Many of you may remember the moment: it was a chilly winter day in November 2021 when news broke that photojournalist Amber Bracken had been arrested by the RCMP while reporting for The Narwhal from Wet’suwet’en territory in northwestern B.C.

Uproar ensued: international media attention, outrage from press freedom organizations and an all-hands-on-deck legal effort to get Amber out of jail. Thousands of people wrote letters to federal and provincial officials demanding Amber’s release and hundreds donated to aid in her legal defence.

After three nights in jail, Amber was released. About a month later, just before Christmas, charges against her were quietly dropped. But the battle didn’t end there.

Today The Narwhal and Amber Bracken have filed a lawsuit in British Columbia’s Supreme Court against the RCMP for wrongful arrest, wrongful detention and violation of our Charter rights.

As a small, non-profit news organization, we didn’t want to have to bring a lengthy, expensive litigation against one of the most powerful organizations in our country. But ultimately we realized we had no other choice. To not move forward with this case would be to turn our backs on what’s right — and to turn our backs on all the stories that happen in remote places without the watchful eyes of journalists, due to the chilling effect of arrests like these. 

Bracken’s arrest is part of a troubling pattern of RCMP infringing on press freedom, whether at the Fairy Creek logging blockades, where RCMP used illegal exclusion zones to prevent journalists from reporting on arrests, or at Land Back Lane in Ontario where journalist Karl Dockstader was charged for failing to comply with an injunction while reporting from the frontlines of the conflict.

All too often, these incidents also involve Indigenous Rights. Previous court rulings have been clear: the arrest of Indigenous Peoples on their lands concerns every single person in this country — and should be a matter of public record, not hidden behind police lines.

Our case aims to establish meaningful consequences for police when they interfere with the constitutional rights of journalists covering events in injunction zones, including both journalists’ liberty rights and the freedom of the press as protected by section 2(b) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

In filing this lawsuit, our goal is to clear a path for all journalists in Canada to do their work without risk of police interference. 

Let’s be clear: we would never have been able to take this bold step without the support of our thousands of readers, donors and members. Today, when we walked into a courthouse in Vancouver to file our court documents, we imagined thousands of you walking with us, hand in hand in this mission to hold the RCMP accountable.

This is going to be a long journey, and we invite you to walk with us. Here are two ways you can join us:

1. Register to attend our live online event on Wednesday, featuring myself, Carol Linnitt, Amber Bracken, legal counsel Sean Hern and Brent Jolly, president of the Canadian Association of Journalists.
2. Make a donation to our legal defence fund for this case.  

If you have burning questions about the case, check out our FAQ page. If you can’t find your answer there, send us an email.

Thank you for your support as we work to defend press freedom in Canada.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

“We were detained for days in cold cells. They took most of our clothes, denied us soap and toothbrushes, and only allowed us to speak to our lawyers.”

On its website, Reporters Without Borders has a brightly coloured interactive map of the world illustrating the results of its World Press Freedom Index, which identifies nations deemed to adequately uphold press freedoms within their borders. Green indicates countries with a “good situation,” yellow means “satisfactory,” light orange is “problematic,” dark orange is “difficult,” and red is “very serious.” The Arab region, including Egypt, where I have roots, is largely and unambiguously demarcated by red, while Canada is yellow.

And yet the opening quote was not uttered by a journalist from the red or orange nations. These are the words of photojournalist Amber Bracken, detailing her treatment at the hands of the RCMP in Canada last year. And they are hauntingly similar to words we have read and heard frequently from journalists working under seemingly impossible circumstances in countries relegated to the inglorious lower levels of the press freedom rankings.

If the red areas on the world map represent an information gap, dark red cracks have gradually been tarnishing Canada’s bright yellow reputation. On Nov. 19, 2021, two journalists, including Bracken, and several protesters, including Sleydo’ Molly Wickham, a wing Chief of the Gidimt’en clan, and Jocey Alec, daughter of Hereditary Chief Woos, were arrested on the Coastal GasLink drill site near the Wedzin Kwa (Morice) River in British Columbia.

