Free Republic

Colleen Cardinal often wondered why her parents turned bright red in the sun but she grew dark along with her sisters. The puzzle was solved when she was a young teen, and the woman she had thought of as her mother disclosed that she had been picked out of a catalog of native children available for adoption. Cardinal was one of thousands of indigenous children taken from their birth families from the 1960s to mid-1980s and sent to live with white families, who officials at the time insisted could give them better care. Many lost touch with their original culture...

A dozen Mi'kmaq communities filed a notice of application with the Nova Scotia Supreme Court on Friday alleging that Canada has not met its obligation to accommodate fishing treaty rights. Membertou Chief Terry Paul says a 1999 Supreme Court of Canada decision found that Mi'kmaq have the right to harvest and sell fish to sustain a moderate livelihood for their families. In that case, Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq Donald Marshall launched a legal challenge after being charged in 1993 with fishing eels out of season, fishing without a license and trying to sell illegally caught eels. The Supreme Court decision cited...

CN halts rail operations, embargoes all traffic in Toronto-Montreal corridor, following illegal blockade of rail line MONTREAL, QUEBEC--(MARKET WIRE)--Jun 29, 2007 -- CN today halted freight operations and embargoed all traffic on its Toronto-Montreal main line after reportedly armed native protesters erected an illegal blockade on the company's tracks near the eastern Ontario town of Marysville, located approximately 10 miles east of Belleville, Ont. CN obtained an injunction barring illegal occupation of the rail corridor when First Nations protesters blocked the line in April of this year. The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) refused to enforce the order issued by...

Bad water, bad leadership Once again Canadians have been left slack-jawed over the living conditions on a Native reserve. This time around the fuss is over a community called Kashechawan on the shores of James Bay. From the safety and comfort of our own homes we stare in disbelief at the newspaper pictures and television images of a community where even the most basic necessities of life can't be taken for granted. Kashechawan, where the water that flows from the taps is so filthy and contaminated it's not fit for bathing, let alone drinking. Where residents, many of whom are...

The Maori Party is already driving a larger and considerably more dangerous wedge into the New Zealand Left than anything so far inserted by the National Party. As it grows in strength and consolidates its already powerful grip on the Maori imagination, the Maori Party has the potential to split Labour into two hostile camps, aggravate racial sensitivities within the trade union movement, and push the Greens below the all-important 5% MMP threshold. The Left's vulnerability to the Maori Party is entirely of its own making. From the early-1980s, the critical "sites of struggle" for most progressive political activists shifted...

Delivered at the ACT New Zealand 10th Annual Conference Christchurch 6 March 2004 Don Brash has put the cat firmly in the middle of the political pigeons. How should ACT respond? Firstly by acknowledging that Brash was right in what he said. We have to ask ourselves why this one speech overshadowed 7 years of similar statements by ACT; why it reduced Peters from being a threat to National to being a non-entity. Answer - voters believed Brash meant what he said. That comes from having a consistent message which leads to credibility and ultimately confidence. Richard, in difficult circumstances,...

Native leader defends HitlerOrder of Canada member: Calls Jews 'disease' and says Nazis were right to 'fry' themLes Perreaux National Post, with files from Southam News Monday, December 16, 2002CREDIT: Bill Keay, The Vancouver Sun Native leader David Ahenakew has been accused of racism after remarks he made on Friday. The Canadian Jewish Congress is calling on members of the Order of Canada to mobilize against a fellow member, a First Nations leader who said Jewish people are a disease and Hitler was right when he ''fried'' six million Jews.David Ahenakew, the former chief of the Assembly of First Nations...

'We have to end the dependency': Native woman seeks to create Salish Free Trade Zone in B.C. National Post Saturday, May 4, 2002 Page: B3 Section: Review Byline: Elizabeth Nickson Source: National Post One often has the impression that in Indian country, all of Canada's aboriginals speak with a single voice, and that voice is saying, "Gimmee more." Provincial and federal transfer payments, slated for various development programs and welfare, amount to approximately $10-billion a year, spread over a population of about one million natives. But most natives say they never see any of that money. Whites, or non-natives, are...