MASE Submission to the United Nations Universal Periodic Review of United States of America

No Start Up Until Clean Up: Human Rights and the Impacts of Uranium Mining and Processing in the United States September 2014

Excerpt:

A. Remediation of Historic Waste

21. The United States’ and state governments’ continuing failure to commit adequate financial and other resources to remediating radioactive waste from historic uranium mining and processing represents an ongoing violation of community members’ and MASE members’ rights to life, health and access to clean water as guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man,16 and the General Assembly’s Resolution No. 64/292 recognizing the right to water and sanitation.

22. The United States’ and state governments’ failure to remediate radioactive waste from uranium mining and processing in minority communities, while achieving remediation in non-minority communities also represents the United States’ failure to realize its obligations to provide equal treatment under domestic laws pursuant to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights18 and the International Convention on the Elimination on All Forms of Racial Discrimination.

23. Moreover, the Special Rapporteur on the human right to water and sanitation (then Independent Expert) submitted a report on disparate access to clean water in the United States to the UN Human Rights Council in September 2011.20 In paragraphs 30-40 of her report, the Special Rapporteur expressed her concern about the pattern of discriminatory impacts on low-income and minority populations in the United States, regarding those communities’ access to safe drinking water.

Read the MASE UPR report Final