The Canadian environmental activist Severn Cullis-Suzuki gained international fame at age 12, when she addressed the Eart Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. More than 20 years on, she is still committed to the cause of sustainability. “It’s great to have a story that inspires people.”
Shell wants to increase oil production from the Canadian tar sands by expanding its Jackpine Mine. The company says it can do so responsibly. But opponents resist the high pace of tar sands development, demanding stronger safeguards for health and the environment in northern Alberta.
Indigenous children in Canada were traumatized and abused for many decades at residential schools meant to assimilate them into white society. A national Truth and Reconciliation Commission is traveling the country to hear testimonies about the former policy, which has been suppressed for years.
Canadian rock singer Neil Young has joined the opposition to oil sands expansion in Alberta. With his ‘Honour the Treaties’ tour, Young has drawn attention to criticism of the industry. His strong rhetoric has come under fire from supporters of the oil sands.
For the first time in history, a member of the indigenous population of North America has been canonized by the Catholic church. Kateri Tekakwitha was a young Mohawk woman who lived over 300 years ago. Her admirers attribute special powers to her.
Some members of Canada’s First Nations are proud to be involved in the Olympic Winter Games. Others say the Games don’t help Native Canadians advance in society. The indigenous ‘Disney show’ presented in Vancouver is at odds with years of neglect, according to critics.
Aboriginal people in remote parts of Canada often live in squalid conditions that you would expect to see in developing countries. In Wasagamack, a First Nation reserve in Manitoba, hardly anyone has running water. The H1N1 virus poses a threat.
The Canadian government offered its ‘sincere apologies’ yesterday for Canada’s past policy of sending indigenous children to Indian residential schools. Victims of the racist system express relief. “I thought it was normal, that I had to do this to become a human being.”
The Inuit of northern Canada experience the effects of global warming on a daily basis. Environmental activist Sheila Watt-Cloutier, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee along with former U.S. vice-president Al Gore, warns climate change poses a threat to the cultural survival of her people. “We are the early warning for the rest of the world.”
One of the most noticeable effects of global warming is the large-scale melt of sea ice in the Arctic. Simon Nattaq, an Inuit hunter, experienced the effects of climate change in a tragic way. The ice is no longer the same, he says in Nunavut’s capital Iqaluit.
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