The Survival demonstration outside Coutts Bank previously advertised on this website planned for the 10th June has been cancelled. In reaction to the planned picket Coutts has just informed Survival that they no longer hold shares in Vedanta, the British-based company whose planned bauxite mine will devastate the lands of India’s Dongria Kondh tribe.
Survival is continuing to lobby other Vedanta shareholders, as well as the company itself.
For more information, please go to http://www.survival-international.org/tribes/dongria
Report follows of picket last week.
Survival protest – ‘Finsbury profits from tribe’s destruction’
28 May 2008
Survival International this morning held a demonstration outside the London PR company FINSBURY, a subsidiary of global advertising company WPP. The protest highlighted Finsbury’s involvement with British mining giant Vedanta, which is set to destroy one of India’s most isolated tribes – the Dongria Kondh.
Carrying placards that said ‘Finsbury profits from tribe’s destruction’, demonstrators handed leaflets to Finsbury employees as they arrived for work, urging them to persuade Finsbury to resign their account with Vedanta.
Vedanta’s subsidiary, Sterlite, plans to mine aluminium ore from the Niyamgiri mountains in Orissa, India, where all of the 8,000 Dongria Kondh live.
The Dongria Kondh vehemently oppose the mine. Jitu Jakesika, a Dongria spokesperson, said, ‘We will become beggars if the company destroys our mountain and our forest so that they can make money. We will give our lives for our mountain.’
The Dongria Kondh have lived on the slopes of Niyamgiri since time immemorial, and are totally dependent on its forests. They view the mountain as sacred, grow crops on the slopes, and gather wild fruit in the dense forests.