Stefan Simanowitz Profile picture
Nov 7, 2021 36 tweets 34 min read Read on X
1/. “For two weeks, Scotland has become the centre of the world. Not just a place where we can meet one another, but a place where we can truly recognise one another.” Mindahi Bastida, Mexico

A delegation of 140 indigenous people have come to #Cop26 with a message. #COP26Glasgow
2/. “We came here to #COP26 because we knew world leaders would be here. But these world leaders are not listening to our leaders; to the indigenous leaders”

Uboye Gaba from Mexico (& his 1 year old son, Mene)
#COP26Glasgow @MingaIndigena #IndigenousPeoplesDay #IndigenousPeoples
3/. “We are physically kicking out loggers, mining companies & land grabbers every day. We need your support. We need you to help to bring attention to what’s happening”

Puyr Tembe, president of @FEPIPA_Oficial in Brazil speaking at #cop26 #COP26Glasgow on #IndigenousPeoplesDay
4/. “I was invited to the World Leaders Summit at #COP26...but when I got to the podium most of the world leaders had already walked out of the room”

Mexican indigenous & climate activist, @xiyebastida of @Re_EarthOrg who travelled from Mexico #COP26Glasgow #IndigenousPeoplesDay
“The wind has carried me here across the ocean like a bird...We are all nature.”

Indigenous leader, Waorani Enqueri, from Ecuador at @COP26 on #IndigenousPeoplesDay.
#GlasgowCop26 #TogetherForOurPlanet

Event at @hubculture with @MingaIndigena @oneearth @grounded @VIVOBAREFOOT
6/. “I have brought with me the hearts and souls of my community. I have also brought a message: that indigenous people are the solution to the problem”

Indigenous leader from Equador talking at #cop26 on #IndigenousPeoplesDay.
#ClimateJustice #ClimateAction at @hubculture Image
7/. Mariella Aymdni from Chile says that when she faces challenging times, the spirit of her dead father appears to her & is by her side

“A great hope is born that we can stop the destruction of this land, of this earth. With you we can.”
#COP26 #COP26Glasgow #IndigenousPeoples
8/. “All of us are warriors of nature & today all of us must come together because Mother Nature is asking for our help"

An indigenous leader from Ecuador at #COP26

Indigenous communities around the world speak 4000+ languages

At #COP26Glasgow they are speaking with one voice
9/. “We are not ‘tribes’. We’re indigenous peoples...In Argentina policies are designed to to invisiblize indigenous communities”

Sadly, rather than being treated as they should be - the most important people at #COP26 - indigenous leaders have been marginalised at #COP26Glasgow
10/. ''It's time to reforest our thoughts. It’s time to reforest our hearts. It’s time to reforest our actions'' @GuajajaraSonia

I don’t speak a word of Portuguese, Spanish or any indigenous languages & yet I understand everything that is said
#Cop26 #COP
11/. “Last month, my village was taken by a mine”

Here Helene Lindmark, a Sápmi elder from northern Sweden, is comforted after sharing her story about the recent destruction of her village by mining company, Boliden, digging for copper & gold.
#COP26 #COP26Glasgow #ClimateAction Image
12/. “Obama is in there. We are out here”

“Our leaders need to listen to the ancestral wisdom”

“We indigenous leaders need to be at the table for the decision-making process”

@BarackObama, why not come & meet Mindahi Bastida & some of the
140 indigenous people at #Cop26 ?
“We have a big problem with deforestation in my community

Factories are being built. Our rivers are being polluted. That is why I have travelled to #COP26

To ask the leaders of the world to really act in the face of this climate crisis.”

Chief Ninawa Huni Kui from the Amazon.
14/. On 1 Nov, Māori activist @IndiMiro put out an invitation:

“This #COP26, learn our histories, listen to our stories, honour our knowledge & get in line or get out of the way”

It’s not too late for #COP26Glasgow & the world to take up this invitation
15/. “My community has been fighting off the oil companies since before I was born. Our communities have been devastated. We’re here at #COP26 to try & ensure our voices are heard”

“Have you been heard”

PAUSE

“Not enough”

Indigenous leader @SumakHelena @Sarayaku_Libre Ecuador
16/. “The battle to save Mother Earth will be the mother of all battles...We need to support, encourage, believe in women, because women are the Earth.”

Indigenous leader, Puyr Tembe, president of @FEPIPA_Oficial Brazil, speaking at @letterstoearth_ event. #cop26 #COP26Glasgow
17/. Ystdy, I spoke with Mindahi Bastida of the Otomi Toltec peoples

He holds two doctorates

His challenge is not only to be heard but also to be understood

Yet how can one to communicate something for which there are no words?

