Cuts to Library and Archives Canada fighting words for archival community

WINNIPEG, MB—While federal departments across the board are reeling from cutbacks in the recent budget, a fiery call to arms is ringing from unlikely sources. Librarians, archivists, historians, and antiquarian booksellers across the country— not generally known for raising a ruckus— are sounding a battle cry against the Conservatives' “war on culture, history, and ultimately, Canada.”

“Our history is in danger, and our culture,” says John Lutz, historian at the University of Victoria and council member of the Canadian Historical Association.

Library and Archives Canada (LAC) is expected to cut approximately 10 per cent of its budget and almost 20 per cent of its staff. This alone is frustrating to the archival community. Already, services at LAC have suffered as belts have tightened. However, it is the elimination of the National Archives Development Program (NADP) that was the final straw for the generally reserved caretakers of Canada’s historical and cultural documents and artifacts.

“It all comes down to archives in Canada being able to help Canadians find their history,” says Lara Wilson, archivist at the University of Victoria and Chair of the Canadian Council of Archives (CCA). The CCA, who have administered the NADP for its duration, recently wrote an open letter to Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages James Moore protesting the cutbacks.

“By cutting these relatively small funds to local archives they are in danger of becoming no longer accessible,” Lutz believes. “Local archives have been using these funds to make their materials secure, to protect them from degradation, and making them available online.”

With a modest budget of $1.7 million, the National Archives Development Program has supported small, local archives across the country to preserve local history for 26 years. The program’s overall cost to taxpayers is a drop in the bucket compared to the $28 million budgeted for celebrating the War of 1812. This doesn't sit well with Lutz.

“A certain kind of history that is pompous [and] jingoistic is getting all these resources,” says Lutz.
While cultural institutions like the Canada Council and national museums and galleries were spared cutbacks in this year’s budget, these institutions will still be affected by the cutbacks at LAC.

“I think what Canadians might not appreciate is that other cultural institutions like galleries and museums use archives to create their exhibits, do their research and so forth,” explains Wilson. “A blow to archives is a blow to museums.”

Even before these cuts were announced, antiquarian booksellers across Canada— who often act as “on the ground” scouts in the acquisition of cultural and historical texts— were feeling the freeze.
“Archives budgets have been cut back so badly it’s hard for them to acquire new material,” says Lutz, “which is impacting the antiquarian book market.”

Burton Lysecki of Burton Lysecki Books in Winnipeg, which specializes in western Canadian and local Manitoban history, has seen these impacts first hand.“We are the fetchers in the process of providing the books that need to be preserved for our national heritage,” he explained to The Dominion. “We’ve been let down on that subject.”

However, “Library and Archives Canada has the money to fulfill its mandate,” a spokesperson for Minister Moore told The Dominion via email. According to Minister Moore’s office, “LAC continues to modernize its operations to digitize its content and make it available to more people.”

While antiquarian book dealing is only a part of Burton Lysecki Books’ business, it is a part of the business that Lysecki and part-owner Karen Sigurdson take very seriously.

“Customers come and go,” explains Sigurdson. “What’s bothersome about losing this customer is the kinds of things we were selling to them. Those are important things that belong in our country.”
If the historical texts are not purchased, there is a strong chance that they will be lost, sold at garage sales or thrown out.

“The point is it’s important that these things be captured and preserved in the national archives,” says Lysecki.

“Countries really only hold together if they have a national story that is available to all of us,” Lutz believes. When the infrastructure and funding to enhance, preserve, and display our national story is eroded, ignored or dismantled piecemeal, Lutz believes it bodes ill for future generations.

“This is, it seems to me, a part of a larger assault on the past,” argues Lutz. “It is part of a series of cutbacks that are going to affect historians and archivists adversely.”

Combined with deep cuts to the information economy and to cultural institutions such as Parks Canada, Lutz agrees that what we are seeing could very well be described an aggressive restructuring of culture, history, and Canada.

“History is under attack from many directions,” he says. Whether anyone will be able to read about this battle in the archives of the future, however, has yet to be determined.

Sheldon Birnie is a writer, editor and song & dance man living in Winnipeg.

Burton Lysecki

Libs threaten to suspend classes unless pickets lifted

Editor's note: Bill 78 was introduced in the National Assembly late Thursday night, and goes even further than what is laid out below. To read the bill itself, click here [PDF, French]. Check the Montreal Media Co-op for updates and more details.

MONTREAL—After fourteen weeks of student strikes in Quebec, the provincial Liberals announced Wednesday they will introduce a law that would suspend the rest of this semester at colleges and universities if striking students do not stop holding picket lines or enforcing strike votes.

Bill 78, "A Law Allowing Students to Receive the Education Provided by the School Which They Attend", was introduced in the National Assembly in Quebec City after deadline late Thursday night.

Student representatives were fast to denounce the proposed regulation on Wednesday night, calling it a "lock-out" and saying it will only add "fuel to the fire."

"Tonight, the government spit in the face of a generation...We will remember how we were treated tonight for a long time," said Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, co-spokesperson for the Enlarged Coalition of the Association for a Solidarity Among Student Unions (CLASSE), at a press conference.

As the government's intentions became clear, an array of voices spoke out against the government using legislating to deal with the conflict, including the Quebec Bar Association, and even a group of students which is actively mobilizing in favor of the tuition fee increase.

Across Québec, over 155,000 students remain on strike at 14 colleges and 11 universities. Since the government made its latest offer to students, some 325,000 students have voted against it. It is the longest student strike in Quebec and Canadian history, launched in opposition to the provincial government's plan to increase tuition fees by 82 per cent over seven years.

Wednesday's proposal from the government came in two parts:

First, at schools where students are on strike, students, administrators and teachers must come to an agreement that would allow any student who wishes to return to class—even those whose associations have voted in favor of the strike—to be able to do so. This requires putting an end to all pickets lines or any other disruptive tactics used to ensure the strike vote is respected. If such an agreement is reached, classes will continue normally for the remainder of the semester.

For those schools where such an agreement is not reached, classes will be suspended immediately, and will resume in August, with each school taking on the task of determining what the schedule should look like. The example of the Université de Montréal has been given, where winter semester classes are being suspended until mid-August. They will then run until the end of September. The Fall semester will begin at the start of October—a month late—and finish in mid-January.

The second part of the proposed law will serve to "guarantee the right to education," according to a government press release. It is believed that this means the government will introduce methods to enforce the ban on picket lines, possibly through major fines. The exact details will only be revealed when the bill is introduced in the National Assembly on Thursday night.

Following the announcement, over a thousand people took to the streets of Quebec City, while up to another 20,000 people marched in Montreal.

The effect of the law, according to CLASSE, is essentially the same as a lock-out: at schools where students are still on strike, they either stop enforcing picket lines - eliminating any power that the strike may have - or they will see classes suspended, removing the element that they are striking against.

"This is a lockout, in the end, because it stops students from exercising their democratic rights in general assemblies," said Jeanne Reynolds, CLASSE's co-spokesperson.

The Quebec Federation of University Students and the Quebec Federation of College Students also spoke out soon after the government announcement. They said that they are already preparing to launch a legal challenge against the legislation, should it be adopted. The Liberal party has a majority of seats in the National Assembly, so there is little doubt it will pass.

The proposed law comes as tensions have continued to rise on campuses.

As the strike continues, more and more students have turned to the courts to seek injunctions allowing them to return to class, even if their student associations have voted by a majority to strike. In most cases, these injunctions have been approved. Thought student unions are officially recognized under Quebec law, their right to collectively strike is not. Therefore the courts and the government see participation in the strike as a personal choice. The result is that if one student out of several hundred - or in some cases, out of thousands - requests an injunction to return to class, they have received it.

While the right of students to strike is not legislated, it has been accepted as a practice in the past.

As court injunctions multiply, striking students have taken action to protect the legitimacy of their strike votes. The result has been hard picket lines and classroom disruptions. In response, both local and provincial police have been dispatched to campuses, ratcheting up tension and resulting in arrests, injuries (often from batons), and tear gas and pepper spray being used.

"Each [member of the National Assembly] who votes in favor of this law will have to live with consequences," said Reynolds. "Government intransigence has already seriously injured individuals."

CLASSE has called for a major demonstration in Montreal on May 22, two months after some 300,000 marched against the tuition fee increase, to show that the opposition remains.

An extended version of this article first appeared in the Montéal Media Co-op. Tim McSorley is a journalist and an editor member of the Media Co-op.

Night March in Montreal

Study shows drop in abuse, HIV rates when sex work brought indoors

VANCOUVER—A recently released study by the BC Centre For Excellence in HIV and the University of British Columbia proves what community advocates have been saying for years: safer indoor spaces for sex work save lives.

The study interviewed 39 women living in supported housing projects on Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. Run by RainCity Housing and Atira, these projects are self-identified women-only (in terms of staff and residents) and include safety measures such as cameras in the buildings, sign-in sheets for guests and harm reduction supplies. Sex workers who live in these buildings are allowed guests, which means that they can bring in their clients.

The women who live in these buildings were largely homeless before moving in, or living in buildings that did not allow guests. This lead to interactions with clients where the workers had very little power or control. “It’s common sense if you think about it,” says long time sex work advocate Trina Ricketts. “Imagine yourself preparing to work outside in the cold, negotiating services and fees in strangers’ cars. Then imagine yourself preparing to work out of your apartment building, which happens to be staffed with caring, vigilant support staff committed to helping you stay safe no matter what.”

The findings are that these projects help empower women to better negotiate safer sex with clients, which is a factor in preventing HIV transmission. “We have previously shown that displacement and lack of safer indoor options for street-based sex workers are directly associated with elevated rates of violence and HIV risk,” says Dr. Kate Shannon, the senior author of the study. Of course, having easy access to healthcare workers with harm reduction supplies also helps.

Workers also reported that being housed inside made them feel safer from police harassment and violence. While many of the workers interviewed for the study were quite weary of police, they found that they felt safer when placed in one of the housing projects.

As one sex worker explains: “On the corner, doing it in the car, I used to be scared all the time, paranoid about cops, scared of getting charged. It is a lot easier now. It is different.”

Less fearful relationships with police as well as access to trained healthcare staff and harm reduction supplies are meeting survival sex workers where they are at. “We have created policies and practices that support women’s choice and ensure their health and safety are protected,” says Amelia Ridgway, Manager of RainCity Housing. “Women have the right to govern their own bodies. We believe that housing is a human right and this is about providing women with the most basic human rights around protection from violence within a harm reduction framework."

This study reinforces the need and effectiveness of safe, indoor sex work spaces which is very encouraging for the sex work community. “Safer sex work spaces support better health and safety, period,” said Dr. Patricia Daly, Chief Medical Health Officer, Vancouver Coastal Health.

Kathleen Cherrington who has organized events such as the International Day To End Violence Against Sex Workers says that perhaps more intentional work spaces may be a next logical step. Not everyone wants to bring their work home with them. “Some sex workers have children and need a place to work that isn't from home. So we also need brothels that are for those wanting a place to work that is away from home,” says Cherrington.

The West Coast Cooperative Of Sex Industry Professionals has formulated a business plan which includes a collectively run sex work space where workers can take their dates. This would be a multiple room establishment where folks could pay per use. Their vision is described as similar to a bath house, with showers, towels and safer sex supplies avaialble to both workers and patrons. The hope would be that as patronship increased, costs could be kept low. Unfortunately, this plan was formulated quite some time ago and has not come to fruition due to both a lack of funding (capital) and legality issues.

This study comes on the heels of a legal development that the sex working community sees as encouraging. The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that prohibiting bawdy houses is unconstitutional, as it increases the dangers faced by those who are forced to work on the streets. While the Conservative government is currently in the process of challenging this decision, it may very well find its way into the practices of law enforcement in Vancouver.

In the meantime, Ricketts feels that more housing, like the facilities in the study, are sorely needed in Vancouver and that no survival sex workers should go without a home. “In my opinion, being homeless is violence,” she says. “So providing housing is paramount to reducing violence against women.”

Eli Mills is a contributor to the Vancouver Media Co-op.

This article was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

Trina Ricketts

Honouring our historical agreements through shared action

KITCHENER, ON—If you travel south along the winding 50-kilometres stretch of the Grand River between Kitchener and Caledonia, you will pass farms fields, forests, a sprawling patchwork of towns with their own industrial sites and golf courses, finally coming to the edge of the Six Nations reserve, and eventually, Kanonhstaton, the “protected place”—a site of Haudenosaunee land reclamation and defense. A brief walk from Caledonia's downtown, the site is still identifiable by the downed hydro tower at the entrance just off the highway, and the skeleton of the trailer burned in early 2008 by a gang of anti-reclamation settlers.

