Austrian Ski Team – Go Home!!

NATIVE YOUTH MOVEMENT
SKWELKWEK’WELT PROTECTION CENTER
INTERNATIONAL STATEMENT

MEDIA ADVISORY
AUSTRIAN SKI TEAM – GO HOME!!

Top Olympic Ski Team Bloody their Hands by Choosing to Ski Sun Peaks

Secwepemc Peoples Will Face Off With Sun Peaks Once Again to Expose Sun Peaks’ Indigenous Rights Abuses to the Austria National Ski Team and the World

(November 16, 2007, Skwelkwek’welt (Sun Peaks),
unsurrendered Secwepemc Territory)

The Secwepemc Peoples will be holding a protest at the Sun Peaks Resort on their opening day, Saturday, November 17th, 2007 at noon against the Sun Peaks Resort and to call on the Austria National Ski Team to boycott Sun Peaks because of all the Human and Indigenous Rights Abuses Sun Peaks continues to carry out against the Secwepemc.

The Austrian Ski Team is in the hot spot after being confronted for their position in choosing to ski at Sun Peaks Resort rather than respect Indigenous and Human Rights. The ski team has chosen Sun Peaks as a training facility leading up to the 2010 Winter Olympic Games.

Arthur Manuel, Indigenous Networks on Economies and Trade, visited Austria in June 2007 and confronted the Austrian Ski Team about their involvement in the controversial Sun Peaks Resort, exposing to them Sun Peaks inhuman treatment towards the Indigenous Secwepemc Peoples, whose land and territory the resort is occupying.

Just weeks ago the Austria National Ski Team opened up the ski season in Austria in a coliseum with over 16,000 spectators and viewed on television by tens of thousands more. The ski team invited Felix Arnouse from the Little Shuswap Indian Band (only representing a few) over for this event in Austria in a big media stunt to disguise the fact that Secwepemc Peoples are opposed to them skiing at Sun Peaks and cover up that they too are accomplices to these Indigenous and Human Rights abuses by knowingly choosing to ski Sun Peaks after they have been informed the truth about Sun Peaks socially irresponsibly business tactics.

NYM spokesperson, Kanahus Pellkey, stated that “We have never signed treaties here in our Territory and Sun Peaks Ski Resort continues to encroach and invade more of our land. Sun Peaks has joined with the governments of BC and Canada to bulldoze down our home and Sweat Lodges, arrest my mother, sisters and grandmothers for living on our own land. We call on the Austrian Ski Team and the world to Boycott the Sun Peaks Resort for their Genocidal practices.”

Contact:

Arthur Manuel,
(250) 319-0688

Kanahus Pellkey
(250) 371-0361

WHAT: PROTEST

WHEN: SAT. NOVEMBER 17TH, 2007 AT 12 NOON

WHERE: SUN PEAKS RESORT
WHY: SUN PEAKS EXPANSION ONTO SACRED MOUNTAIN AND UNCEDED SECWEPEMC TERRITORY & AUSTRIA NATIONAL SKI TEAM INVOLVEMENT IN RESORT

NYM Communications
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Teen accused in Caledonia fracas freed on $5,000 bail

Teen accused in Caledonia fracas freed on $5,000 bail

November 08, 2007
Paul Legall
The Hamilton Spectator
Cayuga (Nov 8, 2007)

A teenager was released on $5,000 bail yesterday over his alleged involvement in a confrontation that landed a Caledonia house builder in hospital with a fractured skull.

Byron Powless, 18, who faces charges of breaking and entering and assault, surrendered to police this week.

A justice of the peace in Cayuga court released him after Six Nations businessman Melvin Styres pledged the bail money and agreed to supervise him while the case is before the courts.

Powless is one of three Six Nations teenagers facing charges in connection with an attack on Sam Gualtieri, 52, and his nephew, Dominic Gualtieri, in his 20s, during a confrontation at Stirling Woods subdivision in Caledonia on Sept. 13.

A 15-year-old male, who can’t be named under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, was released on $5,000 bail in September. He was charged with breaking and entering, assault and uttering death threats.

Richard Smoke, 18, is wanted on charges of aggravated assault and breaking and entering.

Sam Gualtieri spent five days in hospital, including three days in intensive care, after suffering facial injuries, a fractured shoulder blade and two skull fractures.

In summarizing the case yesterday, assistant Crown attorney Mitchell Hoffman said the attack occurred after Gualtieri, his nephew and two other construction workers went to check a house Gualtieri was building for his daughter at Stirling Woods. He was concerned because native protesters were occupying the site .

Hoffman said the construction workers were met by three male protesters who refused to leave and challenged them to a fight.

There was no order against publication at the bail hearing.

But all allegations have yet to be proved in court.

As part of the bail conditions, Powless must live on the Six Nations reserve with his parents, have no contact with the alleged victims and not possess any firearms, explosives or ammunition.

Styres said he agreed to be Powless’s surety because he believes it’s an important time in Canadian history as the Six Nations Haudenosaunee try to assert their land rights.

“He was defending the right of the Haudenosaunee people (to their land) as he understands it,” he said.

