Author Archives: Red Power Media, Staff

2000-year-old artifact redefining age of tattooing in western North America

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2,000 year old tattoo needle made of cactus spines discovered in Utah

Archaeologists have discovered the oldest Native tattooing artifact in western North America.

The artifact came from the very important Basket-maker II culture and is estimated to be 2000-years-old.

The tattoo tool made by the Ancestral Pueblo people, consists of a 3 ½ inch wooden skunkbush sumac handle bound at the end with split yucca leaves and holding two parallel cactus spines, stained with dark pigment at their tips.

A chemical analysis of the pigment on the tips found a residue of carbon which is often used in ancient tattooing ink.

Tattooing instrument recovered from site in the Bears Ears region. (WSU)

The artifact is about the size of a pen.

It had been sitting in storage for more than 40 years.

According to online sources, Andrew Gillreath-Brown, an anthropology Ph.D. candidate, was cataloging artifacts that were recovered from an archaeological site in the south of Utah in the Bears Ears region. These items had been unearthed in 1972 and deposited in Washington State University but not properly examined.

He is the lead author of a paper on the tattoo tool which was published in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports.

This is a close up of cactus spine tattoo tool discovered by WSU archaeologist Andrew Gillreath-Brown. Credit: Bob Hubner/WSU

The find is important because they are the “oldest tattoo artifacts in western North America” reports KEPR.tv.com.

Carbon dating shows it’s from between AD 79 and 130.

Before this tool was discovered, the oldest tattooing needle found in western North America was an artifact from Aztec Ruins in New Mexico that dates to between 1100 and 1280 A.D.

Whereas most modern tattoos are drawn with motorized machines that puncture the skin between 50 and 3,000 times per minute, the Utah relic uses more of a stick-and-poke technique.

“You would’ve held it like you would have a pen and done a series of hand poking,” Gillreath-Brown said.

When European colonialists and missionaries invaded indigenous lands in North American and beyond, they often forbade the practice of tattooing among native peoples. In many places around the world, traditional tattooing all but died out.

Researchers asked tribal elders if their ancestors had practiced tattooing. Many, including from the Zuni, Acoma and Laguna Pueblos, said yes.

Tattooing had a cultural significance and was embraced by indigenous people. However, little is known about when or why the practice began.

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Train Derailment near St-Lazare, Spilled One Million Litres of Crude Oil

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The Canadian National train with 110 petroleum crude oil cars derailed when an emergency brake was applied, rupturing 16 cars.

37 tanker cars carrying crude oil derailed near St-Lazare

Investigators say at least one million litres of crude oil was spilled when a train derailed last month in western Manitoba.

According to Global News, the Transportation Safety Board (TSB) says the spill was mostly contained in a low-lying area next to the track, and it’s too early to comment on the environmental impact.

On Feb. 16, 110 tanker cars loaded with petroleum crude oil, was travelling east at about 49 mph when it experienced a train-initiated emergency brake application.

37 cars derailed at 3:30 a.m. by the Manitoba-Saskatchewan border near St. Lazare.

The TSB says 16 of the cars sustained breaches.

The agency says the investigation is ongoing and some track components and wheel sets are being examined for failure analysis.

CN said the leak did not penetrate the Assiniboine River.

There were no reports of injuries or fires.

CN resumed operations on the mainline the following day of the derailment.

The aftermath of an oil spill in St. Lazare, Man., captured by a drone.

The wreck happened on the same day as a pro-pipeline rally just 50 km away in Moosomin, Sask.

Supporters of pipelines argue that shipping oil by pipeline is safer than by rail.

47 people died in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, on July 6th 2013, when an unattended 74-car freight train carrying crude oil derailed in the downtown setting off a massive explosion and fire.

By RPM, Staff, Updated March 2, 2019.

United We Roll convoy meets counter-protesters as it leaves Winnipeg

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Protesters wave flags and shout at passing trucks as the United We Roll protest leaves Winnipeg early on Friday evening. (Walther Bernal/CBC)

Protest truck convoy passes through Manitoba en route to Ottawa

A convoy of at least 70 trucks protesting Ottawa’s oil and gas policies passed through Manitoba on Friday on its way to Parliament Hill, hoping to pick up steam among local drivers.

