Bloods reject reprisals against French

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Blood Chief Roy Fox said his band has categorically rejected suggestions of reprisals against French advocated in a memorandum recently received at the Blood tribe office.

The memorandum received the week of July 20 encourages aboriginal people to take action against French people in Western Canada if Quebec moves against the Mohawks again.

The transcribed memo read in part: "If the French in Quebec seize Indian lands, Indians must seize French lands in response. If the French destroy Indian buildings and barricades, Indians must destroy French buildings."

The origin of the memo is unknown.

Meanwhile, about 90 members of the Blood tribe with Blackfeet supporters from Browning, Montana held an information picket Tuesday at the Carway, Canada / US border crossing to demonstrate their support for the Mohawks in Oka, Que. and to publicly denounce any type of reprisals against the French.

Wallace Many Fingers, executive coordinator of the Blood tribe administration said "The whole reason for holding the demonstration was Oka. The Blackfoot Confederacy extended its hand across the land in support of the Mohawks.

"We received a handwritten note, called the action memorandum, which urged us to take reprisals (against the French)." said Many Fingers. "Chief Roy Fox brought it up with Treaty 7 Chiefs at a meeting in Calgary. The chiefs said if this is the kind of thing circulating, then we want to counsel peace."

Many Fingers said he did not know if other Indian First Nations received copies of the memorandum.

Roy Fox said the suggestion for reprisals came from "a radical element in Western Canada who want to inflame the situation, destroy the gains (the French) communities have made in the area of language rights and drive a wedge between our respective peoples."

The Bloods call on Prime Minister Brian Mulroney to reconvene Parliament and appoint al all-party special committee to work on an equitable, just and enduring solution to the Quebec / Mohawk Nation standoff and a realistic land claims policy.

Many Fingers, organizer of the peaceful demonstration, said the band members also raised a Blood land claim issue at the rally and demanded the return of sacred artifacts from the Provincial Museum of Alberta in Edmonton.

The Bloods reaffirmed their withdrawal from the land claim process. The Bloods withdrew from the process when the office of specific claims rejected their claim in 1984. After eight years of court battles, the Bloods have instructed their legal council to discontinue the present court case of Shot Both Sides or more commonly known as The Big Claim.

Chief Roy Fox said "the current process has the perpetuator of the crime acting as lawmakers to judge his own case under rules set up to crush the powerless."

Protesters from both sides of the border handed out leaflets regarding Blackfoot sacred bundles and artifacts. The information package urged the Canadian government to enact laws "to protest the religious and cultural rights of Indian people."

Last month a delegation of Blackfeet Indians from Browning, Montana traveled to Edmonton hoping to convince museum administrators to return religious artifacts from the Scriver Collection to the Montana Blackfeet.

Sgt. Lock of the Cardston RCMP detachment said the demonstration was well organized. The Bloods "were very polite, very informative and carried out their demonstration in a very peaceful manner." The protesters slowed traffic but did not stop vehicles from crossing the border.