Located on the boundary between the Six Nation reserve and the settler town of Caledonia, Kanonhstaton has brought Indigenous land rights to the forefront of national attention over and over again in the past six years, gaining prominence rarely seen in land occupations since the 1990 Oka standoff.

Kanonhstaton is about reclaiming the land and stopping a housing development known as the Douglas Creek Estates. The initial action by the group of around twenty, mostly woman Indigenous land defenders was met with little protest locally, and instead garnered widespread support from settler allies.

But on April 20, 2006, the Ontario Provincial Police carried out a violent raid on the site, during which OPP tore open tents, tasered, pepper sprayed, beat, and ultimately, arrested 16 Indigenous people. That day, hundreds from the reserve flooded to the site in response to the raid, ejected the police, and proceeded to build road blockades. Following this unsuccessful eviction attempt, groups of white settlers began organising citizen councils and anti-native and anti-reclamation rallies, under a call for a return to the “rule of law and order.”

This act of police aggression and state intimidation did not end the reclamation. It did, however, lead to a series of violent confrontations and acts of intimidation between hostile Caledonians, the police, and Haudenosaunee land defenders that came to be known as the Caledonia crisis. Instead of breaking the camp, the raid worked to solidify resistance to the development.

“They [those who protect the land] have the dedication to hold on to the land for the next seven generations. We are here, we are here to stay, and we are not going anywhere!” proclaimed Dawn Smith during the sixth-year commemoration of the reclamation, which took place on April 28, 2012. Smith, an Indigenous land defender who was involved in the original reclamation action added: “When we started this, it was with a hope to bring the communities together... to commemorate the Haldimand deed.”

In the six years since the reclamation began, the Federal government, which is, according to Canadian laws, in charge of dealing with land claims, has done nothing to bring resolution to the issue. Ottawa added further insult by appointing the head of the botched police raid, Julian Fantino, to cabinet in 2011 first as Minister of State for Seniors, and then as Associate Minister of National Defence.

The government of Ontario, which has shifted all blame to the Federal government, also purchased the land in question from prospective developers for $15.8 million, settled for further millions with other affected Caledonians and businesses, and acted no further.

This inaction has left the situation simmering, leading to ongoing confrontations and arrests, including over 160 charges laid against Indigenous land defenders.

Ken Hewitt, formerly a lead organiser of the Caledonia Citizens' Alliance, a group which formed to organise anti-native rallies, is now the mayor of Haldimand County, which includes Caledonia. These rallies, now organised by a citizens’ council, known as “CANACE,” continue on a monthly basis with between two and ten attendees who gather and hold racist and anti-native signs as they parade along the boundaries of the reclamation site.

In February 2012, days before the sixth anniversary of the reclamation, a 17-year old Caledonian youth, wrote a suicide note and drove his parents' mini-van into the house on the site which has served as the headquarters of land defenders since the action began in 2006.

The youth ended up in hospital, and the attack left a large hole in the front of the house and troubling questions in the minds of many who live across the watershed and around south-western Ontario. The main question is: how can lasting peace be built with so much trauma and hurt remaining within and between settler and Indigenous communities?

Two weeks after this attempted suicide attack on Kanonhstaton, many of the activists and union organisers from across southwestern Ontario who have been active in the reclamation, were again invited to the site to discuss ideas for building peace between affected communities.

“We have to rebuild our historic friendships, through actively living the agreements that were created to guide our relationships—the Two Row Wampum and the Silver Covenant Chain, we have to respect Indigenous land rights and the Haldimand proclamation, and think to our common future on this land aboard our ever crowding vessels,” said Luke Stewart, a born settler on the Grand River, an indigenous solidarity activist, and a resistance movement historian, as we drove down from Kitchener for the first meeting.

After lengthy discussions between the more than 20 attendees, a proposal was voiced to hold an event which could bring all residents from across the Grand River watershed and from other up and downstream communities, to build the relationships that would make living by the historic agreements possible.

This proposal was eventually transformed into a plan to hold a peaceful rally, walk, and community celebration near the sixth anniversary of the raid. The day would be organized by the newly-formed April 28th Coalition, comprised of a diverse group of Indigenous and settlers,
the group taking its name from the day the Walk for Peace was to be held.

“I feel it is important to make a statement to the government after years of inaction on our unresolved land rights," said Tracy Bomberry, a journalist and Indigenous member of the April 28th coalition, when I asked about her involvement in the event. "A walk for peace will provide the opportunity to get the governments' attention and to educate the larger community of our outstanding land issues not only on Six Nations but across the country."

To guide their work, the coalition looks to historic agreements between the British Crown and the Haudenosaunee. One is the Silver Covenant Chain which represents the bow line of a European ship being tied to the “Great Tree of Life,” indicating cooperation since contact, and commemorated by “polishing the chain"—literally coming together to clean the wampum belt that the agreement is represented on.

The English also agreed to live with the Haudenosaunee in peace, respect, and friendship in accordance with the Guswhenta, or the Two Row Wampum. First agreed to by Dutch settlers and Haudenosaunee in 1613, this agreement has settlers and Indigenous moving forward in parallel on the same river (of life) in their own boats, where one group is not to impact the course (sovereignty) of the other.

“Clearly, somewhere along the way our ship was commandeered by villains and crashed into the Haudenosaunee canoe,” said Stewart, reflecting on the failure of settlers to respect the Two Row.

The other key agreement for the April 28th Coalition is the 1784 Haldimand Proclamation. After the British lost the American War of Independence, the British crown granted six miles deep of either bank of the Grand River to their war ally the Haudenosaunee after purchasing the land from the Mississaugas. This is known as the Haldimand Proclamation.

“While some of this land was later sold off—blocks one to six—and some was leased to settlers, including the Caledonia claim, the vast majority has never been legally transferred from Six Nations,” said Stewart. In another obvious breach of peace, respect and friendship, the money paid in the few legitimate deals from blocks one to six was not kept in trust, added Stewart, it was instead plundered by colonial administrators and misappropriated for infrastructure projects that built Ontario and Canada.

On April 28th 2012, a thousand Canadians from across Southern Ontario participated in the Walk, Rally, and Potluck for Peace, Respect, and Friendship and joined with Indigenous land defenders and families who are tired of the inaction and disrespect shown by all levels of Canadian government, to demand that Six Nations land rights be respected.

Stewart described the walk, which was led by a 25-metre long representation of the Two Row, as “a call to honour and respect our historical agreements, and move toward a peaceful future of healthy coexistence, not colonial subjugation and corporate land theft.”

The march was not the only event the coalition has been working on, said Stewart, who pointed to public information sessions, documentary movie nights, and community meals organised in the lead-up to April 28th that ensured a respectful day with good representation from many communities.

The walk through Caledonia's downtown to Kanonhstaton was occasionally delayed by a small group of Caledonians, who ignored a history of colonialism as they sneered “it is a little late for peace” and demanded to see the passports of marshalls, who asked them to kindly “join in or stop obstructing the path of peace and friendship.” These hecklers included those who had received million dollar settlements for the impact of the situation to their lives.

Local authorities refused to stop the anti-reclamation rallies, but did try and halt the community events on April 28. "Hewitt went to extraordinary measures to stop the walk, with fear mongering in the media and proposing to council that they seek an injunction," said Stewart.

After the rally, march, potluck meal, games, concert and social at Kanonhstaton on April 28th, the buses departed and residents returned home.

“This is only the starting point in an ongoing dialogue and awareness raising on Six Nations land Issues, it was a chance to network, share a meal, make new friends, enjoy some music—all in the spirit of peace, respect and friendship,” said Bomberry. In communities all along the Grand River, added Bomberry, meetings to keep the dialogue going and to build on the momentum of the walk have been set to take place throughout the spring and summer.

Dan Kellar is a born settler on the Grand River Territory, and is an anarchist social justice organiser, who participated in April 28th coalition activities. Dan co-hosts Grand River Radical Radio (GRRR!) and AW@L Radio on 100.3 CKMS-FM (http://soundfm.ca).

April 28 Coalition

Subhead:  May/June 2012 Cover Image:  dominion-issue82-cover.jpg Body: 

Download Issue #82 (May/June 2012) [4 MB, PDF]

To read articles from this issue on the web, visit this page.

Issue #82 is formatted as 24 pages of letter sized paper (8.5x11).

(You need Acrobat Reader or an application that reads pdf files to view the print version of this issue.)

Distribution rights:

You are free (and encouraged) to download, print, and distribute as many copies of the Dominion as you like, with the following restrictions:

• the content of the paper will not be modified
• no advertising or additional content will be attached to the paper
• 15% of any profits derived from the sale or distribution of the Dominion will be paid to the Dominion
• We ask regular readers for a voluntary contribution of between $2 and $10 per issue. See our donation page for details.

Exceptions to any of these restrictions may be granted on a case by case basis. Contact us with any questions.

Fracking wastewater ponds languish in Hants County

HALIFAX—Hydraulic fracturing wastewater shown to contain high levels of radioactive contaminants has been sitting in two open containment pits in Hants County, Nova Scotia, since 2007, the Media Co-op has learned.

A Freedom of Information request has also revealed that the water likely contains a slew of other chemicals, including known carcinogens and endocrine disruptors.

Triangle Petroleum Corporation, the Denver-based company responsible for creating the ponds, announced on April 16, after having stalled on remediating the wastewater for over four years, that it was “contemplating a total exit” from its operations in Nova Scotia. The company’s announcement coincided with the provincial NDP’s announcement that its review of the environmental impacts of hydraulic fracturing, initially slated for a Spring 2012 release, would be extended into 2014.

The first company to explore Nova Scotia’s shale formations for natural gas using the contentious horizontal-drilling method known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, Triangle had been threatening for some time to renounce its 10 year exploration lease on 475,000 gross acres—known as The Windsor Block—spanning Kings and Hants Counties along the Minas Basin.

In an email to Nova Scotia Environment (NSE) dated August 29, 2011—obtained through a NS Freedom of Information request—Dr. Peter Hill, at the time Triangle’s CEO, threatened his company’s withdrawal from the province.

Should the [fracking] Review fail to support deep re-injectivity [sic] of formation waters back to their formation of origin, or ban, restrict or delay shale gas activity for a long period, then we will drain the ponds by the then best method available, remediate all sites, return our licenses back to the Nova Scotia Department of Energy and cease any further investment in the Province of Nova Scotia.

The wastewater comprising the ponds was generated in 2007 when Triangle drilled and fracked two wells in the Kennetcook area of Hants County.

NSE and Triangle have since been at loggerheads concerning the best method of remediation for the 15 million litres of wastewater—the former insisting on trucking the wastewater to appropriate treatment facilities, the latter on injecting the “formation waters back to their formation of origin,” or, namely, drilling an on-site disposal well and injecting it into the earth.

While the deep-well reinjection of fracking wastewater is common industry practice, it runs counter to NSE’s best practices guide.

And for good reason, according to Jennifer West, groundwater coordinator at the Ecology Action Centre (EAC).

“When you punch a hole through the overlying rock formations, which act as seals, and then dump millions of litres of wastewater into that hole, there’s no way you can guarantee that it’s not going to change the quality of the drinking water,” she says. “The practice is appalling given the number of chemicals and anthropogenic contaminants in wastewater.”

Families of chemicals that Triangle used in its fracking slurry for the Kennetcook wells (among others):

Diethylene glycols: An endocrine disruptor known to adversely affect development, the reproductive, cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, respiratory and nervous systems, and to impair function of the kidneys, liver, skin, and eyes.

Isopropanols: Known to have adverse effects on the sensory organs, the liver, kidneys, brain, and blood, and the immune system.

Methanols: A mutagen known to have the preceding effects.

Sodium persulphates: Causes skin, eye, sensory organ, and respiratory, gastrointestinal, nervous and immune system damage.

Trisodium nitrilotriacetate monohydrates: Known to cause cancer, and gastrointestinal, cardiovascular, kidney and ecological damage.

In December 2011, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a draft report on the effects of hydraulic fracturing on groundwater in Pavilion, Wyoming. “Using a lines of reasoning approach,” the study found that “inorganic and organic constituents associated with hydraulic fracturing ha[d] contaminated ground water at and below the depth used for domestic water supply.”