As well, since a May 2021 injunction against the Fairy Creek blockade, more than 1,100 protesters have been arrested on southern Vancouver Island as they fought to protect what remains of our old-growth forests and First Nations territories. During the blockade, the largest act of civil disobedience in Canadian history, the media was shackled behind a vast exclusion zone, with the RCMP initially prohibiting all journalists from entering the area.

On the day of the Coastal GasLink arrests, I felt the need to rub my eyes when I read a headline calling into question Canada’s press freedom. Was I reading this right? Surely there must be a mix-up. And when I read of the attempt to block the collection and dissemination of information on the Fairy Creek protest, I thought of the media blackout in Egypt during the early days of the 2011 Revolution. With tens of thousands of people on the street demanding their basic rights, the state-controlled broadcaster continued to present its regular programming, completely denying the reality unfolding on its streets. What was that if not a clear example of democratic failure?

For more than a decade, I have studied and worked on media in areas that include some of the most commonly cited violators of press freedom in the world, researching and writing on the Arab region and its media landscape for international media outlets, commentary websites and academic journals. I began my career hungry to change stereotypical representations of Arabs in the West, and became engrossed in the intricate and at times dangerous web of the region’s diverse and complex media systems. Implanting myself in them seemed like the only fair way to make my own determinations on the narratives of oppression and censorship.

By virtue of genetics and close family ties, I have always felt a deep connection to the Arab region, and to Egypt specifically. My father moved from there to Canada in 1969 to complete his PhD at the University of Waterloo, where he met my Saskatchewan-born mother, who was also pursuing her PhD. I have existed in an odd balance, firmly Canadian but abundantly aware of my roots and the responsibilities that I internalized as a result of those roots. But if I were to be truly, uncomfortably honest, my relationship to the Arab region within the context of my work has always been from the vantage point of looking in from outside — even, dare I say, from above — holding pride and confidence in the freedoms afforded to us as Canadians, and as Canadians working on or in the media.

I feel certain I am not alone in these sentiments. As Canadians born here, as well as new immigrants and aspiring ones, we all believe ourselves to belong in the yellow. And we are perceived as such.

We are a refuge. We are a representation of safety, of inclusion, of freedom. We, as a nation, are aspirational to so many. And yet for many of our own, we continue to fail.

This should not be a heavy burden to bear, but rather an incentive to strengthen and reinforce the values that have afforded Canada this reputation. It should be an incentive to fully embody these ideals by, for example, breaking the pattern of misrepresentation and underrepresentation of Indigenous and First Nations communities, while standing against violators of human rights and press freedoms elsewhere.

Unfortunately, for individuals immersed in this subject a fatigue can begin to emerge, and often with it a regrettable complacency. It took a murder as ghastly and shocking as Jamal Khashoggi’s for me, and much of the world, to re-examine the degree of danger faced by journalists in the regions I study and beyond. Reports of journalists being arrested, detained, gagged, harassed or worse are so common that one barely feels compelled to read the headline in its entirety — exhausted by the frequency of such reports, and unwilling to fully face the feeling of helplessness that comes with it.

When one digs a little deeper into our own Canadian failures when it comes to democracy, representation and press freedom, a complicated picture emerges, one that echoes the fatigue and helplessness I have felt so frequently working on media in the Arab region.

In 2018, while exploring media coverage of Indigenous issues in Canada, veteran Mohawk journalist Dan David reflected on the explanations he had received as a young local news reporter in the Prairies for why Indigenous issues were covered so poorly. David wrote that he was given the usual excuses: Time. Tight schedules. Inadequate resources. Dependence on advertisements for goods and services that would not be purchased by poor people.

But David was also given another explanation for the lack of coverage: No journalistic payoff. While journalists thrive on exposing corruption and injustice, the non-financial remuneration for that work is the knowledge that it has had a positive impact — and most of the time, that is not the case. “Stories about Indigenous communities never went anywhere. Things never changed,” he wrote.

While David admits that there has been progress since the informal survey he conducted as a young man nearly 30 years ago, other journalists have identified a pattern of something even more disturbing than the systemic negligence toward Canada’s Indigenous communities: a planned and aggressively enforced prohibition of coverage. So what happens when something that has long been ignored ceases to be ignored? For our purposes, we must also interrogate what happens to the journalists who dare to cover it.

