[Indigsol] IPSMO Newsletter. Aug. 23 - 30

[Indigenous Peoples' Solidarity Movement -Ottawa]

IPSMO Newsletter, Aug. 23-30
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1) Meetings
a) Next IPSMO General Meeting, Sept 8 at 7pm
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2) Events

a) Understanding the Epidemic of Violence against Indigenous Women,
Sept 16 at 6:30pm
b) Sisters in Spirit Vigil, Oct. 4,
c) Canadian Human Rights Tribunal on First Nations child welfare begins
September 14
d) QUEERS AGAINST APARTHEID FROM CANADA TO ISRAEL,
Sunday, August 30
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3) Articles
a) Flesh trade targets natives
b) American Indian activist Leonard Peltier once again denied parole
c) Amnesty International request denied re: Leonard Peltier parole
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Attachments:

Chief Matchewan’s letter to AbitibiBowater
SIS 2009 Vigil Poster
SIS 2009 Vigil – Registration Form
SIS Vigil Cover letter
________________________________________________________________________
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1) Meetings
a) Next IPSMO General Meeting, Sept 8 at 7pm

IPSMO General Meeting, Tuesday, Sept 8 at 7pm

IPSMO’s next GM
Tuesday, Aug. 25 at 7pm
Exile Infoshop (256 Bank St.)
Everyone Welcome!
Sorry this location is not wheelchair accessible
ipsmo at riseup.net
http://ipsmo.wordpress.com

IPSMO’s general meeting is where our working groups report back and where
we make decisions about any other organizing that we will do.
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2) Events

a) Understanding the Epidemic of Violence against Women, Sept 16 at 6:30pm

In solidarity with Indigenous Women across Turtle Island
Join us in an evening of understanding
The Epidemic of Continuing Violence Against Indigenous Women

6:30 PM Wednesday, September 16th, 2009
Auditorium, National Library and Archives
395 Wellington St. Ottawa, Algonquin Territory
Wheelchair Accessible
Free!  Everyone is Welcome.

This event is also a fundraiser for Laurie Odjick and her family for their
struggle to find Maisy Odjick (her daughter) and Shannon Alexander,
Anishinabeg teenagers from Kitigan Zibi, who have been missing since
September 5th, 2008 (http://www.findmaisyandshannon.com/), and to support
organizing to end violence against Indigenous women.

Presented by
Indigenous Peoples Solidarity Movement Ottawa
ipsmo at riseup.net,
http://ipsmo.wordpress.com

Opening Ceremony:
Verna McGregor and Elaine Kicknosway, Anishinabekweg, Omàmiwinini
(Algonquin) and
Cree Nation

Films Screening:
The Highway of Tears by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy
The Heart Has Its Own Memory by Audrey Huntley and Folkard Fritz

Speakers:
Laurie Odjick
Omàmiwinini (Algonquin) Nation
Mother of Maisy Odjick, Missing Teenage Girl

Doreen Silversmith
Guyohkohnyo (Cayuga) Nation
No More Silence Network

Bruce Sinclair
Metis Nation (Saskatchewan)
Brother In Spirit, Native Women’s Association of Canada

According to the Sisters In Spirit research by Native Women Association of
Canada, in the past forty years, there are 520 known cases of missing or
murdered Indigenous women and girls.  Why are Indigenous women more
susceptible to violence?  Why is there violence against women,
particularly Indigenous women?  On September 16th, we
will get a closer understanding of the reality of the lives of the
Indigenous women across Turtle Island (Canada) and root causes of violence
against Grandmothers, Grand aunties, Mothers, Aunties, Sisters and
Daughters.

Exact a year ago, on September 15, 2008, hundreds of people gathered in
front of Parliament Hill for a rally to raise awareness and demand a
response from Canadian State on the violence against Indigenous women. 
Since then, the circumstances of Indigenous women have not changed –
colonial and racial oppressions and violence continue.  The majority of
the people in the dominant culture still don’t know the dreadful threats
Indigenous women face today.

In addition to demanding actions from Canadian government, what would it
take for us to understand that the health of our environment is
inextricably linked to the health and well-being of Indigenous women? 
What would it take for us to begin caring about Indigenous women so that
they will be once again respected and honoured like their ancestors prior
to Colonization?
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b) Sisters in Spirit Vigil, Oct. 4 2009

*** distribute nationwide ***

Dear friends,

Summer is here but the Sisters In Spirit Vigil Committee is already
looking ahead to Fall 2009. This year marks the fourth annual SIS Vigil
and we want to make it the best event to-date. An impressive forty
communities held SIS vigils in 2008, several more communities have
approached us in the last few months and we thank everyone for standing
with us.

