MNO in the international arena

Compiled by Linda Lord from Tony Belcourt's notes.

As many of our readers know, Tony Belcourt, the President of the MNO, also represents Métis internationally on behalf of the MNC. March 6-9, 2001, Tony attended the UN World Conference Against Racism (WCAR), Intersessional Working Group Meeting in Geneva, Switzerland. The Department of Canadian Heritage provided financial support for his participation.

Member states of the United Nations convened in this Intersessional Working Group (IWG) at UN High Commission on Human Rights (UNHCHR) Headquarters in Geneva to review a Draft Declaration and Programme of Action for the WCAR. Accredited Non- Governmental Organizations (NGO's) also attended and were provided opportunity to participate.

The objective of the meeting was to complete the review of this document by the end of the session. Because of procedural wrangling, the review did not get fully under way until Thursday. The meeting adjourned on Friday having dealt with clauses on pages 1 - 3 only of the draft document. The Secretariat is trying to schedule the extended meeting of the IWG for the first week of May, 2001. A Preparatory Conference, which will not only further deal with text but will also deal with the agenda and logistical arrangements for the World Conference, will take place as planned on May 21 to June 1, 2001. The World Conference is in Durban, South Africa, August 31 to September 7, 2001.

The Secretariat's draft document was supposed to be the "roll up" of the drafts from each of four Regional Conferences held around the world last year. Those were: the European Conference in Strasbourg, France; the Asian Conference held in Teheran, Iran; the African Conference held in Dakar, Senegal; and the Americas Conference held in Santiago, Chile. Copies of the reports from these meetings.The delegates from the Asian, African, Latin American and Caribbean countries were very displeased with the draft. They were upset that the draft was not, in their opinions, fully reflective of all of the regions and that it was also structurally deficient. New Zealand and Australia were denied participation in the Asian Regional Conference. The views of these two important countries were therefore not included in any reports of the Regional Conferences.

The Secretariat also decided, retroactively last week, that there would be no official "satellite conferences" and therefore the meeting of Indigenous Peoples that took place in Sydney, Australia, was not considered a "regional meeting". Consequently, its report was not considered by the Secretariat when it prepared its draft.

Following a day of opening comments, the debate degenerated and the meeting broke into regional caucuses. The NGO's broke into their own meetings. The Indigenous Caucus went to work on the Secretariat's draft text. A statement addressing the concerns of Indigenous Peoples regarding the text of the "Draft Programme of Action for Equality and Non-Discrimination" is yet to be prepared.

Meanwhile at home, plans are under way for a national meeting to be hosted jointly by the Métis National Council (MNC), Assembly of First Nations (AFN) and Inuit Tapirisat of Canada (ITC) in early May in Vancouver. Other related meetings include:

• the Indigenous Summit of the Americas in Ottawa, March 28 - 31, 2001;
• the Organization of American States (OAS) preparatory meeting April 2 - 6, 2001 in Washington with regard to the forthcoming Summit of the Americas;
• the Summit of the Americas, meeting in Quebec City on April 21, 22, 2001.

One important objective of the joint meeting by National Aboriginal organizations in Vancouver is to prepare a consensus position to be presented to Canada and to the UN WCAR. There is increasing interest and attention paid to the WCAR and, following Durban, there will be opportunity to hold Canada accountable to an action plan to combat racism at home. This is of major significance to us given that racism is so intrinsic to the discriminatory policies of governments and the treatment of our people by government officials, the police, media and the public at large. This subject is also on the agenda of the Summit of the Americas.