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Judge: Urban Outfitters Case Can Continue

Source: Indian Country Today Media Network

A couple of the products Urban Outfitters sold using the Navajo name.

A federal judge has ruled that the Navajo Nation’s lawsuit against Urban Outfitters can proceed.

Senior U.S. District Judge LeRoy Hansen filed an order on March 26 stating that the court is still considering allegations by the Navajo Nation against the retailer. However, as a report from the Farmington Daily-Times has noted, the court has dismissed some elements of the lawsuit.

The lawsuit stems from Urban Outfitters’ use of the terms Navajo and Navaho in referring to products not made by the Navajo Nation. Court documents said that “The Navajo Nation alleges in its Amended Complaint that it and its members have been known by the name ‘Navajo’ since at least 1849, have continuously used the NAVAJO trademark in commerce, and have made the NAVAJO name and trademarks famous with numerous products.”

The claims dismissed by the court were those that condemned the merchandise itself as “derogatory, scandalous, and contrary to the Navajo Nation’s principles” and labeled the alternate spelling “Navaho” as “scandalous.” The products that precipitated the lawsuit, which were re-labeled or pulled from stores altogether, included the “Navajo Hipster Panty” and the “Navajo Print Fabric Wrapped Flask.”

The Daily-Times adds that the Navajo Nation has until the end of the week to file a revised amended complaint.

Washington’s Prison Pow Wows Are Good for Inmates and Their Families

By Jack McNeel, Indian Country Today Media Network

There are no tipis, no horse parades, no trailers selling frybread. There’s not even any grass or dirt, but there’s no question that this is a pow wow—an important, meaningful pow wow. The smiles on the faces of the inmates, the laughter, the hugs and kisses, the families mixing freely with the prisoners—all this makes you momentarily forget that you are in a Washington state prison, in a large concrete room, surrounded by iron bars and razor wire.

What made the 2012 pow wow even better than the previous year’s is the kids, who were for the first time allowed to attend. The printed program provided at Airway Heights Corrections Center says: “This ceremony is dedicated to the shorties. We love you.”

In 2010 the state of Washington removed various traditional practices and religious rights from Native inmates because of budget constraints. One of those was access to pow wows. Some of those rights were reinstated in 2011, thanks to the work of tribal leaders and tribal lawyers. Common sense also prevailed, with people recognizing that the rehabilitation of inmates would be enhanced if these religious and cultural practices were permitted.

The Pacific Islanders bring the noise at Coyote Ridge Corrections Center. (Jack McNeel)

A new organization was formed to help Native prisoners receive better opportunities for cultural and religious activities aimed at rehabilitation. It’s called Huy, from a Coast Salish word meaning “See you again / We never say good-bye.” Gabriel S. Galanda, chairman of the board for that group, says, “Our imprisoned relatives are virtually forgotten, even by tribal communities. Huy intends to keep them in our hearts and minds, and to improve their tribal ways of life behind bars.

Minty LongEarth, an enrolled Santee Indian Nation of South Carolina tribal member, is the Native American Religious Services program director with the United Indians of All Tribes Foundation in Seattle. She basically oversees all the prison pow wows throughout the state. “There are 12 Washington prisons and at those 12 there are 20 Native circles,” she said.

An inmate from Montana who is a member of the Gros Ventre Tribe is at Airway Heights Corrections Center. He is grateful that someone had brought the pow wow back to his prison. “It’s a beautiful thing—all of us gathered together,” he says. “It’s a gathering of all our family, loved ones.… We’re one family, one circle. We dance and we sing and we pray and everything comes together.”

His nephew grabs a bite of food as his mother adjusts his regalia. He then joins his uncle in the dance area, moving to the beat of the drum, very much at ease despite the prison’s concrete walls. “It’s sharing,” he says. “Sharing gifts, stories, meeting new people, new tribes, different nations, different people. I take this walk seriously, this red road seriously. I’m a true believer in everything—the sweat lodge, pow wow, anything sacred.