Sisters in Spirit vigils are focused on honouring the lives of missing and
murdered Aboriginal women and girls. They also provide support
for families as well as an opportunity for families to share their story.
Together we can recognize this Canadian crisis and demand action.

Attached to this email is a Cover Letter and new Registration Form. 
Please complete the form and return it to Laura at lflorez at nwac-hq.org or
fax it to 613.722.7687.  We’ve also attached our 2009 SIS Vigil poster, in
honour of all the communities that joined us last year. Hard copies of the
poster are available free of charge.

In peace and friendship,

The Sisters In Spirit Vigil Committee
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c) Canadian Human Rights Tribunal begins on September 14

Canadian Human Rights Tribunal begins on September 14


The Assembly of First Nations and the First Nations Child and Family
Caring Society (FNCFCS) have asked individuals and organizations,
including KAIROS and the churches, for help in enhancing awareness of and
participation in the upcoming Canadian Human Rights Tribunal that will
examine the impact of federal policies on First Nations children. This is
the first time the Government of Canada is being held to account for its
CURRENT treatment of First Nations children. The tribunal is the result of
a complaint filed by the AFN and FNCFCS in 2007 alleging Canada was
racially discriminating against First Nations children by providing a
lesser standard of child welfare funding than other children receive.

The tribunal starts on September 14 and continues on Sept. 15, 16, 17 &
18, (although it may be adjourned after the first day.) The tribunal is
expected to continue into next year.

Individuals and organizations are being asked to become "witnesses" and to
join the AFN and the FNCFCS in publicizing the tribunal and, if possible,
in attending the tribunal hearings. The FNCFCS web site has more
information at <http://www.fnwitness.ca>.

To ensure good attendance at the hearings, organizations are being
asked to take responsibility for a particular date.

A more formal request will be coming soon from the FNCFCS.

An interview with Cindy Blackstock, from the First Nations Child and
Family Caring Society of Canada:

http://www.ncra.ca/exchange/dspProgramDetail.cfm?programID=86115
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d) QUEERS AGAINST APARTHEID FROM CANADA TO ISRAEL

QUEERS AGAINST APARTHEID FROM CANADA TO ISRAEL
march in this year's Capital Pride Parade!

++++++++++++++
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Meet at 12:30 pm (look for the "Agitate!" spot)
Spark St. & Wellington
Ottawa, ON

http://www.capitalpride.ca/2009/join/#route

Bring noisemakers, banners, flags!

OCCUPATION IS A COCK BLOCK!
++++++++++++++

Queers who are taking a stand against apartheid are inviting all queer
people and allies to join in the struggles for the rights and dignity of
queer people of territories occupied by Canada and Israel.

We reject the corporatization and depoliticization of queer identity that
is being “celebrated” today. Instead, we celebrate the long history of
queers being at the forefront of social justice movements (from the Civil
Rights movement in the U.S. to the Anti-Apartheid movement in South
Africa).

This year, we continue this legacy of Queer resistance. As we march
against different manifestations of homophobia both at home and across the
world, we also march in solidarity with all people struggling for social
justice and self determination everywhere.

Like many queers throughout North America and beyond, we are fed up with
Israel's attempts to falsely brand itself as a safe haven for queers in
order to divert the world's attention from its racist policies towards
Palestinian people. We believe all forms of oppression are related. We do
not support the fight against homophobia if it is perpetuating racism.

We are also standing in solidarity with indigenous people in ''Canada''
who are confronting colonization and imperialism. We recognize that the
Canadian state, from its very beginning, has disrupted and destroyed many
first nations communities through sexual violence, repression,
assimilation and occupation. Queer rights are moot if they mean
legitimization of occupation. There can be no pride in our communities if
we do not stand in solidarity with others who are resisting all forms of
oppression.

Canada and Israel bolster each other's colonial occupations through
political, military and economic support. To us, the links are clear. As
queers our role in the struggle is obvious.

It's been 8 months since Israel's brutal assault on Gaza which saw
hundreds of thousands of people across the world take to the streets in
outrage. Many have joined the global movement of Boycott, Divestment and
Sanctions against Israel.

