MAKE IT A PEACE SUMMIT! UPDATE ON CAMPAIGN TO SAVE SINJAJEVINA MOUNTAIN

On March 1, the Cape Breton Spectator published an essay by Peace Quest Cape Breton Campaign Coordinator Sean Howard on emergency efforts to save beautiful Sinjajevina Mountain in Montenegro from an ignoble fate: being turned into a military training ground by NATO. The full essay can be viewed at:  For Love of a Mountain in Montenegro - The Cape Breton Spectator.   

“For vast stretches of time,” Howard writes, the Mountain” has been home to pastoralist communities living in peace and harmony with each other and the land. Part of the Balkan nation’s Tara Canyon Biosphere Reserve, Sinjajevina is one of the largest unspoilt mountain pastures in Europe. But Montenegro joined NATO in 2017, and in the eyes of the world’s most powerful military alliance the mountain is indeed a perfect place…to practice for war.” “What we have here, in sum,” he concludes, “is military-industrial imperialism, a curse grimly familiar to so many tribal communities (which is how many residents of Sinjajevina describe themselves) and Indigenous peoples. For this reason, the ‘Save Sinjajevina’ campaign is supported by global protest movements led and inspired by Indigenous resistance”.   

On January 25, PQCB wrote to Prime Minster Justin Trudeau, Minister of Defence Anita Anand, and Minister of the Environment Steven Guilbeault, requesting urgent interventions to raise the issue and “at a minimum…propose a postponement of any scheduled military activities, allowing time for a thorough review of all available options and alternatives – a review that should include consultation with local representatives and groups.” 

On January 31, the Prime Minister’s Office wrote to “assure” us that our concerns “have been carefully reviewed” and forward to Mélanie Joly, Minister of Foreign Affairs. The full text of our letter to Prime Minister Trudeau reads:  

“Of behalf of Peace Quest Cape Breton (PQCB) – a non-partisan citizens’ group and member of the International Peace Bureau and World Beyond War network – I am writing to urge you to take urgent action to save Sinjajevina Mountain in Montenegro, a site of great natural beauty and biodiversity, from being turned into a NATO military training ground as early as May this year, when large-scale exercises are planned.   

Sinjajevina Mountain, nestled in Montenegro’s supposedly protected Tara Canyon Biosphere Reserve, is home to eight rural tribal communities prepared to risk life, limb, and liberty to stop what they rightly perceive as an assault on their traditional way of life – and a site, for them, of sacred power, crucial to both their socio-economic and spiritual well-being. “The mountain gave us life,” in the words of Milan Sekulović, President of Save Sinjajevina, a campaign of peaceful civil disobedience overwhelmingly supported by all eight communities and beyond. These communities are demanding that they be granted stewardship of a place they know so well, love so much, and can be utterly trusted to defend.  

In July last year, even Montenegro’s Ministry of Ecology issued a statement recommending that the Mountain be accorded protected status. The Ministry of Defence, however, doubtless under strong outside pressure, is refusing to endorse the recommendation, and as make this appeal to you the clock is ticking down to ecological and cultural disaster. 

Prime Minister, we do not know if you have been briefed on this issue, or have discussed it with any of your fellow NATO leaders, or whether any Canadian Armed Forces intend to participate in the planned training and exercises. We respectfully suggest, however, that the leaders of all NATO states have a right and responsibility to intervene on behalf of these communities whose freedoms NATO is ostensibly pledged to protect, not attack, and so avoid a travesty of justice and an affront to values I am sure you and your Government hold dear. At a minimum, we urge you to propose a postponement of any scheduled military activities, allowing time for a thorough review of all available options and alternatives – a review that should include consultation with local representatives and groups.”