Tribal leader extracts promise from governor on uranium ..

[struggle4progress]

Tribal leader extracts promise from governor on uranium exploration
Navajos want to keep ban in place

SANTA FE NM
Native American Times 8/26/2005

<snip> “The Navajo Nation as a government and a people has said we’re not going to have uranium mining on Navajo land or in Navajo Country,” said President Shirley Joe Shirley, Jr. “We’d like to see that law stick.” <snip>

It was also reported that Strathmore Minerals Corporation officials had met already met with Richardson's office to discuss its plans and that the company hoped to gain state approval to reopen its Church Rock and Roca Honda uranium mines located in McKinley County, which it purchased from Kerr McGee Nuclear and Rio Algom.

Church Rock is located on Navajo lands.

Uranium mining left a bitter legacy on the Navajo reservation. Companies first began mining here in 1918 around the Carrizo Mountain area, around 30 miles west of Shiprock. The pace dramatically increased after World War II as the Cold War began. The Vanadium Corporation of America and Kerr-McGee were the principal owners of the mines, and they have been harshly criticized for not informing workers about the dangers they faced. Ominous signs appeared in early 1960 as longtime workers began to fall ill. A report a year earlier had found that some Navajo miners had radiation levels ninety times that of the acceptable limits. Of the 150 Navajo uranium miners who worked at the uranium mine in Shiprock until 1970, 133 had died of lung cancer or various forms of fibrosis by 1980.

http://www.nativetimes.com/index.asp?action=displayarticle&article_id=6904