Residential school survivors, Indigenous leaders and advocates are gathering in Gatineau, Que., Tuesday, as the office of the Independent Special Interlocutor for Missing Children and Unmarked Graves and Burial Sites associated with Indian Residential Schools holds its final gathering.
Special Interlocutor Kimberly Murray is set to release her final report at the gathering, as well as deliver an Indigenous-led reparations framework.
“The truths that I have heard must inform a new legal framework to respectfully and appropriately recover, protect, and honour the missing and disappeared children and their burial,” wrote Murray in the program for the gathering.
“The disappearances and deaths of thousands of Indigenous children is the ultimate act of injustice. Under international laws, survivors, Indigenous families, and communities, who are victims of genocide, crimes against humanity, and mass human rights violations have the right to know the truth and they have the right to reparations for these egregious harms.”
2-year mandate
Over 150,000 First Nations, Métis and Inuit children were forced to attend church-run, government-funded residential schools between the 1870s and 1997. As of 2021, the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation had documented more than 4,100 deaths of children at the schools.
Following discoveries of potential unmarked graves at former residential school sites, Murray was appointed to the role in 2022 for a two-year term to identify measures and recommendations for a new federal legal framework on unmarked graves and burial sites.
Murray, a member of Kanehsatà:ke, a Mohawk community northwest of Montreal, has held national gatherings in Montreal, Iqaluit, Toronto, Vancouver, Winnipeg, and Edmonton over the past two years.
In July, Murray released a report titled Sites of Truth, Sites of Conscience, which concluded that the history of residential school burial sites is evidence of genocide and crimes against humanity that could in theory be prosecuted.
Justice Minister Arif Virani will be in attendance at the gathering Tuesday.
Neither Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Gary Anandasangaree or Indigenous Services Minister Patty Hajdu would comment if Canada should pay reparation ahead of the report’s release.
“Canada has had a long history of violent colonialism that has led to a lot of suffering and Canada has paid reparations for a number of other harms,” said Hajdu on Monday.
“Those are issues to be sorted out, I think, in conversations with First Nations people but what I can tell you is that reparations, in my mind, are only part of the work ahead.”
Anandasangaree said he looks forward to receiving and reading Murray’s report.
“As a government since 2015, we’ve been advancing many issues including childhood harms that were caused by the failure of federal government policies and we will continue to do that,” said Anandasangaree on Monday.
The release of the Indigenous-led reparations framework at 1 p.m. ET will be livestreamed on the special interlocutor’s Facebook page.
A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line has been set up to provide support for former students and those affected. People can access emotional and crisis referral services by calling the 24-hour national crisis line: 1-866-925-4419.
Mental health counselling and crisis support is also available 24 hours a day, seven days a week through the Hope for Wellness hotline at 1-855-242-3310 or by online chat at www.hopeforwellness.ca.