Oct 20, 2007
Kingston Whig Standard
The Algonquins who have occupied the site of a proposed uranium mine north of Sharbot Lake for almost four months have all but vacated.
Members of the Ardoch Algonquin and Shabot Obaadjiwan First Nations have moved all of their people from the property that is being prospected for uranium by Oakville-based Frontenac Ventures, said Lynn Daniluk, a spokeswoman for local non-Aboriginals who have been supporting the native protest.
"There is still one last trailer that has to come out and they are working on getting that out in the next few days, but there's no one actually on the site," Daniluk said in an interview yesterday.
The evacuation comes as a result of a pledge by the Ontario government to talk to the Algonquins about land- claim issues related to the site. The withdrawal agreement will allow for 12 weeks of mediation with the province.
As part of the tentative truce, the Algonquins have agreed to join nonnative protesters outside the gate to the property and to allow Frontenac Ventures staff to conduct non-drilling exploration under the watchful eye of a monitor.
In return, Frontenac Ventures will not pursue a motion for contempt-of-court charges it initiated after protesters refused to obey a judge's order to vacate.
The two sides, which have been involved in court battles since July 30, were supposed to return to court to deal with the contempt motion on Nov. 14.
The motion asked that the protesters be jailed, fined $5,000 for each day of the occupation, and pay the company $50,000 in punitive damages.
The announcement, which came at a news conference at the site yesterday morning, coincided with a teleconference call between lawyers for the province, the Algonquins and Frontenac Ventures.
Chris Reid, who represents the Ardoch Algonquins, and Neal Smitheman, who represents Frontenac Ventures, said they hope a final deal will be hammered out by tomorrow when the Algonquins and their non-Aboriginal neighbours gather for a public meeting in Sharbot Lake.
"The lawyers had a good chat this morning and I think there is compromise in the air," Reid said yesterday. "I think we're within days, if not hours, of finalizing this."
As of yesterday, only three matters were unresolved.
It hadn't yet been decided how to monitor the work Frontenac Ventures does on the site and who will mediate discussions over how to resolve the land dispute. Also undetermined was the area of land that will be negotiated in any mediation with the province.
The Ontario government wants to limit discussions to the property that is named in the litigation, while the Algonquins want to discuss a larger territory that encompasses a number of watersheds, Reid said.
"Everyone's going back to get some instructions from their respective clients," Smitheman said.
This is not the first attempt to hammer out a temporary truce.
The Algonquins thought they had struck a deal Oct. 5, but backed away when the provincial government proposed to limit talks between the government and Algonquins to "unstaked" lands in the area, as opposed to the 30,000 disputed acres claimed by Frontenac Ventures. Bob Lovelace, a former Ardoch Algonquin chief and group spokesman, said at the time that the move undermined "the spirit of the agreement."
Yesterday's tentative agreement came the day after the news media received a confusing release from the Community Coalition Against Mining Uranium.
The release claimed Frontenac Ventures had given the Algonquins 24 hours to abandon the mine site and that a judge's order to evacuate would be served yesterday morning and the contempt allegations continued.
Smitheman said no such call was made to police.
"It's not true. It's just misinformation and it's irresponsible," he said, adding that he heard the information about the threat came from the OPP.
Const. Paige Whiting, the media relations officer for Lanark OPP, wasn't at work today and couldn't be reached, but her communications boss, Sgt. Kristine Rae, said no such order was to be served yesterday.
"We have spoken to the interested parties and there is nothing going on," she said.
Daniluk, who issued the release to media, said the OPP's Major Events Liaison Team, which has been liaising with non-Aboriginal protesters, sent her a release Thursday warning her about the threat.
She said members of the team assured about 100 protesters at the site yesterday that the order wasn't going to be served.
"They seem to have changed their story," she said. "Part of that seems to have come from the media people phoning them and questioning them."
Supported by local non-native residents, the Algonquins have occupied the site on Highway 509 since June 29, a national Aboriginal day of action.
They say the provincial government shouldn't have allowed Frontenac Ventures to prospect there before consulting with them because the land belongs to them.
According to an agreement signed by the British in 1763, any land not sold to or surrendered to the Crown belongs to their native allies.
The occupation prompted Frontenac Ventures to launch a $77-million lawsuit against the Algonquins and to ask a judge to force the protesters off their land.
The judge gave the order, but the Algonquins have so far refused to leave and the OPP have taken no action, claiming that they would be seen as taking sides on the issue.
Throughout the court process, the Algonquins have said they would end the occupation if the province agreed to begin meaningful land claim discussions.