“We want the current government to realize that they have a huge disconnect with a lot of issues, and the biggest is our oil and gas industry needs to get back in order — and our farmers,” said organizer Glen Carritt Friday morning.

“Everybody’s hurting because the carbon tax is way too much.”

Carritt was driving one of roughly 170 trucks that left Red Deer, Alta., early Thursday morning with a destination of Ottawa as part of the United We Roll protest.

A convoy of trucks left Red Deer on Thursday, bound for Ottawa to demand the federal government do more to help the oil and gas industry in Western Canada. (Tiphanie Roquette/Radio Canada)

He said drivers want to show their opposition to the federal carbon tax and Bill C-69, federal legislation that would change the way energy projects are reviewed, as well as other policies they say are hurting the economy.

On Friday morning, Carritt said the convoy had slimmed down to a core group of about 70 trucks. He was hoping to pick up at least 30 more in Manitoba and Ontario on the way to Parliament Hill for a final rally.

Some of the participants are supporters of the yellow vest protest movement, Carritt said. But he has said the racist and radical views espoused by some yellow vest supporters aren’t part of his protest.

Cleared Deacon’s Corner after 6 p.m.

“We just want our voices heard,” he said. “There’s an election coming up and we want people to realize how important the oil and gas industry is for the rest of Canada.”

The convoy was slowed down briefly early Friday evening as it left Winnipeg, when protesters gathered at Deacon’s Corner to express their opposition to the movement.

“We’re against the message they’re bringing,” said Harrison Friesen, one of about 10 people who stood at the side of the highway, waving flags and shouting at the trucks as they passed.

“For us, we’re against pipelines, we’re Indigenous land defenders. I’m from northern Alberta — I have concerns about what happens with the tar sands, what happens with the community.”

Protesters wait for the convoy to pass Deacon’s Corner on its way out of Winnipeg early Friday evening. (Walther Bernal/CBC)

The RCMP closed down one lane of Highway 1 eastbound just after 5:30 p.m. to give protesters a place to safely stand, warning them not to interfere with traffic in the other lane. Although this slowed the convoy’s progress, the line of vehicles had all cleared the intersection shortly after 6 p.m.

“These people that are out on the road here … they’ don’t like the fact that we’ve got a convoy that wants to promote the pipeline and promote oil,” said United We Roll supporter Les Michaelson, who drove ahead to scout any potential problems the vehicles might encounter.

“We want to put people back to work and doing otherwise is actually going backwards.”

Carritt described the convoy as a grassroots movement of drivers who want to stand up for Canada.

The protest has received support from an online GoFundMe fundraiser, he said, which he’s hoping will continue to take a bite out of the fuel cost of the journey.

For the big-rig trucks, that could be as high as $6,000, Carritt said.

Whether it’s drivers on the road or protesters at Parliament, Carritt said he hopes to see more people out supporting his cause.

“Everybody is welcome as long as they’re peaceful.”

Originally posted by CBC News · Posted: Feb 15, 2019

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European Contact Killed So Many Indigenous Americans It Changed The Climate, Says Study

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Columbus’ first set foot in the Americas in 1492.  

More than 50 million indigenous people perished after Columbus’s arrival

Prior to Christopher Columbus’s arrival in the Americas in 1492, the area boasted thriving indigenous populations totalling to more than 60 million people.

A little over a century later, that number had dropped close to 6 million.

European contact brought with it not only war and famine, but also diseases like smallpox that decimated local populations.

Now, a new study published in the journal Quarternary Science Reviews argues that those deaths occurred on such a large scale that they led to a “Little Ice Age”: an era of global cooling between the 16th and mid-19th century.

Researchers from University College London found that, after the rapid population decline, large swaths of vegetation and farmland were abandoned.

The trees and flora that repopulated that unmanaged farmland started absorbing more carbon dioxide and keeping it locked in the soil, removing so much greenhouse gas from the atmosphere that the planet’s average temperature dropped by 0.15 degrees Celsius.

Typically, experts look to the Industrial Revolution as the genesis of human-driven climate impacts. But this study shows that effects may have began some 250 years earlier.

“Humans altered the climate already before the burning of fossil fuels had started,” the study’s lead author, Alexander Koch, told Business Insider. “Fossil fuel burning then turned up the dial.”