In Tyendinaga, Six Nations, Barriere Lake, Akwesasne, Coast Salish and
across the continent, first nations communities are fanning the flames of
resistance to colonization.

Recently, in Toronto and Montréal, Queers have taken to the streets during
Pride parades to loudly declare their love and solidarity towards the
people of Palestine and their struggle for justice, land and dignity.

This Pride week, it's time for us in Ottawa to reaffirm our solidarity and
to march with our allies in our hearts.

Join us as we loudly declare:

THERE IS NO PRIDE IN OCCUPATION!
************************************

Endorsed by:
Agitate!
Queer fAction
Students Against Israeli Apartheid (SAIA)
Queers Against Israeli Apartheid (QuAIA)
Q-Team MTL
OPIRG-GRIPO
Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR-Ottawa)
Indigenous Peoples' Solidarity Movement Ottawa (IPSMO)
Association of Palestinian Arab Canadians (APAC)

+++++
Media Contact: D.J. Fallous-Tyne
Phone: 613 864 0159Email: falloustyne at gmail.com
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3) Articles
a) Flesh trade targets natives

Flesh trade targets natives

Young Aboriginal women used as a sex commodity in cities across Canada
By TAMARA CHERRY, SUN MEDIA

http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2008/09/29/6916776-sun.html

"The average age of Aboriginal girls who are human trafficked is between
seven and 12 years old," says Jo-Ann Daniels, interim executive director
for the Metis Settlements General Council in Edmonton. (ROBERT TAYLOR/Sun
Media)
On the street corners of Canada's largest cities, thousands of women are
bought and sold every night.
Most of them, experts say, are aboriginal and an alarming number are
trafficked.
"There's a total myth that Aboriginal women either consent to or are born
into the sex trade," says Jo-Ann Daniels, interim executive director for
the Metis Settlements General Council in Edmonton. "The average age of
Aboriginal girls who are human trafficked is between seven and 12 years
old."
In a four-part series running across the country this week, Sun Media
looks at Canada's hidden trade in people; at the failure of this country
to live up to its international obligations on human trafficking, to
prosecute human traffickers and meaningfully help victims.
"It is Aboriginal girls and women who are specifically targeted in this
country to be trafficked, in such huge numbers that it does not compare to
any other population," Daniels says. "We believe that it is the root
source of Aboriginal women ever being involved in the sex trade. We
believe that Aboriginal women and Aboriginal girls have been domestically
trafficked now for, I would say probably since the '50s when there began
to be Aboriginal movement into urban areas or there were more contacts
between Aboriginal communities and towns."
Aboriginal trafficking has been identified as a unique problem in
government reports, non-governmental newsletters and at human trafficking
conferences.
Poverty, abuse, racism and troubled historical relations have all been
cited as reasons for the Aboriginal population falling victim to Canada's
flesh trade at a far higher rate than non-Aboriginals.
FEW ARE LISTENING
But those in the know suggest few are listening and little or nothing is
being done to deal with the indiscriminate exploitation of this
population.
Members of the Institute for the Advancement of Aboriginal Women (IAAW) in
Edmonton began to hear stories from Aboriginal women about how they got
involved in sex work after publishing their 2006 Crime Against Aboriginal
Women report, says Daniels, a former policy analyst for IAAW.
"There was so few of them who had consented. There were so few of them who
got any support to even recognize that they had been domestically
trafficked," Daniels recalls.
Given the total lack of statistics gathered on domestic trafficking in
this country, it is no wonder there is nothing to accurately illustrate
exactly how many Aboriginal people are being trafficked. But this is what
is known:
- More than 500 Aboriginal women have gone missing or been murdered in
Canada over the last few decades.
- According to research conducted by gang expert Michael Chettleburgh, 90%
of the teenaged, urban prostitutes in Canada are Aboriginal.
- About 75% of Aboriginal girls under 18 have been sexually abused, says
Anupriya Sethi, who has researched the issue. Of those, half are under 14
and nearly a quarter are younger than seven.
"According to the Department of Justice and other witnesses, Aboriginal
girls and women are at greater risk of becoming victims of trafficking
within and outside Canada," notes the February 2007 report on human
trafficking from the Standing Committee on Status of Women.
The report noted accounts from several experts about poverty, abuse and
poor living conditions driving Aboriginal women into trafficking.
"Basically their handlers start them in Vancouver," Chantal Tie, a lawyer
with the National Association of Women and The Law, told the committee.
"They work for them there for awhile, then they're sold to someone in
Winnipeg and then to someone in Toronto, and so on down the line as they
get moved around the country."
The RCMP's National Aboriginal Policing Service wanted to examine the
issue further, the report noted, but lacked the funding and human
resources to do so.
Later that year, the First Peoples Child and Family Review published a
report by Sethi after she spent five months interviewing 18 "key
informants," who ranged from trafficking victims to front-line service
providers for sexually exploited women.
Sethi identified trafficking triangles through which Aboriginal victims
are moved: Saskatoon-Edmonton-Calgary-Saskatoon;
Saskatoon-Regina-Winnipeg-Saskatoon.
"These triangles are linked and they're spread all across Canada," Sethi
says in an interview from Ottawa. "One of the trafficked women who I spoke
with said that you sleep in the night and you're in Montreal and in the
morning you wake up and you're in Vancouver."
"I don't know if there are international linkages," she says. "Once you're
in Vancouver, are you taken? Once you're in Toronto, are you taken to New
York or do you go to Los Angeles? I don't know. It hasn't been explored."
In big cities like Montreal, Aboriginal girls from northern communities
are plucked right from the airport, Sethi says.
"Traffickers often know someone in the community who informs them about
the plans of the girls moving to the city. Upon their arrival at the
airport, traffickers lure the girls under the pretext of providing a place
to stay or access to resources," she notes in her report.
'YOUNG, NAIVE'
