#PeoplesClimate #IdleNoMore
Via - Shawn J - @Evolving
End corporate colonization, says Sweetwater Nannauck #idlenomore #FloodWallStreet
Via - Kaeley Pruitt-Hamm @SustainPeaceKPH
Ring of Fire could damage grave, cultural sites
By Jody Porter, CBC News A member of Peawanuck First Nation near Ontario’s Hudson Bay coast says the Ring of Fire mining development
Concerns about burial grounds
THE COLLEGE
student in Timmins has written letters to the Minister of Northern Development and Mines, Nishnawbe Aski Nation and Mushkegowuk Council expressing her concerns. Now she’s launching a petition, seeking signatures from other community members in affected First Nations.
“There is no consultation,” Wabano said. “Meaningful consultation is when everybody is included, the elders, all the residents in the community so they can be aware of what’s going on, because the chiefs can’t speak for me especially when it comes to my grandfather’s traditional territory or my great-grandfather’s final resting place.”
A spokesperson for Mines Minister Michael Gravelle said Ontario is currently focused on engaging the First Nations in the Matawa region, closest to the Ring of Fire.
But the email response to CBC News CONTINUED, saying the province is “fully committed to a wider engagement strategy with our First Nation partners to drive smart, sustainable and collaborative development in the Ring of Fire, subject to the environmental assessment, regulatory approvals and the Crown meeting its duty to consult.”
http://westcoastnativenews.com/family-says-rcmp-officer-elbowed-71-year-old-woman-in-the-face/ :
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Loretta Edjericon of Fort Resolution suffered black eye, bruises
RCMP in N.W.T. are investigating a complaint about a Fort Resolution officer assaulting a community elder.
Margo Edjericon says her 71-year-old mother was injured when two officers pushed their way into her mother’s house at about 4 p.m. on Saturday.
Margo Edjericon says the officers were looking for a young woman. She says she told the two officers that the person they were looking for was in the house but was sleeping and she told them to come back later.
“They pushed their way in,” she said. “One cop … pinned me down on the floor with my arms behind my back and had his knee in my back.”
The other officer continued into the house.
“He came in the hallway and my mom was coming from the bedroom, and that other cop elbowed my mom in the face and had her pinned against the wall.”
Margo Edjericon says her mother, Loretta Edjericon — who is also the mother of Fort Resolution chief Louis Balsillie — suffered two black eyes, facial swelling and bruising to her arm. They’re waiting for test results to find out if she also suffered a concussion and broken nose.
“I trusted the cops all my life, till this happened,” said Margo Edjericon.
RCMP spokesperson Const. Elenore Sturko says a senior G Division officer from outside the Fort Resolution detachment is investigating the incident.
The Atikamekw nation asserting its sovereignty and is targeting forestry companies
The Atikamekw First Nation says it will not allow any forestry work on its territory in Quebec unless it has given prior approval. Th
“The Atikamekw nation asserting its sovereignty and is targeting forestry companies
In a statement, the Atikamekw prevent any logging operation will be allowed on its territory without the operating companies without obtaining prior consent.
This new salvo comes as several forest companies must obtain re-registration in the forest management of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) system. It is precisely on this point that intend to address the Atikamekw to block the operation on their territory Opitciwan.”
In preparation for today’s UN Summit discussing climate change, its implications, and steps to tackle the problem, the People’s Climate March took place on Sunday, September 21st at locations around the world.
New York City’s march was said to have a turnout of over 400,000 making this the largest climate march in history. The indigenous people took the lead of this march as those that are most affected by climate change.
Among them was the Lakota People’s Law Project’s own Madonna Thunder Hawk who marched and spoke at the AIM-West UN Press Conference on Sept. 19th. At the press conference, Thunder Hawk kept her focus on the illegal taking of Lakota children by the state of South Dakota, “The state of South Dakota is still trafficking Lakota children. They get millions of dollars in federal money every year for their so-called child welfare services.” For a clip of Thunder Hawk’s presentation, go to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBypaR8QCf0&feature=youtu.be .
Please become a Member and donate to help the create structural change for the foster care program in South Dakota: http://lakotalaw.org/donate-new.
(via exorpiona)
We do not plan on stopping! Shelley Young#IdleNoMore
Via - Idle No More
Support Winnemem Wintu Cultural Survival!
SIGN the petition and SHARE.
PETITION LINK:
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/support-winnemem-cultural-1
Then write your congress representatives directly! No matter what state you live in, your federal legislators will vote on this. Tell them to vote NO on raising Shasta Dam!This is not a drill. This is as real as it gets.
…Indigenous claims always transcend colonial disruptions: we were here before all that; we are still here; we will make a future here.
