Iroquois Nationals kept out of World Championships for a sport their ancestors invented

BASICS Issue #22 (Sep/Oct 2010)

by J.D. Benjamin

The 23-member Iroquois Nationals team was forced to miss out on playing the Lacrosse World Championships in Manchester last month after British, American, and Canadian officials refused to recognize the sovereign right of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy to issue their own passports.

The Haudenosaunee Confederacy, also known as the Six Nations or Iroquois, includes the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca and Tuscarora nations and has territory on both sides of the U.S.-Canada border.

The Haudenosaunee first issued their own passport in the 1920s for one of their members to attend a League of Nations conference in Geneva. In 1977, the Confederacy reached an agreement with the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and other countries to accept the passports as valid travel documents. Since then, delegations and individual members of the Haudenosaunee have traveled to various countries in Europe, Latin America, and Asia using the passports.

BASICS Issue #22 (Sep/Oct 2010)

by Steve da Silva

Less than three weeks after the Canadian government staged the G20 Summit, where world leaders pledged to half their deficits by 2013, Defence Minister Peter MacKay announced the largest single military purchase in Canadian history.

On July 16, 2010, MacKay announced that the military would purchase 65 F35 Joint Strike Fighters from Lockheed Martin, amounting to $9 billion for the purchase and another $7 billion over 20 years for maintenance and repairs.

While most working-class Canadians may be wondering why the government would spend record amounts on the military in the “era of austerity”, while cuts are being sustained across the board on social spending, and pensions are collapsing, the criticisms raised by the opposition parties and certain NGOs have been limited to the question of whether the military purchase was the right one, and if the procurement process was competitive enough.

BASICS Issue #22 (Sep/Oct 2010)

 by Mike Brito

The Commissioner of Correctional Service of Canada (CSC), Don Head, recently stated that there will be “major construction initiatives” in the Canadian prison system.
Although the Harper cabinet has refused to publicize the cost of their plans to imprison more people, government spending estimates confirm that capital costs for penitentiaries are scheduled to increase by 43% next year.

Estimates released earlier this year show that the prison system’s capital expenditures would increase from $230.8 million for 2009-10 to $329.4 million in 2010-11. It is not clear whether the money will be used to build new prisons or renovate the old.

Public Safety Minister, Vic Toews, asserted that the money would be spent only on “updating and improving” existing facilities. Research conducted at Carleton University has confirmed that there is also a “building spree” at the provincial level, with plans to spend more than $2.8 billion on new facilities and expanding older institutions.

BASICS Issue #22 (Sep/Oct 2010)

by Sikander Panag

In 1914, the Komagata Maru, a Japanese cargo ship, was en route to Canada carrying 376 Indian migrant workers. Of the passengers, 340 were Sikhs, 24 Muslims, and 12 Hindus, all of whom were British subjects and many veterans of the British Army. Upon arriving in Vancouver’s harbour, the passengers were not allowed entry onto the land and the ship was greeted with hostility by Canadian officials.

A similar situation is currently unfolding with the arrival of the MV Sun Sea, a freighter that arrived on Canada’s west coast on August 13, 2010 carrying nearly 500 Tamil refugees. Public Safety Minister Vic Toews called the passengers “suspected human smugglers and terrorists”.

In 1914, only a few thousand Indian immigrants were called Canadian. They were barred from running for public office, serving on juries, and working as professionals in many fields, such as accounting, law and pharmacy. The government passed laws specifically intended to discourage South Asian immigration, such as the ‘Continuous Journey’ regulation. This law prohibited the landing of migrants on ships that made stopovers on the long voyage to Canada from India, a difficult feat considering the distance.

BASICS Issue #22 (Sep/Oct 2010)

by Steve da Silva

In 1990, Canada was taken to the brink of civil war for what on the surface appeared to be about a golf course and some sacred trees.  What was actually at stake, beyond the surface of things, was the fate of a nation, one that had suffered two and a half centuries of the colonial theft of their land, and was no longer going to take it.

This summer marks 20 years since the armed standoff between  Mohawk Warriors and the Canadian Armed Forces near Oka, Quebec, a small Quebec town whose mayor at the time, Jean Ouellette, was trying to push through plans for the expansion of a golf course and the construction of condominiums.  The land in question, however, had for decades, if not centuries, been the subject of a land claim upheld by the Mohawk nation of Kanehsatake, whose ancestral graves and grove of pine trees held to be sacred were situated on the land.

Upon announcement of the development plans, the Mohawks set up a peaceful blockade on a secondary road through the pine forest. After disobeying an injunction passed against them and holding the lines, on July 11, 1990 the Sûreté du Québec went on the attack against those maintaining the blockade, losing Corporal Marcel Lemay to an unknown bullet in the mix.

So says Canadian authorities in case of Salvadorean refugee claimant

by René Guerra Salazar - BASICS Issue #20 July/Aug 2010

In a Kafkaesque turn of events, Salvadorean refugee claimant José Figueroa, a married father of three Canadian-born children, was ordered deported by the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) for his past ties to the Farabundo Martí Front for National Liberation (FMLN). The FMLN is El Salvador’s current governing party and was the opposition guerrilla coalition during the country’s 12-year civil war. IRB member Otto Nupponen issued the deportation order based on arguments from Ministry of Public Safety lawyers and a Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) report claiming that the FMLN “is or was engaged in terrorism and/or subversion”.

For thousands of Canadians of Salvadorean origin this is an outrage. Proud of their ties to the FMLN, Salvadorean-Canadians are bewildered at the decisions made by the relevant Canadian authorities in this case.

What you need to know

by Ashley Mathew and Steve da Silva - BASICS Issue #20 (July / August 2010)

International Women’s Conference in Montreal, Canada, August 13-16, 2010

Cynthia Palmaria - BASICS Issue #19 - May/June 2010

This year marks the celebration of the centennial of International Toiling Women’s Day, which will be commemorated by a historic conference initiated by ILPS (International League of People’s Struggle) to strengthen the international global women’s movement. The conference, entitled “For a Militant Global Women’s Movement in the 21st Century,” was conceptualized with the objective of assessing the achievements of the global women’s rights movement during the last 100 years. We will be honouring the pioneers, celebrating the centennial and drawing up an action plan for advancing the women’s rights movement, starting with the formation of an anti-imperialist women’s alliance. The international initiative committee is composed of Gabriela Philippines, the convener of the Women’s Commission of ILPS and Women of Diverse Origins in Montreal, Canada.

Press Release - April 8, 2010

Twenty-two Canadian citizens, including representatives from churches, labour unions, academics, lawyers and a sitting Member of Parliament, Don Davies, are preparing to head to the Philippines as part of an international observers mission during that country’s upcoming presidential elections.

On election day, scheduled for May 10, 2010, more than 17,000 offices will be contested across the country including the key posts of President, Vice President along with representatives to the House of Representatives, the Senate, and a range of provincial, municipal, and local offices.

by Derek Rosin - BASICS Issue #18

Like many sports fans, I get excited for the Olympics. They’re a chance for us to see great athletes at their best. Power, grace, speed, finesse, the physical and mental efforts of people who have trained years to excel at their sports – the result is often something that reminds me of great art – an almost magical exposition of human capability. Well, that’s the dream anyway. Unfortunately, the Olympics take place in a context that far too often drags the potential of sport through the mud.  

This was apparent right from the opening ceremonies in Vancouver. Despite some impressive moments, the four-hour show was mostly a tacky display of Canadian national chauvinism.