Sethi quotes an Aboriginal outreach worker as such: "Girls tend to believe
in the promises of the traffickers as they are young, naive and vulnerable
in a new and big city. They are unsuspecting of the motives of the
traffickers, since they belong to communities that have a culture of
welcoming strangers."
Experts cite various reasons these girls are leaving their communities.
"Aboriginal communities are facing huge issues, whether it's poverty or
homelessness, sexual exploitation," Sethi says. "If you escape all that
and there is this person who is targeting you... (who) offers you a
shelter, offers you a job or better prosperous life, it's very easy to buy
in."
"I haven't seen the image that I think people have in their head about
people being scooped off reserves and taken other places," says Anette
Sikka, who is researching the issue at the University of Ottawa.
"Chronic runaways are a real issue with trafficking in the Prairie
Provinces," she says. "It tends to be if a young girl has run away a
number of times, people stop looking." Experts interviewed by the Sun
agree common factors that contribute to non-Aboriginal victims being
forced into the sex trade -- such as poverty, drugs and abuse -- are much
more prevalent in Aboriginal communities.
"There's a lot that unites us as Canadians, whether we're African
Canadian, white or Aboriginal. But there are some distinctions with the
Aboriginal community that I don't think most policy makers truly
understand," says Chettleburgh. "The generation of young at-risk
Aboriginals we have right now, many of them are the product of parents
that went through the residential school experience and they've lost that
touch with what makes them Indian."
"THIS IS ALL THEIR FAULT'
"I think there is a conception in people's minds that Aboriginal people
aren't doing anything, this is all their fault, without making a
connection to the whole issue of colonization and what colonization has
done to harm the healthy development of Aboriginal people," says Marlyn
Bennett, director of research for the First Nations Child and Family
Caring Society of Canada in Winnipeg. "You have parents who don't know how
to be parents."
Like international trafficking cases, in some Aboriginal communities, the
exploitation is familial -- fathers and uncles exchanging incest for food
and shelter, Sethi says.
"It's the whole bigger picture and if you miss it, then you'll miss the
point," Sethi says. "How many Aboriginal men healing centres have you
heard about?"
While experts have cited instances of Aboriginal victims being recruited
by Asian and Somali gangs, says Chettleburgh: "There's no shortage of
Aboriginal on Aboriginal victimization in the country." He points to
Winnipeg where large gangs such as Indian Posse, Native Syndicate and Red
Alert "are definitely running the girls on the street."
"I could take you to north Winnipeg, show you a street corner in the
middle of a Monday afternoon, you'll have three girls, 12, 14, working the
corners. Obviously they're being pimped out by gang members, but their
customers are white guys driving middle class sedans that have come from
the 'burbs, who are paying for their $20 (sex acts) in back alleys and
they disappear back to where they came from."
In Hobbema, a notoriously crime-laden reserve south of Edmonton, young
women who have identified themselves as Indian Posse Girls claim to run
the prostitution rings, Chettleburgh says.
"And largely their customers aren't the domestic demand," he adds. "It's
these guys that are driving through the community looking for a score."
"Things like this don't happen without racism being the core cause,"
Daniels says with emphatic frustration. "The number one killer in this
country for Aboriginal women isn't diabetes or cancer. It's
rape-slash-murder. It can grow to such horrific heights and still, what's
happening? Where's the human outcry? If it happened to soccer moms, it
would be a completely different story all together."
"Just simply being an Aboriginal woman puts you at risk. I can go and
stand on the corner of 108th St. and Jasper Ave. (in Edmonton) waiting for
a ride to come along and I will get solicited," she says. "Aboriginal
women who smoke, they'll go out on the side there, away from the entrance
of their business buildings, of their offices, and they'll get solicited.
It's a real problem. That's how racialized the sex industry is in this
country.
'TARGETS ABORIGINALS'
"It just so targets Aboriginal women."
Asked for an estimate of the number of Aboriginal women and girls being
trafficked in Canada, Daniels pauses.
"At this point, I would say hundreds," she says. "If we say thousands, I
don't know if that's 99,000 or 3,000. So just hundreds at this point."
"The women out there now, tragically are --" her voice trails off. "I
don't know how to say this. There's just a lot of Aboriginal women and
girls out there."
Those who care have made several recommendations to the government: Look
closer. Come up with a plan. Save our children. But where is the response?
Even the U.S. State department acknowledges the problem, noting it in
their 2008 Trafficking in Persons report: "Canadian girls and women, many
of whom are Aboriginal, are trafficked internally for commercial sexual
exploitation," the report says.
The Aboriginal issue hasn't been ignored, Winnipeg MP Joy Smith, who
co-chaired last year's Status of Women report, says just days before the
federal election is announced. The only reason Smith, who has passionately
taken on the issue of human trafficking for several years, can give for
her government not addressing Aboriginal trafficking is that they can't
get anything done with a minority government.
Human trafficking can't be ruled out when considering all the missing
Aboriginal women in this country, Bennett says.
"Where are all these women? Where are they? Are they dead?" she says.
"Whether these women are being moved around, we don't know that and we
need to look at that and we need to find out."
"It's very rare with regards to the Aboriginal population that somebody
goes in for money into voluntary sex work," Sethi says. "Unless we take a
step back and see why it's happening, we'll never be able to get through
this problem. We'll always see it as voluntary prostitution and their
problem."
"Either it's ignorance or it's stereotype or it's total indifference or
it's racism or it's a mix of all these factors," she says. "Before we go
any further into prevention and targeted initiatives, let's just start
acknowledging that this issue is human trafficking and not just sex work."
________________________________________________________________________