More than 50 million indigenous people perished by 1600

Experts have long struggled to quantify the extent of the slaughter of indigenous American peoples in North, Central, and South America. That’s mostly because no census data or records of population size exist to help pinpoint how many people were living in these areas prior to 1492.

To approximate population numbers, researchers often rely on a combination of European eyewitness accounts and records of “encomienda” tribute payments set up during colonial rule.

But neither metric is accurate – the former tends to overestimate population sizes, since early colonizers wanted to advertise riches of newly discovered lands to European financial backers.

The latter reflects a payment system that was put in place after many disease epidemics had already run their course, the authors of the new study noted.

So the new study offers a different method: the researchers divided up North and South America into 119 regions and combed through all published estimates of pre-Columbian populations in each one.

In doing so, authors calculated that about 60.5 million people lived in the Americas prior to European contact.

Once Koch and his colleagues collated the before-and-after numbers, the conclusion was stark. Between 1492 and 1600, 90 percent of the indigenous populations in the Americas had died.

That means about 55 million people perished because of violence and never-before-seen pathogens like smallpox, measles, and influenza.

According to these new calculations, the death toll represented about 10 percent of the entire Earth’s population at the time. It’s more people than the modern-day populations of New York City, London, Paris, Tokyo, and Beijing combined.

The disappearance of so many people meant less farming

Using these population numbers and estimates about how much land people used per capita, the study authors calculated that indigenous populations farmed roughly 62 million hectares (239,000 square miles) of land prior to European contact.

That number, too, dropped by roughly 90 percent, to only 6 million hectares (23,000 square miles) by 1600.

Over time, trees and vegetation took over that previously farmed land and started absorbing more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Carbon dioxide traps heat in the planet’s atmosphere (it’s what human activity now emits on an unprecedented scale), but plants and trees absorb that gas as part of photosynthesis.

So when the previously farmed land in North and South America – equal to an area almost the size of France – was reforested by trees and flora, atmospheric carbon-dioxide levels dropped.

Antarctic ice cores dating back to the late 1500s and 1600s confirm that decrease in carbon dioxide.

That CO2 drop was enough to lower global temperatures by 0.15 degrees Celsius and contribute to the enigmatic global cooling trend called the “Little Ice Age,” during which glaciers expanded.

Lingering doubts

“The researchers are likely overstating their case,” Joerg Schaefer from the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, told Live Science.

“I am absolutely sure this paper does not explain the cause of the carbon dioxide change and the temperature change during that time.”

Koch said that some of the drop in carbon dioxide could have been caused by other, natural factors like volcanic eruptions or changes in solar activity.

But he and his colleagues concluded that the death of 55 million indigenous Americans explained about 50 percent of the overall reduction in atmospheric carbon dioxide.

“So you need both natural and human forces to explain the drop,” he said.

Koch said the findings revise our understanding of how long human activity has been influencing Earth’s climate.

“Human actions at that time caused a drop in atmospheric CO₂ that cooled the planet long before human civilization was concerned with the idea of climate change,” he and his co-authors wrote.

But they warned that if a similar reforestation event were to happen today, it wouldn’t do much to mitigate the Earth’s current rate of warming.

The drop in atmospheric carbon dioxide that happened in the 1600s only represents about three years’ worth of fossil fuel emissions today, Koch said.

“There’s no way around reducing fossil fuel emissions,” he said, adding that reforestation and forest restoration remain crucial, too.

This article was originally published by Business Insider.

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B.C. Starts New Reconciliation Process With Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs

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Drummers play as Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chief Namoks (John Ridsdale), front left, enters the room as Indigenous nations and supporters gather to show support for the Wet’suwet’en Nation before marching together in solidarity, in Smithers, B.C., January 16, 2019. THE CANADIAN PRESS

British Columbia says it’s starting a new reconciliation process with the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs, who are at the centre of opposition to a natural gas pipeline in northern B.C.

The province says in a release Thursday that the government and the Office of the Wet’suwet’en are undertaking a process focused on Wet’suwet’en title, rights, laws and traditional governance throughout their territory.

The release says B.C. has appointed Victoria MP and lawyer Murray Rankin as its representative to help guide and design the process, adding that Rankin has an understanding of the Supreme Court’s historic Delgamuukw decision that helped define Indigenous title.

It says the province and the Wet’suwet’en are committed to explore a path forward together that seeks to build trust over time and meaningfully advance reconciliation.

The Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs oppose Coastal GasLink’s plans to build a pipeline from northeastern B.C. to LNG Canada’s export terminal in Kitimat, and RCMP arrested 14 people at a blockade last month before reaching a deal with the chiefs.

The province says its commitment to lasting reconciliation is not connected to any specific project, and the new process will build on discussions that have been ongoing since Premier John Horgan and Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation Minister Scott Fraser visited the territory in August.

“We all recognize that the path forward will involve challenges. It will take a willingness to innovate and take bold steps together,” the province says.

“This engagement is a historic opportunity to advance Wet’suwet’en self-determination and self-governance, and for the province and Wet’suwet’en Nation to establish a deeper relationship based on respect and recognition of rights.”

[SOURCE]

Wet’suwet’en complaints about pipeline builder to be probed by government, police

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RCMP officers join hereditary chiefs and supporters as they walk towards Unist’ot’en camp near Houston, B.C., on Wednesday, January 9, 2019. THE CANADIAN PRESS

Wet’suwet’en say traplines and tents destroyed, archeological impact assessment not yet done

The British Columbia government says it will inspect the site of a planned natural gas pipeline southwest of Houston following allegations that the company building the project is violating its permits.

Members of the Wet’suwet’en Nation and supporters have alleged that Coastal GasLink is engaging in construction activity without an archeological impact assessment and also destroyed traplines and tents unnecessarily.

The Ministry of Energy, Mines, and Petroleum Resources says in a statement that joint site inspection will be conducted by the province’s Environmental Assessment Office and the B.C. Oil and Gas Commission next week.

“We anticipate that it will take some time subsequently to determine whether any non-compliances are evident and, if so, the appropriate enforcement action,” the ministry said.

The RCMP also said it has received complaints from both the Office of the Wet’suwet’en and Coastal GasLink regarding traplines and the removal of personal property items.

“We are following up on all complaints and continue to facilitate ongoing and direct dialogue between all parties regarding various issues,” the RCMP said.

Gidimt’en say 3 tents bulldozed

Trans Canada-owned Coastal GasLink is working to build a natural gas pipeline from northeastern British Columbia to LNG’s export facility on the coast as part of a $40-billion project.

Members of the Gidimt’en clan of the Wet’suwet’en Nation issued a statement Monday saying the company “wilfully, illegally, and violently destroyed” its property this weekend, while the company said its actions have been permitted and lawful.

Jen Wickham, a member of the Gidimt’en clan, said Coastal GasLink bulldozed three tents constructed with timber and canvas in an area along a logging road not included in the company’s plans.

“CGL workers just tore down all our stuff, threw them in [shipping containers] and said we had until the end of the day to pick them up or they would be thrown in the dump,” she said.

The tents were constructed when members erected a barrier at the same location, where RCMP enforced a court injunction on Jan. 7 and arrested 14 people in a move that sparked protests across Canada and internationally.

Wickham said Wet’suwet’en members told RCMP they wanted the tents to remain to host cultural workshops.

Following the enforcement of the court injunction, a road was plowed around the tents allowing free movement of vehicles.

President of Coastal GasLink pipeline Rick Gateman leaves the Office of the Wet’suwet’en after meeting with RCMP members and hereditary chiefs in Smithers, B.C., on Jan. 10. (Chad Hipolito/Canadian Press)

Coastal GasLink said in a statement that all work it’s doing is “approved and permitted and in full compliance” with its environmental assessment certificate issued by the province and the company has met all required pre-construction conditions.

“These areas are active work zones that are lawful and permitted. Any obstruction impeding our crews from safely accessing these work zones is in contravention of a court order,” Coastal GasLink said.

Traplines in dispute

On Friday, Coastal GasLink said it stopped work in an area closer to its planned work site because traplines had been placed inside construction boundaries and people were entering the site, raising safety concerns.

Jason Slade, a supporter with the nearby Unist’ot’en camp run by Wet’suwet’en members, said Monday that work only halted temporarily and the traplines had been destroyed. He said excavation had begun at the site of a planned “man camp.”

The Unist’ot’en allege the actions violate the Wildlife Act by interfering with lawful trapping, as well as an agreement that the Wet’suwet’en hereditary clan chiefs had reached with RCMP allowing the company access to the area and ensuring traditional practices like trapping could continue.

