Each year in St. Catherines, Ontario, the Haudenosaunee hold a whitetail deer hunt in Short Hills Provincial Park. The right to hunt there is guaranteed under treaty, but each year the entrance to the park is cut off by a group of protesters.
 
On November 17th, CFSC Program Assistant Keira Mann spoke on a panel organized by members of the Haudenosaunee and surrounding community. Keira explained how Friends are engaging in reconciliation and how the conflict at Short Hills is part of a larger pattern of disrespect for Indigenous peoples’ human and treaty rights.
 
Over the past several months Jennifer Preston (Hamilton Meeting) has been advancing Indigenous rights work in various places. In July she was in Geneva for the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
 
August had her in Ottawa for a workshop on Indigenous Peoples’ right to water. In September she was back in Ottawa for an Assembly of First Nations forum on advancing Indigenous rights. In October both she and CFSC associate Paul Joffe spoke in Vancouver at the UBC Indian Residential School History and Dialogue Project on the importance of legislative frameworks for implementing the UN Declaration.
 
Paul and Jennifer gave two presentations at a conference on free, prior and informed consent, hosted later in October by the Saugeen Ojibway Nation. They finished the year delivering a pair of workshops at the Cree Nation Government Justice Symposium.
 
Jennifer also traveled twice to Vancouver to work with UBC on a research project focused on implementing the UN Declaration, and twice to Ottawa for meetings with the federal government on international Indigenous rights issues.