In any context where financial, political or religious interests are at play, there exists a tension between journalists’ incentives for coverage and the incentives of those in positions of power to limit or control the coverage of certain issues. Unfortunately, it is almost always the journalists who are at a disadvantage, with more to lose. While the degree of risk varies by issue and region, that tension exists from Riyadh to Regina. In the arrests of Bracken, her colleague Michael Toledano and so many others, we see the price of fighting to hold power to account.

I am not the first to draw comparisons between the failures of Canadian democracy and those of our authoritarian counterparts. Global News reporter Paul Johnson likened the restrictions imposed on reporters covering Fairy Creek to those he had faced while reporting in places such as China. And in response to the same events, the president of the Canadian Association of Journalists, Brent Jolly, decried the attempts by the RCMP to “hide behind a curtain and execute their orders in complete darkness.”

“Maybe that’s OK in a dictatorship,” said Jolly, “but it’s not acceptable here in Canada.”

Dark red cracks.

I, like so many other journalists, media researchers and communicators, entered this field — forgive the colloquialism — bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. My optimism in the power of the word, and its ability to change narratives and consequently the lives of underrepresented or inaccurately represented populations, is squarely rooted in my Canadian-ness.

It is for this reason that the arrests of Bracken and Toledano — and other similar events, particularly those relating to the coverage of Indigenous land defenders — are so jarring, and such a big deal. The point is not to compare the press freedom violations that occur in Canada with those that take place in more oppressive or authoritarian countries or contexts. The point is to hold up a mirror to the actual exercise — successful or not — of our ideals. The point is to examine the dark red cracks in the yellow concrete of our democracy and mend them with care and accountability. And those cracks are growing deeper. When I originally wrote this piece in 2021, Canada was ranked 14th on the World Press Freedom Index. Since then, it has fallen five spots, to 19th.

It is the similarities between the red and the yellow that we should all be concerned about — similarities that call into question our democracy, and the very fabric of our society.

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“Beyond troubling” is how John Brewer, chief superintendent and gold commander of the RCMP’s controversial Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG), described the conduct of some of his officers after reviewing audio recorded in the minutes following police arrests of land defenders and journalists in November. 

Brewer was referring to racist statements made by officers who were involved in a November 2021 raid on Wet’suwet’en territory. He said he put all of his commanders on notice to signal there will be “zero tolerance” for racist conduct.

The police actions were led by the group Brewer commands, which is more commonly known as the C-IRG. The RCMP set up the unit in 2017 to police opposition to industrial projects such as the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion and the Coastal GasLink pipeline.

Public awareness of the special task force is increasing due to its role at several blockades and media scrutiny. As its notoriety grows, the C-IRG faces ongoing allegations of intimidation, harassment and excessive overreach.

During many of its operations, the unit has restricted media access through the use of exclusion zones and detained journalists with what is referred to as “catch-and-release” arrests, effectively removing them from the area and preventing them from documenting police activity. 

This month, APTN News published an in-depth report about the group based on thousands of pages of documents obtained through access to information legislation, court records and more. The Narwhal has published a number of articles about the unit, including an investigation into internal emails that reveal how Mounties changed their story about arresting journalists, an exposé that included audio recordings of members making racist comments and an on-the-ground account of its unilateral approach to arresting anyone present during a logging protest in southeast B.C. 

Critics say the unit should be abolished while supporters maintain it provides a necessary service. What exactly the group is and how it operates is complex and the facts aren’t easy to find — or they’re disputed.

One thing is clear: the C-IRG is in the middle of some of the biggest conflicts around environment and Indigenous Rights in Canadian history.

On Wet’suwet’en territory, it’s partly a clash between courts. A landmark 1997 Supreme Court of Canada decision ruled the nation never gave up its Rights and Title to the lands and resources. Yet, in 2019, the B.C. Supreme Court granted Coastal GasLink an injunction against anyone impeding construction of the pipeline — which had been given a green light by the province. That injunction is what mobilizes the C-IRG. 

For seven months, The Narwhal has been requesting interviews with RCMP. This week, Brewer, who’s in charge of the unit, finally agreed to speak.

Brewer identifies as Indigenous and said policing runs in the family — he’s “third or fourth generation.” He rose through the ranks due to some “early successes in mitigating some protests.”

