In the News
February 14 Memorial Marches
All Out to Support the Families of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls!
All Out to Oppose State-Organized Violence and
Genocide Against Indigenous Peoples
30th Annual Women’s Memorial March, Vancouver, February 14, 2021. (V. Peters)
On February 14, marches are being held across Canada by the friends and families of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, and all those who stand with the Indigenous peoples and their affirmation of their right to be. They demand justice for these crimes and an end to state-organized violence against the Indigenous peoples.
The injuries, killings and disappearances have taken place under the conditions of state-organized racist violence and genocide. These conditions have been part of official colonial policy toward the Indigenous peoples since Canada came into being, and under them Indigenous women in particular are considered fair game.
This is the 31st year that such marches have been held. Organizers in Vancouver explain;
“The first women’s memorial march was held in 1992 in response to the murder of a woman on Powell Street in Vancouver. Out of this sense of hopelessness and anger came an annual march on Valentine’s Day to express compassion, community, and caring for all women in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside [DTES] on unceded Coast Salish territories.
“The memorial march continues to honour the lives of missing and murdered women, and all women’s and gender-diverse peoples’ lives lost in the DTES. Increasing deaths of many women and gender-diverse people from the DTES still leave family, friends, loved ones, and community members with an overwhelming sense of grief and loss.
“Indigenous women, girls, two spirit and trans people disproportionately continue to go missing or be murdered with minimal to no action to address these tragedies or the systemic nature of gendered violence, poverty, racism, or colonialism.”
These conditions must be brought to an end and Canada must make restitution for its crimes and establish just relations with the Indigenous peoples on a principled nation-to-nation basis.
CPC(M-L) calls on everyone to go all out to participate in this year’s events.
(Renewal Update, posted February 12, 2022)