Headlines September 19th

The Six-Band Tsilhqot’in nation in the interior of British Colombia have promised fierce resistance if the Harper government green-lights the development of the$800 million QUOTE “prosperity” END QUOTE gold and copper mine on their traditional territory. The mine would turn a lake that is sacred to the First Nation and that holds 90 000 unique rainbow trout into a tailings dump, replacing it with an artificial lake. If the Cabinet gives final approval to the mine it would be overruling for the first time in Canadian history, a Federal environmental impact study that recommended against the mine, concluding it would have a QUOTE “high-magnitute, long-term and irreversible effect” END QUOTE.

The entire 2000-mile US-Mexico border will now be patrolled by predator drones as part of a policy to increase border militarization overseen by President Obama ahead of November elections.

As many as 2000 additional troops, mostly American, may be headed to occupy Afghanstan under a plan proposed by US General David Petraeus, potentially bringing the US troop levels above the 30 000 authorized by Obama earlier this year.

The Department of National Defence denied that Canadian troops are involved in trafficking heroin, after the British Sunday Times and the BBC reported that Britain’s Ministry of Defence was investigating claims that soldiers from the two countries were smuggling drugs out of Southern Afghanistan on military aircrafts.

Briefing notes obtained by the Canadian Press revealed that a member of the National Directorate of Security, Afghanistan’s intelligence agency, boasted to Canadian military officers in May 2009 that his organization was able to QUOTE “torture” END QUOTE and QUOTE “beat” END QUOTE prisoners during its interrogations.

The Halifax Peace Coalition (HPC) protested DEFSEC Atlantic, a defence and security exhibition in the city, which included Lockheed Martin. Over the summer, Lockheed received a no-bid contract worth $16 billion to sell F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Jets to the Department of National Defence. QUOTE “The Federal government should be investing in hospitals, schools and affordable housing to provide true security for Canadians, not Fighter Jets“,END QUOTE said Tamara Lorincz a peace activist with HPC.

Canadian journalists were falsely signed onto a petition organized by internet advocacy group avaaz.org. The petition opposed the introduction of Quebecor’sSunTV News channel, dubbed QUOTE “Fox News North” END QUOTE into Canada. The news channel would be run by Prime Minister Harper’s former Director of Communications, Kory Teneycke, whose name was also added to the petition, and who was contacted by the trickster. QUOTE “We have taken on some pretty nasty characters in our three-and-a-half-years- everyone from Bush to Burmese dictators to corrupt politicians in Brazil and Germany,” END QUOTE, said Avaaz executive Director, Ricken Patel of the fraudulent signatures. QUOTE “No one has tried this before.” END QUOTE

Briefing notes received under access to information requests revealed the Canadian Security Intelligence Agency says it would use torture-tainted information and share it with foreign governments, violating a Federal policy issued last year that directed the spy agency to QUOTE “not knowingly rely upon information which is derived from the use of torture” END QUOTE

Police continued to make arrests in relation to June’s G20 protests in Toronto, charging 28-year-old Montreal resistant, Juan Lepore with mischief exceeding $5000, mischief endangering life and assault.

In other G20 related news, G20 defendant Alex Hundert was arrested from his home at 10:30 PM after the “Strengthening Our Resolve” event on September 17, 2010. The authorities are alleging breach of ‘no protest’ condition. Hundert appeared at Old City Hall the following morning. The Toronto Community Mobilization Network put out an urgent call for court support. Please keep checking http://g20.torontomobilize.org/ for details and updates.

In other local news, the Queer Resistance Network held a public demonstration outside the 519 Community Centre on September 18 to build the anti-policing movement and build bonds with the community and in response to a recent decision by the. Ontario Police to use the 519 for a recruitment session.

Hundreds of Guatemalan migrant workers and their allies protested at the Canadian embassy in Guatemala City, denouncing the abusive treatment of migrants under the Temporary Foreign Workers Program, under which 4000 Guatemalan migrants work in Canada’s agricultural sector every season.

Distress with the Temporary Foriegn Worker Program can be felt right here in Canada. In a recent media advisory, Justicia for Migrant Workers (J4MW), an advocacy group for the rights of migrant workers, expressed its outrage over the arrest and detension of 11 migrant agricultural workers. They were arrested on the morning of Tuesday, August 31 during an immigration raid conducted in the Chatham-Kent area. All 11 arrested were migrant agricultural workers employed on local farms. They are presently being held in detension in the Windsor jail. QUOTE “J4mW and countless community, legal and labour organizations have expressed their consistent opposition to the mistreatment faced by current and former temporary foreign workers” END QUOTE, says Tzazna Miranda Leal, QUOTE “over the last year, there have been petitions, deputations, and delegations made to Federal, provincial politicians to no avail” END QUOTE, she continues.