Reinjection has been linked to a marked increase in seismic activity in the American Midwest over the past ten years. According to the US Geological Survey, “the injection of [fracking] wastewater into the subsurface can cause earthquakes that are large enough to be felt…and cause damage.”

Earlier this year, Ohio’s Natural Resources Department introduced stringent new regulations for oil and gas drilling companies after several earthquakes in the state had been linked to fracking-wastewater reinjection.

Although its development plan application, submitted to the NS Department of Energy in 2008, states that Triangle would commit “to safeguarding the environment…through the application of best practices,” the company has been stalwart in its opposition to NSE’s insistence on draining the ponds and treating, rather than reinjecting, the wastewater. The company has stated that trucking the wastewater to treatment facilities would be too expensive and would undermine road safety.

Ken Summers is a member of the Nova Scotia Fracking Resource and Action Coalition (NOFRAC) who lives near the Kennetcook ponds. He believes the lengthy impasse highlights the slapdash nature by which shale gas exploration activity in Nova Scotia has emerged.

“Up until they launched their review [of hydraulic fracturing in April 2011], the provincial government was relying on regulations designed to cover conventional drilling, which are insufficient mechanisms when applied to the so-called unconventional method of hydraulic fracturing,” says Summers.

Summers contends that the Kennetcook ponds are the direct result of an absence of fracking-specific provincial wastewater remediation regulations, and are exemplary of a savvy company taking advantage of the tenderfoot provincial government.

“The industry is so new and has developed so fast that provincial and state jurisdictions are way behind the industry players in terms of knowledge and expertise,” he explains.

According to the Kennetcook drill-site plan Triangle submitted to the province, the pits were dug to hold freshwater to be used during the fracking process.

“NSE notes in its documentation that it didn’t give approval for waste ponds, that no permits were issued,” explains Summers.

In 2008, when NSE realized the ponds were holding wastewater, it issued Triangle a two-year temporary storage permit during which time Triangle was to have the water transported to treatment facilities in Dartmouth and Debert, 20 kilometres west of Truro. When the temporary permit expired in June 2010, with no remedial action having taken place, NSE issued a one-year extension with the proviso that by the end of the one-year term they expected definitive plans for draining the ponds and reclaiming the sites.

In August, 2011, two months beyond the extension deadline, with Triangle still pressuring for reinjection, and proposing they “wait for the decisions and recommendations of the Review Committee on Hydraulic Fracturing that [were] expected later [that] year,” NSE demanded that the ponds be drained before winter freeze, or November 1, which Triangle claimed unfeasible, suggesting instead “the gradual use of the brines as a de-icing/wetting agent on Nova Scotia roads.”

Months later, Triangle agreed to drain one of the ponds before winter freeze, which they began to do on November 21. Shortly thereafter, on December 2, NSE received test results showing the wastewater contained high levels of radionuclides, and consequently, owing to the fact that there is no facility in Atlantic Canada capable of treating radioactively contaminated wastewater, suspended all drainage activity.

Radionuclides are unstable forms of nuclides, a generic term for the atomic form of an element. The most common radionuclides in groundwater are radon, radium, thorium and uranium. Radon and uranium occur most commonly in shale and granite formations, which comprise a significant portion of Nova Scotia’s geology. The EPA states that although “most drinking water sources have very low levels of [naturally occurring] radioactive contaminants,” human activity can incite drinking water contamination “through accidental releases of radioactivity or through improper disposal practices.”

Exposure to high levels of radon and uranium has been linked to bone and internal organ cancers in humans.

“They were trucking water out for less than two weeks in five or six trucks a day to Debert, and part of it is sitting in a pond in Debert, but most of it is still sitting in the pond in Kennetcook,” says Summers.

Compounding the matter, the water that was already drained and trucked to the Atlantic Industrial Services facility in Debert before NSE suspended drainage activity now has to be removed from that location because it cannot be treated at that facility.

“Who’s to say where they’re going to go from here, because now we’re talking about a much more expensive process for the company, so it’s back into limbo,” says Summers.

Meanwhile, one of the Kennetcook ponds is leaking and has spilled over in heavy rain, augmenting concerns within the community over groundwater contamination.

The EPA draft report on groundwater in Pavilion, Wyoming, found that “high concentrations of benzene, xylenes, gasoline range organics, diesel range organics, and total purgeable hydrocarbons in ground water samples from shallow monitoring wells near [wastewater] pits indicates that pits are a source of shallow ground water contamination in the area of investigation” representing “potential source terms for localized groundwater plumes of unknown extent.”

Oil and gas companies are not lawfully compelled to disclose the chemicals they use in their slickwater, the proprietary nature of which can make it notoriously difficult when it comes to delineating which toxic elements have been introduced by industry and which are naturally occurring.

A recent EAC Freedom of Information request has disclosed the group of industrial chemicals that were used in the fracking fluid for the Kennetcook wells (See sidebar).

“Chemicals associated with fracking are just the tip of the iceberg,” says West. “We found dozens of dangerous substances which were used for fracking in Hants, but also for drilling and site preparation. We found these through a Freedom of Information request—they weren’t handing out this information at an Open House in Kennetcook.”

The potential for the contamination of our drinking water is multifold, yet the result is singular, according to West.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s the methane, or wastewater, the natural contaminants, or the chemicals that get into our drinking water, it’s just that something [toxic] can get into our drinking water and that’s not acceptable.”

Despite numerous delays and Triangle’s departure announcement, NSE remains firm that the company will clean up its mess. “They are required to meet the terms and conditions of their approval, which includes draining the ponds, treating the wastewater at an approved facility, and returning the site to its natural state before the end of this year,” says Karen White, NSE Director of Communications.

White further emphasizes that “any materials that meet federal legislation requirements under the Nuclear Substances Act and/or the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act must be shipped to an appropriate facility out of province.”

West maintains reservations, given that the government, to no avail, has been asking the company for almost five years to comply with regulations. She says more decisive action needs to be taken. "[Triangle] should be forced to immediately clean up the ponds in Kennetcook before drinking water is impacted by these chemicals, and be held accountable if contamination has occurred."

Steven Wendland is a graduate student and contributing member of the Halifax Media Co-op.

This article was originally published by the Halifax Media Co-op.

Tailings in Hants

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has travelled across the nation, but few have paid attention

Note: This article may be triggering or distressful. To access the Indian Residential Schools Crisis Line, dial toll-free 1-866-925-4419.

VANCOUVER—The national Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Indian Residential Schools, which started over two years ago, has been largely ignored by the Canadian public, despite the participation of thousands of residential school survivors and countless others, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous.

In fact, the first and only history lesson many Canadians ever received about residential schools was through the Prime Minister of Canada's "Statement of Apology to Former Students of Indian Residential Schools," issued in June 2008 and broadcast from coast to coast.

The commission is now over halfway through its five-year mandate. Although the government established the commission in 2008, it took until July 2009 before Head Commissioner Justice Murray Sinclair, Commissioner Chief Wilton Littlechild, Commissioner Marie Wilson and a ten-member Indian Residential School Survivor Committee began gathering statements and documents.

The core of the commission’s mandate is to establish the truth about the schools, educate all Canadians about that history and begin a dialogue about reconciliation.

"Residential schools were part of an overall approach toward Aboriginal people in this country," Head Commissioner Justice Sinclair told reporters in Vancouver at a press conference in February, when the commission issued an interim update on its activities and released several preliminary recommendations.

"It is commonly said that it takes a village to raise a child. The Government of Canada took Indian children away from their villages and placed them into institutions that were the furthest thing away from a village that you could expect," he continued. "Then on top of that, the Government of Canada set out to destroy their villages, so when they got out of those institutions, they didn't have a village to go back to."

Thus far, the commission has held statement-gathering and outreach events in over 500 communities across Canada—including a prison in the Northwest Territories—and national events in Winnipeg and Inuvik.

It has not been easy for survivors to get to a microphone and relive their experiences at these events. But the commission has helped them realize what they’ve overcome.

"I think if you document something, you can't say it didn't happen,” Kecia Larkin, 41, told The Dominion, after speaking at the commission’s regional event in Victoria in April. “And if people who have spoken find some pride in themselves, in the courage to speak out, then that's something that has been accomplished.”

At the regional event in Victoria, 158 residential school survivors and other affected people shared their experiences. More than 2,000 people attended the event and another 3,300 people from 16 countries tuned in to the live webcast.

The commission is not only examining the history of residential schools, but also their ongoing impact on communities as a whole, and on intergenerational survivors like Larkin—the residential school students’ children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and so forth.

"I've seen a lot of pride there," said Larkin. "But it was very painful for a lot of people. It was very heart wrenching. It made people cry out loud."

From the 1860s up until the 1990s, more than 150,000 First Nations, Metis and Inuit children attended residential schools. Some schools were operated directly by the Canadian government and some by Canada through partnerships with church organizations.

Cut off from their families and communities, students were forbidden to speak their own language or engage in their own cultural and spiritual practices. Many children experienced emotional, physical and sexual abuse.

Larkin’s mother and grandmother attended residential schools, and her father attended a boarding school. As a young child, she traveled around North America with her mother, who was involved with the Red Power movement in the early 1970s, which came out of the American Indian Movement and a growing sense of pan-Indian identity. It was not until they moved to Alert Bay when Larkin was four years old that she experienced the legacy of the schools. After being caught for years in cycles of familial violence and abuse, amidst a community dealing with youth drug use, suicides and sexual abuse by the local school principal, she left her home at the age of 15.

Larkin moved to Vancouver and wound up in the child welfare system, which she considers a modern-day extension of residential schools, and on the streets in the Downtown Eastside. After experiencing multiple traumas, she became a heavy drug user and later tested positive for HIV.

Months after discovering her HIV-status, Larkin was able to leave the streets and settled in Victoria, on unceded Coast Salish territory. Over the past decade she has spent much of her time doing advocacy work in the medical system and is co-chair of a group of women that created the first Aboriginal Women’s HIV and AIDS Strategy in Canada.

“Because of colonialism, our experience is very different, which is tied to not just violence but also residential school, and it’s intergenerational,” Larkin said.

Larkin now has two children of her own and has made a conscious effort to give them a better environment to grow up in than the one she had.

"I don't have a lot of connection with my community and culture, and I think that's how it's impacted me directly, and my children, and my family,” she said. “I tell my children what I can, what I know."

The idea that Canadians need to change the way they think about Aboriginal people’s history and experience is one that the commission emphasizes.

"In talking about residential schools and their legacy, we are not talking about an Aboriginal problem, but a Canadian problem," reads the commission's 2012 report. "It is not simply a dark chapter from our past. It was integral to the making of Canada. Although the schools are no longer in operation, the last ones did not close until the 1990s. The colonial framework of which they were a central element has not been dismantled."

The commission was created through the ratification of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement in 2007. It was a result of residential school survivors launching the largest class-action lawsuit in Canadian history against the government, churches and individual school staff for the abuses they endured.

The agreement also established a nominal “common experience payment” for all students who attended the 134 schools and residences identified in the deal, as basic compensation for the people’s sufferings under the residential school system.

But there are many survivors who feel dissatisfied by the compensation offered. Perry Omeasoo, a Cree residential school survivor, told the commission that he was raised by his grandparents as a young child. After his mother’s prior residential school experience, she was unable to parent him and was mostly absent throughout his life.

"It was almost nothing,” Omeasoo said of the compensation payment at a Commissioner Sharing Panel. "I would have rather had my mother. And for that, I will always be resentful."

Not only do some survivors not find the payment healing, but the forms that survivors had to fill out to qualify for payment triggered mental breakdowns in some.

"Amazing how sheets of paper can be so re-traumatizing," said Kat Norris, a Salish residential school survivor and the spokesperson for Indigenous Action Movement. "I had previously gone through years of counselling, so I assumed I was going to be fine. Instead, I totally backtracked, put it on the shelf, and went into a depression."

Norris is a survivor of the Kuper Island Residential School, which she calls the “Alcatraz of residential schools.” She was sent to the school with her two younger brothers and her sister, as young children. When they arrived at the school in the evening, her brothers were taken away from her, straight out of her hands, because of the strict gender segregation.

"The common thread we survivors share is sibling separation," she said.

"It's one of the biggest painful memories of my whole life, seeing them both walking down the hall, looking back at me, not knowing where they were going and I couldn’t do anything," continued Norris. "We only learned, as adults, about how much we all suffered at that school."

There are diverse opinions about the 2008 statement of apology among residential school survivors and other Indigenous people, Norris said. She herself expresses mixed reactions.

