Low-level flights over Labrador to increase

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Innu Nation spokesman Penote Michel maintains the environmental review of military low-level flights over Labrador is a farce, and the Canadian Forces announcement it plans to allow four additional countries access to the airspace seems to prove this out.

Michel said agreements with Belgium, France, Italy and the U.S. will see an increase in the number of flights taken over the land as early as this summer. Germany, British and Dutch military have been active in flight training in the area for nine years.

They are increasing the number of participants involved in low-level flying over Innu land even before the recommendations of the environmental panel are released, so they must have the inside track as to what those recommendations will be, said Michel.

"The Department of National Defence has been marketing Goose Bay to the world's air forces for quite some time and can't wait for the review process to end before announcing the results of this international sales job.

A DND request to allow the number of low-level sorties to be increased from

7,000 flights annually to 15,000 plus 3,000 additional flights at higher altitudes is at the heart of the current battle for the Innu. The Innu contend the flights are detrimental to the wildlife and people who live in the training areas.

Michel said supporters of the Innu have held protests, most notably at the American Embassy in Ottawa in January, to direct attention to their cause. The Innu boycotted the environmental impact hearings, saying they were a farce and a waste of time.

"Nothing we would have said would have prevented DND from proceeding with the expansion of the military presence in our airspace," said Michel.

A Canadian Air Force spokesman denies there has been any negotiations with the Americans to do low-level flight training in Labrador. Capt. Luc Plourde at CFB Goose Bay explained that a squadron of F-16 fighters will be at Goose Bay from April 20 to 27 and requested they be allowed to do some low-level training during those six days.

Innu charge they will make 168 sorties during this time. Plourde said the squadron would be limited by mechanical and weather considerations so there wouldn't be that many flights.

Michel is not convinced.

"After more than 10 years of hard opposition to the training, we are confronted with more, not less training. It's obvious that our culture, thousands of years of occupation in the Quebec-Labrador peninsula, and Aboriginal rights mean very little to the Canadian government.