Akwesasne under siege
by Special Correspondent Jessica Yee, originally published at Rabble
Ed. Note: Jessica wrote this in response to Canadian border patrol agents being armed in Akwesasne. This article gives a summary of the situation:
A respected security and anti-terrorism expert says Canada’s federal government should stand by its guns and ignore threats from Mohawk militants in Cornwall, Ont., who have vowed to storm the Canadian border post if Ottawa gives sidearms to border agents there.
John Thompson, president of the Mackenzie Institute, a Toronto-based think-tank, said Monday that Mohawk militants are “blowing smoke,” and would never attempt an armed, illegal occupation of the offices of the Canadian Border Services Agency.
Native leaders and activists at Akwesasne have been warning for months they would take action to prevent Canada from giving 9-mm pistols to its border agents, because they say the presence of armed government agents on their reserve is an affront to their aboriginal sovereignty.
“Things are escalating in Akwesasne. The Indians aren’t being peaceful anymore,” the news reporters are saying.
500 years of colonization and the continuous refusal to acknowledge our fundamental human rights do not produce peaceful results. I’ll tell you that right now.
But I’m not currently in Akwesasne — my home community which has been under siege by the Border Patrol Services for quite some time now. Yes, the existence of a transnational border that tears a community apart is a sign of putting us under siege. Only this time, since June 1, 2009 to be exact, they want to legitimize and regulate their firearms against us.
So if you want to get a first hand account of what’s going on there right now — I implore you to ask someone who belongs to and is in the community as we speak. But I do have some things to say about this situation which has been a long time coming.
The media have repeatedly asked me about which “side” do I think is right, do I agree with the border being closed, do I side with the “warriors” who refused to back down to the rule of the governments, or am I simply indifferent to it all since I live in Toronto now?
I actually know precisely where I stand – as a Kanionke:haka woman, a Mohawk woman, who belongs to the Haudenosaunee people, and as young person who is part of the next seven generations, I am on the side of my community who is on the side of the land – of Mother Earth. As women we are titleholders and caretakers of the land. And I know very well that the border should not be there.
I am also not a trade economics ignoramus — I recognize why countries feel the need to have borders, make passport and visa systems, promote capitalism, etc. But what I have never understood is how can you really separate a people and a community? How can you tell a nation to pick a side? The answer is to conquer them — that’s how they tried to do it to us — and that’s also why.
What the border has done to far too many of our First Nations communities is horrific and atrocious on so many levels — and it has poisoned our minds to think in singular factions, instead of a full circle. Billy Two Rivers, an Elder and community activist from Kahnawake spoke to me about that this past weekend. “They have no right to tell you which side you belong to. Oh sure, they say it’s St. Regis on the ‘Canadian Side’ and Hogansburg on the ‘American side,’ but that is all your lands. It’s gotten to the minds of our people — and that has got to stop.”
It is incredibly degrading to have to show proof of citizenship simply to see your family or go to the other side of your own community — and sure we might have some sort of a special “border-crossing lane” but its mere existence is enough to put insult to injury — which continues to do much harm to our people. Borders were created to separate and destroy us, all across Turtle Island, but I don’t know how much other people remember this when it’s not going on in their territory.
So what’s going on in Akwesasne now is not an opportunity to jump on the bandwagon of telling the government to shove it — the issue runs much deeper than that. The border might be there, but we are NOT a conquered people.
Which way is going to best resolve this situation I’m not sure of yet but I do know we have a right to stand up for our own community, which will never solely be in Canada or the United States. We belong to Mother Earth in whom no one has claim over – and where there aren’t any borders.
(Image Credit: Ottawa Citizen)
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Jadey wrote:
It is disgusting that the man interviewed for that article is suggesting that the appropriate solution is for Canadian border patrol guards to be perceived as violent and dangerous as their American counterparts. Dudley George, much?? The shooting of a black off-duty police officer last week should be emphasis enough that guns in the hands of authorities puts people of colour at more risk. This expert demonstrates repeatedly that he does not believe Native nations have or can have sovereignty. There are other voices and opinions out there on that and the Ottawa Citizen would do well to seek them out.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 8:43 am ¶
A. Wallace wrote:
Kuddos – you are absolutely correct. No one has claim over a human being. NO ONE!
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 10:17 am ¶
jeff wrote:
This is all part of the militarisation of North America. Local police forces are being turned into power crazed, heavily armed paramilitary forces all over the continent. Why do these border agents need arming all of a sudden?