“I had to come to prison, but prison isn’t always a bad thing. There’s good that comes with it—like this. It helps me get through the year. It’s the happiest I’ve been for a while. I can’t thank the Creator enough for this time and opportunity to be with my family and share this moment. I carry this deep within my soul, my heart, my spirit.”

Another inmate, from Fort Peck, Montana, also treasures the pow wows. “You can’t really put into words how much this means to us,” he says. “It’s the one day of the year that we’re able to show our families we’re better than what they saw us out there doing. Today was the first time that I’ve seen so many grown men in here shed a tear—[that happened] when they saw the little shorties out there dancing.” He says he still has a long time left on his sentence, 25 years, but, “this will help me get through the whole next year. Right after today we’ll start planning and looking forward to the next one.”

Joseph Luce, the chaplain at Airway Heights, also praises the monthly opportunities for Native inmates to engage in cultural activities: “Once a week they get to go out to the sweat lodge area. Twice a month they’ll sweat. The weeks they’re not sweating, they’ll go out and do a pipe ceremony outside. Once a week they’ll be drumming. They get together on average a couple times a week. We also offer special classes to work on drum skills and work on beading skills.”

The pow wow at the Coyote Ridge prison has a slightly different feel from the one at Airway Heights. Security seems a little tighter, but the smiles are equally broad and the drums equally busy.

“These kids coming to prison now are getting younger and younger,” says one inmate who has spent many years in prison. “How are we going to change that cycle? Inside prison, through this program, we’re able to bring up the younger kids, the 18-, 19- and 20-year-old kids and change their lives around by giving them a tool, by giving them a skill. Having them interact with United Indians of All Tribes. Just maybe through that collaboration they’ll be able to get some kind of help when they do get out.

“This is the biggest event of the year for the prison,” he says. “Without this event, life would really suck. This is a really happy event. You see all the men with smiles on their face. There’s a lot of unity here. Unfortunately, in the cells, that unity isn’t there. Here we come together as a family, as a fellowship. We can look at each other and think, That‘s my brother, my friend. This is almost like being free.”

Environmentalists signal they’ll sue BNSF over coal dust

The Sierra Club and four other environmental groups Tuesday said they intend to file a federal lawsuit to force BNSF Railway and six coal companies to better contain the coal being shipped in open-topped trains.

By Hal Bernton

In a legal notice sent to the companies, the environmental groups contend that the trains are spewing coal dust and chunks of debris into the Columbia River, the Lake Washington Ship Canal and other Northwest waterways in violation of the federal Clean Water Act.

The legal challenge comes as environmental groups are campaigning against proposals to build new coal-export terminals in Washington and Oregon that would greatly increase the amount of coal trains moving through the Northwest.

“This action today seeks to stop illegal pollution and keep our river free of dirty coal,” said Brett VandenHeuvel, executive director of the Columbia Riverkeeper. “The threat of coal export makes this lawsuit even timelier.”

Puget Soundkeeper Alliance, Friends of the Columbia Gorge and RE Sources for Sustainable Communities also signed on to the intent-to-sue letter.

In a statement released Tuesday, BNSF said that the railroad has ”safely hauled coal in Washington for decades. Yet despite the movement of so much coal over such a long period of time, we were not aware of a single coal dust complaint lodged with a state agency in the Northwest or with the railroad until the recent interest in coal export terminals.”

“This is nothing more than the threat of a nuisance lawsuit without merit, that is part of an ongoing campaign to designed to create headlines to influence the review process for proposed export terminals,” the statement said.

In Washington state, major new export terminals are proposed for Longview and Cherry Point near Bellingham to send Montana and Wyoming coal to Asian markets. Some coal already is being shipped through Washington for export from British Columbia, and some is shipped to coal-fired plant near Centralia.

That legal notice was accompanied by a listing of more than 20 sites in Washington where coal has spilled since the beginning of 2011.