b) American Indian activist Leonard Peltier once again denied parole

American Indian activist Leonard Peltier once again denied parole

By Associated Press

August 21 2009, 11:03 AM PDT

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — U.S. Attorney Drew Wrigley says imprisoned
American
Indian activist Leonard Peltier has been denied parole.

The complete article can be viewed at:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-us-peltier-parole,0,1411297.story
________________________________________________________________________

c) Amnesty International request denied re: Leonard Peltier parole

21 August 2009

Amnesty International today regretted the US Parole Commission’s decision
not to grant Leonard Peltier parole despite concerns about the fairness of
his 1977 conviction for murder. The organization called for the immediate
release on parole of the activist, who is serving two consecutive life
sentences and has spent more than 32 years in prison.

A prominent member of the American Indian Movement (AIM), Leonard Peltier
was convicted of the murders of two Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
agents, Jack Coler and Ronald Williams, during a confrontation involving
AIM members on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota on 26
June 1975. While Leonard Peltier admits having been present during the
incident, he has always denied shooting the agents at point blank range as
alleged by the prosecution at his trial.

Amnesty International recognizes the seriousness of the crime for which
Leonard Peltier was convicted. However, having studied the case extensively
over many years, the organization remains concerned about the fairness of
the process leading to his conviction, including questions about evidence
linking him to the point-blank shootings and coercion of an alleged
eye-witness.

