STATEMENT ON CANADIAN MILITARY ACTION AGAINST NATIVE PEOPLE, September 1995
The Midwest Treaty Network (MTN) calls for the immediate withdrawal of all
Canadian police and military forces from the Gustafsen Lake Sundance
grounds in British Columbia, and from the Ipperwash former military base at
Stoney Point, Ontario. Both confrontations are the results of the failure
of Canada to properly address Native land rights. To characterize the
confrontations as mere police actions is to further exacerbate the
situations, and to justify the positions of those who see physical
occupation as their only recourse left. The deaths and injuries in the
past week need not have occured and there is certainly no need for any
further military response, which so far has been more violent than even the
1990 Oka siege of the Quebec Mohawk.
GUSTAFSEN LAKE in British Columbia represents just one more symbol that
federal and provincial officials are denying the legitimate claims of
Indigenous peoples whose title to the land was never extnguished by treaty.
Attempting to criminalize these voices will only give rise to similar
actions elsewhere. Canada has refused to deal with this situation since
the 1763 Royal Proclamation stated that Native people "should not be
molested or disturbed" where lands have not been ceded or purchased. If
after two centuries the government has failed to uphold its legal
responsibility, it is a charade to argue that the situation can be
militarily resolved in a period of days or weeks. The armed conflict
reportedly started when a group of cowboys threatened a Shuswap spiritual
leader, calling him a "red nigger." The federal RCMP has now escalated it
to include use of the Army's Bison Armored Personnel Carriers and land
mines. This is an unacceptable militarization of a dispute over religious
access to sacred land.
At the IPPERWASH PROVINCIAL PARK in Ontario, the record is even more recent
and clear. The former military base at the southern tip of Lake Huron
(north of Detroit) was taken illegally from Native people during World War
II. Promises to return the land-which has a burial ground-have gone on
too long, and were recently reversed. The Ojibwe and Potawatomi people
from Stoney Point and Kettle Point have occupied the site for a month,
defending themselves only with baseball bats. They have already lost one
leader, 30-year old Dudley George, to Ontario Provincial Police bullets in
his back on September 6, as other defenders were severely beaten. As at
Gustafsen Lake, police have cut access and communications. Hundreds have
marched in grief and protest, and 150 others have broken through police
lines to join the occupiers, who have asked for a Witness presence and
camcorders to monitor the police.
Ipperwash is another symptom that, even within treaty territories, where
the government has failed to understand Native rights even within its own
constitutional framework. Canada owes its very existence to Native
nations that chose to cede their lands to the Crown rather than the
outright genocidal Americans. We fear that the recent crackdown across
Canada is a message to Native nations not to react to Quebec's possible
vote for independence on October 30 by declaring their own autonomy.
THE MIDWEST TREATY NETWORK was formed when Ojibwe treaty rights were
threatened in Wisconsin in 1989. Our Witness for Nonviolence program
brought hundreds of observers from around our region to monitor Ojibwe
spearfishing under assault by anti-treaty groups. We have supported the
Ojibwe, Potawatomi, and other Wisconsin tribes fighting metallic sulfide
mining plans by Ontario-based companies like Noranda and Rio Algom.
Canadian rallies and visitors have actively supported these Native
struggles in Wisconsin; now it is time to return the favor. As a Native
and non-Native alliance, we are committed to observe and report on threats
made to Native peoples, whether by racist thugs at Wisconsin lakes, or by
Canadian paramilitary forces in Ontario. The colonial boundary drawn so
long ago in Washington and London means nothing to the Indigenous peoples
whose homelands straddle both sides of the Great Lakes.
We urge people of conscience to speak out and demand a peaceful and moral
resolution to the Ipperwash and Gustafsen Lake situations, and a proper
hearing for Native land claims. We urge the U.S. media to cover assaults
on Indigenous peoples in our northern NAFTA partner, much as they covered
the repression of the Chiapas uprising in our southern NAFTA partner last
year. We are urging people to fax Prime Minister Jean Chretien at (613)
941-6900 and Minister of Justice Allan Rock at (613) 947-4276. Send copies
to the Canadian Alliance in Solidarity with Native Peoples (CASNP) at (416)
972-6232. Also call the Canadian Embassy at (202) 682-1740.
Midwest Treaty Network, 731 State St., Madison WI 53703 Fax/Tel. (608)
246-2256 or (715) 779-5071; e-mail: mtn@igc.apc.org