The document also includes photographs that depict coal dust blowing off a train as it passes along the Columbia River near Horsethief Lake. They also show what appear to be nuggets or chunks of coal at other locations, including near the Hiram M. Chittenden Locks in Seattle.

In a teleconference with reporters, several Washington residents spoke about their experiences with coal from the trains. Don McDermott, of Dallesport, Klickitat County, says that coal dust has blown off the trains and settled on his grapevines that grow beside the railroad track in a fish pond.

“My primary concern is that there is trespass on my property,” McDermott said. “The railroads need to contain their loads. The shippers need to contain their loads.”

The legal notice by environmental groups cited industry studies that indicated from 250 to 700 pounds of coal were lost from each rail car during transport.

Courtney Wallace, the BNSF spokeswoman, said that past studies were rough estimates, and indicated the coal losses fluctuated, primarily while the trains were within the Powder River Basin in southeast Montana and northeast Wyoming.

She said the studies were done before 2011, when new regulations to reduce coal dust were put in place.

Wallace says the new coal-loading rules require shippers to take added measures to address coal loss, including putting chemicals known as “topper agents” on the coal that reduce most of the coal-dust loss.

The chemicals also have stirred some concern.

In a Jan. 22 letter to agencies that will prepare the environmental-impact statement for the proposed Cherry Point terminal, the Washington Department of Natural Resources notes that one of these chemicals used in cleaning up the 2010 Gulf Oil spill has “been implicated in subsequent fish and shellfish deformities.”

I-5 lane to be closed Wednesday north of Stanwood

By Bill Sheets, The Hreald

One lane of northbound I-5 north of Stanwood is scheduled to be closed most of the day Wednesday.

Crews plan to inspect roadway panels that could be damaged and need repair or replacement this summer.

The right lane between mileposts 214 and 216 is scheduled to close 7:30 a.m. and reopen at 3 p.m. This is about two miles north of the Highway 532 interchange, near the Washington State Patrol weigh station.

Wal-Mart criticized on its staffing

More complaints have been lodged that the big-box retailer’s shelves at many stores aren’t adequately stocked and lines are long at registers.

By Renee Dudley, Bloomberg News

More than 1,000 emailed complaints signal that Wal-Mart stores’s restocking challenges are more widespread than the world’s largest retailer has said.

Wal-Mart customers from Hawaii to Florida and from Texas to Vermont wrote to express their frustration after Bloomberg News reported March 26 that there aren’t enough workers in the stores to keep shelves stocked, cash registers manned and shoppers’ questions answered. In response to the original article, Wal-Mart spokeswoman Brooke Buchanan said in part, “The premise of this story, which is based on the comments of a handful of people, is inaccurate and not representative of what is happening in our stores across the country.”

The emails began arriving shortly after the article was published and were still coming a week later. Most were from previously loyal Wal-Mart customers befuddled by what had happened to service at a company they’d once admired for its low prices and wide assortment. Many said they were paying more and driving farther to avoid the local Wal-Mart. Some had developed shopping strategies, including waiting until the last minute to grab ice cream, lest it melt in the lengthy checkout lines.

Wal-Mart founder “Sam Walton must be rolling over in his grave to see what has become of his business,” said Tony Martin, 54, a forklift driver who once frequented a store in Glen Carbon, Ill.

Wal-Mart’s restocking challenges stem from a thinly spread labor force struggling to keep up with all the work that needs to be done, said Colin McGranahan, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. in New York. The Bentonville, Ark.-based retailer’s work force at its namesake and Sam’s Club warehouse chains in the U.S. fell by about 120,000 employees between 2008 and Jan. 31, according to a securities filing on March 26. The company now has about 1.3 million U.S. workers. In the same period, it has added about 455 U.S. Wal-Mart stores, bringing its total to 4,005.

McGranahan said he has talked to workers who say they’re being asked to do more than they can accomplish in a shift.

