Protesters topple statues of Queen Elizabeth II and Queen Victoria in Canada after finding more than 1,000 bodies of Indigenous children

Canada commemorated its national holiday on Thursday, which marks the country’s official founding date on July 1, 1867, with fewer celebrations than usual and a darker spirit following the discovery in recent weeks of over 1,000 unidentified bodies of Indigenous children on the grounds of former public boarding schools.

This discovery was unleashed the fury of hundreds of demonstrators, who destroyed the statues of Queen Elizabeth II and Queen Victoria.

Queen Elizabeth II remains the monarch of Canada even though the country became an independent state in 1867. In protesting, people claimed that Elizabeth and Victoria “are the faces of colonialism”, Those who blamed these deaths.

The statues were toppled, desecrated and damaged by a violent mob. With no police in sight at the time, the protesters tied ropes around the necks of the statues and tore them to the ground with chants of “no to genocide“O”tear downAmid the fury over the deaths of 1,000 indigenous children found buried en masse.

Since the end of May, the tk’emlúps te secwépemc, an Indigenous group in western Canada, have revealed the discovery of the remains of at least 215 Indigenous children buried in the former Kamloops school residence, a growing number of voices called for the cancellation of Canada Day celebrations.

The announcement of two other indigenous groups in the discovery of other unidentified graves in as many school residences, government institutions run by religious orders in which indigenous children were forcibly interned, led to many others question the validity of commemorating the founding of Canada.

“I don’t feel like celebrating Canada Day with all that is going on and the horrible events that our people have endured.“He told the news agency EFE Heather bear, one of the Indigenous leaders of the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations (FSIN), which unites the 74 Indigenous groups in the province of Saskatchewan in western Canada.

In early June, vulgar from Saskatchewan revealed the discovery of 751 unidentified graves on the grounds of the former Marievel school residence, a boarding school located approximately 2,500 kilometers northwest of Toronto that operated between 1899 and 1996.

“REHABILITATION” AGAINST ABORIGINAL PEOPLE

Thousands of indigenous children have been sent to Marievel. There they suffered all kinds of physical, emotional and sexual abuse as part of a system of “re-education” aimed at eliminating indigenous culture.

Like the Kamloops boarding school, Marievel was run by the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, a Catholic order.

A growing group of municipalities across the country have decided to cancel July 1 celebrations in honor of Indigenous children killed in school residences.

Yes Thousands of people took part in protest marches in the main cities of the country on Thursday, many of them dressed in orange t-shirts representing the survivors of the school residences.

Bear, who holds the traditional title of chief, revealed that she attended Marievel in the 1970s, but not at the boarding school but at the native children’s day school.

She and her family decided that she could no longer take the racism and harassment she suffered in the public school she attended with white children from neighboring communities.

“Every day, I traveled two hours by bus to go to Marievel. There, at least I was with my peers, there was more respect. In public school there was such discrimination and racism that it was horrible. The teachers really taught other kids to be racist and to hate ussaid Bear.

Bear remembers how he viewed Marievel Residential School cemetery from his classroom and now wonders:How many schools have a cemetery on their land?”.

“I don’t want to celebrate Canada Day when I was part of it,” he said.

DUEL DAY

“I think of those children who had names and their families who loved them. I think the most appropriate thing would be for Canada Day to be a day of prayer, a day of mourning.Added the Aboriginal leader, who acknowledges that, despite everything, for many Canadians, July 1 is still a statutory holiday.

One of them is the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, the main opposition party, Erin O’Toole, which sees the efforts of indigenous and non-indigenous peoples to cancel the celebrations as a attempt by “activists” to “attack” the country.

“I am concerned that the injustices of our past, or our present, are often exploited by a small group of activists who use them to attack the very idea of ​​Canada,” O’Toole said at a press conference. a few days ago. .

The Canadian Prime Minister, Justin trudeau, He was also not in favor of canceling the celebrations., but ordered that the flag flying over the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa is held on July 1 at half mast in memory of indigenous children.

On Thursday, Trudeau said in a statement that “the horrific discovery of the remains of hundreds of children in old school residences in British Columbia and Saskatchewan has made us think fairly about our country’s historic failures and injustices that still exist. Engage against indigenous peoples and many others in Canada ”.

(With information from EFE)

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