Monday, March 13, 2017
UN expert finds flawed consultation process for Dakota Access Pipeline
by Lauren Carasik
On March 3, Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, the UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, issued an End of Mission Statement, following her 10 day visit to the US to study the human rights situation the nation’s indigenous peoples, with a focus on energy development projects. She lamented the failure of the government to engage in meaningful consultations with tribes, concluding that "The legislative regime regulating consultation, while well intentioned, has failed to ensure effective and informed consultations with tribal governments. The breakdown of communication and lack of good faith in the review of federal projects leaves tribal governments unable to participate in dialogue with the United States on projects affecting their lands, territories, and resources."
The UN expert singled out the flawed process with respect to the Dakota Access Pipeline:
“Many indigenous peoples in the United States perceive a general lack of consideration of the future impacts on their lands in approving extractive industry projects in particular, and a lack of recognition that they face significant impacts from development of not just their own, but neighbouring resources as well. In the context of the Dakota Access Pipeline, the potentially affected tribes were denied access to information and excluded from consultations at the planning stage of the project. Furthermore, in a show of disregard for treaties and the federal trust responsibility, the Army Corps approved a draft environmental assessment regarding the pipeline that ignored the interests of the tribe… Although the final environmental assessment recognized the presence of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe five hundred meters away, it dismissed the risks to the reservation and failed to mention any of the other tribes that traditionally used the territory. Without an adequate social, cultural or environmental assessment, and the absence of meaningful consultation with or participation by the tribes, the Corps gave multiple domestic authorizations permitting the construction of DAPL.”
While she did recognize some positive steps towards indigenous sovereignty and self-determination, Tauli-Corpuz expressed deep concern over President Trump’s executive actions on the Dakota Access and Keystone XL pipelines, and recommended “that for any extractive industry project affecting indigenous peoples, regardless of the status of the land, the United States should require a full environmental impact assessment of the project in consideration of the impact on indigenous peoples’ rights.”
In order to move forward, the UN expert emphasized the need for reconciliation:
“The issues surrounding energy development underscore the need for reconciliation with indigenous peoples in the United States. Tribal leaders and representatives indicate that they are interested in engaging in a program of reconciliation to remedy the harms they have faced and improve the government-to-government relationship going forward. Such a program would acknowledge the historical wrongs inflicted upon indigenous peoples in the United States and confront systemic barriers that prevent the full realization of indigenous peoples' rights.”
https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/human_rights/2017/03/un-expert-finds-flawed-consultation-process-for-dakota-access-pipeline-.html