Also coming up are travel documents to travel within the US. Everybody will be treated like the unfortunate people in the article. Theres some equality being planned. But nobody is going to like it.
Im definitely on the side of the indians. Good luck to them. People everywhere should be getting ready to make a stand and defend their freedom.
Visit infowars.com to see how much shit, just like this, is happening all over the place, every day now in the US. Id be interested to hear what people think about that site. Positive or negative.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 10:42 am ¶
Pickly wrote:
it does seem kind of strange that some agreement couldn’t be reached to put the entire area under one country or another, (The map I saw from googling doesn’t seem to show any obvious reasons this would be a big issue, apart from the river being the border), though I’m likely not understanding the full range of issues here.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 1:24 pm ¶
Jadey wrote:
I agree that there is a relationship with militarization, but within Canada at least it is also an issue of sovereignty, self-determination, and national identity. Military history in Canada is somewhat different from the US (no revolution/civil war means less developement of militias and the like), and provinces and territories are less autonomous relative to states in the US. The pressure for border control comes from the desire to maintain positive relations with the US, to limit immigration legal or otherwise as much as possible, and to control trade and economy at the borders. Native nations on the border pose an obstacle to these aims, and so the efforts to eliminate the “Indian Problem” (so named by the government years ago, and reiterated in proposed legislation as recently as 1969 by Pierre Trudeau and Jean Chretien) continue as they have since contact.
Canada’s colonial history is largely one of squatting and systemic covert violence, and this has not changed, although the language surrounding it has become more cautious and coded. The information war in this case is over whether there exists any other nation with a “claim” to the land (in and of itself a colonial belief–the notion of land as subordinate property) that would challenge the illusion that Canadian sovereignty is based on.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 1:28 pm ¶
Persia wrote:
IIRC, there’s a similar situation on the Mexican-US border, and the tribal lands there are being used for drug smuggling (or so the NPR story I heard claimed). And all this would have been avoided if people just paid attention and had some respect. Argh.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 1:55 pm ¶
Lisa J wrote:
Wow, I’m not familiar with this issue, but it sounds pretty f-d up. That line about “The Indians aren’t being peaceful anymore” killed me. Cause white people, as a group not everyone, have always been so peaceful, like when they stole the land of the First Americans, put many of you on reservations and tried to kill you and/or steal you identity. I don’t get why so many people (not all) especially those in the media like to conveniently forget the atrocities committed by white governments and some white people in the name of “freedom” (theirs) and to obtain/steal wealth from others but let someone with a dark complexion do one thing (no matter the magnitude) , and they are painted as the bad guys at best and savages or unintelligent brutes at worst. SMH.
@jeff, I hope you are wrong about that. It would be irritating and humiliating for everyone, especially people who are regularly profiled, and it would waste a heck of a lot of money that we do not have on foolishness rather than reinvesting into the American people to get us out of this recession.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 2:39 pm ¶
jeff wrote:
Jadey, dont worry about missing out by being in Canada! Plans are afoot to combine Canada the US and Mexico into one big Europe style super-state. The US way of doing things is coming to a town near you. Maybe even quite soon.
LisaJ I hope I am wrong too, but the more I research, read and hear the more certain I am that something is up. And its going to be alot worse than humiliating and irritating.
Seriously go and have a look at infowars.com or prisonplanet, those sites will explain things alot better than I can. Really opens your eyes about who is really in control of what and whom and how we are all being played against each other.
I hope its ok to plug those sites here, sorry if its not but there is alot of information out there and the readers of racialicious seem to be fairly swithed on, with enquiring minds. Tuskagee experiments anyone?
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 3:39 pm ¶
jeff wrote:
should read tuskegee. sorry.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 3:40 pm ¶
foshothoyo wrote:
i hate to say it but armed occupation of state buildings is probably going to end badly, but i honestly wish them well in their struggle for sovereignty and justice.
What would work better is to start a bank and lend the state money. Owning their debt would be more effective than a thousand protests and occupations.
The threat of violence usually results in the escalation of state-sanctioned force, and appealing to their “humanity” and “conscience” is an exercise in futility. So what’s the answer?
Somebody said once that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies. Native peoples could have their own swiss banking system right here in the states. Somebody needs to start an international aboriginal banking cartel so native peoples everywhere can have some real teeth, a powerful lobby, and their own private security company.
