Dancers celebrate the signing of a transfer of control of the cared children to the community in Cowess’s First Nation, Saskatchewan, Canada, in front of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (left) and Chief Cadmus Delorme. Cowesss is also the site of a former boarding school with unmarked graves. Liam Richards / The Canadian Press via AP Hide caption
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Liam Richards / The Canadian Press via AP
Dancers celebrate the signing of a transfer of control of the cared children to the community in Cowess’s First Nation, Saskatchewan, Canada, in front of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (left) and Chief Cadmus Delorme. Cowesss is also the site of a former boarding school with unmarked graves.
Liam Richards / The Canadian Press via AP
VANCOUVER, British Columbia – Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says his “heart breaks” after discovering more unmarked graves on the grounds of an indigenous residential school in the southern Gulf Islands off the coast of British Columbia.
The Penelakut tribe say more than 160 undocumented and unmarked graves were found on the site of the former Kuper Island Indian Industrial School.
“I acknowledge that these results only add to the pain families, survivors and all indigenous peoples and communities are already feeling as they reaffirm the truth they have long known,” Trudeau said during a news conference in Ottawa on Tuesday.
“For the members of the Penelakut tribe, we are here for you. We cannot bring back the lost, but we can and will continue to tell the truth, ”Trudeau said.
The Penelakut tribe issued a letter saying the graves were found on the site of the former dormitory on what is now Penelakut Island between Vancouver Island and mainland BC, about 126 kilometers southwest of Vancouver.
“We know that many of our brothers and sisters from our neighboring communities attended Kuper Island Industrial School,” said Chief Joan Brown’s letter. “We also recognize with great sadness and loss that too many have not returned home.”
The Kuper Island Indian Industrial School was operated by the Roman Catholic Church from 1890 to 1969 when it was taken over by the federal government. The school closed in 1975 and the building was demolished in the 1980s.
Trudeau said the federal government will work with indigenous peoples to combat discrimination and systemic racism.
In recent months, nearly 1,000 unmarked graves have been discovered on former residential school grounds in British Columbia and Saskatchewan.
In July, ground penetrating radar found 182 human remains near a former dormitory in Cranbrook, BC, 524 miles east of Vancouver.
Just a week earlier, Cowesss First Nation, located about 135 kilometers east of Saskatchewan’s capital, Regina, said investigators had found “at least 600” unmarked graves on the site of a former Marieval Indian residential school.
In May, the remains of 215 children, some of whom were only three years old, were found buried on the grounds of what was once Canada’s largest indigenous residential school near Kamloops, BC, 354 kilometers east of Vancouver.
From the 19th century through the 1970s, more than 150,000 Indigenous children were forced to attend state-funded Christian schools, most of which were run by Roman Catholic missionaries, to integrate them into Canadian society.
The Canadian government has admitted that physical and sexual abuse was rampant in schools and that students were beaten for speaking their mother tongue.
Two members of parliament from the New Democratic Party have called on the federal government to investigate allegations of “crimes against humanity” in boarding schools.
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