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Friends of the Disappeared Strike Again, Occupy Anglican Church headquarters in Vancouver
 
Friday, May 18, 2007, 1:00 pm PST, Vancouver
 
For the second time in one week, aboriginal men and women of the Friends of the Disappeared (FoD) undertook an occupation in Vancouver today to demand the repatriation of the remains of thousands of children who died in church-run Indian Residential Schools across Canada.
 
"We gave the government and churches one week to answer our demand, and they ignored us, so we're back" declared Rob Morgan, FoD spokesperson.
 
Twenty five aboriginal men and women, including residential school survivors, peacefully occupied the headquarters of the Anglican Church of Canada and demanded records and other evidence of deaths in residential schools from church officials.
 
"Eyewitnesses describe how Anglican Church officials flogged children to death at the St. George's residential school in Lytton, B.C. in 1952" said Kevin Annett, a FoD researcher, to media.
 
"Rows of little skeletons were unearthed at the Anglican school in Alert Bay, B.C. in the late 1960's. Eyewitnesses were sterilized with an X Ray machine at the Anglican Carcross school in the Yukon, during the 1950's. This church is responsible for genocide."
 
The occupiers demanded to see Anglican Bishop Michael Ingham, who was handed a letter over a year ago by residential school survivors which asked for information about missing residential school children. Ingham has never replied.
 
"We gave Michael Ingham a letter of demand on April 15, 2006 to tell us where our relatives are buried, and he never answered us. So we're here to find out why he's ignoring us and covering up mass murder" said Rob Morgan, a second generation residential school survivor from the Nishga nation.
 
Church media officer Neil Adams told Morgan and the occupiers that "Bishop Ingham is not available and can't be reached." Adams also declined to share information about any death records held by the Vancouver diocese, and refused to answer questions put to him by survivors, including, "Who is going to be held responsible for the deaths of these children?".
 
One residential school survivor told reporters who attended the occupation how her friends found the skeletal remains of small children "between the walls" of the Lejac school in Prince George, BC.
 
"I was locked in a small closet for two weeks and almost died because I wouldn't cry when they whipped me" she described.
 
Other survivors spoke of family members who never returned from residential schools, how they themselves were tortured on "a rack (where) they stretched and broke me", and of children thrown to their deaths down stairs by priests, and then buried in orchards near residential schools.
 
"The church and government keep doing this to us: a lot of polite nothing" stated Rob Morgan to reporters as the occupiers vacated the office after an hour.
 
"They are evading the whole thing and they still treat us like we're children. But we're not dumb Indians, we're educated now and we're standing up. We're going to keep doing these sit ins and other things to shake them up until they return the bodies of our people, and surrender the criminals".
 
Morgan and Annett announced at the end of today's occupation that similar actions are being planned in Ontario in the coming weeks, as part of an escalating campaign to "bring the children home and their murderers to justice."
 
For more information:
 
 
(messages) 1-888-265-1007
 
 
 
 


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... and on this radio program: "Hidden from History", every Monday from 1-2 pm (PST) on CFRO 102.7 FM (www.coopradio.org) (Vancouver)