CORPORATE GREED AND VANDALISM - RIO TINTO CORPORATION BLOWS UP SACRED PILBARA SITES:

 This cave in the Juukan Gorge, dubbed Juukan 2, was destroyed in a mining blast. Photograph: The Puutu Kunti Kurrama and Pinikura Aboriginal Corporation.

In a stunning example of corporate greed and total lack of sensitivity, not only to ethnic sensibility, but to scientific value, the Rio Tinto Mining Corporation blew up rock shelters bearing evidence of 46,000 years of occupation in Australia's Pilbara region.

"A sacred site in Western Australia that showed 46,000 years of continual occupation and provided a 4,000-year-old genetic link to the present-day traditional owners has been destroyed in the expansion of an iron ore mine. The cave in Juukan Gorge i the Hammersley Ranges, about 60km from Mt. Tom Price, is one of the oldest in the western Pilbara region and the only inland site in Australia to show signs of continual human occupation through the last Ice Age. it was blasted along with another sacred site on Sunday. Mining company Rio Tinto received ministerial consent to destroy or damage the site in 2013 under WA's outdated Aboriginal heritage laws, which were drafted in 1972 to favour mining proponents. One year after consent was granted, an archaeological dig intended to salvage whatever could be saved discovered the site was more than twice as old as previously thought and rich in artefacts, including sacred objects." (Wahlquist 2020)

Juukan 2, after the blast. Photograph: The Puutu Kunti Kurrama and Pinikura Aboriginal Corporation.

According to current understanding "The Aboriginal population of the Pilbara considerably predates, by 30-40,000 years, the European colonisation of the region. Archaeological evidence indicates that people were living in the Pilbara even during the harsh climatic conditions of the Last Glacial Maximum. The early history of the first peoples is held within an oral tradtition, archaeological evidence, and petroglyphs. Near the town of Dampier is a peninsula known as Murujuga, which contains a large collection of world heritage listed petroglyphs, dating back thousands of years. Rock art in the Pilbara appears to have been primarily etched into the hard rock surfaces, compared to predominantly paintings on the softer sandstone of the Kimberley. This does not preclude that painting was and is not performed in the Pilbara. In 2006, it was estimated that 15% of the population of the Pilbara was of indigenous background, approximately 6,000 people." (Wikipedia)

While I have been unable to determine whether any Aboriginal rock art was actually destroyed along with the caves, it is hard to believe that there were no graphic images or markings remaining from 46,000 years of occupation. In any case they were important archeological sites as well as important examples of cultural heritage, and their destruction illustrates the mindless ignorance of corporate profiteering. 

REFERENCES:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilbara

Wahlquist, Calla

2020 Rio Tinto Blasts 46,000-year-old Aboriginal Site to Expand Iron Ore Mine, May 25, 2020, the Guardian, Manchester, England.