UN to discuss Alberta’s Lubicon Cree
February 19 2007
www.630ched.com

GENEVA/630 CHED - A UN Committee has started hearings in Geneva with one of the items on the agenda the Lubicon Cree of Northern Alberta.

The small band, which lives in an oil-rich area east of Peace River, has never signed a treaty with the federal government.

The problem is that oil companies and logging companies have moved in to traditional Lubicon territory. Land the Indians say they haven’t given up title to.

Two UN committees have already declared Canada to be in violation of international agreements — an agreement on civil and political rights …

By Mohammed Mesbahi and Dr Angela Paine
www.stwr.net

In 1948, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human rights. All the world’s nations agreed that every human being in the world had the right to adequate food, water, housing, healthcare, education, political participation and employment. Almost sixty years later, a global economic system based on competition and profit has failed to provide these essentials for the majority of the world. 800 million people are still starving to death in a world of plenty and the gap between the rich minority and the poor majority has increased and continues …

The following was written by Saswat Pattanayak, www.saswat.com, on January 1, 2007

Today marks the beginning of a new era. The demise of United Nations as we ever knew it. With Kofi Annan, the last conscience keeper of the largest global association formally retiring yesterday, the hopes that the UN has some utilities any longer are tarnished.

Far from being skeptical, this is perhaps a desired opinion. After all, do we really need a United Nations that functions as a casino for a few fraud whitejackers—those conmen who own the place and its crooked tables?

The UN has been converted into the …

By Richard Seymour. Rwanda’s Genocide and the Myth of Western Non-Intervention

The officially sanctioned gesture, when reminded of Rwanda, is to shake one’s head and say “Never Again”. What do you mean “Never Again”? The murder hasn’t stopped – it has slowed down and moved to another country. The murder of up to one million people in 100 days stands out and understandably rivets the attention to that horrendous period in April 1994. What is more, we have a confession from the Hutu leader Kambanda, currently being held in Mali, that there was a plan to exterminate the Tutsis, and that …

Prentice has been speaking up quite often - saying alot of pretty fantastic and wonderful things, just like what’s in the following article.

Reality presents something quite different from what he relays though - and in the next few days I’m going to try and write something that reflects this. I’ll add it in a reply on this page. Ahni.

UN rights accord poses problems
The Leader-Post
Friday, December 01, 2006

I would like to respond to the Nov. 28 letter by Joyce

A. Green, entitled “Canada backtracks on indigenous rights”. The fact is that Canada has a strong record of supporting and advancing …

Q&A With Chairperson of the Indigenous Peoples Caucus, Les Mazeler, by Elisa Burchett

2006-11-30 | When a correspondent brought to light, during the noon briefing at the U.N., that some delegations were saying “We will just wait until September”, Gail Bindley-Taylor Sainte, Spokesperson for the President of the 61 session of the General Assembly responded, “Well, I think that’s the cynical view, but I think the hope is, knowing that many people are waiting on this, particularly NGOs and of course indigenous peoples themselves, and I think everybody is aware of the importance people have placed on this [issue] after 24 …

Well none of us should be suprised. Eventhough this declaration is non-binding (like all other UN declarations) it clearly proved to be too much for Nation-States to accept (in good faith.)

Who can blame them? Can you imagine Indigenous Nations having a right to their own territory (in principle)? Can you imagine Nation-States like Canada having to ask Indigenous Nations permission (in theory) to relocate them? Or indigenous histories, languages, customs, and traditions having (the conceptual) right to exist? I know, it’s unthinkable… and so the Nation States, remaining ever true themselves as Masters of their own Universe - agreed to …

First Nations Leadership Council Troubled By Today’s Vote at the United Nations Inaction on Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Inexcusable

BC -– After two decades of discussion and development, the slow pace of approval of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples came to a halt today at the current session of the UN General Assembly in New York. A resolution put forward by the Namibian delegation – in effect, a non-action motion on the Declaration – was supported by a majority with 82 Nation States voting in favour, 67 Nation States …

by: Valerie Taliman / Indian Country Today

NEW YORK - The stage is set for a showdown at the United Nations between countries favoring adoption of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous peoples and a handful of nations - including the United States - that are actively opposing it.

The U.N. General Assembly, comprised of 191 nation states, is expected to adopt the long-awaited declaration within the next two weeks, pending political roadblocks that may delay its passage.

The nations opposing the declaration are the United States, Canada, Australia, Russia and New Zealand - countries with large populations of indigenous …

INDIGENOUS PEOPLES’ CAUCUS,
UNITED NATIONS General Assembly, 61st Session
NEW YORK
13 November 2006

COMMUNIQUE

The Indigenous Peoples’ Caucus held an emergency meeting this morning due to a report that a few States will take procedural actions to derail the adoption of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. This report is evidenced by the Government of Botswana’s statement delivered to the Third Committee on 10 November, which contained a highly inaccurate and prejudicial interpretation of the Declaration provisions. Upon review of this written statement, we note that Botswana has adopted the words and views of the governments of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, …