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HEARST-Constance Lake has identified a problem with prescription drug abuse on its reserve. They are seeking the assistance of other communities and organizations that are dealing with the same situation.

Band authorities say as many as 900 tablets of prescription drugs such as Oxycodone, Oxycontin and Percocet are coming into the community at one time and being sold for $9 a tablet. Chief Arthur Moore said "The major challenges of this drug problem are accessibility and tolerance."

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OTTAWA-Amnesty International has released a report stating "Canadian officials have too long ignored the threat to Indigenous women in Canadian towns and cities. Many are missing, some have been murdered, and Canadian authorities are not doing enough to stop the violence."

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The most recent round of negotiations on the decades old and often volatile Temagami land claim have lasted three years and are about to enter another phase. Development on Timiskaming Crown land was stalled for years when a land caution preventing staking and exploration activities was attached to nearly 10,000 square kilometres of land in the district as a result of the Native claim.

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The North American Indigenous Games (NAIG) is returning to Canada, but not until 2008.

British Columbia officials are thrilled Cowichan Valley on Vancouver Island has been named the host. The official announcement was made Oct. 22 following a NAIG council meeting in Uncasville, Conn.

"We're very excited about this, both from a community and provincial level," Minister of Skills Development and Labour Graham Bruce told Raven's Eye. "It's created quite a buzz here."

Bruce was co-chair of the Cowichan Valley bid.

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There is no shortage of guidebooks and instructional seminars for the international business traveller, but they don't spell out how to work with Aboriginal people, a Justice Institute spokesman claims.

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Vancouver-based Meis artist Sandy Scofield sange to an appreciative audience during the True North Wild and Free performance on the Horowitz Stage at the University of Alberta. The Nov. 5 event was a fundraiser for the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) Edmonton chapter, and it was part of a cross-country tour by CPAWS to promote the preservation of the Canadian boreal forest.

"Well I think it's a really wicked cause what they're doing. It just struck me as something I would like to do," Scofield told Raven's Eye.

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"It's an exciting project," the new president of SEM Resort Ltd. said about the joint venture corporation that recently rescued the financially foundering St. Eugene Mission Resort to turn it into a top-rung tourist draw.

Daniel Shilling, understandably, does not want to dwell on past "management problems and cost over-runs." He sees great opportunities for this resort located in the St. Mary's River Valley that opened for business in January 2003.

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Now that the federal court has ruled that off-reserve Aboriginal people have been discriminated against when it comes to skills and training funding, what has the federal government done to remedy that discrimination?

Pit on-reserve people against off-reserve people in a scrap over money, say two women associated with a Toronto Aboriginal employment and training agency.

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"In 2002-2003, the oil and gas activity increased by 62 per cent," Treaty 8 First Nations chair Chief Liz Logan said about exploration in their traditional territory in British Columbia. "And then this year, just to August, it increased another 27 per cent, and so the province is really encouraging development."

The problem with that, the chief explained, is that "They don't want to look at the cumulative effect of all of this. Everybody is just looking at each well. They're looking at site-specific stuff. Nobody wants to look at the big picture.

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Foster parents and their supporters who want to draw attention to the strengths and problems of the foster care system launched a unique project this month to put the system in the public eye.

Gary Mavis, executive director of the Federation of Aboriginal Foster Parents (FAFP), spoke to Raven's Eye on Nov. 3 about the launch of the Aboriginal Foster Doll Awareness project by his organization the previous day.

The project has three main goals:

* Humanize young people in care

* Acknowledge British Columbia's good work, and