The push for “truth and reconciliation” collided with unanswered questions Thursday as First Nations chiefs blasted Parliament for refusing to criminalize residential school “denialism” — even as headline-making claims of potential burial sites remain unverified by excavation.
The Assembly of First Nations erupted at the Senate after senators sank a bill that would have sent people to prison for up to two years for denying Indian Residential School abuses, according to Blacklock’s Reporter.
“It is a shame that we live in a country that will not protect our people from hate crimes,” Manitoba Grand Chief Garrison Settee of Pimicikamak Cree Nation told reporters Thursday at the AFN AGM in Ottawa.
“The Senate defeated a bill that would amend the Criminal Code to include Residential School denialism as a crime. Our people have been through a lot.”
