By Portia K. Skenandore-Wheelock
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America

SMITHERS, British Columbia – Highway 16 is a remote stretch of road that cuts west across four provinces in Canada to the Pacific Ocean. A section of the road in British Columbia runs near remote logging towns and Indian reserves and has become known as the “Highway of Tears” due to the dozens of women and girls that have gone missing or been murdered near the highway. Most of these women and girls are indigenous and almost all of the cases continue to go unsolved.

The impoverished area and nonexistent public transportation has made hitchhiking a common means of transit. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) formed a special unit that has officially linked eighteen of these unsolved cases that occurred from 1969 to 2006 to the highway but families, activists, and the Minister of Indigenous and Northern Affairs, Carolyn Bennett, believe the number is much higher. Complaints of racism and sexism committed by the police as well as disparities in police action for non-Indigenous women that have gone missing are behind this claim. Minister Bennett said the police often fail to do investigations and deem the deaths of indigenous women and girls to be suicides, accidents, or drug overdoses. She said, “What’s clear is the uneven application of justice.”

A United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women report completed last year found the previous government’s efforts under Prime Minister Stephen Harper to protect indigenous women from harm to be “inadequate” and found “grave violations” of the women’s human rights with the lack of an inquiry into the disappearances and murders. The report said failures by law enforcement have “resulted in impunity.”

Canada’s new government led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has promised a “total renewal” of the country’s relationship with indigenous people and in December Trudeau announced a National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls which completed the public participation stage of the inquiry design process this past spring. Nationally, the RCMP has officially counted a total of 1,181 missing and murdered indigenous women and girls but research done by the Native Women’s Association of Canada finds the number could be as high as 4,000 women and girls. The national inquiry is expected to cost $40 million ($31 million U.S.).

British Columbia has committed $3 million to improve public transit along the “Highway of Tears.” This includes extending transit services, sharing costs with First Nations reserves for community vans, and highway infrastructure safety improvements, including webcams and transit shelters.

Families and supporters continue their efforts to search for the missing. Ten years ago families walked a 700km stretch of Highway 16 from Prince Rupert to Prince George to raise awareness and improve safety along the highway and the walk is being done again over the next three weeks, ending on June 21, National Aboriginal Day. The first walk ended with a two-day Highway of Tears Symposium that focused on prevention, support, and emergency planning. Since then the Highway of Tears Initiative has been making efforts to implement recommendations from the symposium to build community supports and do workshops with first responders, but with limited funding. Brenda Wilson, the only official staff member of the initiative, said, “Some of the things with the government have changed. They’re starting to recognize the work that needs to be done in a lot of our communities between Prince George and Prince Rupert. This is Northern British Columbia. We need to be in the forefront. We can no longer be silenced. We need to be a part of British Columbia.”

For further information, please see:

New York Times – Dozens of Women Vanish on Canada’s Highway of Tears, and Most Cases Are Unsolved – 24 May 2016

CBC – Highway of Tears ‘cleansing walk’ begins in Prince Rupert – 3 June 2016

The UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, Report of the Inquiry Concerning Canada – 30 March 2015

The Government of Canada – National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls – 8 March 2016