more valuable
than pirate's gold,
466 01:42:01:09
and officers in trim white uniforms pick up their golden cargos
from a place we call "Bananaland."
467 01:42:13:29
There's no question that the United States
has a long history of intervening in Latin America,
468 01:42:19:22
of fomenting coups and assassinations.
469 01:42:22:12
The CIA has admitted that they were deeply involved
in the overthrow of Arbenz in Guatemala.
470 01:42:27:19
Well, in 1953,
Guatemala passed a major land reform law.
471 01:42:33:09
This was going to have significant effects
throughout all of Central America.
472 01:42:37:14
It was right around that time that they began
to seriously contemplate a covert operation
473 01:42:42:25
directed at overthrowing the government of Guatemala.
474 01:42:46:08
The coup was essentially carried off by the U.S.
475 01:42:49:15
There were major business interests involved.
476 01:42:51:28
The company that was most offended by the reforms
that were taking place was United Fruit Company.
477 01:42:57:18
On the board of United Fruit was John Foster Dulles,
who happened to be our Secretary of State,
478 01:43:04:11
and his brother, Alan Dulles,
was the head of the CIA,
479 01:43:07:28
and so there was a convenient link
for these fears about appropriation of land with the CIA.
480 01:43:15:26
The CIA is not working to protect the American people.
481 01:43:20:22
Its primary function is to protect American corporations.
482 01:43:24:13
The events of recent months and days
add a new and glorious chapter
483 01:43:30:08
to the already great tradition
of the American states.
484 01:43:33:20
The fomenting or carrying on a war in a country,
if it were to do this,
485 01:43:37:13
without any kind of Congressional approval,
486 01:43:39:29
I think would put some real strain on the Constitution.
487 01:43:43:17
We are an imperial nation,
and we basically have been an imperial nation
488 01:43:47:25
throughout most of our history.
489 01:43:49:22
We have to protect our resources, and the way to do it
is with police states that institute harsh repression.
490 01:43:58:09
The U.S. didn't invent that policy;
that's imperial policy.
491 01:44:01:28
...that Guatemala is going to enter a new era in which there will be
prosperity for the people together with liberty for the people.
492 01:44:11:19
I mean, it really shows how small actions undertaken
by the United States can have huge effects over decades
493 01:44:18:25
in the way the history of another country unfolds,
494 01:44:22:09
and for Guatemala,
it's been all unfortunate.
495 01:44:26:03
So now that you've seen where bananas come from
before they reach your table,
496 01:44:30:15
our journey to Bananaland has ended.
497 01:44:33:04
We hope you enjoyed the trip;
we know you like bananas.
498 01:44:50:07
In September 2010, they tried to kidnap me.
499 01:44:53:22
But thank god nothing happened to me.
500 01:44:57:08
This year too.
A company bus, a mine bus,
501 01:45:02:13
that transports the workers for the mine.
502 01:45:06:19
It tried to run me over.
503 01:45:08:20
They have been following me.
504 01:45:11:28
Everything they have done
to the other women here.
505 01:45:15:12
Like our friends, we've gotten the same threats.
506 01:45:21:15
Do you want to just sit here and
wait and see if they talk to us?
507 01:45:25:00
Or do you prefer to leave? Want to go?
508 01:45:29:18
Let's go then.
What do you think?
509 01:45:33:08
How do you feel? It's your van.
[It's not a problem.]
510 01:45:36:02
Should we park here, do you think?
511 01:45:39:02
We are definitely on public property
and they're definitely on to us.
512 01:45:43:09
Well, it's based on the activism because you get targeted
by your neighbors, let alone the company,
513 01:45:47:15
but then what happens is your neighbors start turning on you,
saying, "Because of you, we didn't get money from the company,"
514 01:45:52:25
or "Because of you, this or that or the other thing,"
so it's using poor against poor.
515 01:45:57:15
The whole community is against me right now.
They don't want to see me.
516 01:46:03:04
[The whole community is against you?]
Yes.
517 01:46:07:17
[Why?]
Because they are all working with the miners.
518 01:46:12:07
Gentlemen, I have a question.
519 01:46:15:18
You guys cut out my fence.
520 01:46:17:28
Why did you cut it up? It is my land.
521 01:46:22:17
By me saying that, one of the leaders got up...
522 01:46:26:19
...and he grabbed the machete
and pulled the sheath off of it.
523 01:46:31:29
I hugged my granddaughter.
