Canada: China seeks probe into Indigenous children’s remains
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
China and its allies called on Tuesday for an independent investigation into the discovery last month of the remains of more than 200 Indigenous children at a Canadian boarding school.
The remains of 215 children, some as young as three years old, were found in British Colombia at the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School, a discovery Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as heartbreaking.
“We call for a thorough and impartial investigation into all cases where crimes were committed against the Indigenous people, especially children, so as to bring those responsible to justice, and offer full remedy to victims,” Jiang Duan, a senior official at China’s mission to the UN in Geneva, told the Human Rights Council.
He read the statement out on behalf of countries including Russia, Belarus, Iran, North Korea, Syria and Venezuela. Canada later delivered a joint statement on behalf of more than 40 countries calling for access to China’s Xinjiang region to look into alleged mass detention of Uighur Muslims.
Canada’s residential school system, which forcibly separated Indigenous children from their families, constituted “cultural genocide”, a six-year investigation into the now-defunct system found in 2015.
Leslie Norton, Canada’s ambassador, told the council that what happened at the Kamloops school was “neither an exception nor an isolated incident” and that Indigenous children had suffered severe injustices and mistreatment over decades.
“As Prime Minister Trudeau recently stated, we also acknowledge that Indigenous people still face systemic racism, discrimination and injustices,” she said, adding that it was addressing issues and supporting communities.
The discovery of the children’s remains in Canada’s westernmost province reopened persistent wounds for First Nations , Métis and Inuit, especially residential school survivors and their families.
Canada formally apologised for its residential school system in 2008, and as part of a class-action settlement with survivors, more than $2.68bn ($3.23bn Canadian) in compensation has been paid to more than 26,700 claimants, according to a report issued earlier this year.
Trudeau, who campaigned on a promise to relaunch Ottawa’s relationship with Indigenous people, said earlier this month that the mass grave found at Kamloops residential school was “a painful reminder of that dark and shameful chapter of our country’s history”
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A case of the wrong guys asking the right questions ... Canada will shrug this off and see it as for what it is, being good at our job of being a member of 5-Eyes.
5 eyes?? Here we call it 4 eyes and a blink... NZ is dragging the chain..
lol
'...a discovery Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as heartbreaking.'
'...we also acknowledge that Indigenous people still face systemic racism, discrimination and injustices...'
'...a painful reminder of that dark and shameful chapter of our country’s history.'
These statements are repeated every few years. There will be a protest, an investigation, a committee. Media plays it up. Nothing changes. One might wonder why ...
Wrong guys asking the right questions, yes that is obvious it remains to be seen what the Canadian government will do to address the situation with the First Nations people.
Alas, as it has always done, one insufficient sluggish step at a time. There are still in Canada large swathes of people who see Natives as drunken whiners.
Not that there shouldn't be further investigations with the Canadian boarding schools, but what these countries, especially China, are trying to do is say look there and not here, considering the Uighur Muslims.
This was coming, remember that Putin claimed Canada was No.2 behind the US when it came to Cyber shenanigans. On a lighter side, Australia thinks it is the better of the 5.
What China, Russia and NK are saying is ''people in glass houses should throw rocks''...If they really wanted to go all-in they could have a field day with the US and Canada and their century-old racist towards its indigenous people and anyone not white.
Simple as that.
Sure. You are just as oppressed as an Uigher.
Sorry for the antifa spell check but what's a "Uigher"? /S
Uighur , Chinese (Pinyin) Weiwu’er , also spelled Uygur or Uyghur , a Turkic-speaking people of interior Asia. Uighurs live for the most part in northwestern China , in the Uygur Autonomous Region of Xinjiang ; a small number live in the Central Asian republics. There were some 10,000,000 Uighurs in China and at least a combined total of 300,000 in Uzbekistan , Kazakhstan , and Kyrgyzstan in the early 21st century.
They've been in the news. I'm surprised you haven't heard anything.
I know who they are, I met a bunch of them in Dublin 1999.
First I have heard of it..we are no better or no worse than anyone else...what makes you think otherwise??
You are quite right, Shona1, Everyone has their dirty laundry, so I doubt that ANY nation can come to the table with clean hands. When I started to teach Australian law, I was quite surprised to see that the indigenous Australians did not have the same riights as the colonists and their present descendants.
Of course the purpose for the USA to cast stones at China is so obvious - it is to hinder China's rise so that it does not overtake the USA as the world's number one nation.
Evening Buzz. Must have been many moons ago you taught that.
Things have changed a lot for the Koori people and things have come along way since those days...and yes we still have away to go.
I for one am very proud of the Kooris and they have my greatest respect.
Yeah, I'm sure there must have been some changes as I've not taught Australian Law for the past 9 years.
Another ignorant comment, well done Sean.
My comment is to be taken in a historical context but I know that's probably too much for simple minds, so carry on.
It was just a joke. I just finished watching both seasons of Secret City on Netflix ... fabulous show!
No worries..never heard of Secret City...glad you enjoyed it..