THUNDER BAY – The United Nation’s Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, spoke at Lakehead University at a lecture on Free, Prior and Informed Consent: A Local and Global Issue.
The Special Rapporteur’s visit is part of an unofficial visit to Canada and a part of a research project bringing together over thirty Indigenous leaders and researchers from Canada, Peru and Chile to share their experiences and perspectives with a focus on Ontario’s Ring of Fire mining project and other Pan America mining projects.
An overflow crowd at Lakehead University filled two lecture theatres for the talk.
This talk was organized by Lakehead University’s Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Mining and Exploration, Lakehead’s Office of Aboriginal Initiatives, and Laurier University’s Indigenous Rights and Resource Governance Research Program.
The Special Rapporteur’s public talk is part of a larger Pan-American research project Resource governance and Indigenous rights: Understanding intercultural frameworks for negotiating free prior and informed consent funded by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) grant held by Laurier professor, Dr. Terry Mitchell.
Grand Chief Sergio Campusano Villches from Chile addressed the conference delegates earlier in the evening and expressed how in his territory, often it is Canadian mining companies who they deal with and how difficult protecting the land can be for his people.
