4th Annual Memorial March for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women

The Anti Violence Project is honoured to support the organizers of the 4th Annual Memorial March for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women.

MEDIA CONTACT :
Sinead Charbonneau
250-­‐891-­‐1942

Indigenous women face among the highest rates of violence in Canada.
The 4th Annual Memorial March for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women will
be held on Sunday, February 12th, 2012, we will gather at 11:00 outside Our
Place at 919 Pandora Ave. At noon we will march down Pandora to Government
and on to Thunderbird Park. People are invited to gather at Thunderbird Park
around 1pm for an open memorial event with speeches, songs, food, and prayers.
This is a family event and people of all ages are welcome. There will be vans to
support Elders or those requiring assistance along the march as well as bus tickets.
The Memorial March originated 21 years ago, on February 14, in Vancouver’s
Downtown Eastside. The march calls attention to the disproportionately high
numbers of missing and murdered Indigenous women from this neighbourhood.
Today, this march has come to represent a time for remembering, grieving,
honouring, and seeking answers for Indigenous communities and their allies across
Canada. This march is a time to stand in solidarity with the families whose loved
ones have gone missing and been murdered from Vancouver Island and beyond.
According to the Native Women’s Association of Canada’s 2010 report, there are
over 600 missing and murdered Indigenous women in Canada. Of these deaths,
nearly half of the murder cases remain unsolved. Rates of violence against
Indigenous women are highest in British Columbia with 28% of the cases of
missing and murdered women occurring here. As this is a memorial, not a
protest, we ask people refrain from bringing banners, flags, or leaflets. People are
invited to wear red, or regalia, and to bring drums.
Violence against Indigenous women implicates all people who make home in today’s
“Canada.” This year, let us walk to honour those who are missing and murdered, and
say that today, this violence must stop with us.