“Stuff gets backed up, and they’re forced to respond as best they can,” said McGranahan, who rates Wal-Mart market perform, the equivalent of a hold. “The result is an increasing amount of customer-encountered out-of-stocks.”

Those items are missing at a crucial time for Wal-Mart, when the U.S. economy already is restraining its shoppers’ spending. Same-store sales for Wal-Mart’s U.S. locations in the 13 weeks ending April 26 will be little changed, Bill Simon, chief executive officer of Wal-Mart U.S., said on a Feb. 21 earnings call.

Wal-Mart said the customers complaining to Bloomberg aren’t a sufficient sample size and don’t represent shoppers’ impressions of its stores nationwide. The company surveys more than 500,000 customers a month, asking them about checkout lines, store cleanliness and the helpfulness of workers, Buchanan said Monday in emailed statement.

“These customers continue to tell us they have had a positive shopping experience and those numbers have trended upward over the past two years,” she said. “Our in-stock shelf availability is at historically high levels and averages between 90 and 95 percent. We will continue to work hard for our customers and meet their expectations by offering them everyday low prices on the broadest assortment of merchandise.”

Wal-Mart U.S. had sales of about $274.5 billion in the year ended Jan. 31, more than the total sales of Target and Costco Wholesale combined in their comparable periods. Wal-Mart says two-thirds of Americans shop at Wal-Mart each month. The company also had 6.6 billion visits to its U.S. stores in the last year, up 23 million from a year earlier, Buchanan said.

Still, investors have lost some enthusiasm for Wal-Mart. It closed at a 0.2 percent discount to Target on a price-to- earnings basis Monday, compared with an average 7.3 percent premium during the past year. Wal-Mart on March 20 traded at a 3.2 percent discount to its smaller rival, the lowest in more than a year.

Martin, the forklift driver, said Wal-Mart’s low prices don’t matter because it’s no longer a one-stop shopping destination.

“As much as I need to take advantage of the low prices that Wal-Mart has to offer, the money I would save” is spent on gas to drive to other stores to buy the items that were missing at Wal-Mart, he said. “So it is easier to just shop elsewhere.”

Bob Shank Jr., 68, of Tucson, Ariz., said there are two Wal-Mart stores in his area. At the older one, there are “different items left on shelves where they don’t belong, items on the floor not replaced, empty shelves.” The new store has “bare shelves” and “few employees visible, especially at the check-out counters.”

Shank tried several times to buy his favorite rum and eventually asked whether the brand had been discontinued. He got the same response at both stores: ” ‘No’, they said, ‘we just haven’t had time to re-stock.’ ”

Mike Grimes, 61, said he and his wife expect to wait at the Wal-Mart supercenter in Sikeston, Mo.

“We wait until we’re about to put items on the conveyer belt, then one of us will run back and get the ice cream,” said Grimes, who operates a furniture and appliance store. “Otherwise it will melt. We know we’ll be standing in line 20 minutes or more.”

Barry Hastings, 65, said he rarely completes his shopping list at the Wal-Mart in Fredericksburg, Va.

“They run out of Simply Lemonade. No stock on Dr Pepper seven-ounce cans. No ground pork, no onions, no green beans, and the list goes on and on,” said Hastings, who photographs the empty shelves and shows them to store managers as proof of the problem.

Rosemary Alvino-Ditmore, 63, of Sierra Vista, Ariz., a self-employed writer who shops at Wal-Mart at least twice a month, keeps a running list of items she’s been unable to find over the past year: oatmeal, nutrition bars, Suave shampoo, clothing patches, distilled water, drapes, sweatpants, knee-highs and more.

“Why have this huge Wal-Mart if you always have pegs empty or empty shelves?” she said.

Offensive? Jeremy Scott And Adidas Debut “Native American” Tracksuits

Source: Fast Co Design, www.fastcodesign.com

The Kansas-born designer is back with a new collection of Adidas collaboration threads, including several that reappropriate Native American iconography.

