1}
that 3,000 Makiritére... have the right to a surface
of 100,000 km..."
(Coppens, 1972, p.
6).
Heated
court battles ensued with the government essentially
evading the real issue and refusing to take sides.
According to Coppens
(1972, p.
17)
the real
motive of the gcvernment was not to develop the
land as a "cooperative" but a "pretext to seize
Surreptitiously the...region,"
anda smokescreen
to openly and arbitrarily colonize
(cf.
Siverts,
1972).
As of late 1972,
the colonists withdrew and the
land was being incorporated under the jurisdiction
of the National Agrarian Reform.
enable colonization to
Ultimately this will
"officially"
take place, with
the intent to fully assimilate the Makiritare and
bordering tribes.
All of this is occurring in an area
that Venezuelans once considered "tierra baldia"-uncultivated waste
Bikini Atoll,
In 1946,
in
Marshall
lana.
Islands*
the small community that inhabited Bikini Atoll
the northern Marshall
Islands,
United States Trust Territory
of the Pacific Islands, was relocated when its ancestral homeland
wes selected as
4
first nuclear
;
I am especially grateful for Robert Kiste,
Anthropology,
of
qua
the United States
the
University of Minnesota,
information contained in
9011]
v2
test site in
Department of
for providing me with
this
the
section.