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity and annotated to fact-check some of Brewer’s statements. 

The unit you’re in charge of has a unique name. What do you do to strike a balance in your work when it comes to law enforcement that protects both community and industry?

We make best efforts to meet with all parties and every side involved in any issue that the Community-Industry Response Group is called in to work on. I know there’s been articles out there that talk about, we work for industry and all that stuff — that’s simply not true. We do work with industry, we work with protesters, we work with governments at all levels and we work with non-government agencies. 

Injunctions are often sought by industry to seek relief from interruptions. We are directed by the courts to enforce those injunctions, so we don’t have an option to do it or not do it. So it does look like that, but I will tell you I’m on the road right now and I’m meeting with Indigenous leaders about protest issues that have been going on in their communities.

(Fact check: TC Energy, Coastal GasLink’s parent company, and LNG Canada wrote letters to senior RCMP officials last fall urging the Mounties to enforce the injunction. Jeffrey Monaghan, associate professor at Carleton’s Institute for Criminology and Criminal Justice, told The Narwhal at the time the courts can’t instruct RCMP to enforce an injunction. “Police do not have to enforce these injunctions — they have discretion,” he said. “The police are choosing to enforce these injunctions.”)

Are the interests of industry ever favoured over the interests of community?

No. And I’ll tell you what I mean by that: our goal is to make sure everybody’s rights are respected under the law. For protesters, we make best efforts to make sure that the protests, if they’re going to happen, are lawful, peaceful and safe. With industry, they have a right to conduct their work, but if it ever changes and the industry tries to trample on people’s rights, we will step in and do the same thing to stop that. We are bound by the law, the charter. 

Myself, I want to make sure everybody’s rights are respected under the law. And it’s not easy sometimes, I’ll tell you. I know it looks bad, but there’s always two sides and we are kind of caught in the middle being impartial. Impartial doesn’t mean we are neutral — we don’t sit back and watch, we have to deal with issues. My group has personally stepped in between industry when they want to take matters in their own hands to prevent any injuries or violence.

(Fact check: On June 22, Wet’suwet’en community members filed a lawsuit against RCMP, alleging “unlawful and overzealous” policing designed to “harass and intimidate” and discourage them from occupying the territory.)

Can you provide a bit more clarification and detail on the nature of the relationship between your unit and private security, many of whom are former RCMP members?

We’re not everywhere all the time. The base relationship is they bring forward issues. It’s no different than when you’re going into the shopping mall and you talk to the security guard. 

As for them being former police officers, well, if I was creating a private media company, I would probably hire former members of the media. I wouldn’t go hire a ditch digger. You know what I mean? 

I am clear with my police officers: sometimes [security workers] are people they know but again I harp on that impartiality. During a protest, we had a situation very early in C-IRG where one of the members walked up and shook the hands of his former boss who was there and yakked it up with him. I was not happy with that. That person was brought aside and told, “Don’t ever do that again.” But it happens, people are human.

We’re under no misunderstanding that private security wants to bring us in. We understand that and we do work as a command team to [inform] members [that] security has a role to play but do not be, I’ll use the word, chummy. Be professional. When I hear they’re not, I’m quick to come down on those members and if they can’t be impartial and professional, then they’re not on the team anymore.

What training are members given when they volunteer to be part of the unit?

They go through training in managing protests, what to expect in protests, the laws, rules, regulations and policies around protest [and] civil injunction law, which most police officers aren’t very familiar with. They do de-escalation training and they do Indigenous awareness and background training. As well, they learn about the history of other protests. We do case studies on protests that have happened in the past and best practices, lessons learned.

Are they required to undergo mental health or psychological assessment?

All members of the RCMP have assessments as part of their intake into the RCMP. Whenever an RCMP member is exposed to a traumatic situation, we have critical instance stress debriefing. We’ve done that a few times for deployments. Every member of the RCMP at any time has access to any kind of psychological treatment or they can see a mental health professional. 

I actually present that, as part of the training. I talk to people about how I do it — I make sure to look after myself physically and mentally. The final presentation they get on the course in their training is from me about mental and stress resiliency.