One of Amnesty International’s concerns is that Leonard Peltier’s
extradition from Canada in 1976 -- where he had fled following the
shootings -- was secured on the basis of the coerced testimony of an
alleged eye-witness which the FBI knew to be false. The witness, Myrtle
Poor Bear, later retracted her testimony that she had seen Leonard Peltier
shoot the agents but the trial judge did not allow her to be called as a
defence witness at his trial. Other concerns include the withholding by
the prosecution of evidence, including potentially key ballistics evidence
that might have assisted Leonard Peltier’s defence.

"The interest of justice would be best served by granting Leonard Peltier
parole,” said Angela Wright, US Researcher at Amnesty International.
“Given the concerns around his conviction, the fact that appeals before
the courts have long been exhausted and that he has spent more than 32
years in prison, we urge the Parole Commission to reconsider its
decision.”

The parole hearing, which took place over four hours on 28 July, was the
first full parole hearing to be held in the case since 1993. In addition
to the concerns about the fairness of his conviction, parole was sought by
Peltier and his lawyer based on his good conduct record in prison and
arrangements made by the Turtle Mountain tribe to receive him into their
community on his release.

Background Information

Leonard Peltier is an Anishinabe-Lakota Native American who was a member
of the American Indian Movement (AIM), an activist group involved in
promoting the rights of “traditionalist” Indians during a period of
intense conflict in the 1970s. In the two years prior to the confrontation
in which the agents were killed, more than 60 Indians on the Pine Ridge
reservation had been killed, allegedly by paramilitary squads connected to
the tribal government, without anyone being brought to justice for the
crimes. AIM members who had come to the reservation to assist
“traditionalists” opposing the tribal government were also allegedly
threatened. Relations between AIM and the FBI were also tense, with
accusations that the authorities had not done enough to protect those at
risk on the reservation.

The confrontation in which the two FBI agents were killed took place after
the agents entered the reservation with an arrest warrant for four people
and started following a van. A fire-fight ensued. Evidence was presented
at trial to show that the agents received multiple shots and were quickly
disabled before being shot dead at point-blank range.
Two other AIM leaders, Darelle Butler and Robert Robideau, were initially
charged with the agents’ murders and were tried separately: no evidence
was presented to link them to the point-blank shootings.

The jury acquitted them after hearing evidence about the atmosphere of
violence and intimidation on the reservation and concluded that, arguably,
they might have been acting in self-defense when they were involved in the
exchange of gunfire.

Following their acquittal, the FBI renewed its efforts to pursue Leonard
Peltier, who had fled to Canada. At his trial, the prosecution alleged
that the rifle which killed the agents belonged to Peltier. During
post-trial investigations, the defence team discovered a teletex message
suggesting that the rifle in question contained a different firing pin
from the one used to kill the agents; this was raised on appeal and an
evidentiary hearing held at which the significance of the teletex was
contested by the government. On appeal, the government also argued that
sufficient evidence had been presented to the jury at trial to show that
Leonard Peltier had “aided and abetted” the killings even if he had not
been the actual killer.

However, Amnesty International believes that the outcome may well have
been different had Peltier been able to challenge the ballistics evidence
linking him to the fatal shots more effectively.
________________________________________________________________________

e) Canadian Human Rights Tribunal on First Nations child welfare

I would also ask that you take a minute to join our I am a witness
campaign. It is free and takes only 2 minutes. What being a witness means
is agreeing to follow the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal on First Nations
child welfare through the media or attending in person and drawing your
own conclusions as to whether Canada is treating FN (First Nations)
children fairly. Individuals and organizations can sign
up so please spread the word - here is the website www.fnwitness.ca

On February 27, 2007, the Assembly of First Nations [AFN], a political
organization representing all First Nations in Canada, and the  First
Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada [FNCFCS], a national
non-profit organization providing services to First Nations child welfare
organizations, took the historic step of holding Canada accountable before
the Canadian Human Rights Commission for its
current treatment of First Nations children. The complaint alleges that
the Government of Canada had a longstanding pattern of providing less
government funding for child welfare services to First Nations children on
reserves than is provided to non-Aboriginal children.

The inequalities in First Nations child welfare funding are longstanding
and well documented (Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples [RCAP], 1996;
McDonald & Ladd, 2000; Loxley et. al., 2005; Amnesty International, 2006;
Assembly of First Nations,
2007; Auditor General of Canada, 2008; Standing Committee on Public
Accounts, 2009) as are the tragic consequences of First Nations children
going into child welfare care due, in part, to the unavailability of
equitable family support services (McDonald & Ladd, 2000; Blackstock and
Trocme, 2005; Amnesty International, 2006;
Clarke, 2007; Auditor General of Canada, 2008; National Council on
Welfare, 2008).