In related news, J4MW learnt of the death of 2 Jamaican migrant workers, as a result of workplace injuries near Owen Sound, Ontario. J4MW notes that such accidents and accompanying violations of workplace safety standards are commonplace for migrant workers and urges the Minister of Labour to take steps to prevent future deaths and injury. We would like to offer our condolences to the families of the two workers.

Canadian Minister of Citizenship and Immegration, Jasen Kenney visited Asia to build support for law enforcement to crack down on human smuggling and flights of refugees to Canada, a month after a boatload of Tamil refugees arrived in British Colombia. An Immegration and Refugee Board hearing in Vancouver ordered the release of the first of the Tamil refugee applicants, a pregnant woman with three children who is suffering from complications to injuries she sustained in Sri Lanka. The 492 Tamil migrants who arrived abord the MV Sun Sea in Esquimalt, BC on August 13 have been held in detension facilities in the Vancouver area with children being put in care by the provincial government.

Eight separate incidents of QUOTE “swarming” END QUOTE over the last two weeks in Halifax landed victims in hospitals and one in surgery. The recent state of QUOTE “random” END QUOTE violence with no QUOTE “profound motivation” END QUOTE went unreported until a victim of the sixth swarming went to the press after he learnt from hospital staff of the previous incidents.

A recent report released by Statistics Canada shows that students in Ontario paid the highest tuition in the country for the second year in a row. Undergraduate students pay an average of $6307 (an increase of 5.4 per cent) and that graduate fees have increased by 10 per cent. The Canadian Federation of Students Ontario called this situation QUOTE “a national embarrassment” END QUOTE.

BP warned the US Congress that if it passed legislation barring the company from acquiring new offshore drilling permits, it wouldn’t have money to pay for damages caused by the Gulf of Mexico spill, leaving observers to concludethe company is using the funds as a bargaining chip to ensure continued access to the Gulf of Mexico,which accounts for 11 Per Cent of its global production of oil.

An offshore petroliam platform exploded and burnt in the Gulf of Mexico, 80 miles of the coast of Louisiana, west of the site where BP’s well spilt.

A fuel tanker ran aground in the Northwest passage, though no spills were reported, as it delivered nine-and-a-half million litres of diesel fuel to remote communities in the Canadian arctic. QUOTE “I don’t know if people are prepared for (a spill),” END QUOTE, said Jeannie Ugiuk, a local MLA.

More than 500 First Nations and Northern BC residents marched in Prince George BC, against a proposed pipeline that would allow Enbridge to transport oil from the Alberta Tar Sands to Canada’s West coast and on to China. The next day, an Enbridge pipeline spilt more than 6000 barrels of oil into an industrial park near Romeoville, Illinois. QUOTE “This most recent pipeline leak is the nail in the coffin for the Northern Gateway Pipelines Project,” END QUOTE, said Chief Larry Nooski of the Nadleh Whut’en First Nation in a press release.

For good measure, another pipeline in Buffalo leaked an indeterminant amount of oil,enbridges third spill in three months.

Alberta Premier Stelmach said he would compare a recent study that found elevated levels of Mercury, lead and 11 other toxins in the tar sands’ main water source, the Athbasca river, to government research that has backed up long-standing industry claims that oil development has has left the water unaffected. QUOTE “If it means that we have to do something more, we will” END QUOTE he said.

The Harper Government muzzled Natural Resources Canada scientists this spring, telling them they would need QUOTE “pre-approval” END QUOTE from the Minister’s office to speak with national and international journalists. The policy is reserved for QUOTE “high-profile” END QUOTE issues like QUOTE “climate change (and) oilsands” END QUOTE, but access to information documents show the rules are being applied so broadly that a scientist who published a study about a colossal flood that hit Northern Canada 13 000 years ago was prevented from speaking to the media. QUOTE “If you can’t get access to a nice, feel-good science story about flooding at the end of last glaciation, can you imagine trying to get access to scientists with information about cadmium and mercury in the Athbasca river?” END QUOTE said Andrew Weaver, a University of Victoria Climatologist.

Thanks to the dominianpaper.ca and to the various community organizations.