At the mouth of the Unuk River near Ketchikan, there is a very old petroglyph. According to Lee Wagner of Metlakatla, the rising sun painted onto a rock above the river is thousands of years old and it’s a family crest.

“And you will also see remnants of more of them along the river as you go up into Canada,” Wagner said over the phone.

Further up the river, over the Canadian border, there is a site proposed for an open pit gold mine. It’s one of multiple large-scale mining projects proposed on Canadian soil that Alaska tribes say would directly impact watersheds that run across the border into Alaska. And the tribes have long demanded a seat at the table in how Canada manages those projects. 

The tribal coalition is known as the Southeast Alaska Indigenous Transboundary Commission, or SEITC. They submitted a brief on Feb. 19 to the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights accusing Canada of violating their human rights, including their right to a healthy environment.

Guy Archibald is the SEITC executive director. He says the Unuk River case is interesting because the line he has heard from mining companies – that if they build a mine, they can minimize its impact on the watershed – doesn’t work here. There already was a mine at Eskay Creek along the Unuk River in the 1990’s. And Archibald says the watershed is still feeling the effects, over a decade after the mine shuttered.

Read more: krbd.org

Photo: krbd.org