Native Women’s Association of Canada calls for a National Inquiry on Missing and Murdered Aboriginal women and girls
Press Release – For Immediate Release
Native Women’s Association of Canada calls for a National Inquiry on Missing and Murdered Aboriginal women and girls
Vancouver, BC (28 July 2011) – Jeannette Corbiere Lavell, President of the Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC) is calling for a National Inquiry on Missing and Murdered Aboriginal women and girls.
“The Government of British Columbia has shut us out of the British Columbia Missing Women Commission of Inquiry,” President Corbiere Lavell said, “and now we have no confidence that it will be able to produce a fair and balanced report. The decision of the BC government to restrict funding for counsel primarily to police and government agencies demonstrates how flawed and one sided this process has become.”
Funding for counsel outside the justice system has been restricted to one lawyer representing a fraction of the families affected by the tragedies of Vancouver’s DTES. The thirteen groups granted standing at the Inquiry by Commissioner Oppal have been denied funding to participate by the BC government.
President Corbiere Lavell said, “The Commissioner made it very clear that he considered our participation throughout the hearing process to be vital to a fair and full examination of the issues. I am deeply disappointed that we are unable to bring forward the voices and concerns of Aboriginal women and girls to this Inquiry as we had planned.”
NWAC was initially concerned about the limited scope of the BC Commission of Inquiry, but chose to participate to bring forward the knowledge and expertise developed through the Sisters In Spirit initiative. NWAC is now calling for a National Inquiry to focus on the issue of missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls across Canada. President Corbiere Lavell indicated that NWAC is interested in finding ways to work closely with the federal government to develop the scope and organization of such an inquiry, and to ensure that NWAC’s expertise and knowledge is brought forward to assist in it’s deliberations.
NWAC will now seek the support of all Canadian governments, and all Canadians, for a National Inquiry that can effectively examine violence against Aboriginal women and girls, and do so with the full participation of Aboriginal women.
For further information, contact:
Claudette Dumont-Smith, Executive Director
613-722-3033
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BACKGROUNDER: NWAC calls for a National Inquiry
on Missing and Murdered Aboriginal women and girls.
The British Columbia Missing Women Commission of Inquiry is the first and only independent inquiry in the country into disappearances and deaths of Aboriginal, poor, and marginalized women.
The Native Women’s Association of Canada was the only Aboriginal organization granted full standing at the Inquiry.
NWAC represents an extremely impoverished and marginalized segment of the population, and takes very seriously its obligation to improving the living conditions, health and wellness, and safety of Aboriginal women and girls.
The disappearances and murders of Aboriginal women and girls are a country-wide tragedy and governments, individually and collectively, have legal and moral obligations to prevent this violence.
NWAC has documented over 600 cases of missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls across Canada. New cases continue to be identified each month.
At the July meeting of the Council of the Federation, the Premiers expressed concern about violence against Aboriginal women, and support for a new National Aboriginal Women’s Summit (NAWS III) in 2012. However, just days later, on July 22, 2011, the Government of British Columbia confirmed that it would not implement the recommendations of Commissioner Oppal for funding to NWAC and other groups, whose participation he deemed necessary to make the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry fair and effective.
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