Something that has to be felt to be understood.
18/. “Inside #COP26 they’re trying to find absurd solutions to the #ClimateCrisis. Outside COP we have been able to build networks & find strength in our shared experience of genocide & ecocide inflicted on our people & our territories”

Wilma Esquivel Pat, @futuroindigena Mexico
19/. "Indigenous people have done more than any government in the world in the fight against climate change”

@NinaGualinga from the Ecuadorian Amazon on why indigenous people’s deep knowledge is essential in finding solutions to the #ClimateCrisis.
#COP26 
20/. Indigenous peoples have been conserving & sustaining lands & natural resources long before the rest of the world

And they’ve been doing it far better than industrialised nations

In the fight against #ClimateChange, the world must listen to look to them #COP26 #COP26Glasgow ImageImageImageImage
21/. “We’re sorry & we ask for forgiveness”

Having explained what he wanted to do & been granted permission by these Indigenous leaders, a Scottish man apologises to them for what our nations have done to their nations: for what our ancestors have done to their ancestors #COP26
22/. At the opening session of #COP26, @IndiMiro invited delegates to “learn our histories, listen to our stories, honour our knowledge…or get out of the way.”

As the summit wraps up, @MingaIndigena will bring Indigenous leaders to discuss whether that invitation was taken up. ImageImage
23/. “We can’t continue to participate in conferences & pretend we’re driving effective change”

Members of the ‘Familia Indigena’ - formed at #COP26 - at a final press conference

The bonds forged between these groups has been one of the truly positive things to come out of COP.
24/. “Don’t close your eyes
Don’t bite your tongue
Look at what is happening
And raise your voice
Because each one of us is responsible for looking after our planet”

Indigenous leader, Manuela Dahua, from Ecuador at #COP26.
#ClimateAction #COP26Glasgow #ClimateCrisis #COP28 @AOC
25/. Writing about her journey to #COP26 , Maka Monture Päki from Alaska, says:

“I think about the journey my ancestors made when they migrated down the Copper River. So many of us are descended from ancestors that journeyed in the service of their people. We are their echo.” Image
26/. “Water has memory. The land recognises us. When we are apart, the land misses us as much as we miss the land,” Tamara Archie of the Secwempec Nation, Canada

“The journey to return to my spirit has been long” she says

This is true for everyone

But we must make that journey
27/. Speaking to Indigenous activists like Nashieeli Valencia (Zapoteca), I’m reminded of the words of Lilla Watson

“If you have come here to help me you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together”
#COP26
28/. “Learn our histories
Listen to our stories
Honour our knowledge
Or get out of the way”

The politicians at #COP26 ignored this invitation but you don’t have to

It is an open invitation & one that rewards those that take it up with beauty beyond words
29/. “Beyond words”

Ay, there’s the rub

The barriers to truly understanding the message offered by Indigenous people aren’t linguistic or cultural

The lessons they bring can’t be set out in a briefing or PowerPoint

They have to be felt or experienced to be understood.
#COP26
30/. As I leave Glasgow & my train follows the Clyde, past it’s source at Lowther Hill & carves it’s way down the spine of Britain on a pristine day, why don’t I feel the pessimism most are voicing about #COP26?

The task ahead looms like a mountain, but I feel resolutely hopeful
31/. Mine isn’t a naive hope that our politicians will do the right thing

Instead, it’s a hope grounded in knowledge of what humanity is capable of: something I’ve been reminded of by the Indigenous people at #COP26  - a little of which I’ve tried to capture in this thread above Image
32/. “If you have come here to help me you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine then let us work together”

I’ve written this #THREAD about #IndigenousPeople at #COP26 up as an article. #ClimateCrisis
newint.org/features/2021/…
33/. “The one who tells the stories rules the world”

Indigenous people don’t need a voice

They have a voice

We must listen

Listen thru our ears & our hearts
@MingaIndigena @futuroindigena @coicaorg @tebtebba @amazonwatch @mongabay @JaneGoodallInst @AOC
34/. This thread is being translated into several different languages (see below)

Could you help translate (DM me) or share with ‘influencers’?

Here it is in SPANISH👇

Este hilo ha sido traducido al español. Retuitea y comparte con amigos de habla española e 'influencers'👇
35/. Here is the thread on Indigenous people at #COP26 translated into Italian

Please share with Italian-speaking influencers

DM me if you can translate into other languages

Questo thread è stato tradotto in italiano. Per favore, RT e condividi con amici ed influencer italiani
36/. Here is the thread on Indigenous people in French

Please share with French-speaking ‘influencers’

Ce thread a été traduit en français. S’il vous plaît RT et partager avec vos ami·e·s et influenceurs·euses francophones

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More from @StefSimanowitz

Jun 25
Wow!