The clan also alleges it is violating its permits with the B.C. Oil and Gas Commission and Environmental Assessment Office by beginning construction work before an archeological impact assessment has been complete.

In a letter to the commission on Friday, Chief Knedebeas of the Unist’ot’en Clan points to an affidavit filed by a company official in November as part of its court injunction application, saying the assessment is scheduled for May.

Knedebeas asks in the letter that a stop-work order be issued immediately while the allegations are investigated.

The Canadian Press · Posted: Jan 29, 2019

[SOURCE]

 

Coastal GasLink stops work on pipeline over trapline dispute in northern B.C.

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RCMP officers look on as contractors pass through their roadblock as supporters of the Unist’ot’en camp and Wet’suwet’en First Nation gather at a camp fire off a logging road near Houston, B.C., on Jan. 9. (THE CANADIAN PRESS)

A company building a pipeline has stopped work on the project in northwestern British Columbia where 14 people were arrested earlier this month.

Coastal GasLink says in a notice posted on its website on Thursday that it stopped work in an area south of Houston because traps had been placed inside construction boundaries and people were entering the site, raising safety concerns.

The company says it was working with the RCMP to address the issue.

Earlier this week, the Unist’ot’en Clan of the Wet’suwet’en Nation alleged on social media that pipeline contractors had driven a bulldozer through the heart of one of their traplines south of Houston, which they say violates the Wildlife Act by interfering with lawful trapping.

The company says its work in the area has been fully approved and permitted, and it reminded the public that unauthorized access to an active construction site where heavy equipment is being used can be dangerous.

The pipeline will run through Wet’suwet’en territory to LNG Canada’s $40-billion export facility in Kitimat.

Opponents say Coastal GasLink has no authority to build without consent from Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs.

The company says it has signed agreements with the elected councils of all 20 First Nations along the route, including some Wet’suwet’en elected council members

Those council members say they are independent from the hereditary chiefs’ authority and inked deals to bring better education, elder care and services to their members.

Hereditary chiefs say they have authority over 22,000 square kilometres of Wet’suwet’en traditional territory while elected band members administer the reserves.

Carolyn Bennett, the minister of Crown-Indigenous relations, says the dispute is an example of how the Indian Act, which imposed the band council system on First Nations, is still creating confusion and conflict over Indigenous governance.

The Canadian Press

[SOURCE]

Gasoline pipeline explosion in Mexico kills 66 people, leaves dozens injured

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A gasoline pipeline explosion in Tlahuelilpan, Mexico, has killed at least 66 people and left dozens injured.

Officials say people had been filling up containers from an illegal pipeline tap when fire broke out on Friday evening.

According to news reports, video footage showed dozens of people in an almost festive atmosphere gathered in a field where the pipeline had been breached by fuel thieves. Footage then showed flames shooting high into the air against a night sky and the pipeline ablaze. Screaming people ran from the explosion, some themselves burning and waving their arms.

Dozens of burned bodies lay in a charred field on Saturday where the blast occurred in what is one of the worst incidents to hit Mexico’s troubled oil infrastructure in years. Relatives of the deceased and onlookers gathered around the scene. Plastic jugs and jerry cans that the victims had carried to collect spilling fuel were scattered among the carnage.

The fire resulting from the explosion has been extinguished, Mexican Secretary of Public Security Alfonso Durazo said on Twitter, and rescue teams have begun to recover bodies.

Gov. Omar Fayad said at least 76 people were injured. More than 85 other people were listed as missing.

The pipeline is owned by Mexican oil company PEMEX.

Some social media users responded to the explosion with anger, arguing the fuel thieves only had themselves to blame.

Rising international fuel prices have made the crime increasingly attractive.

The government is attempting to prevent fuel theft but some argue the strategy has led to fuel shortages.

The explosion occurred amid gas stations in several states and the country’s capital running dry for nearly two weeks.

Tlahuelilpan, about 62 miles north of Mexico City.

Indigenous leaders to gather in support

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Photo: UBCIC

Hereditary chiefs opposed to a natural gas pipeline in Wet’suwet’en territory in northern B.C. are holding a gathering of solidarity on Wednesday that is expected to attract Indigenous leaders from across the province.

Chief Judy Wilson, secretary treasurer of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs, said she was planning to attend the meeting and other members of the group had already flown to Smithers.

