JETS NOT WELCOME IN NITASSINAN
**Following is a statement sent by Daniel Ashini, the Innu Nation's
Director of Innu Rights and Environment, to ACT's October 30 rally
in support of the Innu. About 300 people attended the demonstration
in Toronto, which also called for an end to clear-cut logging in Clayoquot
Sound.
As well as this statement, the rally heard from Innu speakers Jackie
Ashini and Kathleen Nuna. A giant stump from the Clayoquot
old-growth forest was also present.**
I know a piece of paper is a poor substitute for an Innu spokesperson,
but I hope that this letter will at least convey to you some of our feelings
about low-level flying in our homeland, Nitassinan. I'm sorry I couldn't
be with you in person to participate in your rally, but I, and other
Innu spokespeople, are very busy here with several pressing concerns.
In any event, let me start by simply thanking you all for coming out
to the rally to show your concern for the future of Nitassinan, for the
potentially negative impacts of low-level flying, and your support for
the Innu people. Your ongoing support, and the hard work of the
organizers of these rallies, is very much appreciated by the Innu people.
I know that many of you have never had a chance to visit Nitassinan,
to witness with your own eyes its majestic valleys, carpets of black
spruce forests, serpentine rivers, and awe-inspiring aurora borealis.
Had you spent even a minute in this beautiful land, you would
understand instantly why we struggle so hard against military flight
training and other industrial intrusions, and you would know that
your protest actions are truly grounded in a deep appreciation for the
earth and all its creatures.
With that as an intro, let me say that we are now at a crucial point
in our fight against military flight training. After eight years of
environmental impact assessment, the Department of National Defence
is about to release a new Environmental Impact Statement. You will
remember that the first statement was a real mess and received
heavy criticism from independent experts retained by the Innu Nation,
from the Environmental Assessment Panel, and several other agencies.
Besides participating in this assessment process, we have also continued
to oppose the flight training through direct action, through civil
disobedience at the military base in Goose Bay and on the Minipi Lake
bombing range. Many of our people have been arrested and spent
time in jail as a result of these actions. In fact, I and close to 50 other
people were back in court just two days ago [October 26] in relation
to charges stemming from an occupation of the ramp at Goose Bay in
September.
Our civil disobedience actions have been an important vehicle for
the communication of our concerns about the impacts of the flight
training to national and international publics, and of course, many
of our supporters have played a key role in helping to reach these
publics.
With the release of the new Environmental Impact Statement some
time in December or January, DND hopes to push ahead as quickly as
possible to get the environmental review process finished with.
The Allied air forces, Happy Valley-Goose Bay Town Council, and
the Newfoundland government are all pressing DND to get the
environmental public relations job over with as soon as possible.
To this end, changes have been made to the Environmental
Assessment Panel, to replace formerly strong members who had the
wherewithal to scrutinize carefully the research done by DND, with
new members who are either ex-military and government bureaucrats,
pro-industry consultants, or who have limited capacity to understand
the complexities of the flight training. I am very concerned that the
environmental assessment with this new panel in charge has become
a whitewash, or just another public relations rubber stamp for the
military.
What you have to remember now is that there are serious defects
in what DND is doing to protect the Innu and the wildlife from the
negative impacts of military flight training. You have probably heard
that DND says that it can reduce the impacts of the flight training to
a bare minimum by getting the Allied air force pilots to avoid our
camps and concentrations of wildlife. However, DND promised to avoid
these noise-sensitive areas before it had really made much of an effort
to determine their location.
When the Department started to conduct inventories to find out
where wildlife concentrations are located, it found them all over the
place. And when it started to implement some avoidance restrictions
to prevent overflights, the Allies started to scream bloody murder.
They told DND that they came to fly at Goose Bay because there were
no restrictions on the activities, unlike those in Europe. They told DND
that if it did not stop putting in all these avoidance restrictions they
would pack their bags and go somewhere else. So as a result of this
pressure, DND has been going back to the Canadian Wildlife Service
and provincial wildlife agencies to get them to agree to watered-down
avoidance measures. The Innu Nation has just released a study which
looks at this whole process. It concluded, after an exhaustive analysis of
documents obtained through the federal Access to Information Act,
that DND is not designing the avoidance measures on the basis of
scientific criteria, but through a process of political negotiation.
Now, this situation is clearly unacceptable to the Innu Nation. We
had been encouraged to sit down and cooperate with DND and to
provide the coordinates of our camps on the basis of DND's argument
that the impacts of the flight training would be eliminated through
the avoidance program. But this program is clearly not working; in fact
it's a sham. We have no faith in this program whatsoever and see
no reason to cooperate with the Department.
My message to you is that you must join with us in communicating
to the Canadian public that DND's avoidance program is a sham.
Inform yourselves about why it is a sham and tell the Canadian
government as loudly as you can that the avoidance program is no
good. Next, prepare yourselves to intervene in the upcoming
environmental hearings. We are going to need your support at this
time. Of course, the timing of these hearings is very important
because they will happen just before Canada and its Allies start to
renegotiate the terms of the bilateral agreements that permit flight
training at Goose Bay. You must join with us in telling the panel and
the Allied air forces that the training is not welcome in Nitassinan.
That's about all I have to say today. But let me close by again
thanking you all for your participation in this rally and your ongoing
support of the Innu people of Nitassinan.
Tshinashkumitan.