Algonquins Erect Land Protection Camp within Wildlife Reserve, Stop Illegal Logging

10th Decem­ber  This past Spring, Quebec’s Min­istry of Nat­ur­al Resources—without mean­ing­ful­ly con­sult­ing the Algo­nquins of Bar­riere Lake—issued per­mits for the 2013–14 oper­at­ing year to Res­olute For­est Prod­ucts and oth­er large log­ging com­pa­nies who have sub­se­quent­ly clear-cut vast tracts of the for­est this past sum­mer and fall, up to last week, when the Algo­nquins stopped the unau­tho­rized log­ging, which has been tak­ing place in vio­la­tion of signed Agree­ments with the First Nation.

Res­olute For­est Prod­ucts and oth­er log­ging com­pa­nies have already dam­aged many sen­si­tive area sites on the Bar­riere Lake Tri­lat­er­al Agree­ment Ter­ri­to­ry, includ­ing sen­si­tive area sites which the Que­bec Min­istry of Nat­ur­al Resources and the log­ging com­pa­nies know to be of par­tic­u­lar cul­tur­al and eco­log­i­cal impor­tance.

Today the Algo­nquins have erect­ed a Land Pro­tec­tion camp with­in the La Verendrye Wildlife Reserve at the Poigan sec­tor, to stop unau­tho­rized log­ging from dam­ag­ing Algo­nquin cul­tur­al sites and crit­i­cal wildlife habi­tat until an already agreed upon Mea­sures to Har­mo­nize Process is re-estab­lished on an urgent basis. The Algo­nquins of Bar­riere Lake are demand­ing that the Que­bec gov­ern­ment:

• Coop­er­ate in a mea­sures to har­mo­nize process to iden­ti­fy and pro­tect cul­tur­al and eco­log­i­cal sites.
• Hon­our the 1991 land­mark Bar­riere Lake Tri­lat­er­al Agree­ment and relat­ed 1998 Agree­ment with Que­bec on Co-Man­age­ment and Resource Rev­enue Shar­ing among oth­er issues.