THE THUNDER BAY POLICE SERVICE

Canada’s three most western provinces are taking exception to cigarettes crossing their borders and bearing only the federal stamp for taxes paid.

Rainbow Tobacco Company’s latest shipment of cigarettes, a gift to a woman in the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations, was the latest tobacco seized by a provincial financial department.

Windspeaker: What one quality do you most value in a friend?
Inez: Trustworthiness. It’s hard to come by these days, but I’ve been blessed with some good solid friends.

W: What is it that really makes you mad?
I.J.: Ignorance and racism. It makes my blood boil.

W: When are you at your happiest?
I.J.: It’s a toss up: Either when I’m getting a tickle attack from my son or rocking out onstage.

Hundreds of people battled heavy rain to gather in solidarity and remember the missing and murdered women of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. The 20th Annual Women’s Memorial March was held Feb. 14.

“We are here because we are failing to protect women from the degradation of poverty and systemic exploitation, abuse and violence,” said organizer Marlene George in a statement before the march. “We are here in sorrow and in anger because the violence continues each and every day and the list of missing and murdered women gets longer every year,” she said.

THE TELEGRAPH-JOURNAL REPORTS

The Yinka Dene Alliance has rejected the financial incentives offered by Enbridge, which wants to cut through their lands to build its $5.5 billion Northern Gateway project. With about a quarter of the lands necessary to accommodate the proposed right-of-way of the project, the rejection of the plan by the alliance is pretty significant. That is if it’s really a rejection, and not part of the negotiation dance.

Can a person come back from a bad choice, like the lack of judgment Chief Guy Lonechild demonstrated when he chose to drive while under the influence in 2009, before he was elected to lead the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations? Well, some have, but will he?

Lillian Jones was sure that she had dodged a bullet when her second child Samantha was born at a healthy 7 lbs, 6 oz. and continued to eat and grow well. But at six months old Samantha caught a cold. She didn’t have just the usual symptoms of a stuffy, runny nose, crankiness and loss of appetite. Samantha also developed tremors.
Jones, concerned that something was seriously wrong, took Samantha to the hospital emergency department. Samantha spent the next month in hospital in an oxygen tent fighting for every breath and losing weight.

Solar-powered housing in First Nations communities will be given serious consideration in an international competition to take place this fall in the United States.

A group of University of Calgary students, with the input of a Treaty 7 Aboriginal Advisory Council, has developed TRTL (pronounced “turtle”), which relies heavily on the influence of the Treaty 7 First Nations culture while addressing modern day  issues such as mold, fire, and infrastructure details.

Myron Lameman fuses activism, filmmaking, comedy, and drama to raise awareness about the circumstances faced by his community.

“What I really hope to do is make Indigenous issues accessible,” he said. “There are themes that affect everyone.”

Lameman, who splits his time between Portland, Oregon, and his home community of Beaver Lake Cree Nation, has been making films for the last couple of years.

His most recent comedic short film, Blue in the Face, was screened at the 11th annual imagineNATIVE film festival in Toronto, Oct. 21 - 24.