“For me, it acknowledged our Indigenous Holocaust," Norris said. "Immediately, I felt I could breathe, I felt free. And it's because our experience was acknowledged."

At the same time, she explained, “it isn't enough. It is a token apology, trinkets, again, from a government that continues to barrage our people with ingenious legislation bent on keeping our land and destroying it forever. It is felt that we can simply be paid off and silenced forever. Realistically, our pain carries on throughout our lives, as shown by intergenerational impact.”

Norris is planning to give a statement of her own experiences at the commission’s national event in Vancouver next year.

While statement-gathering and outreach activities are ongoing across the country, the commission also has several national events left in its mandate: June 21 to 24, 2012, in Saskatoon; September 18 to 21, 2013, in Vancouver; yet-to-be-determined dates and locations in Quebec and Alberta; and a closing Ceremony in Ottawa.

"We know that the damage continues," Commissioner Justice Sinclair told those gathered at the event in Victoria. "In two years this commission will no longer be around, but this conversation must continue."

Sandra Cuffe is a freelance journalist and researcher currently based in Vancouver, unceded Coast Salish territory. She hopes to make it to Saskatoon in June.

IRSSS

Musqueam set up camp at condo site after infant graves desecrated

MARPOLE, VANCOUVER—The Musqueam First Nation has vowed to shut down condo construction to protect a major ancient burial site at the Marpole Midden. Infant graves were unearthed by heavy excavating equipment at the Vancouver location this week.

More than 100 Musqueam and supporters marched to the construction project at 1338 SW Marine on Thursday, May 3. The marchers included representatives from several First Nations. Musqueam are now occupying outside the site and say they will remain until protection for the site is assured.

The move to protect their 4,000-year-old village site come after more burials were dug up by the condo developer. Construction stopped six weeks ago when the developer first disturbed intact burials. Musqueam leaders say promised talks with the developer, the city and the province have gone nowhere.

The Musqueam reportedly offered a swap with developer Century Holdings for nearby land, but to no avail. The Marpole Midden is considered one of the most important in Canada and was named a National Historic Site in 1938.

Union of BC Indian Chiefs Grand Chief Stewart Phillip announced that the site will "remain shut down until the province is prepared to come to the table and discuss a resolution to this situation."

Musqueam Chief Ernest Campbell warned "never question our resolve or the resolve of our fellow First Nations, or of any one else for that matter, when it comes to protecting our sacred burial rights."

Musqueam spokesperson Cecilia Point said supporters are welcome to come down and join the protest on the sidewalk or bring a tent and stay.

This article and these images (and more) were originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

Musqueam Marchers Musqueam Marchers II

Feds continue burden-shifting onto the 99 per cent

VANCOUVER—The federal government recently raised the age threshold for Old Age Security benefits from 65 to 67. This new age requirement will come into effect in 2023. The Harper government says that the OAS in its current form is an untenable strain on resources as Canada’s population ages. But, as critics point out, the fiscal case presented for the cuts has been deeply flawed and misleading.

The federal government argues that the OAS cuts are necessary to stem “unsustainable” program expenditures that are rising from $39 billion in 2011 to $108 billion in 2030 (and Canadians are left to simply imagine how quickly costs will rise in later years).

The government's projections, however, do not adjust for inflation or economic growth. They were stated in nominal rather than proportional terms, creating a “sticker shock” effect. Put in more meaningful numbers, the cost of OAS will rise by 2.4 per cent to 3.2 per cent of the GDP between 2011 and 2030.

The government case also omits that these cost increases are projected to peak in 2031, then plateau and ultimately reverse, falling back to 2.4 per cent of GDP by 2060 (according to the government’s own actuarial report on OAS).

The more sober assessment of the OAS situation is supported by the non-partisan Parliamentary Budget Officer, Kevin Page, who said that the program was already on sustainable long-term fiscal footing, “even under the baseline assumption that there is some additional enrichment to elderly benefit payments.”

Even evaluated on the grounds of the modest budget savings they appear to offer, the OAS cuts are problematic.

The lost income resulting from the OAS cuts is substantial for individuals. The exact amount varies depending on the year of retirement. For example, a person who is 35 years old today stands to lose a total of $24,451 as a result of the changes.

“Canada’s public pensions are already too meager. And I fear, if they are raising the age, that it won’t be long before we see further cuts in these inadequate pensions,” said Gudrun Langolf, first vice president of B.C.’s Council of Senior Citizens’ Organizations.

Cuts to retirement income will push more seniors into low-income status, and degrade the quality of life of others, particularly at a time when employment-based pensions are increasingly scarce and also facing cuts.

Workplace pensions are rapidly being converted into “defined-contribution” plans. These plans offer weaker income security, largely because they channel retirement savings into individual investment accounts that are vulnerable to the short-term fluctuations of the market.

The burden of the OAS cuts, as is all too often the case, will be borne disproportionately by low-income seniors, as well workers in what the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives calls physically demanding or stressful occupations (for whom delayed retirement is especially burdensome).

As Michael Wolfson, the former Assistant Chief Statistician at Statistics Canada, has noted, the costs will also inevitably be carried by taxpayers through provincial governments, which will have to fill the income gap left by OAS cuts from their welfare budgets and through other forms of social assistance. Since OAS benefits are taxable, any potential fiscal savings from the cuts will be further offset by a drop in federal and provincial income tax revenue.

Some Canadians will manage to sock away more money in private retirement savings programs such as RRSPs, but ownership of these plans is already highly skewed towards the top of the income distribution. Participation rates in private retirement savings plans in 2008 were 86 per cent for the top fifth of income earners and 9 per cent for the bottom fifth, according to Statistics Canada.

Private retirement savings programs also carry far higher administrative costs than public pensions, reducing the overall efficiency of the retirement system, even while increasing income inequality in retirement.

The OAS particulars aside, Canadians might also ask why their future incomes must be targeted for belt tightening, while corporate tax rates continue to fall (to 15 per cent federally this year, down from 28 per cent in 2000). This is to say nothing of billions spent on the war in Afghanistan, over $600 million planned spending on building new prison cells, and an estimated $25 billion on new fighter jets.

Perhaps unsurprising in this context, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has taken particular note of Canada’s growing inequality, which has seen the incomes of the top 0.1 per cent more than double over the past 30 years, while their tax rates have fallen precipitously (and median Canadian wages have stagnated).

Cuts to OAS appear to be just one more turn of the vice-grip that places the burden of government austerity measures onto the backs of those who can least afford it. What remains to be seen is how communities and citizens will respond to this set of policies in an era of majority government and renewed activism in Canada.

Alex Hemingway is a Vancouver-based educator and PhD student in Political Science at UBC. He received master's degrees in Global Politics and Social Policy at the London School of Economics.

OAS umbrella Occupy Pensions!

LGBTQ activist mourned, Missing Women commission scorned, foreign workers' salaries shorn

Opposition to tankers, oil and gas pipelines on Canada’s West coast continued. Hundreds of people gathered at the BC provincial legislature in Victoria, for the Rally Against Enbridge. Enbridge is the company behind the controversial Northern Gateway pipeline that would carry tar sands crude from northern Alberta to port in BC, leading to a rise in tanker traffic. Critics say that both the pipeline and the tanker traffic pose a significant risk of oil spills and environmental contamination.

The US Justice Department filed the first criminal charges connected to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010. A former BP Engineer, Kurt Mix, was arrested on charges of deleting hundreds of text messages between himself and his supervisor that were related to the failed attempts at plugging the BP well, which continues to leak crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

Police and protesters clashed for two days in Montreal during a forum and job fair for the Quebec government's Plan Nord northern development plan. On the second day, 80 protesters—many of whom witnesses said were peacefully demonstrating—were placed under mass arrest while participating in a rally organized by the RRQ coalition (Réseau de Resistance du Québécois) and InnuPower.

Dutch-born, Albertan environmentalist and activist Wiebo Ludwig died at the age of 70. Ludwig was perhaps best known as having been convicted of five charges related to a pipeline bombing and vandalism that occurred in 2000. Ludwig’s farm, near Hythe, Alberta, is in the veritable eye of the Peace Region gas fields, where not everyone is happy with the gas-fueled boom.

The province-wide student strike in Quebec entered it's twelfth week, with 180,000 students still not attending class in protest of rising tuition fees. Nightly protests in Montreal have been taking place for a week straight (with up to 25,000 people participating) following the government's abrupt expulsion of the leading strike association, CLASSE, from negotiations due to a protest which featured some property damage being listed on an open calendar on their website. The other four student associations taking part in the negotiations walked out as well. While both sides have made proposals since, negotiations are now at a standstill.

The Ontario Human Rights Commission ruled that the province’s requirement that trans- people can only change the sex on their birth certificate after sexual re-assignment surgery is “substantively discriminatory” and ordered the government to change its regulation. The decision could have impacts in jurisdictions across Canada.

Well-known and respected Halifax LGBTQ activist and organizer Raymond Taavel died from injuries incurred while defending a friend during a physical attack outside Menz and Mollyz Bar. Taavel was involved in a wide range of organizations, from co-chairing Halifax Pride events to being a lead organizer with Fair Vote Nova Scotia. Three hundred people attended a memorial rally only a few hours after he died. Witnesses said that Taavel’s attacker used homophobic slurs during the fight; he is being charged with second-degree murder.

The Department of National Defence was harshly criticized by Auditor-General Michael Ferguson for withholding information from political decision makers about the purchase of F-35 fighter jets. An “unknown bureaucrat” is being blamed for the typographical error categorizing the F-35 deal as being in the “definition” project phase, meaning it had received preliminary approval from the Treasury Board, which it never actually had.

There appeared to be confusion as to who exactly is legally-bound to clean up Boat Harbour, the natural estuary lagoon that has for years been an effluent dumping site for the Abercrombie Point pulp and paper mill in Nova Scotia. The Nova Scotia government has demanded a report outlining the intended clean up procedure from current mill owners Northern Pulp. This is contradictory to the indemnity agreement that the province signed with the mill in 1998, stating that the clean up is the province's responsibility if the mill should ever close.

Alleged Wikileaks whistleblower Breanna Manning will be going to trial on September 21, 2012, on the charge of "aiding the enemy," after a military judge rejected the argument that all charges against Manning be dropped due to “prosecutorial misconduct."*

Refugee rights activists in seven cities across the country took action against Bill C-31, dubbed the Protecting Canada’s Immigration System Act by the Conservative government. The activists, who refer to the bill as the Refugee Exclusion Act, occupied Conservative MP offices and dropped banners to draw attention to the new regulations.

A wide range of organizations issued an open letter explaining why they are boycotting the Missing Women Inquiry in British Colombia, and rejecting Commissioner Wally Oppal's invitation to resume their participation. The 15 groups range from Battered Women's Support Services, to the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, to Downtown Eastside Sex Workers United Against Violence. "The Inquiry was dead at the point—and was completely strangled—when Premier Christy Clark denied funding" for the legal representation of Indigenous and women's organizations, UBCIC Grand Chief Stewart Phillip told reporters. "Oppal is beating a dead horse."

Demonstrators from across Ontario marched to mark the sixth anniversary of the Douglas Creek Estates development occupation in Caledonia. The occupation was carried out in 2006 by members of Six Nations in order, they said, to reclaim their traditional territory of Kanonhstaton. The land dispute is still unresolved. Earlier in the month, the mayor of Caledonia had called for the cancellaton of the march, calling the land claim dispute a “quagmire.”

In response to Chilean student protests for more accessible university education and lower tuition fees, President Sebastian Pinera announced his government would establish new taxes to raise $700 million to cover ballooning tuition fees. Chileans pay some of the highest university fees in the world, and students have vowed to continue their protests&mdahs;which have been ongoing for the past year— saying the government’s reforms do not go far enough.

The federal government announced it was introducing two-tiered wages for temporary foreign workers, who employers will be allowed to pay 15 per cent less than the average hourly wage in their sector of work. The government had previously said it would not institute a two-tier wage system; labor and immigrant rights activists denounced the change as introducing second class workers and provoking wage depression, as local workers would be forced to compete with lower-paid foreign workers. For the first time ever, there are more temporary foreign workers than permanent immigrants migrating to Canada.

Israel legalized the three settlement outposts of Bruchin, Rechalim and Sansan in the occupied West Bank. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has also been involved in preventing the demolition of another illegal settlement, Ulpana, after a court found it was built on private Palestinian land. In reaction, US State Department Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland stated, "We are obviously concerned, we don't think this is helpful to the process, and we don't accept the legitimacy of continued settlement activity,” while UN Chief Ban Ki-moon released a statement that he was “deeply troubled” by this “provocation.”