Controversy is Jeremy Scott’s thing; you may remember Co.Design’s coverage of his Adidas shackle sneakers, which braced wearer’s ankles with chains. “In retrospect,” wrote Mark Wilson, “they weren’t such a fantastic idea.” Last month, Scott unveiled his 2013 Adidas Originals collection, and while it’s not all easy punchlines about race and ethnicity, many critics are up in arms about several garments that borrow from Pacific Northwest Native American traditions.

Scott’s thing is parroting genres and subgenres–which usually results in some pretty awesome hybrid garments. Take a peek at the lookbook and see how many distinct cultural sects you can count. I got to five, at least. Scott gives nods to late ’70s British skinheads, ’80s urban streetwear, and ’90s raver culture, to name just a few.

The 2013 collection stumbles into some problematic territory when it comes to a series of tracksuits, shoes, and dresses decorated with cartoon renderings of Pacific Northwest Native American carvings–what some bloggers are calling “totem pole print.” Totems originated as a way for some First Nation groups along the Pacific coast to honor their ancestors, describe legends, and sometimes, memorialize the dead. Scott’s simplified the symbology and tacked them onto dresses, tracksuits, and sneakers.

Curious what those in the Native community would think, I reached out to Jessica Metcalfe, a Turtle Mountain Chippewa who is a professor of Native American art, fashion, and design. As it turns out, she’d already seen the designs and written a post about them. “Misappropriations like this one are bad, unethical, and in some cases illegal,” she told me. “Bizarre, garish, unpleasant and disgusting were several terms used to describe this outfit by people in the Native American community. Several individuals noticed that his inspiration was unoriginal, and that his take on Northwest Coast formline was ignorant, disrespectful and badly construed (in other words, Scott needs to work on his ovoids and u-forms).”

More than that, Metcalfe explains, they devalue the meaning and quality of the original source material. “When companies like Forever 21, Urban Outfitters, or Adidas put out tacky images like this, they perpetuate the idea that Native American people have no sense of ownership or artistic legacy when it comes to our art, and anyone can steal it, tack their name on it, and make a buck–all the while putting forward the idea that our art is ugly and cheap,” she says.

After mulling over these images for a bit, I wondered if there’s a “right” way to do this. Metcalfe thinks so–after all, she’s built a business mindfully promoting Native designers through her blog and online shop, Beyond Buckskin. For the prolific and often very funny Scott, it seems like a missed opportunity: Why not make this a joint effort with the First Nation artists? I’m willing to bet that the fruits of that collaboration would’ve been super interesting. Instead, we get a cartoon version of a tradition that goes back hundreds of years. Even divorced from its historical underpinnings, it’s just sort of. . .lazy.

Whether you agree with critics or not, it seems that Adidas wants to keep these from American eyes–these pieces won’t be available in the United States. Check out the full collection and judge for yourself here.

Yakamas urge feds to consider horse slaughter

By Shannon Dininny, The Associated Press

YAKIMA — A Northwest Indian tribe urged federal officials to explain their position against slaughtering horses in the United States, calling it “absurd” to prohibit the practice.

The question of equine slaughter has been a hot-button issue in the West, where horses hold an iconic role as loyal companions. Animal welfare groups have expressed outrage at the idea of resuming domestic slaughter, which Congress effectively banned in 2006 by cutting funding for federal inspection programs. Others, including some animal welfare groups, contend the ban has resulted in increased horse abuse and abandonment and booming wild horse populations on state, federal and tribal lands.

No group is perhaps more affected by the matter than the Yakama Nation, a Washington tribe with an estimated 12,000 wild horses roaming across its sprawling reservation in the arid, south-central part of the state, Yakama Nation Chairman Harry Smiskin said in a March 29 letter to President Barack Obama and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.

“We don’t understand why it is OK to slaughter many animals in this country — certainly the White House and the USDA have meat on their cafeteria menus every day — but for some reason horses are considered sacrosanct,” Smiskin wrote. “We should not manage these horses based on purely emotional arguments, story books or movies we all saw as children.”