524 01:46:34:11
Her head was here like this.
525 01:46:38:06
So he thought he was going to
cut my head off with the machete.
526 01:46:41:24
Why would anyone want to kill me?
Why?
527 01:46:45:23
Because of the miners, if not for them...
528 01:46:48:08
I'd be fine, happy, no problems.
529 01:47:04:01
No.
530 01:47:04:25
I'm going to go up right now to the container.
531 01:47:07:24
To talk to the geologist.
532 01:47:11:07
Maybe we can have more time.
A little more time.
533 01:47:14:12
We can't wait.
Because the truth is it's been too long. Too long.
534 01:47:17:15
People are trying to make a living
and we're losing days.
535 01:47:20:24
Right now we're in a time of work.
536 01:47:24:03
Right.
537 01:47:25:29
One thing. Let me go up.
I'm going to go up.
538 01:47:30:09
I will...do you have a telephone?
539 01:47:32:16
I'm not giving you my number.
540 01:47:33:29
I can't have your number. But your name?
So I can...
541 01:47:36:10
Not my name either.
542 01:47:38:05
I'm not interested in you talking to me.
543 01:47:43:02
What they are saying is...
544 01:47:46:12
remove the machines and nothing more.
[Sure.]
545 01:47:49:13
There's nothing more to say. Nothing to discuss.
[Ok.]
546 01:47:53:05
We're being patient.
We're reasonable people. We're adults.
547 01:47:57:20
We understand what you're saying but
this is what we're asking.
548 01:48:03:06
We don't want to talk anymore. We've been patient.
[Sure.]
549 01:48:06:15
I can't do anything more.
550 01:48:13:03
The company has to remove its machinery
from this piece of land.
551 01:48:19:20
This land didn't belong to those who sold it.
Many people are heirs to this land.
552 01:48:28:19
You say the problem is there are many heirs. I want
to see the legal documents to present to the courts.
553 01:48:36:16
We don't have them. Why go to the courts?
The courts have been bought out!
554 01:48:41:20
We don't want to bother anybody.
555 01:48:45:23
However it seems to you,
we've only bought according to the law.
556 01:48:49:26
Nobody was forced to sell to anyone.
557 01:48:53:04
This is how they got the land.
558 01:48:55:16
They blindfolded people's eyes.
559 01:48:58:23
But nobody's going to cover our eyes.
560 01:49:03:08
Men with an oath on their lips
and muscles in their arms,
561 01:49:06:10
but men with greed in their hearts,
562 01:49:08:27
ready to break their backs
to sell their very souls for gold.
563 01:49:13:14
I'm a billionaire!
564 01:49:14:29
I'm a trillionaire!
565 01:49:16:14
I'm a zillionaire!
566 01:49:18:00
I love gold.
567 01:49:20:29
I could get cash for this gold medallion
of me wearin' a gold medallion!
568 01:49:24:16
Price of gold today is, uh, $1580.
569 01:49:28:06
Why is gold worth some twenty bucks an ounce?
570 01:49:30:06
I don't know, because it's scarce.
571 01:49:32:01
I've never understood gold, quite frankly.
572 01:49:34:01
It's this item that isn't all that useful,
but it's valuable because people assign it a value.
573 01:49:38:23
Why is the price of gold so high right now?
574 01:49:41:10
Demand.
575 01:49:42:15
Global demand.
576 01:49:43:20
Do you th--do you think gold is money?
577 01:49:48:01
No.
NEW SUBTITLE
At the end of the day, why gold?
578 01:49:50:26
You know, it's gold because it's gold
because it's gold because it's gold.
579 01:49:53:26
You can't look into this too deeply
or the whole thing just falls apart.
580 01:49:57:14
Gold in itself ain't good for nothin' except makin' jewelry with,
and gold teeth.
581 01:50:00:21
Why should we be mining gold at all?
582 01:50:04:00
We already have huge amounts
of mined gold in the world.
583 01:50:08:16
The value of the only place we have to live,
of the water that we need to survive,
584 01:50:15:03
does not compare to gold.
585 01:50:16:24
I mean, gold--we're not gonna eat gold,
we're not gonna bathe with gold,
586 01:50:21:26
we're not gonna drink gold.
587 01:50:23:23
If you offered me the choice of looking at some 67 foot, uh,
cube of gold, and looking at it all day,
588 01:50:31:25
and the alternative to that was to have
all the farmland of the country...