The nation-wide internal uprising in Syria against President Bashir Al-Assad has entered its 14th month, resulting in a UN-estimated death toll of 9,000 civilians. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights accused the Ba’ath Party regime of war crimes during a two-week offensive in the northern province of Idlib as the UN attempted to broker a ceasefire.

Tens of thousands of people across the country enjoyed 4/20, the unofficial holiday for all things cannabis. While revellers self-medicated without police interference in Vancouver, Ottawa and Toronto, tickets were handed out and arrests were made in London, Ontario, and Regina.

*We originally referred to Breanna Manning as Bradley Manning, perpetrating mainstream media practices of mis-naming and mis-gendering her. We have since corrected the text, and we apologize for the error.

Six Nations Caledonia anniversary march Montreal Night March

Indigenous community leader celebrates ruling, promises continued opposition

MEXICO—On Friday, the Chilean Supreme Court ratified a lower court ruling that rendered Goldcorp's environmental assessment for the El Morro mine null, due to irregularities including the company's failure to properly consult with the Diaguita Huascoaltinos Indigenous and Agricultural Community, whose lands would be destroyed if the mine is built.

Following the lower court ruling, Goldcorp stated that they would not stop working until they received an order declaring the Resolution of Environmental Quality, a kind of environmental permit, to be without effect. "This is the order, and there is no appeal," said Sergio Campusano Villches, President of the Diaguita Huascualtino community.

The Chilean press is reporting that the Supreme Court decision was unanimous, and that the company must respond to the ruling before taking further steps towards opening the mine. 

The judgement in their favour was a surprise, according to Campusano, who was already preparing to take the legal battle international.

"We were afraid because three of the five judges in the Chilean Supreme Court have been accused of being bought off," Campusano told the Vancouver Media Co-op. "We were actually even preparing to go to the Inter American Commission, since we know there's a lot of money at play here."

The decision has raised the question of whether Goldcorp actually would prefer to deal with this case inside of Chile rather than in international courts, says Campusano. But, he says, his people will continue to oppose proposed copper mine, which requires an almost $4 billion investment by co-owners Goldcorp (70 per cent) and New Gold (30 per cent). Both companies are based in Vancouver.

"These days the ideas of 'consultation' and 'consent' have been manipulated by consulting and human resources firms that work for the government, local governments also stick their noses in there without knowing what they're doing," said Campusano. "All we did was play the game that they want us to play, and 'the illusion' has ended."

The Diaguita Huascoaltinos Indigenous and Agricultural Community have already taken a case against Barrick Gold to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Campusano will be in Vancouver in early June to speak at the Shout Out Against Mining Injustice event, organized by the Council of Canadians.

Dawn Paley is a freelance journalist and co-founder of the Vancouver Media Co-op. This piece was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

Diaguita Huascoaltinos Indigenous and Agricultural Community Goldcorp Base Camp El Morro

Fifteen thousand take to Montreal streets as Quebec government plays semantics, blocks negotiations

MONTREAL—It didn't take long; as always, the consensus among the media came quickly: "Downtown turns into battlefield," "Another demonstration goes sour," "Montreal student demonstration turns violent," "Violence breaks out during student protest"... 

At the end of a day where 15,000 people took to the streets, a day that saw the provincial government play the worst kind of politics during negotiations with student representatives, you'd be hard-pressed to get any of that from the night's headlines.

Also invisible from those opening lines were any mention of police actions—actions which, if you were watching the live stream from CUTV, checking out clips on Youtube, or even following nearly any Twitter feed (let alone if you were actually at the protest)—did more to set off tensions than anything protesters did two nights ago.

The events of April 26 were set in motion by Education Minister Line Beauchamp's announcement that she was expelling the Coalition Large de l'Association pour une Solidarite Syndicale Etudiante from the negotiating session, which were meant to find a resolution to the 11-week-old student strike that has swept the province.

CLASSE represents 50 per cent of the 180,000 students on strike and was largely responsible for launching the strike in the first place. It has also been a constant thorn in the side of the government, organizing the most radical acts of civil disobedience and maintaining a firm line demanding the continuation of the province's tuition fee freeze.

Why were they expelled? After the coalition adopted a clear position against violence towards people, but encouraged civil disobedience, Minister Beauchamp demanded that CLASSE agree to a 48-hour truce for negotiations. During this time, the union would be allowed to organize traditional protests (which it did Wednesday afternoon), but not engage in economic disruption. While CLASSE did not have a mandate to sign a truce, it did state that it had no disruptive actions planned for the next 48 hours.

The Federation des Etudiants Universitaire du Quebec as well as the Federation des Etudiants Collegial du Quebec (FEUQ and FECQ) had already previously spoken out against "violent actions," including acts of vandalism and civil disobedience.

On Monday at 4pm, all three associations sat down with government representatives for the first time since the strike began.

Less than 40 hours later though, it was all over.

Since the start of the strike, CLASSE has maintained a website featuring a Google calendar that showed all student actions across the province, including those that involved actions that the government defines as disruptive or violent. This didn't appear to be a problem to start the truce, but it did serve as the excuse to end it. The ostensible reason was a march last Tuesday night that was announced on the Google calendar included at least one count of property destruction (a broken window), and confrontation with police, resulting in five arrests.

Clearly looking for a pretext to attempt once again to split the tuition freeze movement and to marginalize the association with the most radical—and persistent—membership, Minister Beauchamp took to the airwaves at 2pm Wednesday, announcing that CLASSE was expelled from the negotiations. Within several minutes, the other two federations walked away in solidarity.

A protest had already been called a week earlier for Wednesday night, and the government's arbitrary discussion to cut short negotiations—before, by most accounts, they had even really started—led to people understandably being angry and looking for a way to express their anger.

As Daniel Crespo, one of the organizers of last night's demonstration, told Cyberpresse:

«Évidemment on souhaite une manif énergique. Calme, c'est pas le mot...En ce moment, je crois que le sentiment qui se vit au sein des étudiant-e-s c'est la colère. Alors le calme, je ne crois pas qu'on en ait.»

"Obviously, we're hoping for an energetic demo. Calm isn't the word...Right now, I think the feeling students have is anger. So 'calm'? I don't think we have any."

That said, I have been in the middle of much angrier marches than what hit Montreal last night.

Fifteen thousand people were in the streets last night.  Fifteen thousand who were fed up with a government that earlier in the day essentially spit in the face of the student strike movement, demonstrating the same condescension, arrogance and rejectionism that has characterized their approach to this movement, one of the largest social movements in the history of not just Quebec, but of Canada.

And despite all this anger, it was mostly channeled through chanting and speeches. All it took though was a few paint balloons and six broken windows before 15,000 people were announced illegal. Targeted for property destruction were banks, Loto-Quebec and a military recruitment centre: not random targets, but symbols of the government and the economic powers which are behind the push for higher tuition fees and with them higher debt. When the government refuses to negotiate in good faith for over two months, and slams the door when negotiations finally begin, is it any wonder that people would turn their frustrations on the symbols of that government and those who back them?

The response of police was unannounced and muscled. I was just a few metres from where the first percussion grenade went off, in the middle of the crowd, and I feel confident saying that the use of these weapons came before most—if anyone—in the streets knew that the march had been declared an illegal assembly. It was only after the crowd scattered that a voice was heard over the police loudspeaker announcing that the march was illegal. And looking to accounts posted on social media, I'm definitely not alone in that assessment. By the time the announcement was heard, police were already forcing their way into the crowd, separating it, with small groups of people scattering in all directions near the corner of Peel and Ste-Catherine.

From other parts of the march have come reports of police on horses charging crowds, excessive use of pepper spray and gas, batoning and tear gassing. It was only after this excessive intervention that the more aggressive tactics—a car lit on fire, more windows smashed, rocks thrown at police—took place.

Some will clearly argue that once a single window is broken, the law is broken and police have every right to intervene. But can six broken windows justify the police aggression documented on Wednesday night? And if six broken windows can make 15,000 people targetable for dispersion and arrest, then what does a tear gas cannister to the chest, or a concussion grenade to the eye, or a baton to the head or ribs, or a car ramming through a crowd equal? All are clearly more dangerous to the health and safety of individual people: police aren't taking on objects when they aggress, they are taking on flesh and blood. 

When all was done—around 1am—85 people were arrested (70 in a mass arrest near St-Dominique and des Pins at the very end), accounts of police brutality were innumerable on social media, and students and supporters were vowing to fight on.

This morning, Quebec Premier Jean Charest was once again denouncing student violence as the obstacle of continued negotiation, playing out the same tired lines he and Minister Beauchamp have had on repeat for weeks. Tired lines that have, and will, do nothing to end this conflict.

Tim McSorley is an editor with The Dominion and a member of the Montreal Media Co-op.

This article was originally published by the Montreal Media Co-op.

April 25 night march in Montreal 1 April 25 night march in Montreal 2

Mining companies are only part of Canada's corporate presence in Latin America

LOS CABOS, MEXICO—The hard fought battle against the Keystone XL pipeline, which was slated to carry tar sands crude across Canada and the United States to port in Texas, kicked struggles against Canadian-owned oil and gas companies up to a new level. Resistance dominated headlines in Canada, while rural folk, Indigenous people, celebrities, and climate activists in the US took direct action to block Calgary-based TransCanada’s plans. In northern BC, Indigenous-led resistance to the proposed Enbridge pipeline, along with a host of other US-owned infrastructure projects, have become front and centre issues for environmentalists and activists across Canada.

The role of Canadian oil, gas and pipeline companies in other parts of the world is, however, less discussed. Many activists have focused on the behavior of the Canadian mining sector, a natural choice given the size of that sector compared to the oil and gas industries in Canada. “In Canada, a major difference between the oil and gas and mining sectors is that while many of Canada’s largest companies are oil and gas producers, some with integrated operations, they are not particularly prominent in the global arena just now,” reads a 2008 report by the Economic Commission on Latin America.

It’s been four years since that report was released, and it might be time to revisit the idea that the Canadian oil and gas sector hasn’t gained prominence on a global scale. Take the case of Latin America, where a host of oil and gas companies based in Calgary and Toronto have been increasing their holdings throughout the hemisphere, taking advantage of the same lax legal standards Canadian mining companies enjoy.

A study by Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP found that in 2010, Canadian oil and gas companies made over $35 billion in mergers and acquisitions in Central and Latin America, and the region is the second most attractive place (after the United States) for Canadian oil companies to invest outside of Canada. Colombia in particular has quickly become a favourite destination for this new surge of Canadian oil and gas investment.

At the same time as the Canadian Senate approved a free trade agreement between Canada and Colombia in June of 2010, a government-hosted bidding fair on oil and gas properties was taking place in Cartagena, Colombia. "I have some good news for our Canadian friends. The Senate has just approved a free trade agreement...so that opens the way for a lot of opportunities and our government is very happy about that,” said then-Colombian Energy and Mining Minister Hernan Martinez to corporate representatives bidding on oil and gas concessions in Cartagena that day.

Canadian oil companies were among the chief supporters of the agreement, which was roundly criticized because of the continued killings, kidnapping and displacement of Indigenous people, trade unionists, peasants, dissenters and the poor in Colombia. A free trade agreement with Peru was approved by the Canadian Senate a little later, on the heels of a massacre in the Amazon province of Bagua where an estimated 100 people were killed during protests in defense of their lands.

A preliminary list of Canadian oil companies active in Latin America

CALGARY
Gran Tierra Energy Incorporated: Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, Peru
Parex Resources Incorporated: Colombia, Trinidad and Tobago
Canacol Energy Limited: Colombia, Guyana, Brazil
Talisman Energy Incorporated: Colombia, Peru
Nexen Incorporated: Colombia
Petrominerales: Colombia, Peru
Quattro Exploration and Production: Guatemala
Quetzal Energy Limited: Colombia

VANCOUVER
Petro Vista Energy Corporation: Colombia, Brazil
TrueStar Petroleum Corporation: Guatemala

TORONTO
Pacific Rubiales Energy: Colombia, Peru, Guatemala

Pacific Rubiales and Talisman, two of the most important Canadian oil companies in Colombia, have already come under intense criticism linked to the high environmental and social cost of their operations.

A class action lawsuit brought against Talisman in 2002, which was later dismissed, alleged that the company was involved in funding war in southern Sudan. “Talisman Energy finances and directs the Government of Sudan’s ethnic cleansing campaign and must be stopped before all of our villages are destroyed and all of the people are killed,” said Taban Deng, a former government official, in 2002, from what is today Southern Sudan.