But it’s not mandated — they have access but aren’t required to do so? 

Before they come on to C-IRG, no, they don’t have to do assessment. They have to be fully fit for duty under RCMP policy, which is both physically and psychologically cleared.

The Narwhal received and reported on audio recordings of members making jokes and racist comments about the people they had arrested in November. In the recording, the officers described one person they arrested as a “fucking tool” and joked about an American arrested and said they would “make her walk” to the border. They then mock the red handprints that Indigenous people had painted on their faces to signify Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, comparing them to orcs from The Lord of the Rings. How do you respond to this?

When I heard that I was not happy, obviously. It was troubling, no, beyond troubling, that’s not the word I want to use. We did reach out and said, we would like two things: give us the unedited, full versions of those recordings and the people who were there, we encourage them to make a complaint under the public complaints act, and we’ll follow up.

(Fact check: The Narwhal adheres to the Canadian Association of Journalists ethics guidelines, which notes we do not “share unpublished information — such as notes and audio tapes of interviews, documents, emails, digital files, photos and video — with those outside of the media organizations for which we work.”)

I do not and will not tolerate that by any of my members. If I find out it happened and who did it, they won’t be in the Community-Industry Response Group anymore. We have about a 20 per cent turnover of people every year (and there’s well over 200 people in the unit.) For some, it’s not for them so they exit voluntarily. Others, we determine as a command group it’s not for them and they are asked to leave. And that’s for lots of reasons, it’s not for racist or bigoted or inappropriate comments, sometimes they just don’t have it. 

But I will tell you, as an Indigenous person myself, I will not tolerate that. I heard the recordings, the parts that were put into the article. I had my whole team, all my commanders, sit down: Can you identify those voices? There’s absolute zero tolerance for that in this unit. You are a professional and if you can’t be, you’re out. Simple as that.

I take misconduct and inappropriate conduct by members of my organization very serious and I will do everything I can to hold them accountable and root them out.

Every commander was put on notice to be watchful and mindful of this and reminders were sent out to everybody on the team that you have to be aware of what you say, when you say it and it’s not tolerated.

Regarding the November arrest of photojournalist Amber Bracken, on assignment for The Narwhal, and documentary filmmaker Michael Toledano, we previously reported on an email you wrote in which you said your unit was preparing a package for the court “which will articulate the reasons for arrest and the background activities of these individuals which bring into question their impartiality and show they have been advocating and assisting the protesters.” 

According to our assessment of court records, there was no such package filed. Can you provide more details on what you meant when you wrote about the background activities of Bracken and Toledano?

At the time of the arrest of both Amber and Michael, obviously I was in command there. There was ample opportunity to come out and exit that structure they were in. It’s easy to say, “You knew they were there.” We didn’t know they were there until they were arrested.

Up to and including us entering, they could have [said] right away, “We’re media.” And that didn’t happen. It wasn’t until hands were laid on them. They were in there when people were defiant, refusing to come out. And I’m not saying that they couldn’t be part of that and do their job. All they had to say from within was, “Hey, I am Amber Bracken, I am with media. I am in here.” It just didn’t happen.

(Fact check: Bracken was reporting live from the location until RCMP cut off power and communications. The Narwhal also communicated directly with Mounties prior to the enforcement to inform them Bracken was at the location and she was openly displaying her identification as a member of the press.)

I’ll be quite honest with you, I will take Mr. Toledano aside: I know he works for groups and does work with the Gidimt’en checkpoint group and with a film company there. You can’t switch on and switch off when you are media. We’ve dealt with several of these, where we’ve got media people one day and the next day they’re sitting down blocking the road. We arrest them, because they’ve switched roles.

The crown and the company decided not to pursue the charges against the two — I’m fine with that. The arrest itself, I’m comfortable with.

I personally review the circumstances whenever we make an arrest of media or some high-profile person. What makes a society is that we have an open press that can report on anything. I’m not here to trample on that, despite what people say. 

(Fact check: In a previous interview, Toledano told The Narwhal his work, which has been aired on major networks across the country and picked up by numerous publications, speaks for itself. The feature documentary he is currently working on, in collaboration with Wet’suwet’en community members, recently won an award from the Cannes Film Festival’s Docs in Progress.)

