Mohawks raise spectre of another protest

Andrew Thomson, CanWest News Service

Published: Monday, April 23, 2007

A spokesman for the Tyendinaga Mohawks near Napanee, Ont., vowed yesterday to stage another protest within 30 days similar to the railway blockade that halted passenger and freight trains running across Eastern Ontario.

The Mohawks peacefully removed their railway blockade ahead of schedule on Saturday morning, ending a standoff with police and freeing up trains.

The blockade's removal meant the re-start of railway traffic on the busy Toronto-Montreal corridor late on Saturday morning. Passenger trains were running as scheduled by the afternoon, though with delays from anywhere between 40 minutes to two hours.

Shawn Brant, a blockade leader, said that other economic targets were being eyed by those protesting land issues in the Bay of Quinte region. "We wanted to show [the government] that we were serious and we don't feel they should be questioning our resolve in dealing with this matter because we will act on the next target," he said yesterday.

A community meeting on Friday raised concerns about the potential for violence. Residents were also worried the federal government would walk away from land negotiations if the blockade continued, Mr. Brant said.

The barriers came down peacefully at about 6 a.m. -- 18 hours earlier then the group had planned. There were no arrests, according to the Ontario Provincial Police.

"We went in on a consensus basis and we discussed it, and we reduced our time from 48 hours to 30 hours in order that we could come out together," Mr. Brant said. "It wasn't the result of a gun to our head." They were protesting a proposed condominium development on the Culbertson Tract, a 375-hectare area claimed by the Mohawks, along with a controversial gravel quarry nearby.

Mr. Brant had also alluded to the one-year anniversary of the Caledonia standoff and the recent suspension of Tyendinaga's police chief for alleged racist comments about the RCMP he made to a local newspaper.

Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice told CBC News Saturday there was "no excuse" for the blockade, which would hamper public support for the Mohawk land claims and hurt the negotiation process.

The blockade, which began at midnight on Friday with a burnt out school bus, closed the double track CN line at Deseronto Road, a rural road dividing Napanee and Tyendinaga Townships. A court injunction to "cease and desist was ignored.

Meanwhile, the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) is planning to lead a protest today at Queen's Park in support of the Tyendinaga Mohawks.