Canadian Natives protest forestry in United States

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The Cree international campaign on forestry is catching fire in Washington, D.C.

Crees addressed a rally of about 100 people against Canada's forestry policies outside the White House in April.

They were joined by officials of the British Columbia Interior Alliance, which represents five First Nations that cover a quarter of the province, as well as by American and Canadian environmentalists.

After the demonstration, the First Nations officials and environmentalists held a press conference to denounce Canada's weak regulations governing forestry.

They said Canada's limp environmental rules and its coziness with the forestry industry not only damage wildlife and Native ways of life, but also amount to an unfair subsidy for cheap Canadian timber exports that are flooding the United States.

They said they were forced to take their concerns to Washington because no one is listening in Canada.

"It's obvious that the fate of the Crees is linked to the fate of the trees," said Romeo Saganash, the Grand Council of the Crees' director of Quebec relations.

"If there are no trees, there are no Crees. Our cultural survival is at stake here."

While in Washington, Native leaders also met with U.S. congressional staff and handed in submissions outlining their complaints to U.S. trade officials, who are about to start renegotiating the Canada-U.S. Softwood Lumber Agreement.

Chief Alfred Manuel, spokesman for the B.C. Interior Alliance, said the concerns of Canadian First Nations have to be on the table at those negotiations.

"All sales of timber from British Columbia are stolen timber. We're subsidizing the British Columbia forestry industry based on the fact that they don't have to deal with our Aboriginal title," he said. "It allows Canadian timber to be sold dirt cheap in the U.S."

The Crees and B.C. First Nations have made a tactical alliance with U.S. forestry industry groups to call Canada to the floor over its weak forestry regulations. Especially irksome is the fact that Canada has some of the world's lowest stumpage fees - which are a kind of tax that the provinces charge forestry companies to cut public trees.

U.S. industry lobby groups charge that the low stumpage fees mean Canadian wood exporters can undersell American companies, threatening U.S. jobs.

One American environmentalist at the press conference said Canada's forestry industry is stuck in the 'dinosaur' age.

"It's pretty clear that what is going on is liquidation forestry. It's the antithesis of free trade. It is inflicting huge amounts of injury on eco-systems, on Native people and U.S. livelihoods."

The Washington events are the latest Cree actions since they promised in March to launch an international protest against the handling of a $500-million Cree lawsuit against forestry activities in their homeland in northern Quebec.

In March, a judge who had rendered a pro-Cree ruling in the lawsuit was removed from the case and replaced with a judge who had formerly worked as a Quebec government lawyer. Outraged, the Crees threatened to tear up the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement and asked for support from First Nations across the country to denounce the judge's removal.