Smiskin argued the market for horse meat in other parts of the world, as well as the United States before World War II, could create jobs, humanely reduce overpopulated herds and feeds others, adding “it is absurd to prohibit it.”

Smiskin declined to talk about the letter in a telephone interview Monday.

Congress lifted the slaughter ban in a spending bill the president signed into law in November. Now the USDA is preparing to inspect a southern New Mexico meat company that has been fighting for more than a year for approval to convert its former cattle slaughter operation into a horse slaughterhouse.

Valley Meat Co. sued the USDA last year to resume the inspections, and the agency said last month it had no choice legally but to move forward with the application, as well as several others. However, the Obama administration threw a new twist into the more than yearlong debate with a statement urging Congress to reinstate the ban.

Several Northwest tribes have joined together in support of opening a horse slaughterhouse in the region to address booming wild horse populations on their reservations. The Yakama and Colville tribes in Washington, the Umatilla and Warm Springs tribes in Oregon, and Shoshone Bannock in Idaho say the horses destroy medicinal plants and damage habitat for other species.

———

Associated Press writer Jeri Clausing contributed to this story from Albuquerque, N.M.

Standing tall for the fallen

A retired Marine’s journey aims to raise awareness for those wounded in war

Mark Mulligan / The HeraldChuck Lewis, a Marine Corps veteran living in Ronan, Mont., walks eastbound down U.S. 2morning toward Gold Bar on Monday, the second day of a 3,300 mile, 6-month journey across the U.S. — Mark Mulligan / The Herald
Chuck Lewis, a Marine Corps veteran living in Ronan, Mont., walks eastbound down U.S. 2morning toward Gold Bar on Monday, the second day of a 3,300 mile, 6-month journey across the U.S.

By Gale Fiege, The Herald

STARTUP — Retired Marine Corps Sgt. Chuck Lewis is walking for the fallen.

U.S. soldiers, sailors and Marines killed in war or those who returned with physical and mental disabilities are the focus of his cross-country campaign.

Lewis is committed to walk 3,300 miles from Everett to Washington, D.C., during the next six months to raise money and awareness for programs that help military veterans.

Lewis, 62, from Ronan, Mont., began his patriotic journey Easter morning at Legion Park in Everett where Bill Quistorf, an Army veteran who lives near the park, shook his hand. Lewis said goodbye to his wife and daughters and started walking down Marine View Drive to Hewitt Avenue headed to U.S. 2.

He won’t see his wife again until he reaches Kalispell, Mont. They’ll have another reunion in Dubuque, Iowa, and she plans to meet him in late September when he finishes at the Vietnam Memorial in the nation’s capital. Hoping to walk 25 miles a day, Lewis plans to reach Chicago, dip down to North Carolina and then up to Washington, D.C.

Lewis, a Vietnam veteran and retired electrical engineer, is pushing a flag-decorated cart loaded with a tent, a sleeping bag, clothes for any weather condition, a second pair of shoes and a solar panel to power his iPhone, which is interfaced with a SPOT global positioning system that allows his supporters to track his progress online.

He spent Sunday night at the Sultan Firehouse, where firefighters Steve Tonkin, Michelle Fox and Andrew Lowry decided to take Lewis out for supper.

“He’s got a long way to go, so we wanted to give him a good start,” said Tonkin, 47. “Chuck’s a good guy. I’m a veteran, too, so what he’s doing hits home in several ways.”

Though he was prepared for chilly rain, Lewis donned a pair of athletic shorts and a T-shirt Monday morning to continue his spring walk along U.S. 2 in the Skykomish River valley.

In Startup, Lewis wondered aloud if this was the community where he would begin to see some elevation gain.

“Is this where I start going up? I see the mountains ahead,” Lewis joked. “I already have a blister, but I’ve run 100-mile races and I’m prepared.”

While taking a break, Lewis told a story about two Marine Corps veterans who returned to Ronan last year from combat duty in Afghanistan. One came home missing his legs. The other killed himself three weeks later.

