[Cispes-ERN] Support community efforts to halt gold mining in El Salvador

[CISPES National Office]

Greetings! Please help support this Dear-Colleague letter initiated by our
friends at the Share Foundation and US-El Salvador Sister Cities.  The
deadline for signers is this Friday. 


- CISPES National Office


****************************************


Support community efforts to halt gold mining in El Salvador! 


Contact your congressperson and urge her/him to sign Rep. Michaud's letter
to the Salvadoran Legislative Assembly (text below)


BACKGROUND


Communities in rural El Salvador are being threatened by mining exploration
and extraction.  These communities are gravely concerned that mining
activities-large-scale open-pit and subterranean excavations using a cyanide
extraction process-will exacerbate levels of deforestation, pollute water
supplies, contaminate air and soil, and jeopardize locals' health. 


Late in 2006, the U.S. government's Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC)
awarded $461 million to El Salvador.  The MCC's stated goals include the
reduction of poverty, promotion of democratic, responsive institutions, and
environmental preservation.  El Salvador's application for these funds
emphasized assistance for small- and medium-sized producers to expand their
markets, the expansion of agricultural production, and the creation of a
"green zone" to attract tourism.  All funding will be channeled to the
northern region of the country (ie Chalatenango, Cabañas, Morazán, Santa
Ana). 


Yet the mining projects' potentially devastating effects, which include
water shortages, water, air and soil pollution, deforestation and health
risks, run counter to the MCC goals.   


It is also troubling that community demands for the right to consultation on
the uses of their lands have been met by the deployment of the Salvadoran
military to the area.


The below letter, to be signed by members of the U.S. House of
Representatives, urges Salvadoran legislators to support a mining reform
bill that would ban metallic mineral mining in El Salvador.  Approval of
this reform law would represent a major victory in the struggle to halt
mining operations in El Salvador--please join us to help make this dream a
reality!


REQUEST


We ask you to email and call your congressperson (find their contact
information at
<http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?key=-1&url_num=8&url=http://
www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.shtml> www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.shtml )
and urge her/him to sign on to the letter below.  The deadline for signature
is Friday, February 23. 


To sign onto the letter, your representative should contact Kim Thompson in
Rep. Mike Michaud's office by phone (202-225-6306) or email <
<mailto:Kim.Thompson at mail.house.gov> Kim.Thompson at mail.house.gov>.


WHEN YOU CALL


1.  Identify yourself as a constituent and ask for the legislative aide who
covers foreign policy/Latin America/El Salvador.


2. Introduce yourself and tell the aide who you represent (a sister parish,
a school, a committee, etc).


3.  Ask the aide if s/he has seen Rep. Michaud's Dear Colleague letter on
mining in El Salvador.  Encourage her/him to have the representative sign
on.   Explain that you don't want mining to jeopardize U.S. Millennium
Challenge Account development funds in El Salvador.  


4. Offer to send her/him the Dear Colleague Letter if s/he hasn't seen it.


5. Tell her/him how to contact Rep. Michaud's office, and that the signing
deadline is Feb. 23.


6. Send an email to  <mailto:tcl at share-elsalvador.org>
tcl at share-elsalvador.org letting us know that you called your
representative, the name of the person you spoke with, and whether or not
the office will support the letter.


If you get a voice mail, leave your name and contact information, ask that
the representative support the Dear Colleague letter, and request a
telephone call back.

For more information and any questions, contact SHARE at 202.319.5542.

THANK YOU for your action to halt mining in El Salvador! Please spread the
word of this action among friends and colleagues.

 

TEXT TO BE SHARED WITH YOUR REPRESENTATIVE


Dear Colleague,

We are writing to ask you to co-sign the attached letter regarding the
incompatibility of mining operations with Millennium Challenge Account funds
to El Salvador authorized by Congress. 

The letter urges Salvadoran legislators to support a proposal to support a
mining reform bill before them that would ban metallic metal mining
excavation.  Such projects are incompatible both with the purpose of the
Millennium Challenge Account and with the environmental guarantees the
Government of El Salvador proposed in its application for MCA funds.

To sign onto the letter, please contact Kim Thompson in Rep. Mike Michaud's
office at 5-6306 or email Kim.Thompson at mail.house.gov. The deadline for
signing is Friday, February 23.