“I’m heading up there to support the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs and the people, the clans, in their fight to protect their land,” Wilson said.

She said the difficulty that the hereditary chiefs have had in getting their authority recognized by industry and government is familiar.

Elected band councils are based on a colonial model of governance, she said. Under the tradition of her Secwepemc First Nation in the B.C. Interior, title belongs to all of the people within the nation.

“Collectively, people hold title for our nation,” she said.

Coastal GasLink says it has signed agreements with all 20 elected First Nations bands along the pipeline route to LNG Canada’s $40-billion export facility in Kitimat, B.C.

But the project has come until scrutiny because five hereditary clan chiefs within the Wet’suwet’en say the project has no authority without their consent.

While elected band councils are administrators of their reserves, the hereditary chiefs say they are in charge of the 22,000 square kilometres comprising Wet’suwet’en traditional territory, including land the pipeline would run through.

Members of the First Nation and supporters were arrested last week at a checkpoint erected to block the company from accessing a road it needs to do pre-construction work on the project, sparking protests Canada-wide.

On Thursday, the hereditary chiefs reached at deal with RCMP, agreeing that members would abide by a temporary court injunction by allowing the company and its contractors access across a bridge further down the road, so long as another anti-pipeline camp is allowed to remain intact.

Hereditary Chief Na’Moks told reporters that the chiefs reached the agreement to ensure the safety of those remaining at the Unist’ot’en camp, but remain “adamantly opposed” to the project.

The interim court injunction will be in place until the defendants, including residents and supporters of the Unist’ot’en camp, file a response in court Jan. 31.

A Facebook page for the Wet’suwet’en Access Point on Gidumt’en territory posted an alert on Sunday calling for rolling actions across the country.

It referred to the 1997 Delgamuuk’w case, fought by the Wet’suwet’en and the Gitsxan First Nations, in which the Supreme Court of Canada recognized that Aboriginal title constituted an ancestral right protected by the constitution.

“As the Unist’ot’en camp says, ‘This fight is far from over. We paved the way with the Delgamuuk’w court case and the time has come for Delgamuuk’w II,’ ” the statement says.

The ruling in the Delgamuuk’w case had an impact on other court decisions, affecting Aboriginal rights and title, including the court’s recognition of the Tsilhqot’in nation’s aboriginal title lands.

The Canadian Press

[SOURCE]

Indigenous convoy slows Ontario highway traffic in solidarity with B.C. pipeline protest

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The eight-car convoy left from the Mohawk Nation at Akwesasne early Friday morning, with hopes of reaching the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory near Belleville, Ont. (Stephanie Brown/CBC)

‘We’re standing strong with our brothers and sisters out west,’ said one participant.

A convoy of vehicles slowed traffic on a stretch of Canada’s busiest highway Friday morning in Ontario in a show of solidarity with an anti-pipeline protest in British Columbia.

Eight westbound vehicles rolled down Highway 401 near Cornwall, Ont., at about 50 km/h during the early rush hour. Provincial police cruisers formed a buffer around the convoy and surrounding traffic.

The vehicles are carrying people from the Mohawk Nation at Akwesasne, about 86 kilometres southeast of Ottawa, and the Kahnawake Mohawk Territory, just south of Montreal.

Brandon Bigtree, who was driving one of the vehicles, said the demonstration was to show support for protesters at the Unist’ot’en camp — the site of a fortified checkpoint preventing people set to work on the Coastal GasLink pipeline project from accessing the Wet’suwet’en territory in northern B.C.

Wet’suwet’en and police have agreed to allow the company access to do pre-construction work as specified in an interim injunction order for the time being, following arrests on Monday.

“We’re standing strong with our brothers and sisters out west. What’s going on out there isn’t right,” Bigtree said.

He said Indigenous communities across the country feel the federal government and provinces are failing them.

“We just need to let [the federal government] know that we’re all united.”

Those in the convoy from the Mohawk Nation at Akwesasne are also trying to raise awareness about local governance issues. Some in the community are frustrated with how the elected band council has handled  negotiations over a 130-year-old land grievance along the banks of the St. Lawrence River. They are advocating for the nation’s hereditary leadership to play a larger role in the process.

The convoy hopes to make it to ​the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory near Belleville, Ont., today.

CBC News · Posted: Jan 11, 2019

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