Aboriginal Justice

Latest Update

RAPID LAKE, QUEBEC: Government responds to Algonquin demands with police violence

At 5:30 a.m., on 6 October 2008, seventy-five members of the Barrière Lake Algonquin First Nations (BLAFN) along with twenty non-native supporters set up a nonviolent blockade on Hwy 117, approximately 300 km north of Ottawa/Gatineau. The Algonquins were calling on the federal and provincial governments to honour a resource-sharing agreement signed twenty years ago, and to respect their customary governance structures. They dragged logs across the highway, and set up ‘lockboxes’: cement-filled barrels designed to allow individuals to insert their arms so that the authorities cannot easily pull people participating in a public witness away from a site. Three members of Christian Peacemaker Teams were present as human rights observers. [MORE]

ALGONQUIN TERRITORY, ON: Aboriginal land rights, undoing racism and birdfeeders


From 15-23 November 2008, a CPT delegation convened in the Algonquin territory north of Kingston, Ontario.  There, the Algonquin First Nations groups and settlers of European origin are continuing the struggle to protect their territory from uranium mining.  The land that they are fighting for is unceded, and therefore falls under the protection of Royal Proclamation of 1763, which is a basis for current Canadian law.  Furthermore, the Canadian government has a legal obligation to consult First Nations groups before allowing mining exploration.  It has honoured neither of these laws.

CPTnet Stories

Events