4 i) 4 y ferences to consultation between , —— | OTTAWA The Inuit Mapirisat of Canada (ITC) the or- ion of the Inuit people in far north, and the Canadian tic Resources Committee CARC), on Nov. 13 jointly con- femned the government’s. hand- ig Of the Polaris Project of Arvik ‘Mines Ltd. Thomas Suluk, Project Direc- Hor of ITC land claims said he is /tlously disturbed that Inuit are 4 development proposal that has jilteady been given the go ahead. ‘ITC has many questions Pout the Arvik project, but we q have been denied any opportunity 10 discuss them. The minister has tefused to provide us with in- formation.” Suluk said. This happened in the case of the Nanisivik mine at Strathcona : Sound, Four years ago, at the lime of Cominco’ initial proposal | '0 develop the Arvik mine, ITC’s ’ former president James Arvaluk ) Pointed out the need for Inuit /Onsultation to Judd Buchanan, } 2 Northern Affairs Minister at time. oa a letter to Buchanan, Ar- ki luk said, ‘‘Our attempts to par- Cipate in the planning of the anisivik project were frustrating 4nd we don’t want to experience Same thing with Arvik.”’ Although Jake Epp the’ new ONservative government’s Minister, has made vague re- © company and the Inuit com- | Munities on this new proposal, he Clearly indicated an agree- ©w Cominco to proceed with velopment plans. eon have been using the area Und the mine site and adjoin- . caster Sound for a number tho centuries and probably Usands of years. This use has n Becumented in the 1974 @ Use and Occupancy Project one out jointly by Epp’s own partment and ITC. {9Ntce again being forced to react to . ea has dlréady been reached to” The lands and waterways con- tinue to be used for hunting and trapping by Inuit living in the communities of Resolute Bay, Grise Fiord, Arctic Bay and Pond Inlet. Inuit depend on many species that inhabit the area in- cluding whales, walrus, birds, caribou, polar bear, musk ox and seals. Despite the obvious implica- tions on land claims, both Com- inco and the federal government have failed to contact ITC as the Inuit body negotiating land claims in this region of the Northwest Territories. “We have not heard from the government about Arvik™ since 1976,’ Suluk said. ‘““When we heard indirectly about plans to re- vive Arvik, we tried to get more information by contacting the minister in a letter on Sept. 27 this year. We received nothing . . . ex- cept a telex acknowledging our letter and a promise of a meeting. _ The meeting has not come ab- out.” ITC learned more about Com- inco’s plans for Arvik from news- paper articles and a “‘commu- niqué’’ from the minister’s office issued on November 6. ‘This is not open government; this is government by press re- lease,”’ Suluk said. There has been no consultation with the two Inuit regional or- ganizations in the Central Arctic and Baffin. Lack of consultation has been a growing problem in other parts of the North during Epp’s term as minister. ITC has not been con- sulted about the important preparations of a regional plan in the form of a green paper for the Lancaster Sound area. Baker Lake Inuit have also been kept in the dark about plans for a multi-million dollar uranium project in their hunting areas. ITC has learned. indirectly about Urangesellschaft’s plans to build an entire new townsite if the fed- Feds bypass Inuit on mine project Members of the Inuit community listen intently during meeting earlier this year on land claims. The federal government has bypassed the Inuit in developing Arvik Mines. eral government and mining com- panies are successful in the Baker Lake court case. Urange- sellschaft views the Keewatin as a ‘“‘uranium province’’. ‘*Epp and his government seem comfortable with the notion of development at any price. Development is more important than Inuit concerns about our homelands and land claims.”” Pro- ject director Suluk has doubts whether ITC will see a land claims agreement while EPP is Northern Affairs Minister. “Mr. Epp fails to acknowledge the importance of land claims un- less he is forced to by pressures of large development corpora- tions,’ Suluk said. A recent example of this at- titude surfaced in the Yukon where the minister moved quickly on land claims with the Council of Yukon Indians because of the im- portance. Foothills Pipelines placed on the land claims ques- tion. ‘‘Are we to conclude that our negotiations will not go ahead unless a similar situation develops in Nunavut?’’ (Nunavut — Our Land — is the area viewed by Inuit as their homeland.) The fact that Mr. Epp has refused to go ahead with the COPE final agreement in the Western Arctic adds even more uncertainty about what will happen to ITC. Inuit Tapirisat and the Cana- dian Arctic Resources Committee called upon the minister who was appearing before the Standing Committee on Indian and North- ern development on Nov. 14, to make the following commit- ments: 1. To consult with the local-Inuit communities, their regional or- ganizations, and the ITC before any further action is taken on the Arvik mine. 2. To have the government undertake or require the company to undertake up-to-date social, ‘environmental, and economic studies on the impact of this mine on the region, and to make this information public. 3. Toholda public hearing on the socio-economic and environ- mental impacts of the mine on the region. 