‘You’re not listening to us’: Some First Nations warn they will resist Ontario’s Ring of Fire development – by Isaac Phan Nay (National Observer – March 30, 2023)

https://www.nationalobserver.com/

Leaders from five First Nations in northern Ontario gathered at the province’s legislature Wednesday vowing to resist proposed mining development near their lands. “We will take a stand, whatever that looks like,” Wayne Moonias, chief of Neskantaga First Nation, said. “Enough is enough.”

Representing the Neskantaga, Grassy Narrows, Muskrat Dam, Wapekeka and Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug First Nations, the leaders and community members called for a meeting with Premier Doug Ford and warned they would continue to resist if Ontario allowed development near their lands without further consultation.

“We have not given our free, prior and informed consent to these developments,” Moonias said. “If the premier wants to get a bulldozer to cross our river system, he’s going to be met by our people.”

Since Ford was elected, the Ontario government has pushed for mining in the Ring of Fire region, a wetland landscape about 500 kilometres northeast of Thunder Bay. The area includes one of the world’s largest peatlands, which stores about 26 gigatons of carbon and is responsible for significantly reducing the world’s planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.

For the rest of this article: https://www.nationalobserver.com/2023/03/30/news/not-listening-us-some-first-nations-warn-they-will-resist-ontarios-ring-fire-highway