when a court recognized them as the owners of a remote cattle station at the center of landmark protests. The Noonkanbah claim, which gained international attention in 1980 when a U.S. company's proposal to drill for oil on a sacred Aboriginal site prompted major protests, is seen as the impetus for Australia's land rights movement.
The Federal Court Friday determined that the local Yungngora people have exclusive native title rights over the 1,800-square- kilometer estate in Western Australia's Kimberley region.
Hundreds of Yungngora gathered at Noonkanbah, which they now run as a cattle station, to celebrate the decision and to consider what to do with the land which is rich in minerals, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported.
"It puts behind the struggles that we have gone through in the past, when the government and miners tried to override our people and our culture for the sake of the so-called public good," Noonkanbah community chairman Dickey Cox said.
The Yungngora have held a pastoral lease for the estate since 1976 but the Federal Court decision gives them exclusive rights over the whole parcel of land, save for a stock route and an aerodrome which are government owned.
Australia's indigenous communities were stripped of all their land when British settlers arrived more than 200 years ago and it was not until the 1970s that a movement to recognize native title rights gained support.
Despite having a lease for the Noonkanbah estate, in 1980 the Yungngora people came up against the mineral exploration company AMAX which had state government backing to drill for oil at a sacred site on the estate.
The resulting protests have been credited with leading to the establishment of the Native Title Act and other decisions which have sought to give indigenous people control over their traditional lands.