With respect to what you wrote about background activities, when you wrote that Amber Bracken was assisting protesters, was that based on a misunderstanding? Or did you have actual evidence that never made it to court?

I will say for Amber, yeah, it was certainly more of a misunderstanding. The arrest, I’m comfortable with and I will always maintain that. But yeah, the background … How do I put this, Matt? You’re going to print this and it’s making me look dumb. I would say, Amber was up there doing her job. She just should have at least identified herself, not waited until we laid hands. You can appreciate my members don’t know who she is. They may know of her but even if they had a photo, which they did not, at the time they’re focused on threats. 

In that case, when I reviewed it, I viewed their actions certainly in that dwelling as participating.

(Fact check: In audio recordings captured shortly after the arrest, RCMP officers seem to indicate their awareness of Bracken, noting, “The one Amber chick is fine, the media chick. She’s clean and normal.”)

When you were the silver commander in charge of enforcement operations on Wet’suwet’en territory in 2019, you noted the RCMP needed to “counter everything negative” that media reported about the enforcement. Can you explain why you said this?

When we get negative stories, when people accuse us of brutality, breaking people’s legs intentionally [or] strip searching, none of this happens. We’ve had allegations that we set police dogs on people — it’s just not true. That’s what I’m talking about. I’m not talking about, you know, a legitimate story. But it’s when you get this obviously over-the-top sensational reporting where it’s one-sided. That angers me because it’s so ridiculous.

When we’re called the “militarized” police, I hate that term. People who say that seem to forget that we’ve had a number of police officers outgunned and gunned down in this country, nevermind elsewhere. So yeah, guess what? Our job is inherently dangerous, with lots of risks. We mitigate those risks with tactics, different uniforms, police dogs, sure. Some of our members are trained and use carbines, long guns. But we’re not militarized whatsoever. That green uniform the emergency response team uses, it’s been adopted in most tactical units in policing because it blends in: night, day, urban, rural. It’s just a uniform, it’s not camouflage.

When I talked about [how] we need to counter the negative stories, that’s what I mean.

The unit has been accused, both in and out of court, of overreach, violating RCMP policy by removing name tags and wearing thin blue line patches, and the likes of intimidation, harassment and aggressive conduct. What steps are you and/or others taking to investigate these accusations?

Every time an accusation is made, regardless of the basis to it, as a command team we look at it and cross reference with public complaints we receive. You can appreciate that protesters, especially when there’s an injunction and we’re arresting people and stopping their protest, are not happy with us and they’ll make allegations. Whenever we can, we will investigate. I’m surprised sometimes of the allegations that are printed, simply because on the face of it, they’re not accurate. 

There’s a recent story printed calling C-IRG a secret organization — we’re not very secretive when our marked police cars have our name on it. If we are secretive, boy we really stink at it. We don’t spy on people. I don’t have a spymaster, that kind of stuff. I appreciate the sensationalism of it but it’s just not accurate.

As for the breach of policy taking name tags off, I made that decision. I cleared it with my higher command, my bosses, and I had to articulate why, I didn’t just do it. Our members were getting doxxed with their name. People were searching their personal information online. I got doxxed, because my son has the same name as myself. They went through his social media and got to me. We had a member where protesters found out where his church was and went to the church and confronted people. We’ve had wanted posters put up around the City of Victoria of police officers. I mean, come on, how is that reasonable? So I made that decision that I wasn’t going to make it easy.

Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs have repeatedly called for the removal of RCMP from the territory prior to any discussion with governments on how best to proceed. In light of the unit’s mandate, which notes it uses “a measured approach in facilitating the peaceful resolution of public disorder issues” and “proactively engages all stakeholders through open communication and meaningful dialogue” what is your response to the chiefs with respect to the continued policing of Indigenous land defenders, community members and their supporters?

First of all, I will say that not all hereditary leaders in Wet’suwet’en are opposed to this project. I would respectfully say that’s not accurate. Some certainly are and that’s their right. The elected chiefs and councils there [support the project] and there’s been elections since the project started so people have had a chance to speak. They’ve re-elected leaders or elected leaders that continue supporting the pipeline for the economic benefits agreements and whatnot. It’s not as easy as all the Indigenous people are for or against it.

