Saskatchewan –
Indigenous group leaders Canada said investigators had found 751 unmarked graves at the site of a former school where indigenous children lived in Saskatchewan. Last month the bodies of 215 children were also found at a school in British Columbia.
“This is a crime against humanity, an attack on the First Nations,” said Bobby Cameron, chairman of the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous First Nations.
He wished for more graves to be found in the school grounds all over Canada. Cameron said it would continue to investigate.
“We will not stop until we find all the bodies,” he explained.
The bodies were found at the Marieval Indian Residential School. The school operated from 1899 to 1997 where Cowessess First Nation is now located. The area is about 85 miles east of Regina, the capital of Saskatchewan.
Chief Cadmusn Delmore of Cowessess said the graves had been marked. However, the Roman Catholic Church which operates the school has removed the marker.
“The pope needs to apologize for what happened,” he said.
“Apology is one step in the healing journey,” he continued.
Last month, the bodies of 215 children, some as young as 3 years old, were found buried in what was once the largest indigenous housing school in Indonesia. Canada. The school’s location is near Kamloops, British Columbia.
Following the discovery, Pope Francis expressed his pain at the discovery and pressured religious and political authorities to explain “this sad affair.”
But he did not convey the apology requested by the First Nations and the Prime Minister of Canada.
From the 19th century to the 1970s, more than 150,000 Indigenous children were forced to attend state-funded Christian schools. The school is run mostly by a congregation of Roman Catholic missionaries, in a campaign to assimilate them into Canadian society.
The Canadian government has recognized that physical and sexual violence is rampant in schools. Where in the violence students were beaten for speaking their mother tongue.
(lir / haf)
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