This inequity is further amplified for First Nations children by
shortfalls in education funding, housing and publically funded voluntary
sector supports (Blackstock, 2008).In October of 2008, the Canadian Human
Rights Commission ordered a tribunal to determine whether or not
discrimination had occurred pursuant to the
Canadian Human Rights Act. The tribunal is similar to a court process with
all evidence taken under oath. The AFN and the First Nations Child and
Family Caring Society will present the case supporting our allegation that
the Canadian Government is discriminating against First Nations children
and then the federal government will respond. The Tribunal will then
decide if discrimination happened or not. If it
did happen, then the Tribunal can order a remedy to the discrimination.
The tribunal is open to the public.

Interview with Cindy Blackstock, First Nations Child and Family Caring
Society of Canada
http://www.ncra.ca/exchange/dspProgramDetail.cfm?programID=86115

Why is this case important?First Nations children are drastically over
represented in child welfare care. As of May of 2005, the Wen:de study
found that 0.67% of non Aboriginal children were in child welfare care in
three sample provinces in Canada as compared to 10.23% of status Indian
children. Overall there are more First Nations children in child welfare
care in Canada than at the height of residential schools.First Nations
children are entering child welfare care at increasing rates.

According to federal government figures the number of status Indian
children entering child welfare care rose 71.5% nationally between
1995-2001.The Canadian Incidence Study on Reported Child Abuse and Neglect
(CIS) has found that First Nations children come to the attention of child
welfare authorities for different reasons than non Aboriginal children.
First Nations are not more likely to experience abuse than non-Aboriginal
children. First Nations children are more
likely to be reported for neglect which is driven by poverty, poor housing
and caregiver substance misuse.

Provincial child welfare laws apply both on and off reserves. The
provinces fund child welfare for children off reserve but expect the
federal government to fund it on reserve. If the federal government does
not fund the services or funds them inadequately, the provinces typically
do not top up the funding levels. This results in a two tiered child
welfare system where First Nations children on reserves get less funding
for child welfare than other children.

Repeated reports, including by the Auditor General of Canada (2008) and
Standing Committee on Public Accounts (2009) confirm that federal
government funding for child welfare services on reserves is inadequate
and must be changed in order to ensure First Nations children and families
on reserves receive a comparable and culturally based child welfare
services. Although the federal government has been aware of the shortfalls
in its child welfare funding for over nine years, it has implemented only
modest improvements in three provinces.

Canadian Human Rights Tribunal NewsRead the research on First Nations
child welfare fundingAbout the tribunalWhen will the tribunal begin?
It starts on September 14, 2009 and continues on September 15, 16,17 and 18.

Additional dates for the tribunal have been set for October, November and
January and February.

What does it mean to be a witness?
By being a witness you are making a commitment to follow the case by
either coming to watch the tribunal in person or by following it in your
local media. As a caring Canadian, we invite you to follow this historic
case and then decide for yourself whether or not you feel the federal
government is treating First Nations children fairly today.

Who can be a witness?

Caring individuals of any age can register. We will not list your names to
protect your privacy but we will keep track of how many people sign on so
you can see the witness community grow.Caring organizations can also
register and will be given an option of publically listing their
organization on our list of Witnesses.

How can I follow the case?

As a witness, we ask you to turn to your local media, the Aboriginal
Peoples Television Network and this website for updated information on the
tribunal as it occurs. We will do our best to ensure this historic story
is covered and you can help by alerting your local media sources.

Why will being a witness help?

It is when caring citizens do not engage that the most horrible human
rights abuses can happen. As a witness you are sending a message that you
care about all children being treated fairly and equitably by governments.

Does it cost anything?

No. Tribunal Location and Dates Location: 160 Elgin Street 11th Floor,
Ottawa, Ontario Time: 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. - with morning and afternoon
breaks and a lunch break

Dates: September 14 to 18, 2009October 13 to 16, 2009November 9 and 10,
2009November 16 to 20, 2009January 18 to 22, 2010January 25 to 29,
2010February 8 to 12, 2010February 15 to 19, 2010.
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