Stay strong out there.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 4:45 pm ¶
The Czech wrote:
They’ve fought armed battles against police and the Canadian army before.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 8:32 pm ¶
Fei Hu wrote:
There u¡is a problem here which authorities in the US are trying to avoid speaking on. On the US southern border there are several “Nations” (as opposed to the smaller unit which is a “tribe”) whose lands have been divided by the government because of the wave of fear rolling over the US since the 911 incident. These nations live, and always have lived, on both sides of the US-Mexican border. By treaties they have always had the freedom to move between Mexico and the US because the border does not apply to these people. But now their lands have been divided and this is causing much strife among these nations. The larger ones are the O’odham, the Cocopah, Kickapoo (These people must now cross at only Lukeville or Nogales. Then there are the Apache, the Koumeyaay and the Yaqui. They can no longer cross their own lands as their lands lie on both sides of the US-Mexican border. Treaties have been disregarded without notice to these nations by both Mexicans and Americans. Again these people have put themselves in the role of those who break treaties and cannot be trusted and here we are in the 21 century having made no real progress in this area. Sad but true.
There are problems with trafficking of drugs, arms etc over Amerindian national lands but they are no more problem than any other part of the border and the police from each nation do their best to police their lands and their borders. Anything else is just an attempt to get more control over these nations.
Now a couple of questions for Ms Yee. You mention the terms Kanionke:haka, Haudenosaunee and Mohawk. Excuse my ignorance of the northern people but what do these terms indicate clan, tribe or nation or which is which? My understanding the situation is that these tribes comprise the Iroquois “confederation” of more than one nation. Mohawks, Cayuga, Seneca, Onondaga and Onieda. I have always associated the Iroquois confederation with the northeastern territory that is modern NY State. If that is so does this mean that the Mohawks north of the present US-Canadian border are yet another group in addition to the Bear, the Wolf and the Turtle or are they part of these three clans or tribes?
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 9:02 pm ¶
Sami wrote:
Solution seems clear to me: Border agents get the hell out and let the natives police border crossings through their land. Both countries get to save money on policing the border in that area, and get to avoid continuing the incredibly shameful behaviour of the last few centuries that you’d hope they’d be able to move past by now.
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 9:28 pm ¶
Sobia wrote:
A few months ago Israeli peace activist Jeff Halper gave a Canada-wide speaking tour in which he told his audiences that the Israeli army were training Canadian police forces in certain techniques. Reading this post reminded me of what happens to Palestinians, which then reminded me of what Halper said a few months ago.
I don’t know if this is related but I really can’t help but I wonder if there is a connection….
Posted 08 Jun 2009 at 9:47 pm ¶
m. wrote:
“Necessary” and “real” as some people may deem them, if people had not shown up here in North America and Mexico/C.+S. America from abroad–supplanting our traditional ways of life with their self-serving ways and beliefs–the *idea* of an actual border or border patrol that dictates when we may travel or where we belong wouldn’t exist at all. Many people, such as the Chiricahua, have come and gone between what is now the U.S. and Mexico as they pleased…that is the way things have always been done by many peoples from the beginning, and it is the same way up North. The border is an insult to the Akwesasne community and parking armed agents there is just the icing on the cake, a threat to their sovereignty. I would feel so frustrated and demeaned if I had to show documentation or present proof of which “side” I am coming from/returning to every time I travel to visit my family and friends. Or even worse: be separated from them for good (an entirely different region, but one can only imagine how relatives torn apart by the Korean DMZ must feel).
Jessica Yee, thank you so much for this article. BPS occupiers and Canadian “experts” need to take their guns and bold ideas, then back off your homeland. You are correct: this land has been colonized, but Indigenous people have not been conquered.
Posted 10 Jun 2009 at 12:23 am ¶
RCHOUDH wrote:
It’s very upsetting to find out that such colonialist actions against the First Nations people on their own land is continuing to occur in this day and age and by the same Western perpetrators. What’s even more upsetting is that if it wasn’t for Racialicious, I would have never heard about this injustice going on (forget mainstream media even independent media sources don’t report on this). Thanks Racialicious for bringing this to light; for my part I hope to inform as many people as I know about these continuing injustices rendered invisible by the mainstream.
Posted 10 Jun 2009 at 2:32 pm ¶
Rachel wrote:
Fei Hu: Kanionke:haka and Haudenosaunee are the Mohawk words for Mohawk and Iroquois, respectively.
Posted 12 Jun 2009 at 2:55 pm ¶
Fei Hu wrote:
Rachel. Thank you.
Posted 13 Jun 2009 at 2:15 pm ¶