He added he would teach Powless to act within the “confines of the Canadian law, so he doesn’t end up in this building again.”

Powless must return to Cayuga court on Dec. 5.

Native activist cites ‘treason’

Native activist cites ‘treason’

November 08, 2007
Paul Legall
The Hamilton Spectator
Cayuga (Nov 8, 2007)

A native activist facing attempted murder and other serious charges in the hijacking of an undercover police van has accused the Canadian government of “high treason” against aboriginal people.

“I’m here by force and under duress,” Albert Kirk Douglas, 32, told the justice of the peace in Cayuga court yesterday.

He said the Canadian government has no jurisdiction over his people, whom he identified as signatories of the original treaties with the British Crown. “It is imperative that this court understand that our jurisdiction extends to wherever our language, Kanienkeha (Mohawk), is spoken,” he said.

As a signatory Indian, he considers himself subject only to the sovereign laws of the clan mothers, “recognized by all international law.”

“Should the officers of this court continue assuming jurisdiction in this matter, it would constitute the crime of high treason,” he warned.

The justice of the peace replied that other native protesters had recently advanced similar arguments in Cayuga court and the judge had ruled Canadian criminal law applied to everybody.

“None of those Indians were signatories,” Douglas interjected.

Douglas, in custody since Sept. 27, was remanded in custody until Nov. 14.

The attempted murder charge stems from the hijacking of a U.S. border patrol surveillance van at Douglas Creek Estates on June 9, 2006. The occupants of the vehicle, which included OPP officers and U.S. law enforcement agents, had been taking pictures of native protesters at the site.

It is alleged that a group of protesters, including Douglas, took over the vehicle, forced the occupants out and tried to back over a semiconscious OPP officer who had collapsed on the street.

Douglas is also charged with robbery and assault in relation to an attack on two TV cameramen in the Canadian Tire parking lot in Caledonia the same day. He also has outstanding charges of obstructing and assaulting police for allegedly putting up a fight when he was arrested with 15 other protesters at Douglas Creek Estates April 20, 2006.

He was wanted on a Canada-wide warrant when he was arrested Sept. 27 during a routine traffic stop on Highway 401 at Morrisburg.

Nine native protesters, arrested at the Stirling Woods subdivision in Caledonia on Sept. 19, also made an appearance in Cayuga court yesterday. They were all remanded out of custody until their next court appearance on Dec. 5. They were charged with mischief for refusing to leave the property and with assaulting police to resist arrest after heavily armed OPP officers went onto the property and arrested them.

Six Nations ’embassy’ set ablaze

Six Nations ’embassy’ set ablaze
Natives vow to rebuild Argyle Street structure

November 07, 2007
Paul Legall
The Hamilton Spectator
Caledonia (Nov 7, 2007)

Six Nations residents will be holding an old-fashioned building bee to replace a makeshift shelter at Douglas Creek Estates that was destroyed by an arsonist Monday night.

A piece of art commemorating native war veterans also vanished in the blaze shortly before midnight.

With the community pulling together, native leaders expect to have a new structure standing at the Argyle Street entrance by the weekend.

It’s believed someone either entered the unlocked building and ignited the blaze with gasoline or threw a firebomb inside before disappearing into the night. There was no one near the building at the time and the arsonist appears to have snuck in while the security guards were changing shifts.

Native spokesperson Bryan Skye said the vandalism has angered the community and could hamper current land claims negotiations between the Haudenosaunee Six Nations and the federal and provincial governments.

“It’s a major setback at the tables. The anger and frustrations that this cowardly act of violence against the Six Nations has caused will set us back in the progress we were making,” said Skye, who sits on the archeology and the public awareness and education side tables.

He said he’ll be raising the incident when talks resume next Tuesday. “We need answers.”

The one-storey uninsulated frame structure was constructed of particle board and was used as the cookhouse in the summer of 2006 when there were as many as 200 to 300 protesters occupying the former subdivision.

Natives have occupied the site since late February 2006, claiming the original sale of the land for a road was never legal.

In recent months, with only a skeleton security crew on duty, the structure was converted into a kind of reception centre at the Argyle Street entrance. With aboriginal flags fluttering overhead, it was the area where protesters met reporters, members of the public and even foreign dignitaries.

“The building was our embassy. It was where we’d meet and greet people and hold meetings. We had people from different countries visit us. It was our embassy that was destroyed as a result of arson,” Skye said.

The building had also housed a mural honouring native men and women who had served the Crown in foreign wars for more than 200 years. Six Nations artist Arnold Jacobs had donated the piece to be displayed at Kanonhstaton, as Douglas Creek Estates is now known among natives.

Six Nations Confederacy spokesperson Hazel Hill also condemned the vandalism. She called it “an attack on Kanonhstaton (the protected place) by Canadians who have disturbed the peace that Six Nations has been working so diligently to preserve.”

“It’s kind of ironic with Veterans’ Day just around the corner that a sign honouring veterans should be destroyed,” she added.

She’s confident, however, the community will rally together to build a new structure.