In some ways, it seems that little has changed in the 10 years since Talisman was active in Sudan. In December of last year, Amazon Watch released testimony from a priest who traveled into northern Peruvian Indigenous communities near Talisman’s operations. “The presence of Talisman is generating conflict between those who accept and those who don't accept the company, and a conflict like this here in the jungle runs the risk costing many lives,” said Father Diego Clavijo. “What they are doing here [in the Pastaza river basin] with some ex-leaders is also dividing people, and it is going to cause death and destruction,” he said. “We are on the verge of genocide, genocide between peoples, due to infighting over the presence of the company here.”

Talisman made inroads in conflict-ridden Colombia in 2010, when they bought 49 per cent of BP’s oil and gas projects in Colombia, including more than 2,000 kilometres of pipelines.

Pacific Rubiales, for its part, operates the largest oil project in Colombia. The company, which at one point had a military base with 600 soldiers stationed on its property, has been subject to ongoing strikes by the United Workers Union (USO). Numerous incursions by riot police to break up strikes have resulted in serious injuries among workers. Pacific Rubiales is working hard on public relations, having recently sponsored a prestigious golf tournament in Colombia, inaugurated with a celebrity swing by Bill Clinton.

Along with Nexen, another Calgary-based company, Pacific Rubiales has announced that it has discovered natural gas reserves within its Colombian concessions. A number of other Canadian companies have recently displayed renewed interest in the vast jungle regions of northern Guatemala, which is populated by communities primarily of Mayan descent. Increasing conflict in the region, exemplified by a horrific massacre of 27 peasants in San Benito, Peten, last year, has not been linked directly with oil and gas interests, instead being linked to the activity of drug cartels.

Tracing the fault lines of Canadian oil and gas companies in Latin America and the Caribbean also requires looking at Canada’s role in the banking sector throughout the region. RBC and Scotiabank are both major players, with banks and ATMs popping up throughout countries with heavy mining and oil and gas investment.

"Today, RBC has bought off every single aspect of the [Royal Bank of Trinidad and Tobago], and now financially dominates the landscape," said Macdonald Stainsby, an activist and writer who returned from the island nation earlier this year. “[RBC has] openly called for financing of new oil plays, in particular they’ve brought up tar sands,” he said. Stainsby, who runs the website oilsandstruth.org, increasingly devotes time to making links with communities organizing against tar sands in countries like Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela.

Building these links of solidarity and continuing to raise awareness about the impacts of oil and gas projects on local communities, while at the same time organizing against war and repression that so often accompany these projects, is work that must continue if we are to have any chance of collective survival on this planet.

Dawn Paley is a freelance journalist and co-founder of the Vancouver Media Co-op. A version of this article was published in the March/April print edition of Watershed Sentinel.

Oil Death Jeans Improved

For Raymond, and for all of the Raymonds, which is to say: for everyone

Editor's note: In the early morning of April 17th, prominent gay rights activist Raymond Taavel was fatally assaulted as he tried to break up a fight outside a popular Halifax nightclub. Later that day, as rumours swirled that the murder was a hate crime, hundreds gathered on Gottingen Street, in Halifax's North End, to collectively mourn and pay respect to Taavel. Tanya Davis, Halifax's poet laureat, recited the following poem.

There are words that spring to mind
like sadness
like violence
like senseless crime
like how this affects all of us
like how every tear in every eye falls from all of us
and today Halifax is an ocean of anguish
a sea of angry
beside the Atlantic.

And how do we handle this
what happens next
how do we manage the sorrow and the stress?
This afternoon I walked the sidewalks
not so different than the one where he met his death
where no person should ever have to lay their head
both concrete and Raymond were innocent.
I walked the sidewalk and every person I met
I tried to look into them

Do you know? Do you know?
Do you know what we're supposed to do now,
'cause I don't

I won't hate more
I won't love less
so many people - maybe even his killer - are loveless
not unloveable
maybe ignorant, definitely sick
and probably he shouldn't have been let out to walk around
and probably he was hateful and homophobic
but what's painful
besides this loss, besides all death
is the simple fact of it that remains:
this isn't over yet
- people left behind for every step we gain

I walked down the sidewalk that is in the city where I live and love
I look for eye contact
for allies in the right to live and love
I wore black and tough
as it is complicated stuff
how to protect oneself and yet open up

I stumble here
it isn't clear
I put my ear to the ground to listen for the sounds of people's fear
being taken down by other people's fear
who are guilty for their deeds but do not live in isolation here

There are systems failing us everywhere
prisons and education and mental health care
there is separation stark and severe
we reach out our hands to make connection
but some are all mixed up
bring death and destruction
it's all fucked up
like when he struck him, here

And, now, a being from the tribe of Love is gone
and we are one less strong
in a battle we are tired of fighting in the first place
lay down your arms
peace is your birthright

One more time we pick up the pieces and we keep loving
struggle for freedom
for all beings
Gottingen street gets another beating.

Well, we'll love it harder
reach our arms out further
to encircle all of our neighbours
'til we work through all of the hating

this is for all of you
this is for the pain in our city today
this is for Raymond

Tanya Davis is Halifax's poet laureat

Remembering Raymond Taavel on Gottingen Street, Halifax

Changes to refugee law shut doors to persecuted minority

TORONTO—The Roma Community Centre's one-room office, located on the ground floor of the Crossways Plaza in Toronto, has been operating in this location since October 2011. Founded in 1997 after the arrival of over 3,000 Czech Roma refugees in Canada, the RCC is the only organization for Roma operating in Toronto. Originally based out of the office of Culturelink, an immigrant settlement organization, the new space now hosts a number of different programs including a weekly English as a Second Language class, a women's support group and immigration counselling.

According to Gina Csanyi, Executive Director of the RCC, since acquiring the new office space there has been a dramatic rise in the number of people coming to the centre—around 20 per day—mostly Roma from Hungary. Csanyi said, “as things become progressively worse in Hungary more and more are fleeing.”

The Roma, more commonly known in the English-speaking world as Gypsies, are Europe’s largest minority with an estimated 8 to 12 million living in Europe, the majority in Central and Eastern Europe. Roma trace their roots back to northern India and are said to have left their home country and migrated west over 1,000 years ago. Throughout their long history in Europe they have been subjected to slavery, exiled, killed, used as scapegoats and have been historically marginalized in almost every country they have settled in. During the Second World War military officials sent the Roma living in Nazi-occupied countries en masse to concentration camps. Seven thousand Roma lived in the Czech Republic before the Second World War; less than 600 survived.

Today they suffer low employment rates, low education levels, lack of access to government services and health care, poverty, segregation and violent crimes perpetrated by neo-Nazis and skinheads. Forced school segregation programs and state removal of children affect Roma families in some jurisdictions.

Since 1997, thousands of Roma have been seeking asylum in Canada, the first wave coming from the Czech Republic, quickly followed by Roma from Hungary, and to a lesser degree Slovakia and Romania. Currently the largest group of Roma seeking asylum in Canada are from Hungary.

In recent years, changes to visa requirements and changes to immigration and refugee laws have created significant challenges to those wishing to immigrate here, leading to a massive decrease in the number of Roma accepted as refugees.

I met Robert and Monika, two volunteers, in the Roma Community Center on a Friday afternoon. They were helping organize the Hungarian Roma community.

According to Robert, a Hungarian Roma who came to Canada with his wife and child in 2010, one of the major problems in Hungary is that Roma are afraid to speak up about the persecution and discrimination they face because they have little support. Members of the police and government are intolerant of his people, he says. A far-right nationalist party that specifically targets Roma and Jews has grown into the third largest political party in the country and has spearheaded anti-Roma legislation. If Roma were to speak up, says Robert, they could lose their jobs and neo-Nazi groups would threaten them. The risk and insecurity prompted Robert and his family to flee the country. “I never want to go back,” he says. He and his family are waiting for their refugee court hearing to determine whether or not they can stay in Canada.

For many Hungarian Roma, applying for asylum in Canada is their last hope at finding a safe place to raise a family. Monika, another Hungarian Roma who came to Canada with her husband and 2 children said, “We had to sell everything to come here: our house, everything. We have no place to go if we return.”

According to Csanyi there are a number of obstacles the Hungarian Roma face when coming to Canada such as a lack of understanding of the rigorous process of the refugee system and what documents are expected for each refugee case such as police and medical records. It is often difficult for Roma to obtain these papers in their home countries because of police and state discrimination.

In Toronto, lawyers profiteering on the refugee claims of Hungarian Roma are also becoming an issue. “When I meet a client and see who their lawyer is I immediately know if they are going to have a successful claim or not,” says Csanyi. “These lawyers don’t even meet their clients. They cut and paste PIFF forms, have an almost 0 acceptance rate, stretch out the case for years and once legal aid runs out they drop the clients.” This severely affects the chance of a successful outcome in the hearing.

The recent history of Roma immigration to Canada has been a complex one, which Csanyi and others say has been aggravated by immigration legislation such as Bill C-11 and the newly proposed Bill C-31.

The latest Roma immigration wave began in 1997, as rates of neo-Nazi attacks and discrimination in their home countries increased. At first the Immigration and Refugee Board largely granted the Roma refugee status based on the evidence of systematic and long-term persecution in the Czech Republic and Hungary. The acceptance rate for Hungarian Roma before 1998 was around 78%.

As the number of Hungarian Roma refugees increased in 1998, the Immigration and Refugee Board organized an unprecedented examination of the overall conditions in Hungary that would be used in deciding other Hungarian Roma refugee cases. This is the only time such an investigation, known as a “lead case,” has been carried out in the history of the IRB.

The lead case involved two families and the tribunal decided that the conditions in Hungary did not amount to persecution and denied the claimants refugee status. The result was that acceptance rates for Hungarian Roma dropped from 70 per cent to 8 per cent from 1998 to 1999.

On March 27, 2006, the lead case was overturned by the Federal Court of Appeal on the basis that it was designed solely to limit the number of Hungarian Roma accepted as refugees in Canada. From 1998 to 2006, more than 10,000 Hungarian Roma refugees were rejected and deported back to Hungary.

Newly appointed Immigration Minister Jason Kenney publicly vocalized the idea that refugee claims made by European citizens were illegitimate. Starting in 2008, the term “bogus refugee” became synonymous with refugees coming from so-called “democratic” countries. This had a strong impact on the outcome of refugee claims made by Roma coming from Eastern Europe. In 2008 the acceptance rate for Czech Roma was 94 per cent. After these public statements the acceptance rate plummeted to 10 per cent in 2010.

Soon after, the government established new visa requirements for Czech residents (as well as Mexican residents), drastically limiting them from coming to Canada and applying for refugee status.

Kenney's targeting of Roma refugees sparked legal action in the Roma community. Rocco Galati, a Toronto-based immigrant lawyer, and the Czech Roma community launched a lawsuit against Kenney accusing him of blatantly undermining the Immigration and Refugee Board's independent tribunal process by spreading bias against the Roma. Court action is ongoing.

Despite these difficulties, last year there were 4,423 new refugee claims in Canada made by Roma from Hungary, with 5,975 cases still pending. While Hungary is currently the country with the highest refugee claims made in Canada, its acceptance rates are one of the lowest. The 2011 acceptance rate of refugee claims from Hungary was 18.3 per cent compared to the national average acceptance rates, which was 44.6 per cent. The average wait time for a hearing is 3 years, forcing many people to live in uncertainty long-term. Many point to immigration legislation and institutional bias against the Roma as the reason for these low acceptance rates.

The Balanced Refugee Reform Act (Bill C-11) passed in 2010 under a minority Conservative Government. At the time of adoption, some of the more contentious parts of the legislation were removed in order to satisfy opposition party demands, only to resurface in the Conservative Government's latest immigration bill, C-31.

Kenney has said he hopes to see Bill C-31, named Protecting Canada’s Immigration System Act, passed by June 2012. Bill C-31 is an omnibus bill that incorporates aspects of several previously proposed pieces of legislation. The new laws would allow the detention of “irregular arrivals”—those who arrive by boat, for example—without a warrant or an appeal. It would also grant the Minister of Immigration sole authority to set a list of “safe countries,” which are deemed to be capable of protecting their citizens. This would limit the ability of residents of these countries to apply for refugee status and would revoke their option to appeal a rejection. They would also only be given 15 days to prepare and file their written statement which sets the basis of their claim, leaving little time to find legal counsel and translation.

