And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Billions at stake as largest treaty
reopened
WebPosted Tue Jun 22 11:13:22 1999
http://newsworld.cbc.ca/cgi-bin/go.pl?1999/06/22/treaty990622
GROUARD FIRST NATION, ALTA. - One hundred years
after Ottawa signed its largest land deal with First Nations, Ottawa has
agreed to take a second look at the controversial treaty.
INDEPTH:Aboriginal Canadians
Treaty 8, which involves some 500 bands in northwestern Canada, has become
the focus of a bitter fight between Indian bands and the federal government
over billions in natural resources. The government hopes to change that
with an agreement to head back to the bargaining table.
Monday in Northern Alberta, at an event to commemorate the anniversary, the
Treaty 8 chiefs and Indian Affairs Minister Jane Stewart signed a letter
agreeing to head back to the bargaining table.
"I've never been a real fan of deciding things in courts because in the end
you have to negotiate and I think the message here today is that we're
better sitting here as partners understanding one another and recognizing
one another," Stewart said.
In recent years, Treaty 8 First Nations have launched at least a dozen
lawsuits, claiming billions in lost revenue from the land's minerals,
timber and oil and gas. The chiefs say their great grandfathers never gave
up those resources when they signed the treaty.
"Many of the promises have been broken," said Eddie Talman, grand chief of
Treaty 8. "Much of our treaty has been eroded. Why must we beg for what is
rightfully ours."
Ottawa's goal is much the same as it was during the first treaty
negotiations -- to avoid a war over land. This time, that war just happens
to be taking place in the courts.
It's not clear, however, how Monday's agreement differs from an earlier
agreement, signed between Talman and Stewart last October. That deal was a
commitment to "examine Treaty 8 in partnership," according to the
minister's press release.
IN DEPTH: Martin O'Malley CBC NEWS ONLINE
http://newsworld.cbc.ca/news/indepth/aboriginals/ On Nov 30, 1998, Chief
Joseph Gosnell led his Nisga'a people to the doors of the British Columbia
legislature in Victoria. The Nisga'a delegation from the Nass River Valley
in northwestern British Columbia brought with them a canoe, which they
placed on the steps of the legislature. "The canoe symbolizes a cargo of
hope," one of the Nisga'a explained.
LINKS AND VIDEO
The last time they made the trek, in 1887, barricades blocked their way to
"The Big House" and they were unable to sign the treaty they had been
promised. The Nisga'a returned home empty-handed, after paddling 750
kilometres up the wild coast to the remote Nass River Valley.
The return trip in 1998 was far more than symbolic. This time, Premier Glen
Clark escorted the the Nisga'a into the Big House where Chief Gosnell had
been invited to make a speech, an honour reserved for visiting heads of state.
The Nisga'a are expected to get their treaty, though it requires approval
of both the British Columbia legislature and the House of Commons. The
treaty gives the 6,000 Nisga'a title to 2,000 square kilometres of the
lower Nass Valley, limited self-government, extensive fishing and logging
rights, and $340 million.
It is the first treaty negotiated by the B.C. government in more than a
century, a momentous event in the history of aboriginal Canadians. And
there's more to come: 50 other aboriginal groups are waiting to negotiate
other treaties with the B.C. government. Paul Tennant, professor of
political science at the University of British Columbia, says the Nisga'a
treaty marks a social shift in the province. "It means a new view of what
it means to be a British Columbian," he said. "It really marks the death of
the old white tribe."
Hardly a year goes by without a major event linked to Aboriginal Canadians.
There was the dangerous standoff between police and Mohawks at Oka near
Montreal, then the threat of a breakaway partition by the Crees of northern
Quebec if separatists take the province out of Canada, then aboriginal
Canadians in Labrador blocking development of Inco's massive nickel find at
Voisey's Bay. And back in time, the plains rebellion led by Metis leader
Louis Riel.
And back, back in time
If you fly beyond Old Crow Flats in northern Yukon you can see the remains
of old logs that form massive, man-made structures once used to catch
caribou. Aboriginal Canadians call them "the caribou corrals."
The corrals were designed to capture migrating caribou. The log walls of
the corral were higher than the caribou. The animals entered at a place
where the corrals were about five kilometres wide. The corrals gradually
narrowed until the caribou were trapped, providing a convenient bin of live
meat, enough to feed dozens of families over the long Yukon winter.
Finding the caribou corrals excited archeologists, anthropologists and
paleontologists. They discovered that some of the logs used for the corral
walls had been fashioned by stone axes, which suggested the corrals might
have been used in prehistoric times. By carbon-dating fossil bones by the
corrals, scientists determined they were 30,000 years old, which proved to
be a rare instance of direct evidence of human activity in the Western
Hemisphere..........
Reprinted under the fair use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.
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Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit)
Unenh onhwa' Awayaton
http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/
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