Incredible news to wake up to

Julian Assange is free after a plea deal

He was released on bail from Belmarsh prison & boarded a plane which is currently heading to Australia

His release is a testament to those fought for his freedom #JulianAssange

Julian Assange is scheduled to appear in a federal court in Saipan, a US commonwealth in the Pacific, where he’s expected to plead guilty to one charge under the Espionage Act & be sentenced to 5yrs

Given he’s already served this time, he should walk free
The public have a right to know what their govts do in their name

Julian #Assange’s prosecution represented a grave threat to press freedom, undermining the key role of journalists & publishers in scrutinizing govts misdeeds & creating a chilling effect

Read 6 tweets
May 15
1/. Four years, ago this tweet👇broke the #CareHomeScandal

The govt had INSTRUCTED hospitals to send people “who may have #COVID19” to care homes WITHOUT TESTING

They KNEW about asymptomatic transmission in Jan 2020

Many thousands died

This revelation led to other questions…
Image
2/. From the start of the pandemic the govt had given #Palantir, a US spyware company with reported links to #CambridgeAnalytica, access to NHS health data

The NHS = the most trusted brand in the UK

Cambridge Analytica = the least trusted

Disturbing…

3/. Palantir worked on the NHS data store with #FacultyAI - a company with ties to Cummings

In 2020, @amnesty warned that Big Tech firms might use the COVID crisis to hoover up genomic data, obliterating the last frontier of privacy: our biological selves

Read 5 tweets
Mar 9
1/. “It is the greatest mass-killing in recorded history; & it goes on daily, hourly, as regularly as the ticking of your watch”

Arthur Koestler’s 1944 essay expressing frustration at the failure of the world to acknowledge Nazi atrocities resonates today
wethescreamers.com
2/ “There are a few of us…yelling at you in newspapers…Now & then we reach your ear…But it only lasts a minute. You shake yourself like puppies who’ve got their fur wet; then the screen again descends & you walk on, protected by the dream-barrier which stifles all sound”
#Gaza Image
3/ Koestler notes maniacs lose contact with reality so “perhaps it’s we, the screamers, who react in a sound & healthy way to the reality which surrounds us, whereas you are the neurotics who totter about in a screened fantasy world because you lack the faculty to face the facts” Image
Read 8 tweets
Feb 23
“They got me!” Liz Truss tells far-right kingpin, Steve Bannon, before going on to explain that, to have effectively tackled “the deep state” that runs Britain & its institutions, she would have “needed a bigger bazooka”! #LizTruss #BritanniaUnchained
"I was just saying it like it is & that’s what people respect me for"(!)

Liz Truss’ compares her premiership to a one night stand & says she was just “fattening the pig” for slaughter & that she should have gaslit the public like Rishi Sunak is doing (!)
"I faced the most almighty backlash...from the usual suspects in the media” Liz Truss

“Truss's decline is simultaneously tragic & horrifying but the claim that the media conspired against her can't go unchallenged. There are front pages praising her to the rafters” @mrjamesob



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Read 4 tweets
Jan 4
1/. In 2020 I started a thread warning that Trump might launch an attack on Iran before the end of his term

It wasn’t the first time there had been a real danger of a US-led, Israeli backed attack (records show Bush had come close in 2007/8)

The risk appears now to be very high
Image
2/. It’s clear that the bomb blasts in Kerman on the 4th anniversary of #Soleimani's assassination by the US, could lead to a quick ratcheting up of dangerous tensions

After Oct 7, the US sent two aircraft carrier groups to the region

Iran just deployed a warship to the Red Sea
Image
3/. Three US soldiers were killed & two dozen injured in an unmanned aerial drone attack on US forces stationed in northeastern #Jordan near the Syrian border, President @JoeBiden said

This could mark a dangerous escalation
arab.news/y8h8h
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Read 18 tweets
Nov 6, 2023
Despite previous denials, Michelle Mone finally admits her involvement in failed PPE supplier Medpro

There should be a criminal investigation into possible intentional breach of beneficial ownership disclosure rules

The govt VIP Lane needs investigating

Something about the #MichelleMone interview doesn’t pass the smell test

Why are Mone & her husband - currently under criminal investigation in UK & Spain - being given a prime time slot to tell ‘their side of the story’?

5 questions @bbclaurak should ask

@bbclaurak “I don’t honestly think there’s a case to answer. I can’t see what we’ve done wrong” @MichelleMone

Wow! #MichelleMone & #DougBarrowman on @bbclaurak’s programme, this morning

Read 13 tweets

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