Canada’s Independent Special Interlocutor for Missing Children and Unmarked Graves and Burial Sites at Indian Residential Schools has released her preliminary report.
Kimberly Murray was appointed to the role last year and tasked with leading engagements with Indigenous families, groups, and communities.
Ultimately, her goal is to determine how government can better support Indigenous people in the search for their missing loved ones.
That includes improving laws related to the identifying, protecting and preservation of unmarked burial sites at former Residential School sites.
Her report found a need to expand investigations beyond identified sites, implement recommendations faster, and clean up patch-work laws.
She has brought forward 48 findings based on 12 areas of common concern for everyone she spoke with.
Among those concerns are: access to and destruction of records, increases in violence related to denialism, a lack of funding, repatriation of children, challenges with media and public disclosures, and a need for Indigenous health and wellness supports.
It also lays the foundation for a repatriation framework to address gaps and barriers in Canada’s colonial legal system.
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