Indigenous Canadian Women Are Suffering a Murder Epidemic
Last week’s discovery of the body of Loretta Saunders, an Inuit student who disappeared while working on a thesis about missing and murdered Native Canadian women, sparked calls across the country for action. NGOs say violence against Aboriginal women and girls is reaching epidemic levels — and around half of the murder cases remain unsolved.
Saunders was the third young Aboriginal woman killed this year, according to the Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC). Five others were found last fall.
On February 13, NWAC delivered a petition to the House of Commons, signed by over 23,000 Canadians in support of the call for a national inquiry.
Next time you want to say “Canada’s such a nice place! Nothing bad happens in Canada!” please give a thought to this.
(via exorpiona)
Ontario police have found the car of a missing Halifax woman and are treating her disappearance as suspicious.
Halifax police said a man and a woman who were travelling in the car in Harrow, Ont., were arrested for being in possession of a stolen vehicle Tuesday night.
Blake Leggette, 25, and Victoria Henneberry, 28, appeared by video in Windsor provincial court on Wednesday. Both have been remanded into custody and are scheduled to appear in court on Friday, again via video.
Halifax Regional Police Const. Pierre Bourdages said the pair had outstanding warrants in Halifax and Calgary.
Loretta Saunders, 26, who is three-months pregnant, hasn’t been seen since last Thurday night.
Bourdages said Leggette and Henneberry know Saunders.
“This file has now been transferred over to the major crime unit given the suspicious nature of the investigation,” the officer said. "Investigations are still looking for any sightings of Loretta.“
Saunders, an Inuit woman from Newfoundland and Labrador, is a student at Saint Mary’s University. Her thesis focuses on missing and murdered aboriginal women, making her disappearance a surreal irony for her family.
Her sister, Delilah Saunders, said she last contacted Loretta by text on Friday, Valentine’s Day, but the only reply she received was a brief “Hey.”
Loretta is described as fair skinned, 5-7", weighing 120 pounds, with straight light brown hair.“
Anyone with information can leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers by calling toll-free 1-800-222-TIPS (8477).
Hi, may I request a signal boost? Loretta Saunders is a young Inuit woman who was living in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She hasn't been heard from since Friday, and today her stolen car was found in Ontario. Ironically, she was writing her thesis on (1)
Asked by Anonymous
(2) missing aboriginal women & girls, making this all the worst for her family. Loretta is pregnant and somewhere between Ontario & Nova Scotia; her family is desperate for answers. If anyone knows ANYTHING please contact your police or Crimestoppers
CHRISSY SWAIN, DEFENDING GRASSY NARROWS - Chrissy Swain shares about her connection to the land, the importance of youth defenders, and how some leadership should “smarten up” and be Anishinaabe.
Posted June 10, 2013
On December 2, 2002, youth and Elders of the Grassy Narrows First Nation established a blockade on a logging road in their territory and sparked one of the longest standing Indigenous logging blockades in Canadian history. The Grassy Narrows community has survived many colonial traumas including relocation, residential schools, mercury contamination, flooding of sacred grounds and burial sites, and clear-cut logging within their traditional territory. However, resistance is strong at Grassy Narrows where youth and Elders are actively defending their territories by re-occupying their lands, reviving their culture, and exercising their rights to manage their land as they see fit.
“You writers from the dominating culture have the freedom of imagination. You keep reminding us of this. Is there anyone here to dares to imagine what those children suffered at the hands of their so-called ‘guardians’ in those schools. You are writers, imagine it on yourselves and your children. Imagine you and your children and imagine how they would be treated by those who abhorred and detested you, all, as savages without any rights.
Imagine at what cost to you psychologically, to acquiesce and attempt to speak, dress, eat, and worship, like your oppressors, simply out of a need to be treated humanly. Imagine attempting to assimilate so that your children will not suffer what you have, and imagine finding that assimilationist measures are not meant to include you but to destroy all remnants of your culture. Imagine finding that even when you emulate every cultural process from customs to values you are still excluded, despised, and ridiculed because you are Native.
Imagine finding out that the dominating culture will not tolerate any real cultural participation and that cultural supremacy forms the basis of the government process and that systemic racism is a tool to maintain their kind of totalitarianism. And all the while, imagine that this is presented under the guise of ‘equal rights’ and under the banner of banishing bigotry on an individual basis through law.
Imagine yourselves in this condition and imagine the writers of that dominating culture berating you for speaking out about appropriation of cultural voice and using the words ‘freedom of speech’ to condone further systemic violence, in the form of entertainment literature about your culture and your values and all the while, yourself being disempowered and rendered voiceless through such ‘freedoms’.”
—Jeannette C. Armstrong, ‘The Disempowerment of First North American Native Peoples and Empowerment Through Their Writing’ (paper prepared for Saskatchewan Writers Guild 1990 Annual Conference)