4. To take no further action on Arvik until the Lancaster Sound green paper is completed. BOYCOTT SOUTH AFRICAN PRODUCTS Oil — it’s a racket mee Canadian Tribune ‘‘profiteer for da a. (December 3) was Gulf Cana- ae Nat rapacious guzzler of our oil and in line dollars reported a profit for the and nine months of 1979, after expenses $124 taxes, of $191,700,000, from ah +,900,000 in the same months of 1978, “h Crease of $66,800,000. Rather a ealthy”’ rip-off. * * * ee €t this giant oil octopus is not eae It wants more.-Along with other ign-owned or controlled oil com- es, it is damanding’ that Canada The don the two-price system for oil. Want ian producing companies the world price for oil on the mente market. And pliant govern- nts, peeral and provincial, are doing . ig they can to reach that goal as ow as se : Loughe: governments, particularly the the C eed government of Alberta and 8 thei government of Canada, aim to they If snouts into the trough as deep as . Can. Their aim: to garner a richer ofthe t Of tax dollars out of the pockets the Consuming public. Why? To returp amount gathered, back to the oil = hea in the form of tax concessions name of exploration and develop- Ment, Of * * * oil Course, Gulf Canda is not the only Com: ° * Ug DPany reporting windfall profits. S.-owned multi-national oil com- Sp Marxism-Leninism in Today’s World panies are all reporting unprecedented high profits over the past year. The com- panies claim that this is due to two fac- tors: shortage of oil and the high price of crude set by OPEC (Organization of Pet- roleum Exporting Countries). However, is has been clearly established by inde- pendent marketing experts that the cur- rent oil shortage has been artificially created by the multi-nationals. Their data shows that at the peak of the oil ‘‘crisis’”” this year the U.S. im- ported 11.5% more oil than in 1978. It is also known that when Iran cut produc- tion this year other producing countries made up the deficit by increasing theirs. With its total output of over 40-million barrels a day, OPEC provides 45% of the oil needs of the capitalist countries. In respect to OPEC price increases of crude oil it is well-known that the multi- nationals ignored the OPEC limit of $14.50 a barrel and sold crude on the Rotterdam market at up to $35 a barrel early in 1979. In addition, the inflation which is exported to the OPEC coun- tries, and the decline of the U.S. dollar caused the real price received by the OPEC countries to drop to $7.50 a barrel. This took place at a time when the multi-nationals were making record profits and the public was paying through the nose for oil and gasoline. OPEC reacted to this gouging by al- lowing each member country to collect royalty fees. This caused the price for crude in the OPEC countries to climb to the present $23.50 a barrel. Not to be outflanked, the multi-national oil com- panies are now selling crude on the Rot- terdam market at more than $40 a barrel. eek er All of this price-rigging by the multi- nationals will surely cause oil pices to keep spiralling. The Western press will step up its propaganda about a further shortage of crude. OPEC will be blamed for the high prices. At the same time according to generally accepted data, the giant oil companies will continue to stockpile crude and limit the supply of heating oil. There is even talk of an ‘‘emergency rationing plan’’ for Canada. This, quite naturally, will mean still big- ger profits for the oil companies and col- der winters for ordinary Canadians. The government does nothing to cur- tail the profits of the companies. Rather, it is proposing even more tax conces- sions to them while blaming the OPEC countries for the high cost of oil and gasoline to the consumers. On the other hand, the government does not tell the public that OPEC's share of refining is only 6%, 3.2% of the chemical industry and 3% of transportation. All the rest is refined, transformed, shipped and mar- keted by the oil multi-nationals. * * * PACIFIC TRIBUNE— DECEMBER 19, 1979—Page 11 Oil. makes for dirty politics on the part of imperialism. Oil politics are linked to ag- gression, war and expansionism. Oil is used as a tool to make rich countries richer, poor countries poorer, and as a brake on economic development in weaker capitalist countries. Energy resources are the centerpiece of a steadily expanding manufacturing sector of the economy. That is: if it is used in the producing country to meet the needs of an expanding economy. However, at the present time oil is being used as a tool to turn Canada away from an expanding manufacturing economy to a resource economy. The higher price for oil, followed inevitably by similar in- crease in the price of energy in other forms, ‘will result in placing Canada in a weakened competitive positon both at home and abroad. * * * The chief victims of such power plays between competing capitalist interests will be the working people, as increased costs of production are passed on to them through cheaper wages and higher prices. But this not need be the end re- sult. Working people should demand of the Clark government that oil and gasoline prices and taxes on the son- sumer for domestic use be frozen at the present levels. Note: all data used extracted from an article Oil and Politics, Granma, November 18, 1979 by Luis M. Arce.