589 01:50:35:24
For a quick profit, to get a piece of metal to stick in a vault
so we can say we own it,
590 01:50:43:05
we're destroying the very future that we want to--
that we're trying to secure.
591 01:50:48:27
All the litany of harms and violations
to get this gold out of the ground,
592 01:50:53:11
and then you take this gold and you take it home to your country
and you bury it under the ground.
593 01:51:01:07
I was with the crowd in the British Honduras,
where I made my fare back home
594 01:51:04:00
and almost enough over to cure me
of the fever I'd caught.
595 01:51:06:17
Dug in California and Australia,
all over the world practically.
596 01:51:10:09
Yeah, I know what gold does to men's souls.
597 01:51:20:20
We're here only because we think
that there are minerals for the Marlin Mine.
598 01:51:25:13
I don't know if there's anyone here
who has worked in the mine?
599 01:51:28:02
No, nobody works there.
600 01:51:30:14
But if there are no minerals here,
we'll do nothing more and we'll leave.
601 01:51:33:23
At the most it will be fifty days.
And we'll leave. We'll stop.
602 01:51:38:08
We'll leave.
603 01:51:40:17
This water here.
It puts life at risk.
604 01:51:44:26
So there is a violation to the right to life.
605 01:51:49:11
Where are you from?
606 01:51:51:11
[I'm for Chile.]
You're from Chile.
607 01:51:53:04
I'm Guatemalan. I'm originally from here.
I'm M'am.
608 01:51:56:26
I'm originally from these lands.
My grandparents were born here.
609 01:52:02:11
Here we have a representation
of various communities.
610 01:52:05:13
They represent the communities.
611 01:52:08:18
We need to avoid this problem.
612 01:52:12:16
For example, you see here that all of the
people came without weapons.
613 01:52:18:22
Nobody brought arms. But on the other hand
you did come protected.
614 01:52:23:12
I don't know what your fear is?
615 01:52:27:15
All of the authorities who have come here,
616 01:52:30:04
have come on behalf of the company.
617 01:52:32:25
We, as part of the population, nobody has
taken into account our demands and our needs!
618 01:52:39:05
And many times the authorities only come
to intimidate the people!
619 01:52:45:13
For what reason?
620 01:52:48:05
So, our intention is, as part of
the people of San Miguel, to say that...
621 01:52:51:03
get the company out.
622 01:52:55:06
At nine in the morning,
I'll give a response, and you will...
623 01:52:59:05
[Not a response, no!]
624 01:53:01:13
A response, right?
625 01:53:02:25
[Remove the machinery!]
626 01:53:04:07
That's the response I'll give in the morning.
[No, no!]
627 01:53:07:21
Yes, that's what you want!
628 01:53:10:02
[Tomorrow remove it! Sign it there.]
629 01:53:17:02
[You need to take into account the petition
and you will avoid this problem.]
630 01:53:20:28
[Tomorrow we'll be here to remove the machinery.]
631 01:53:25:13
But listen, listen.
632 01:53:27:05
Tomorrow we're going to tell the truth.
We're going to tell the truth.
633 01:53:30:14
We're going to say "Yes, we'll remove the machinery"
or "No, we're not taking the machinery."
634 01:53:35:26
I'm making the decision.
635 01:53:38:03
[And take the company out!
The town requests it!]
636 01:53:42:13
[Not just the machines, take the company out!]
637 01:54:08:24
All of us who are here,
we are suffering.
638 01:54:12:14
From enduring thirst, enduring hunger
all due to one transnational company.
639 01:54:17:14
I've got the paper written by
the engineer Marco Meneses.
640 01:54:23:13
Last night at 6 o'clock.
641 01:54:26:23
We've been waiting here for 3 hours.
He's 3 hours late.
642 01:54:33:04
We don't have anything else to say to Mr. Marcos.
643 01:54:36:12
So we're going to act, the people of
San Miguel Ixtahuacán who have come here.
644 01:54:45:12
The people have decided
645 01:54:49:21
to set fire to the machines!
646 01:55:30:01
Nice to meet you. How are you?
647 01:55:33:01
[Good, thank you.]
648 01:55:35:06
I know that Gregoria is here, so turn her in.
649 01:55:40:14
Identify this man who is shooting video.
[What?]
650 01:55:47:00
I want to see your ID
and why are you videotaping?
651 01:55:51:04
[It's my job.]
652 01:55:55:06
Yes, but you need to respect the law.
653 01:56:13:28
Does the company