“In the military, these guys have a purpose and people who have their backs. When they get home, everybody is busy, so they have nobody to talk to. The economy is poor and they can’t find a job,” Lewis said. “I probably can’t help too many of these guys personally, but I can raise awareness and money for the programs that can.”

Lewis waves to the drivers who honk their horns. Occasionally people stop him to ask about his journey.

The side of his cart is decorated with a thermometer graphic that shows how much Lewis has raised for veterans. His goal is $50,000, but he has a second thermometer ready to go should people donate more.

Lewis invites people to walk with him through their towns. If anyone asks, he is able to give a presentation about his trip. He also welcomes help with places to sleep, shower and wash clothes.

To offer such help to Lewis and donate to the cause, go to www.walkingforthefallen.com.

Human Traffickers Target Aboriginal Girls, Women

Source: Native News Network

THUNDER BAY, ONTARIO – The reality of the sex trade in Canada, which involves for the most part victimized young girls hidden in underground sex trade and human trafficking networks, was a topic of discussion during two separate events held in Thunder Bay this March.

Diane Redsky

Diane Redsky, Shoal Lake First Nation, says the majority of
human trafficking involves Canadian women, including Aboriginal
women and girls as young as 10.

Bridget Perrier, co-founder of the anti-prostitution group Sex Trade 101, and Diane Redsky, a project director with the Canadian Women’s Foundation, were part of the two dialogues.

On March 6, Perrier sat on a panel that was put on by the Gender Issues Centre at Lakehead University. Perrier told the audience of 40 or so people that she entered the sex trade as a child and exited as woman.

“I still sleep with the lights on,”

Perrier said, who has been out of the world of prostitution for 10 years.

“I still suffer from the effects of the trauma, of prostitution.”

The panel itself consisted of four women, including Perrier. Three of the four had been involved in prostitution, and had started at a young age.

Redsky’s presentation, which took place March 18 at the Ontario Native Woman’s Association, ONWA, Thunder Bay site, went into detail on how prostitution was not a choice when it came to human trafficking.

Redsky, of Shoal Lake First Nation, works with the Canadian Women’s Foundation on the National Task Force on Human Trafficking of Women and Girls in Canada.

Though the presentation was open to the general public as well as frontline workers and social workers, there was a small turn out of people at the event. Perrier noted as well at the sex trade panel the lack of social workers, law enforcement, media, and frontline workers present in the audience.

“They should be here learning, hearing firsthand about the women and girls they work with,”

Perrier said.

“Human trafficking is not the same as human smuggling,”

Redsky said.

“With smuggling, one pays a fee to enter Canada and they are free to go, with trafficking once they get here they are not free to go.”

Redsky also dispelled the myth that human trafficking only happens with people who are coming into Canada, which she said does happen but that the majority of human trafficking cases involve Canadian citizens themselves. “The trafficking started and occurs in Canada.”

“There is an overrepresentation of Aboriginal women and girls being trafficked in Canada.”

Redsky said. She stated that Aboriginal women and girls are targeted for their vulnerabilities and that they experience more violence than any other cultural group.

“As of September 2012, 72 human traffickers have been convicted in direct and related cases, 69 pending cases, 164 victims, most of the victims are Aboriginal women and girls,”

she added.

“And who are the victims?”

Redsky asked.

“The majority are marginalized women and girls who were sexually exploited at a young age, some as young as 10 years old, homeless youth, kids in the child welfare system, with a demand for young and younger girls.”

“For one young woman or girl, a trafficker will have a financial gain of $300,000 a year,”

Redsky said.

“Many traffickers will have multiple girls, two to five young women. The younger the girls are, the more financial gain.”

Redsky said that the amount of financial gain that the trafficking of young girls bring is something that the traffickers want to protect, which is why there is a deep underground network of traffickers across Canada.