Julianna Beaudoin, a PhD student at the University of Western Ontario, has been researching Roma and human rights issues since 2002, specifically focusing on the Canadian IRB and immigration policies. “Bill C-31 is yet another way the Canadian government is trying to reinforce the notion that there is a 'queue' for refugees, and groups like Roma who are taking active roles in trying to escape persecution and violence are 'jumping the queue,'” says Beaudoin. According to Beaudoin, Canada, as a signatory to the UN Convention on the Status of Refugees, has an obligation to provide Roma with a fair refugee hearing.

According to the government, assignment to the safe country list will only come after investigation, though there are questions as to whether other factors could be at play. Syed Hussan, an organizer with the immigrant and refugee rights organization No One is Illegal, argues that “safe country” legislation is linked to economic factors and trade agreements that Canada has signed or is negotiating. In particular, Canada is currently negotiating the Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement (CETA) with the European Union. Hungary is a member and held the presidency last year.

Critics question Canada's willingness and ability to accept refugees from countries with which it has signed trade agreements, since such economic affiliations often tacitly show support for a country's political system as well. Placing these countries on the “safe country” list gives the Canadian government the power to turn away large numbers of refugees. “We call this bill the Refugee Exclusion Act,” says Hussan. “This bill gives [immigration officers] massive powers of detention [of] anyone who is not a citizen and demolishes all the key pillars of a permanent refugee system. If citizenship can be taken away at the whim of a government we are in deep trouble.”

Kristyna Balaban is a Toronto-based documentary filmmaker, photographer, and a member of the Toronto Media Co-op, which produced this piece.

Toronto Roma vigil

Pending trade agreement with EU only benefits big business

CHARLOTTETOWN—As Canada negotiates its furthest reaching free trade agreement to date, cities and towns across the country are sounding warning bells that it could change local governance as we know it.

The Canadian government is negotiating a Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) with the European Union. The accord goes far beyond the reach of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), offering unrestricted trade in goods, services and investments between the 27 EU nations and all levels of Canadian government.

“The first thing to realize is that it [CETA] involves far more than trade,” says Scott Sinclair, Senior Research Fellow with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA). He warns of the potential for the deal to greatly affect municipalities’ ability to govern.

The agreement has become known as the “next-generation” deal because of the degree to which it includes all aspects of trade, covering intellectual property, standards and regulations, settlement dispute resolutions, services, investments and government procurement.

The biggest business leaders in Canada and Europe have been the driving force behind the negotiations. They stand to profit, particularly through the agreement's offer of sub-national procurement contracts, which is creating worry and opposition within municipalities.

Municipal-level governments traditionally use procurement contracts to benefit the local economy, opening bids, or a tender contracts, that target local businesses. These local contracts create jobs and opportunities in the region, and and can promote certain kinds of development policies.

But under CETA, non-federal contracts, formerly exempted from free trade agreements, will soon be open to any and all competition, and not limited to local businesses or groups.

Example: the City of Charlottetown, PEI, recently announced an $18 million combined sewer contract that will be opened up to local Maritime engineering, construction and water treatment companies.

For a major project such as this, Charlottetown might look to local contractors for the construction services in order to create jobs in the community. The project may also use the tenders to support environmental or other development initiatives.

However if CETA becomes law, Charlottetown would lose its authority to choose to hire locally and to choose to which parties to grant the procurement contract.

The EU is pushing for a “non-discrimination” clause within the CETA agreement that would mean the procurement terms would apply to all levels of government: when any government calls a bid, it must be open to foreign investors as well as local or national ones.

Minimum limits (or “thresholds”) are in place to distinguish projects and services that are worthwhile to open to foreign investors, which allow smaller contracts to remain outside the purview of the CETA. These limits have been criticized as being too low; they are modelled off of World Trade Organization figures and are set at $340,600 for goods and services and $8.5 million for construction projects.

Charlottetown city councillor Cecil Villard admitted that while the thresholds pose little to no threat for a municipality the size of his city, larger municipalities have much to lose. “My first reaction was that I would be more concerned about the level of thresholds if I were a big city. Toronto’s, Vancouver’s, and Montreal’s are sure to feel the impact,” Villard told The Dominion in an interview.

In fact, municipalities have been calling for a complete exemption from the agreement. The City of Toronto passed a resolution on March 6 demanding its exemption from CETA. And Toronto is not alone: Montreal, Hamilton, Burnaby, Prince Albert and Kingston have all passed resolutions to safeguard their rights to local governance.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) has submitted seven principles to International Trade Minister Ed Fast and the negotiating team. The principles lay out the protections it would like to see in CETA. The Council of Canadians and the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) have also launched a major national campaign to educate and empower the public on the potential consequences of CETA.

As pointed out in a recent NDP report, CETA “deprives provincial and municipal governments of crucial economic levers, particularly during economic downturns, to use government purchasing to stimulate the economy and encourage local spinoffs.”

CETA fails to recognize the autonomy of municipalities and is solely playing to the interests of big businesses, say its critics. “It's a bill of rights for corporations,” according to Leo Broderick, Vice Chair of the Council of Canadians.

Inspired by the concept of social justice, Chera-Lee advocates for human and environmental rights through community and legal initiatives from Charlottetown.

CETA versus Canadian Municipalities

Calling LRAD ‘communications device’ allowed cops to skirt rules

TORONTO—The police have tried to convince the public that its Long Range Acoustic Devices (LRAD), purchased for the G8 and G20 summits, were strictly communications devices—that they weren’t to be used as weapons. But internal police intelligence reports suggest otherwise.

Outside of public messaging, the police have in fact referred to the devices as weapons, according to documents obtained by The Dominion.

“Whether you call it a weapon or a communications device, it can be used in situations where it can cause people significant hearing loss, significant pain,” said Abby Deshman, a Program Director with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA).“They can be used as weapons; they have been used as weapons in the past.”

The CCLA believes that the government should have properly tested and regulated the LRAD before putting it into use—and this would have happened if the LRAD had been designated a weapon.

The CCLA is now calling on the government to institute stronger rules on their use based on testing conducted since the summits.

Manufactured by LRAD Corporation, the devices can play recorded MP3s or be spoken into through a microphone, and they also have a built-in alert function that emits high-pitched tones.

“This non-lethal weapon can produce permanent ear damage,” reads a May 31, 2010 intelligence brief created by the G20 Joint Intelligence Group (JIG). This group consisted of the Toronto Police, Ontario Provincial Police, RCMP and Peel Region police. JIG intelligence reports were sent to various security partners, government departments and, in some cases, international and corporate partners.

A week later, the JIG issued a correction, inline with the official police messaging, stating that the LRAD “is in fact a communications device.”

Toronto Police did not respond to a request for comment on the difference between the internal documents and the public messaging about the LRAD.

A 2010 briefing note created prior to the G20 by a media relations officer with the Toronto Police detailed the police’s official position. According to the note, the LRAD is a “tool to send emergency notifications, directions for evacuations, etc.” It added that the tool will “allow police to communicate to large crowds in various languages.”

This note described the LRAD very differently from a JIG report created shortly after the September 2009 Pittsburg G20 summit.

The older report described the devices as “sound cannons” to “engage unlawful protestors,” originally developed for military purposes and was “employed against Iraqi insurgents and Somali pirates.”

The Pittsburg G20 summit was the first place these devices were used by the police, rather than by the military. “Police used the device to emit a high-pitch sound that forced demonstrators to cover their ears and withdraw,” reads the report.

“There were no reports of demonstrators attending the hospital,” the report also noted.

Despite this claim, a bystander alleging permanent hearing damage due to the LRAD is suing the city of Pittsburgh, according to a press release from the American Civil Liberties Union dated September 21, 2011.
Karen Piper, the plaintiff in this suit, was subjected to the high pitch sound of a nearby LRAD for several minutes during the protest. She got no warning before the alert started, according to the release.

“Piper immediately suffered intense pain as mucus discharged from her ear. She became nauseous and dizzy and developed a severe headache,” read the press release. “Since then, Piper has suffered from tinnitus (ringing of the ears), barotrauma, left ear pain and fluid drainage, dizziness and nausea. She still suffers from permanent nerve damage.”

Concerned about how the LRAD would be used at Toronto’s G20 Summit, the CCLA took the matter to court. A ruling was made on June 23, 2010. No injunction on the use of LRADs was granted, but a judge did order greater restriction on their use.

“Part of the reason that the LRADs were bought or deployed in a hurry was that one-time funding was available from the federal government in order to police for the G20,” said Deshman.

Using federal funds, the Toronto Police acquired four LRADs in preparation for the G8 and G20 summits. Three were the portable “100X” model and one was a larger “300X” model, which can be mounted on a vehicle or boat. On top of that, the OPP also acquired three LRADs of their own.

Alphonse MacNeil, the RCMP officer in charge of all G20 policing, approved the purchase of these LRADs. However, when it was revealed by the Globe and Mail that the RCMP does not approve of the LRAD being used for crowd control or in urban settings, pressure was placed on MacNeil by the Ministry of Public Safety to justify his actions.

“Public Safety are on me about why I supported the purchase of the LRAD for TPS and OPP,” wrote MacNeil in an internal email.

In response, MacNeil received a briefing note on the LRAD, which said that the Toronto Police Service had developed a set of guidelines for appropriate use, and that the force had already used the tool to execute a warrant. It also pointed to the Pittsburg G20 and the Vancouver Olympics as examples of other events where the LRAD had been used.

The document explained that in addition to delivering audio recordings the “alert functions can be used if necessary.” It noted that the manufacturer recommends never using it for more than two-to-five seconds. It also explained that in order to use the LRAD, police commanders on the ground would need permission from an off-site Incident Commander.

CCLA’s Deshman said the police and other law enforcement officers have to be “extremely careful” about using new technologies like the LRAD.

“We can’t just take manufacturers’ assertions about when a device is appropriate and when it should be used, because they have an interest in selling the device,” Deshman said. “What we need is our government to strongly and independently test these things.”

While the LRAD was used by Toronto Police to amplify an eviction notice at Occupy Toronto in November 2011, it wasn’t used during the G20 protests, despite the chaos on the streets of Toronto.

The CCLA was still concerned and, after the summit, pressed to have the LRAD

regulated as a weapon. The province undertook a study on the matter and a report was issued in November 2011.
The report was based on a review of literature and field tests of the device. It established the disagreement on whether the LRAD is a weapon but did not take a definitive stance on the matter. It did, however, recommend changes that could be made in how the LRAD is regulated.

The report also noted that police operating the device may also be at risk of ear damage, recommending that operators of the 300X model stand at least two meteres behind the device.

“The report indicated that the existing limits on when LRAD can be used need to be updated,” said Deshman, “so we called on the government to implement that immediately. We haven’t yet received a response.”

In recent years, police forces in Canada have been acquiring another new device, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). These miniature robotic helicopters can fit in the trunk of a car and be flown by remote control to conduct aerial surveillance. They have been deployed to assist in homicide investigations, search and rescue and to view traffic accidents from above.

The RCMP, OPP and several local police forces across Canada have acquired these devices from Canadian companies that manufacture them: Waterloo-based Aeryon and Saskatoon-based DraganFly. In August 2011, the New York Times reported that an Aeryon’s Scout model UAV was donated to Libyan rebels by an anonymous donor.

A more advanced UAV, the Predator Drone, was used by a local sheriff in North Dakota. The aircraft is normally used to patrol the US-Canada border, but in this instance was used to assist the sheriff to spy on a family and their land.

A version of the Predator Drone armed with missiles is used by both the US Air Force and the CIA. These drones are reportedly used to carry out targeted assassinations in countries such as Yemen, Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“We are increasingly seeing police interest in purchasing new technologies, technologies that often have been developed in context such as military use,” said Deshman. “I think this is a trend we will continue to see as technology develops.”

Deshman points to the Taser as an example of a device that was introduced without sufficient regulations or testing. There were 26 taser-related deaths in Canada between 2003 and 2008, including the high-profile death of Robert Dziekanski. National attention on Tasers, particularly after police Tasered and killed Dziekanski at the Vancouver International Airport in 2007, led to deeper scrutiny of the device and its regulation.

Deshman said Canada should learn from this lesson.

“It was probably the worst possible way for them to introduce a new technology,” said Deshman. “What we should be doing is having a lot of public discussion about new technologies, about the benefits and drawbacks.”

Tim Groves is a freelance journalist and investigative researcher based in Toronto.

