The World Sikh Or­ga­ni­za­tion of Canada has wel­comed the Fi­nal Re­port of the Na­tional In­quiry into Miss­ing and Mur­dered In­dige­nous Women and Girls, which af­firms that Canada has com­mit­ted geno­cide of in­dige­nous peo­ples.  

A DEV­AS­TAT­ING re­port that pins Canada as a coun­try which has com­mit­ted geno­cide of its in­dige­nous peo­ples called “Re­claim­ing Power and Place”, which makes 231 rec­om­men­da­tions for jus­tice was re­leased June 3 and has caused a stir all around Canada.

In a me­dia state­ment, WSO Pres­i­dent Mukhbir Singh has said, “All lev­els of gov­ern­ment in Canada must ad­dress what the Re­port calls the ‘per­sis­tent and de­lib­er­ate hu­man and In­dige­nous rights vi­o­la­tions and abus­es’ suf­fered by In­dige­nous women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA peo­ple.”

“The use of the word geno­cide can­not be taken lightly and this Re­port must prompt gov­ern­ments, law en­force­ment, busi­ness and other so­cial ac­tors to fi­nally ini­ti­ate real and sys­temic change.”

In a gi­gan­tic ef­fort, the Na­tional En­quiry panel lent a pa­tient ear to thou­sands of vic­tims and their fam­ily mem­bers over a pe­riod of three years. “We thank the Com­mis­sion for hear­ing the truths of over two thou­sand fam­ily mem­bers, sur­vivors of vi­o­lence, ex­perts and Knowl­edge Keep­ers,” stated the WSO re­lease.

The World Sikh Or­gan­i­sa­tion of Canada has al­luded to the geno­cide of Sikhs in In­dia and said, “The Sikh com­mu­nity has also suf­fered geno­cide and sys­tem­atic vi­o­lence in In­dia and we be­lieve that the ex­am­ple set by Canada in con­fronting past wrongs and hear­ing the voices of vic­tims, can set an ex­am­ple for other coun­tries.”

Ex­press­ing sol­i­dar­ity with the in­dige­nous peo­ples, the WSO said that “We will do all we can to stand with our In­dige­nous friends and sup­port their jour­neys of heal­ing. We call on Cana­dian Sikhs to read the Re­port and com­mit to the calls to ac­tion. WSO and Sikhs across Canada stand in sol­i­dar­ity with In­dige­nous peo­ples in their calls for safety, equal­ity and re­spect.”