Photo Gallery
Photos from the Book
These photos are all included in the physical book in black and white, and included here in their color versions.
Figure 16. Mining Conflictivity: CGN and Lote Ocho.
From left to right: Carmelina Caal Ical, Margarita Caal Caal, Rosa Elbira Coc Ich, Amalia Cac Tiul, Lucia Caal Chun, and Olivia Asig Xol, all six women plaintiffs in the Caal vs. Hudbay legal case in Canada, here in their community of Lote Ocho. Lote Ocho, El Estor, Izabal, Guatemala, September 29, 2014.
Photo: James Rodríguez.
Figure 4. Eviction of Barrio La Revolución.
Hired men from the nearby community of Mariscos burn homes at Barrio La Revolución. On January 7, 8, and 9, 2007, the Guatemalan Nickel Company, local subsidiary of Canadian Skye Resources, ordered the forced eviction of five Maya Q’eqchi’ communities around Lake Izabal in both El Estor and Panzós. Over eight hundred State security forces carried out the forced eviction, destroying and even burning many huts in the Indigenous communities who claim the territory as ancestral land. Barrio La Revolución, Chichipate, El Estor, Izabal, Guatemala. January 9, 2007.
Photo: James Rodríguez
Figure 11 . San Rafael State of Siege.
Checkpoint between San Rafael Las Flores and Mataquescuintla during the first day of the Guatemalan government’s declared State of Siege in four municipalities in support of the mining operation of Vancouver-based Tahoe Resources. Numerous constitutional rights were suspended for thirty days. Mataquescuintla, Jalapa, Guatemala, May 2, 2013.
Photo: James Rodríguez.
Goldcorp Inc.
From 2004-2017, Goldcorp Inc. - mining giant from Canada, now merged with Newmont Gold - operated a large cyanide-leeching, mountain-top removal mine in Mayan Mam and Mayan Sipakapan territories of western Guatemala. The World Bank was an early and crucial investor in and supporter of this mining operation. Local communities suffered forced evictions, killings, repression and criminalization of community defenders, environmental destruction and health harms. No reparations were ever given to the villagers for all they suffered; no justice was ever done - in Guatemala or Canada - for the mining harms, violations and crimes that Goldcorp committed directly or indirectly.
15 May 2010 Overlooking the Marlin Mine, San Marcos
Carmen Mejía with ADISMI (Association for the Integral Development of San Miguel Ixtahuacán): "Bienvenidos, esta es mi mina. Este es mi desarrollo." Welcome. This is my mine. This is my development." On 12 and 15 June 2010, Carmen received a number of threatening text messages, saying that she shouldn’t defend human rights and that she would be killed.
Photo: Catherine Nolin
14 May 2008 - Comitancillo, San Marcos -- Goldcorp's expansion plans revealed & community comes together to say 'no.'
Sign reads: "No to mining, conserve Mother Earth who nourishes us, no to exploration of natural resources"
Photo: Catherine Nolin
9 May 2018 Salitre, San Marcos
Aniseto López Díaz, Maya Mam farmer & leader of community movements resisting and denouncing harms and violations caused by Goldcorp Inc.’s Marlin mine in western Guatemala. He has suffered attacks, criminalizations and threats, for his community defense work - with Grahame Russell and UNBC Delegation/Field School
Photo: Catherine Nolin
Tahoe Resources (now Pan American Silver)
Since 2012, Tahoe Resources - originally a corporate spin-off of Goldcorp Inc., now bought out by Pan American Silver - has been trying to operate a silver and gold mine in the Xinka territories and campesino communities of south-eastern Guatemala. As with each of the mining harms resistance struggles in Testimonio, Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities have suffered: government and company repression, including killings; criminalizations on trumped up charges; health and environmental harms; other human rights violations.
13 May 2014 San Rafael las Flores, El Escobal Mine GOLDCORP MAKES US SICK!
Merle (second from right) brought this banner from the Mining Injustice Network in Toronto. This is the Canadian-owned Tahoe Resources El Escobal mine but Tahoe is a 'child' of Goldcorp (former CEO of Goldcorp Kevin McArthur stepped down from Goldcorp and started Tahoe - of which Goldcorp owns some 40% of the shares).
Photo: Catherine Nolin
13 May 2014
San Juan Bosco carried out a consulta "community consultation of good faith" on 17 February 2013, just a month before the Guatemalan government ordered a state of siege and suspended a range of of rights (right of association, for example) and sent in the security forces to intimidate, capture, and imprison people opposed to the mine. 99% voted against mining.
Photo: Catherine Nolin
5 May 2018 Casillas, Santa Rosa, Guatemala The Permanent Peaceful Resistance / Roadblock that has refused to let any mining-related vehicles or equipment through for several months
Photo: Catherine Nolin
La Puya
“La Puya” (the thorn) is the name of an encampment set up by campesino (farmer) women and men, young and old, north east of Guatemala City. Since march 2012, La Puya has been maintained at the entrance of an illegal mining operation initiated first by Radius Gold (Canada) and then Kappes Cassaday & Associates. Due to illegalities and widespread opposition, KCA was not able to begin operations, though every step of the way has been characterized by corruption and impunity, human rights violations and repression.
26 May 2012 La Puya Resistance, San José del Golfo / San Pedro Ayampuc
One of the community spokespersons - Antonio “Tono” Reyes - describes this as a struggle for LIFE. He said to us - 'don't be ashamed to be Canadians. There are bad people in Canada just as there are bad people in Guatemala.' They don't blame us for what Radius Gold is doing to their families. He said we must work together as humans.
Photo: James Rodríguez
16 May 2016 Guatemala City
Lawyer Rafael Maldonado in La Sala de Vistas courtroom of the Guatemalan Supreme Court of Justice Catherine Nolin & James Rodríguez attended a hearing in which lawyers with the Centre for Legal-‐Environmental and Social Action (CALAS), on behalf of the mining-‐affected communities, petitioned for the final, definitive suspension of the mining license for the El Tambor mine (Progreso VII Derivada) owned by American-‐based Kappes, Cassiday & Associates (KCA), previously owned by Radius Gold.
Photo: Catherine Nolin
26 May 2012 La Puya Resistance, San José del Golfo / San Pedro Ayampuc
Strong women leaders, including Yolanda Oqueli (right), spoke of wanting us to feel welcomed by open arms, open to us as human beings, not as Canadians. Two weeks later, Yolanda Oqueli was shot and barely survived an assassination attempt.
Photo: Catherine Nolin
El Estor
El Estor is a municipality in eastern Guatemala. The majority population are Maya Q’eqchi’ people living in over 50 villages along Lake Izabal and in the mountains to the north, where they and their ancestors have lived for 100s of years. Since the early 1960s, a series of Canadian companies - INCO, Skye Resouces, Hudbay Minerals - and then Solway Investment Group (Switzerland) have operated, or tried to operate an open pit, mountain top removal nickel mine characterized, every step of the way, by corruption and impunity, environmental and health harms, human rights violations and repression.
16 May 2017 La Unión, El Estor, Izabal
Maria Choc sharing testimonio for inclusion in the book, with James Rodríguez and Grahame Russell
Photo: Catherine Nolin
May 7 - Barrio Revolución, El Estor, Izabal, Guatemala
Barrio Revolución, a community of approximately 90 families, rebuilding after Skye Resources/CGN burned down their community in late 2006
Photo: JP Laplante
19 May 2010 Hike into Lote 8
Hike into the new site where people are trying to recover from the trauma of January 2007.
Photo: Catherine Nolin