In April, the Blue Planet Project was at the United Nations in Geneva highlighting Canada’s violations of the human right to water with member states in advance of the UN’s universal periodic review (UPR) of Canada’s human rights record. Blue Planet Project campaigner Meera Karunananthan was joined by representatives of the Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO), the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), and Professor Lynda Collins, co-chair of the Centre for Environmental Law and Global Sustainability at the University of Ottawa.
Karunananthan raised with UN member states the appalling manner in which the Harper government is dismantling environmental protections and attacking civil society checks and balances in order to push through massive extractive projects that have been harmful to people and the environment in Canada and abroad. The MKO argued that there are 1,000 First Nations homes without basic water and sanitation infrastructure in Northern Manitoba alone and that indigenous populations do not benefit from the $3 billion a year made from the sale of natural resources in the territories of the 30 First Nations communities it represents. While CUPE said that Canada undermines – through an ideological push for public-private partnerships (P3s) – municipal public water and sanitation systems that have provided excellent drinking water and sanitation services for decades.
The National Post reported, “‘Canada has not been listening to civil society, labour and indigenous voices in Canada’, said Meera Karunananthan, a Council of Canadians campaigner who was in Geneva this week, along with others, challenging Canada’s human rights record. Grand Chief David Harper of the Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimaka, who also travelled to Geneva, said ‘1,880 First Nation homes in Canada do not have clean running water.'”
The delegation met with almost a dozen key UN member states from Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia. On April 26, during the universal periodic review, Germany, Spain, Ecuador, Norway and Egypt all raised the human right to water and asked very clearly for this right to be recognized in Canada.
For more, please read:
Human Rights Council UPR report on Canada
UN must challenge Canada’s complicity in mining’s human rights abuses
Canadian delegation urges UN to challenge Canada’s record on human right to water
Challenging Canada at the UN on Earth Day
Canada’s violations of the human right to water
