Rail service between Ottawa and Toronto and Toronto and Montreal is expected to gradually return to normal on Saturday following a blockade near Napanee. Via Rail says the interruption affected a few thousand passengers and forced four trains to stop in Belleville or Kingston, while three other trains were precluded from operating. Some delays were to be expected for passengers travelling on Saturday, but Via said it doesn’t anticipate any significant delays to its operations on Sunday as a result of Saturday’s events.
The First Nations-led movement Idle No More emerged in Canada in December 2012 to protest legislation that threatened both the rights of First Nations and environmental protections. The movement has since spread into the U.S. and beyond--and has become one of the central voices in the struggle for Indigenous and ecological justice. Alex Wilson is one of many organizers of Idle No More, based in the Opaskwayak Cree Nation. She talked to Ragina Johnson and Brian Ward about the state of the movement.
Between an increase in mining exploration work and development of a potential liquefied natural gas export industry, British Columbia’s First Nations are heavily engaged in consultations over resource projects in the province. It puts the First Nations Energy and Mining Council, an aboriginal-created advisory body, in an important position at a critical time for aboriginal communities, both in terms of managing the impact of resource projects and realizing benefits. “We need (the council),” said Ed John, Grand Chief of the B.C.
In the latest in a series of announcements escalating resistance to oil and gas development in North America, the Oglala Sioux nation and its allies have committed to stopping the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline on their territory if Obama approves the project.
Unist’ot’en Camp has recently learned that the construction phase of the proposed Pacific Trails Pipeline has started from the East and also from the West. They intend to have the pipeline finished to the Eastern and Western borders of our unceded lands with us as the last obstacle. The entire illegitimate BC governmental system as well as the Harper regime plan on using mainstream media and their powers within to come down hard on the Wet’suwet’en for our refusal to allow them to bully their way into our lands.
Existing in an almost tranquil atmosphere compared with the uproar surrounding plans to build crude bitumen pipelines to the Pacific Coast, British Columbia’s LNG sector may be in for a jolt. A small aboriginal community, with only 800 residents, is locking horns with the British Columbia government and the industry over the use of water for hydraulic fracturing.
With the announcement of the National Energy Board’s ruling in favour of Enbridge’s Northern pipeline, and the fall of yet another government environmental safeguard, the organizers of the anti-pipeline blockade camp in Northern BC are more committed than ever to holding their ground. Along with partner Forest Action Network (FAN), they’ve put out a call for more volunteers, and FAN director Zoe Blunt says they’ve received a flood of applications in the past week from people eager to travel to the camp and help out.
First Nations in northeastern B.C. repeated a familiar story to the Site C Joint Review Panel on Tuesday, saying they are being backed into a corner, and warning that they are ready to set up blockades if the hydroelectric dam is approved. Public hearings in aboriginal communities over B.C. Hydro's $7.9-billion proposal concluded in Halfway River First Nation, where band members and elders said they're united "shoulder to shoulder" to stop the flooding of the Peace River valley.