Michael H. Michaud, Member of Congress 

Jim McDermott, Member of Congress 

Tammy Baldwin, Member of Congress

Michael Capuano, Member of Congress 

 

TEXT OF LETTER TO THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

February 2007
Lic. Guillermo Antonio Gallegos Navarrete, ARENA

Profesor Salvador Sánchez Cerén, FMLN

Señor Luis Roberto Angulo Samayoa, PCN

Coronel Carlos Rolando Herrarte, PDC

Dr. Héctor Miguel Antonio Dada Hirezi, CD

Dear Sirs:

We are writing to express our concern that funds allocated for the
Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) compact with El Salvador will fail to
advance MCC sustainable growth and development goals due to metallic mineral
mining activity proposed for the same region targeted by the compact.
Proposed mining activities are incompatible with the aims that the MCC and
the Salvadoran government have articulated in the compact and jeopardize the
compact's success. 

We write to highlight our concerns and to ask for your serious consideration
of the mining reform law awaiting review by the Economic and Agricultural
Commission of the Legislative Assembly. This reform law would prohibit
metallic mineral mining in El Salvador, thereby protecting the environmental
integrity of northern El Salvador and helping to safeguard the aims of MCC
funding.

El Salvador's compact with the MCC includes funds to support agricultural
reactivation and ecotourism in the northern region of the country. The
compact proposal specifically noted the "transcendental importance" of the
environment and of human development to the success of the compact.

Over the past year, the Salvadoran government has awarded 30 licenses for
metal exploration and one license for metal exploitation (extraction) to
mining companies from Canada, the U.S., and Australia. We believe that
metallic mineral mining activity is incompatible with agricultural
reactivation and ecotourism because of its negative effects on the
environment and on Salvadoran society. 

Through communities in some of our congressional districts which are
partnered with affected Salvadoran communities, we are aware that the local
population is alarmed about these effects and has made clear its strong
opposition to prospective mining projects in their communities.

These negative effects include:

• Water shortages: El Salvador suffers from chronic water shortages of
water, yet it is estimated that 200,000 liters of water a day will be needed
for the mineral extraction process. Water shortages are poised to become a
potential source of conflict and social upheaval in El Salvador.
• Increased deforestation: In 2005, the United Nations Development Program
ranked El Salvador as the most highly deforested country in the world. Open
pit and/or subterranean mining will destroy precious trees and woods vital
to the ecotourism and agricultural plans of the MCC compact. 
• Water pollution: Most mining activities will occur in the Lempa River
basin. Not only does the Lempa River provide water to the northern region of
El Salvador, but it also supplies an estimated 30% of the drinking water to
the capital city. The cyanide-based process that separates mineral from rock
will pollute the Lempa River and secondary rivers flowing from it, risking
the health of people and animals using the rivers' water for consumption and
irrigation, compromising agricultural, fishing, and cattle raising land use,
and threatening the proposed "green zone" envisaged in the MCC compact. 
• Health issues: Mineral extraction will pollute the air with toxic mercury,
cyanide and sulfur dioxide gases. Theses gases have been linked to pulmonary
and respiratory illnesses, cancer, miscarriages, fetal deformities and are
known to cause headaches, loss of appetite, nausea, skin problems, and
vertigo.

These effects are directly contrary to El Salvador's Millennium Challenge
Account proposal which states that "inhabitants in the Northern Zone will
benefit from having access to potable water and sanitation services...
reduced incidence of illness, reduced health care costs, diminished time to
obtain water, reduced costs for water, and reduced harm to the environment."
(p.10 Summary of the Proposal for Financial Support from the Millennium
Challenge Corporation May 2006).

The threat of metallic mineral mining jeopardizing the success of
sustainable development plans for northern El Salvador can be halted now,
before extraction advances. We urge you and your colleagues to carefully
consider the legislation that would prohibit metallic mineral mining in El
Salvador. 

Thank you for your attention and consideration.

Respectfully,


Michael H. Michaud, Member of Congress

Jim McDermott, Member of Congress 

Tammy Baldwin, Member of Congress

Michael Capuano, Member of Congress

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