Arctic Peoples

By Clive Tesar

Saami in Sweden are demanding that the Swedish government improve protection for traditional Saami reindeer herding territories. The Saami are making the demand in the face of increasing pressures on traditional Saami lands for mining and wind-power developments.

We are at a crisis point in Saami areas whereby the last unexploited Saami areas are being claimed by a mining and wind-power boom,

says Malin Brännström, lawyer for the Swedish Saami Association.

The state has a responsibility to ensure that Saami rights are protected. But the state is currently making it easier and easier for resource projects to go ahead, with no consideration being given to the impacts on traditional Saami livelihoods, such as reindeer herding.

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by Clive Tesar

The Arctic Council has released a version of its Arctic Oil and Gas Assessment, prompting new discussion about the effects of oil and gas development in the Arctic.

Patricia Cochran, Chair of the Inuit Circumpolar Council , spoke at an event held when the Assessment was released. She recalled the words of another Inuit Leader, Eben Hopson, founder of the ICC, who more than thirty years ago told a major pipeline inquiry

“The politics of the Arctic are no longer the politics of the people, but they are the politics of oil.”

Cochran also pointed to a conclusion reached by Michael Baffrey, one the authors of the Assessment, that

“When local organizations and institutions lack power, local interests are likely to be neglected, so that costs are borne disproportionately by local residents while benefits accrue primarily at the regional and national levels.”

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