Tag: Aboriginal

The national body representing hundreds of mining and mineral exploration companies in Australia has told a parliamentary inquiry it would be “overreach” to strengthen federal laws to protect Aboriginal heritage.

© Provided by The Guardian
Photograph: PKKP Aboriginal Corporation/AFP/Getty Images

But at the same hearing into Rio Tinto’s destruction of a 46,000-year-old sacred site at Juukan Gorge, the Law Council of Australia argued the opposite, saying there was an “an urgent need” for federal government leadership on Indigenous cultural heritage protection.

© Photograph: PKKP Aboriginal Corporation/AFP/Getty Images
The Juukan Gorge in Western Australia before it was destroyed by Rio Tinto in May.

The law council said the commonwealth needed to ensure state and territory laws enshrined important principles