Oct 23/95: Gustafsen Lake-Genocide = business as usual

CANADA ACCELERATES INDIGENOUS TERMINATION AGENDA

Settlers In Support of Indigenous Sovereignty (S.I.S.I.S.)
SISIS@envirolink.org
Monday, October 23, 1995

CALL FOR IMMEDIATE INTERVENTION

In less than two weeks the people of the province of Quebec will vote on whether to remain in the Canadian federation or opt for a new sovereign state. A study done by the University of Ottawa and the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington suggests that this will lead to Canada being dismantled. "The resulting economic chaos could lead the United States to force its own solution" it adds (Globe and Mail, October 10, 1995 - The United States would gain clout, the study says).

Meanwhile the unextinguished original title holders - the Mohawks, Crees and other colonized indigenous nations - continue to be systematically suppressed. In a recently released 500 page study Sovereign Injustice, the James Bay Cree write "there appear to be significant indications that the use of force and acts of violence are likely to be a by product of a unilateral declaration of independence by Quebec." Quebec's ruling Parti Quebecois native claims negotiator David Cliche has warned of native separation movements across North and South America. ("Cree Chief Says No" - Globe and Mail, Oct. 13, 1995)

In Canada's westernmost province of British Columbia the largest and costliest RCMP operation in Canadian history ruthlessly suppressed the Defenders of the Shuswap Nation's stand for sovereignty and jurisdiction on sacred unceded Sundance Grounds at Gustafsen Lake. They are now being fed into the sausage machine of a tyrannical colonial court system that is demonstrably guilty of genocide in usurping jurisdiction over unceded Indian lands.

On Wednesday, October 18, 1995, Judge Nicholas Friesen issued a Canada- wide warrant for the arrest of Dr. Bruce Clark on charges of contempt of court and resisting arrest. Dr. Clark, an international and constitutional law expert acting as counsel for the beleaguered Defenders, has along with his clients been subjected to a vicious demonization campaign by the Canadian establishment for his impregnable legal challenge to the colonial status quo. The resulting persecution masquerading as prosecution has forced him and his family to flee to Europe. Meanwhile his clients are facing the full wrath of the notoriously corrupt B.C. Courts without benefit of the only counsel able, ready and willing to present the statutes and precedents confirming Indigenous Sovereignty over unceded territory.

The NDP B.C. government is reeling from a developing scandal involving the Nanaimo Commonwealth Holding Society. The Society, run by members of the New Democratic Party, was supposed to be a non-profit group that raised money for charity but "a commercial crime investigation last year found the organization had actually been ripping off charities by skimming bingo money that was supposed to go to groups for the mentally handicapped, boys' and girls' clubs and cultural groups. A forensic audit has revealed the NDP worked with the society in diverting charity money for political purposes" (Vancouver Sun, Oct. 18, 1995).

This is the cynical, corrupt and duplicitous group who announced Wednesday, Oct. 18, 1995 its bogus and fraudulent B.C. Treaty Commission will transfer about 5 billion in cash and 5 billion in land to puppet Indian Act bands over 20 years. This extinguishment and termination device would reduce sovereign nations to municipal style governments dependent upon co-management agreements with the monster resource extractors which dominate the province.

The province's Indian elite, The First Nations Summit, met recently and reported increasing unrest in their communities. The government sponsored chiefs termed traditionalists opposition to their collaborationist agenda as 'extremists'. "The parallel I would like to draw is what is taking place in the Middle East", said chief Joe Mathias a spokesman for the B.C. First Nations Summit. "You have extremists trying to destroy the peace process" (Victoria Times Colonist, Sept. 23, 1995). Some chiefs expressed concern about the level of discontent on their reserves. And they admitted they didn't know how to deal with questions raised by the Gustafsen Lake rebels and others about the legitimacy of elected chiefs. Some aboriginal people are beginning to challenge elected chiefs saying only leaders chosen by custom are legitimate. "We are left with the legacy of Gustafsen Lake" said Shuswap Chief (tribal council) Nathan Mathews. "There are serious challenges about who are the legitimate representative of first nations people." (Vancouver Sun, Oct. 5, 1995).

The silver haired traditionalist grandfather who acted as spokesperson and war-chief during the recent siege, Wolverine, (also known as William Ignace) had his $10,000 bail revoked after political statements and pressure from B.C. politicians including B.C. Attorney General Ujjal Dosanjh who rejected a widespread international call for independent international adjudication of the colonialist criminal suppression of indigenous rights. "There shall be no alien intervention in the affairs of the state in this country and this province." (Vancouver Sun, Sept. 15, 1995). International outrage from ex-U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark to European parliamentarians and traditional sovereigntist activists across the Americas have condemned the excesses of Canada's anti-Indian program.

The Shuswap traditionalists, their counsel and their non-native allies criminalized with them are desperately in need of your support and solidarity. The largest repository of unceded territory in North America is at risk. The traditional hereditary leadership is calling for a great outpouring of indigenous and popular resistance to halt the onslaught against them and their threatened home lands.

IN SOLIDARITY AND RESISTANCE AND
HONOUR: Healing our nations united in resistance.


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