Statements and history

"Nuclear issues threaten the Western Shoshone People. Radioactive fallout from indiscriminate weapons of mass destruction, secret shipments of plutonium into our country, low-level nuclear waste facilities exploding from rain water intrusion at the Beatty dump and licensing of Yucca Mountain for high-level nuclear waste inflict conditions intended to bring about the destruction of the Western Bands of the Shoshone Nation of Indians. Much nuclear risk we experience has been done in secret and demonstrate intent. The nuclear weapons industry remains lawless and unaccountable. The US must join the Treaty on the Prohibition on Nuclear Weapons.

"The US has failed to live up to the promise of peace and brought instead weapons of war to our country that kill our land and people, a violation of International Law peremptory norms and 18 USC 1091.

"We love our horses and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) stole our horses and blamed us for destruction of the range caused by US nuclear weapons radioactive fallout.

"We need environmental regulations to protect our already vulnerable people. We need collaborative baseline health assessments of radiation exposure. We need health registries, surveillance and monitoring over time. Origin is important to uncover masked health effects.

"We need expansion and reauthorization of the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act to include Trinity downwinders.

"We need the President to implement Article 6 of the Treaty of Ruby Valley for a reservation for our protection, development and growth. This would have the effect of making trespassing by other Americans occupying Shoshone country legitimate.

"Finally, Andrews County Texas Holtec facility is licensed for high-level nuclear waste from commercial nuclear reactors pending licensing of the proposed Yucca Mountain deep geologic high-level nuclear waste repository without environmental protections. The waste send to Texas will be stranded and abandoned there because the Yucca Mountain site will not be licensed. Yucca Mountain is Western Shoshone property with Constitutional protection under Article 6 Section 2 and the Treaty of Ruby Valley. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission agrees that, after spending $15 billion dollars the Department of Energy, even with the Department of the Interior Bureau of Land Management Master Title Plats, the land status record of the US, the Department of Energy cannot prove ownership because Western Shoshone title remains unextinguished.

"Every step in the nuclear chain releases CO2. Stop funding nuclear and fund renewables instead."

Principal Man Ian Zabarte, Western Bands of the Shoshone Nation of Indians
Treaty of Ruby Valley (Consolidated Treaty Series Vol. 127 1863)
Secretary of State of the Western Shoshone National Council
Secretary of the Native Community Action Council

For 70 years UK nuclear weapons tests and production have killed and contaminated thousands of people. The UK’s first nuclear explosion was at Monte Bello in the Pacific. With Australia’s collusion, 21 UK nuclear bomb explosions spread radioactive mushroom clouds across the South Pacific. As well as uranium mining, Aboriginal homes and lands were contaminated by deadly plutonium tests at Maralinga, causing appalling suffering to this day.

From 1962 to 1992, the UK  exploded 28 nuclear tests at the US Nevada Test Site, on the lands of the Western Shoshone, poisoning animals, plants, people and water. Combined with US tests, over 900 nuclear bomb explosions were inflicted on the  Western Shoshone. We can insist on accountability for these crimes. We can insist on remembering and raising awareness in the UK where the majority of people know nothing about the impact of UK nuclear testing. We can insist the land rights of the Western Shoshone are respected.