“If you think it, human trafficking, is not happening in Thunder Bay, then you are wrong,”

Perrier said.

“What do you think of when you hear the words juvenile prostitution?”

Redsky asked.

“Someone older who chooses the lifestyle? Now how about when I say child abuse? Someone younger, and someone is hurting them. We should never call it juvenile prostitution. Those two words should have never been put together.”

Redsky said that in Ontario, child protection legislation does not protect all kids. “One has to be under the age of 15 to be considered a child in need of protection. This creates a vulnerability for young people because there is no safety net for them.”

“With younger girls, there is a bigger financial gain,”

Redsky said.

“Sometimes they are as young as 10, with the average age being 13. Eighteen to 19 years old is less valuable, and those in their early twenties are almost of no value to the traffickers. The demand for them is not the same. That’s who you will often see in the survival sex industry.”

“Nobody sees the bigger picture,”

Redsky said.

“We need to build an understanding of what she has gone through.”

photo credit Stephanie Wesley

Indigenous Peoples Call for Inclusion in Global Mercury Treaty

Source: Native News Network

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Representatives from the Global Indigenous Peoples Caucus have convened in Geneva, Switzerland to make the final push for the inclusion of Indigenous Peoples in the United Nations global mercury treaty.

The final, weeklong negotiating session initiated on Sunday, January 13.

The Caucus is a collaboration of Indigenous representatives from the Inuit Circumpolar Council, Island Sustainability Alliance Cook Islands Inc., International Indian Treaty Council, and the California Indian Environmental Alliance.

Methylmercury is a neurotoxin found in fish and other marine animals. Fish are one of the main sources of protein, and also serve social, cultural and spiritual purposes in many Indigenous communities. Indigenous Peoples disproportionately suffer the adverse effects of mercury contamination, yet they are not specifically mentioned in the current draft of the mercury treaty text.

“I am honored to have the opportunity to advocate on behalf of Indigenous Peoples in Geneva and look forward to engaging in meaningful dialogue with the country delegates about our priorities,”

said Jacqueline Keliiaa, Vice President of the Board of Directors for the California Indian Environmental Alliance.

“Our communities back home are continually affected by mercury exposure left over from the California gold rush. We deserve a strong treaty that is inclusive of our distinctive status as Indigenous Peoples.”

New studies show that even low-level exposure to mercury contamination over long periods of time may considerably impair health. Indigenous Peoples must be included in the text to ensure that the treaty provides appropriate protections so we can practice our cultures and life-ways without the threat of mercury in our lands, waters, foods or in the bodies of our children.

“The International Indian Treaty Council calls upon all UN agencies and UN member States to implement and follow up on the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as the internationally accepted minimum standard adopted by the UN General Assembly and now endorsed by all States including the US and Canada.”

“The Declaration recognizes Indigenous Peoples as “Peoples” and not “populations”, and affirms a number of inherent rights that are directly impacted by mercury contamination including rights to health, subsistence, culture and the rights affirmed in Nation to Nation Treaties,”

said Andrea Carmen, Executive Director of the International Indian Treaty Council.

The National Congress of American Indians, the oldest and largest American Indian and Alaska Native organization in the United States has also joined the effort for Indigenous inclusion.

On January 10, the National Congress of American Indians adopted a resolution calling for the United States government to propose treaty text recognizing the impacts of mercury on Indigenous Peoples.

“We are honored and pleased that the National Congress of American Indians recognizes the severe impacts that mercury has had on Native Peoples, our homelands, and our sources of sustenance,”

said Tia Oros Peters, Executive Director of the Seventh Generation Fund, a key supporter of the resolution.

The mercury treaty is amongst the first multilateral environmental treaties to be negotiated since the adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of indigenous Peoples in 2007. This is a unique opportunity for the international community and the United Nations system to abide by the standards set out in the UN Declaration, including the recognition of Indigenous Peoples as “Peoples” and not “populations”, as well as the implementation of rights related to environment, health, culture, foods, amongst many others.