Flyer Text: Why we are protesting against "Canada Day"

[Text of the flyer distributed at the "Anti-Canada Day" protest at CN Rail in Montreal ...]

CN Rail – whose corporate headquarters are in Montreal (935 de La Gauchetière Street West, right beside the main Central Train Station) -- is a multi-billion dollar company, with installations and tracks from ocean-to-ocean.

However, in a legal maneuver that can only be described as colonial, CN is currently suing three activists from the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory for over 100 millions dollars. CN’s lawsuit is that much more offensive when you consider that CN tracks cross native territories all over “Canada.” Their lawsuit is about intimidating and marginalizing effective indigenous organizers, who are active in the legitimate defence of their land and livelihood.

When travellers consider the “inconvenience” of delayed trains, or blocked highways and bridges, contrast your temporary inconvenience with the permanent and deeply entrenched theft of land from native communities, and the adverse social conditions that hundreds of years of genocide have produced.


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Support indigenous struggles for sovereignty, dignity and self-determination
WHY WE ARE PROTESTING AGAINST “CANADA DAY"


::: CN Rail: Drop your racist lawsuit against Mohawk protesters :::

CN Rail – whose corporate headquarters are in Montreal (935 de La Gauchetière Street West, right beside the main Central Train Station) -- is a multi-billion dollar company, with installations and tracks from ocean-to-ocean.

However, in a legal maneuver that can only be described as colonial, CN is currently suing three activists from the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory for over 100 millions dollars. CN’s lawsuit is that much more offensive when you consider that CN tracks cross native territories all over “Canada.” Their lawsuit is about intimidating and marginalizing effective indigenous organizers, who are active in the legitimate defence of their land and livelihood.

When travellers consider the “inconvenience” of delayed trains, or blocked highways and bridges, contrast your temporary inconvenience with the permanent and deeply entrenched theft of land from native communities, and the adverse social conditions that hundreds of years of genocide have produced.

We are here today to put CN in Montreal on notice that protests and disruptions by non-native allies -- who stand in solidarity with the actions of native protesters across Canada – will escalate if CN does not cease and desist their racist lawsuit immediately.


::: CN, George Bush and the “NAFTA+Homeland Security” Model :::

While CN uses the courts to attack native activists, their CEO -- E.
Hunter Harrison -- is a member of the North American Competitiveness Council, a key promoter of the recently formed "Security and Prosperity Partnership" (SPP) between Canada, the United States and Mexico. The SPP continues the imposition of the pro-corporate North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), combined with paranoid "Homeland Security" policies.

The SPP is an attack on all working and oppressed peoples, especially the indigenous peoples of "North America". The SPP leaders – George Bush, Stephen Harper and Felipe Calderon -- will be meeting later this summer, from August 20-21, in Montebello, Quebec (just 90 minutes from Montreal), Today’s Canada Day picket is a contribution to ongoing anti-SPP efforts.


::: Canada is stolen land :::

Today’s protest occurs within the wider context of indigenous demands for justice, across Turtle Island. Canada Day celebrations hypocritically hide the brutal realities on which “Canada” is founded – the theft of native land, and the forced displacement of indigenous peoples.

Canada Day is not a day to “celebrate”, but rather to challenge the genocidal and colonial underpinnings of the Canadian state. As non-natives, we must also take responsibility for struggling against the Canadian state while showing genuine solidarity, in actions and words, with indigenous-led struggles for self-determination.

There is no justice on stolen land.


INFO: noii-montreal@resist.ca - 514-848-7583
“When justice fails, block the rails!”