LRAD - Sonic weapon

Honduran journalist visits Montreal, reaffirms strength of resistance movements

MONTREAL—In June 2009, Honduran president Manuel Zelaya was kidnapped by soldiers and taken to Costa Rica in a military airplane. The Honduran army took control of the streets.

Nearly three years later, a popular resistance movement continues to organize against and oppose the coup. Meanwhile, the Canadian government and Canadian companies continue to deepen their ties with the controversial post-Zelaya regime.

The coup in Honduras was more than the kidnapping of a popular, progressive president. The day of the coup, Zelaya was scheduled to oversee a non-binding, nationwide survey on whether people were in favor of holding a binding referendum on re-writing the Honduran constitution. For the first time in history, the opinion of regular Hondurans would have had the potential to dramatically change the future of their country.

Had the June 2009 survey passed, it would have meant serious momentum toward a long-term goal of the Honduran social movement, the writing of a new constitution by way a people's assembly, inviting representatives from every sector and municipality to join in the re-founding of Honduras.

The coup, a joint operation by the military, supreme court, congress, and business elite, put a stop to all of this. It meant that the current Honduran constitution, written under a US-backed military dictatorship in the early 1980s, would continue to benefit a small elite.

But the coup also gave rise to the creation of the National People's Resistance Front, which now has local chapters in each of Honduras' 298 municipalities. The resistance movement is dedicated to bringing about a new constitution, at whatever cost.

In 2011, Honduras became the deadliest country in the world, for those countries which the UN has been able to gather statistics. "Our country of just 8 million people is suffering more than 20 murders per day," said Felix Molina, a Honduran journalist who recently spoke in Montreal during a Canadian tour. “Among the victims are around 20 journalists and 424 women. On top of murders, there are death threats, forced disappearances, exile for some and a general criminalization of the social resistance movement.”

Molina is the host, producer and founder of the radio show Resistencia. The show airs on the station Radio Globo, which has supported resistance and pro-democracy movements since the coup.

In the November 2009 Honduran general elections, Porfirio “Pepe” Lobo was elected president in a vote took place under what some considered a state of siege.

In the five months between Zelaya's kidnapping and the vote, more than 4,000 anti-coup activists were arbitrarily detained. Anti-coup media outlets were repeatedly shut down by the military. More than 100 community organizers were assassinated. Meanwhile, Zelaya, the president in exile, made his way back to Honduras and hid out in the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa surrounded by the military.

As a result of the deteriorating security conditions under the interim coup regime headed by Roberto Micheletti and the military's offensive against the resistance, all international election observation bodies refused to send observers.

Regardless, the United States and Canada applauded Lobo's election, and put pressure on other countries to do the same.

The Harper administration has shown it is especially eager to work with Honduran officials since the coup, and Canada's corporate interests in the country continue to grow. In August 2011, Stephen Harper traveled to Honduras and signed a free trade agreement with Honduras. The announcement was unexpected, and took many by surprise.

”The Honduran population was never informed about this [agreement],” said Molina. “As with many of the most important decisions in Honduras, they learned about it after it was taken.”

Honduran congress is considering a new mining law, which critics say prioritizes corporate interests over human rights. This mining law, they say, is designed to benefit mining companies by, among other things, failing to protect access to water and limiting both access to information about mining activities and the ability to have mines closed.

Canadian mining company Goldcorp has faced criticism of its San Martin gold mine, which operated from 2000 to 2008 in central Honduras.

Goldcorp consistently denied that its operations had anything to do with a variety of health problems among locals, including miscarriages and skin diseases, as well as the death of livestock. In 2011, results of tests conducted in 2007 were finally released, showing heavy metal poisoning among 62 residents of the area near the mine.

The National People's Resistance Front recently voted to form a political party as another way to confront these corporate interests. Some groups within the wider resistance movement believe there are other ways to continue the struggle, such as establishing autonomous popular zones and small-scale municipal powers.

“The discussion is far from being over,” Molina said during his talk in Montreal. “In the meantime, we have to make sure that the popular movement keeps existing and to reinforce the capacities of the National Resistance Front.”

Stéfanie is part of the Montreal Media Co-op and is currently interning at CKUT 90.3FM's community news department.

Jesse Freeston is a media co-op sustainer and maker of the upcoming film Resistencia about the ongoing farmer occupation of Honduras' Aguan Valley, www.resistenciathefilm.com.

This article was produced by the Montreal Media Co-op.

Questions? Comments? Drop us a line: info@mediacoop.ca.

Felix Molina

Community March Against Racism takes to Vancouver streets

VANCOUVER—Hundreds of people took to the streets of Vancouver on March 18 for the annual Community March Against Racism, marking the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination on March 21. The march, organized by No One is Illegal (NOII)–Vancouver, began at Commercial Drive and 14th Avenue and made its way along the Drive to Grandview Park.

Along the way, stops were made to gather for songs and speakers. After Coast Salish drumming and singing in the middle of the busy intersection of East Broadway and Commercial, Kat Norris of the Indigenous Action Movement asked for a moment of silence "for all of our people on the street, for all of our people incarcerated, for all of our people suffering in their homes..."

Further along the Drive, the march paused once again. "There was a man that was lit on fire on this street by neo-Nazis, and very little was done about it," explained rally emcee Harjap Grewal.

Robertson De Chazal and Alastair Miller, both reportedly members of neo-Nazi group Blood and Honour, have been charged for the 2009 attack against a Filipino man, who had been sleeping on a discarded couch near Commercial Drive. The attack was one of several in recent years that targeted people of colour.

"Feeling safe to walk these streets should not be just a Canadian fiction," a group from the Kalayaan Centre recited in a collective poem. "So-called progressive Van city, silencing histories."

NOII's Grewal highlighted the fact that in the early 1900s, Vancouver was home to race riots and racist legislation—and today racist attacks and legislation remain. "We need to see how these things are linked, and we need to fight back."

"Aqui estamos y no nos vamos. We are here and we're not going anywhere!,” said activist Richard Marquez. "We can't rely on the cops, the courts and the legislators. We’ve got to rely on the people's movement."

Sandra Cuffe is a writer and aspiring janitor currently living in Vancouver.

This article was originally published by the Vancouver Media Coop.

Community March Against Racism Canada is a Racist State No fences, no borders Carnival Band

Recovering an Indigenous language in Canada

MONTREAL—Kathy Robinson is a language warrior. At the age of 81, she is one of the last two fluent native speakers of Tseshaht (pronounced “tsi-sha-aht”), a language once popularly spoken on the west coast of Vancouver Island, British Columbia.

Tseshaht is not the only language indigenous to Canada that is at risk of disappearing.

Of the 50 Indigenous tongues in Canada, most are in danger of extinction. Globally, the last speaker of a language dies every two weeks. There are at least 2,500 endangered languages and dialects destined for extinction in the next 100 years, according to the UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger.

“This all happened because of residential schools; we’ve almost lost everything,” said Elder Robinson when asked why her language is disappearing. “We’ve pretty well lost our language, except for a few that kept it.”

Elder Robinson said the residential school system played a huge role in diminishing the number of speakers of Native languages because Indigenous children were forced to speak English. Now, Robinson is fighting to keep her Native language alive.

“I’d just like to leave behind what I know, so the next generation will know this,” said Robinson, who is a mother of 10 daughters.

The Tseshaht people are one of 14 Nations that make up the Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council.

Robinson has devoted the last 33 years of her life to creating language materials for the Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations. Learning from her elders, she developed the foundations of the Tseshaht curriculum that is still used at the local Tseshaht community school. The school is called Haahuupayak, which means “a tool (yak) for teaching with love (haa huu pa)."

Over the decades, Robinson has revived dances, songs and stories for her community's children that are based on her early memories and on ethnographic interviews found in linguist Edward Sapir’s notes, which she has spent 15 years translating and analyzing.

Two of her daughters, Jessica Stephens and Katherine Robinson, are also involved in language revitalization. Jessica is a member of he First Peoples’ Heritage, Language and Culture Council (FPHLCC), which developed FirstVoices.com, an online language documentation and education resource.

“[My mother] brought along all her old memories to the children and teachers,” Stephens explains. Her mother started by translating simple objects from English to Nuu-chah-nulth. She then got excited about puppets, which led to translating all the English nursery rhymes, colours, numbers, animals and “everything on earth” into her language.

“There wasn’t any real money back then for a First Nations curriculum. My mother and her co-worker worked long, hard and cold hours to get this done,” Stephens said. “They worked for peanuts but their commitment and passion forged them on.”

Today, First Nations languages are taking on new forms. The FirstVoices team in British Columbia, of which Elder Robinson’s daughter Katherine is part, provides online tools to enable First Nations communities to preserve their Indigenous languages in digital form. New media tools now provide a new pathway for transmitting and conserving oral cultures threatened by extinction.

Soon First Nations people will be able to send text messages to each other in Indigenous languages—thanks to an innovative mobile application that FirstVoices will launch on April 22. It will be available in BC’s 34 languages, which include 60 dialects.

The new texting application, called FirstVoices Chat, is generating a huge buzz among First Nations youth.

“Access to the applications on mobile devices has really sparked an interest in youth to get involved with language. They are going to be able to text everyday in their own language,” said Peter Brand, FirstVoices Co-ordinator.

FirstVoices Chat is one of several new mobile apps that provide multimedia First Nations dictionaries and phrase collections with audio recordings, images and video. The apps are a mobile extension of language collections archived by First Nations communities at FirstVoices.com. They incorporate touch-screen keyboards that use the unique characters for each of the 34 Indigenous languages of BC, as well as an English keyboard.

FirstVoices also runs a language program called The Language Tutor, which has been implemented in several schools in BC. The software offers computer-based language learning courses that are tailored for specific First Nations cultures. Parents have used it in collaboration with local teachers to create successful language immersion environments in several communities.

"It's very exciting to see the new generation of language champions emerging right in front of us," said Peter Brand.

Jessica Stephens said her mother recognizes how essential computers are for revitalizing their language and developing new materials, but that taking computer courses brought up a lot of her mother’s fears from her experience in residential school.

“Her fear was up and she was resistant, but she had to go if she wanted her language to have a chance,” Stephens said. “So she overcame her fear and learned.”

“She liked it and was confused by it, but she kept typing and today she is an efficient computer geek,” Stephens added. “My mom is always on the computer translating the stories. She remembers the people who she is translating. She knows them and has talked to them so it is like she is the link. She loves, absolutely loves translating their notes.”

Elder Robinson is celebrated in her community for having contributed so much of her energy to create a Tseshaht dictionary, books of traditional mythology, collections of song lyrics and children’s stories.

Michael Kelly, a member of the Elders Team from the Indian Residential School Survivors Society, shares Robinson’s belief that residential schools and other historic assimilatory practices are the root cause of the demise of many Indigenous languages.

“When I came back from six years at residential school, I was like a stranger in my own family,” Kelly said.

For Kelly, six years was long enough to lose everything he once had.

“I used to be able to understand our language as a child,” he said. “When my mother died, when I was nine years old, I went to residential school and I was forbidden to speak it; I was a heathen if I spoke it.”

Kelly, along with 22 other elders from different communities in BC, are currently taking part in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s events scheduled in First Nations communities throughout 2012.

Kelly, in an interview in the city of Port Alberni, Vancouver Island, affirmed that the first step towards Indigenous language revitalization in Canada is the healing among the elders who survived residential schools.

“They come in with a lot of anger and guilt,” said Kelly of many First Nations elders. “'Why did I let this happen to me when I was so young?' They’ll blame themselves, and the priests and brothers and prefects, who taught us how to be guilty and think we are not worth anything, and that we are nothing more than drunken Indians.”

But that anger and guilt might be somewhat relieved for those sharing their stories—often for the first time—and by having their voices heard and their experiences validated, Kelly said.

“The pain does not go away,” said Kelly. “The healing is really important so they don’t have to walk around with their heads hanging down, not trusting people, afraid of who they are.”

Stephens affirmed that although healing is important for the elders, it is not an easy process.

“Spiritual healing can only take place when the elders are ready for it. It is a romantic thought that we open this healing door and they all walk in. Life is not like that. Some will never walk in, others will peek in, while still others will take a quick glance, feel too much fear, pain and shame and run far away. The severely wounded can’t even go near the door. Some people wish that we could just heal ourselves quickly and maybe it would go away and they wouldn’t have to hear it again.”

Anna Luisa Daigneault is an anthropologist and language activist from Montreal. She currently works for the Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages in the US and is involved with several language revitalization projects in Peru, Paraguay and Chile.

Kathy Robinson