(Fact check: While there are community members and elected officials who support the project, Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs, representing all five clans of the nation, issued Coastal GasLink an eviction order first on Jan. 4, 2020, and again in November, 2021.)

As to calling for the removal of the RCMP and then they’ll talk, I will tell you throughout the last number of years up there since 2019, we have scaled back our posture numerous times to where we almost have nobody. We cleared out of the community industrial safety office, we stopped patrolling regularly and what did we get? Each and every time, we got blockades. 

If you want to call for removal of the RCMP, how about this: get everybody out of there, then talk to government. I agree with them on that point. That’s how this is going to be solved, through meaningful dialogue with industry and government. Unfortunately, until that happens, the police are there to keep the peace and enforce that injunction. If the protesters agreed to absolutely stand down, I would be happy. If we don’t have to be there, why would we be there? I can’t wait to be out of the territory when we don’t have to be there to enforce that injunction.

(Fact check: Wet’suwet’en community members and their allies are currently building a balhats, or feast hall, on the territory and there are numerous cabins, smokehouses, homes and other facilities close to pipeline worksites.)

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On Friday, Nov. 19, snow blanketed the ground as heavily armed RCMP officers descended upon a tiny house occupied by Wet’suwet’en land defenders in northwestern B.C. 

The RCMP’s job: clear the way for construction on the Coastal GasLink pipeline, which is planned to supply the LNG Canada terminal with fracked gas for export.

There was one small hitch — two journalists were inside the tiny house. 

One of them, Amber Bracken, was on assignment for The Narwhal. Bracken, an award-winning photographer who also works with publications like The New York Times and National Geographic, clearly identified herself as a journalist, yet was arrested, charged with contempt of court and detained in jail for three nights.

Within 48 hours, the Canadian Association of Journalists pulled together a letter signed by more than 40 news outlets and press freedom organizations, calling for the immediate release of Bracken and freelance documentary filmmaker Michael Toledano.

“The RCMP stated the reason for arresting the two was because they had ‘embedded’ with the protestors, which has never been illegal in Canada,” the letter stated.  

In this case “embedded” seems to mean that the journalists were in the injunction zone, beyond police lines — which happens to be exactly where they needed to be to document the militarized police raid. 

Alas, much of the debate that simmered in the weeks following the arrests circled around the RCMP’s false insinuation that the journalists had crossed a line between journalism and activism, stoking the small cadre of voices who falsely claim The Narwhal is engaged in “advocacy.” 

Often, this line of critique overlooks our strong code of ethics and accuses The Narwhal of having a “point of view.” Let’s look at that more closely. To accuse one news outlet of having a point of view is to assume that other news outlets do not have a point of view. But is that really true? 

As The Narwhal’s Ontario bureau chief Denise Balkissoon said in her 2020 Atkinson lecture, objectivity is an impossible ideal. Who a journalist interviews, what quotes are used, what stories are assigned in the first place — all of these are subjective decisions being made in newsrooms every day. 

“You do have a point of view. You are not coming from nowhere,” she said. “The person who can challenge your point of view is yourself, and it is something you should be trying to do as a journalist instead of pretending it just doesn’t exist.”

The very concept of a “view from nowhere” is one that privileges status quo interests, which are easily invisible to the untrained eye. For instance, why does every newspaper have a business section, but not an environment section? That’s a choice about editorial priorities made by every newspaper in the country that few people ever think about. While stories in the business section of the newspaper may touch on environmental issues, they are almost always told through the primary lens of business interests. 

Meanwhile, The Narwhal operates a bit like the mythical environment section of the newspaper. We focus on a different set of issues: biodiversity, climate science, Indigenous Rights, sustainable development, the intrinsic value of the natural world. Quite often, we choose to report verified facts that may be inconvenient for those in power or others who want to protect the status quo. Do these choices represent a point of view? Sure. But no more so than the choice by a newspaper to have a business section and not an environment section. 

Another example: racialized journalists have long been told they can’t cover certain stories because they’re “too close to them,” whereas white journalists haven’t been told the same thing. In this case, the dominant white perspective is considered no perspective at all, while the perspective of a racialized person is considered a “point of view.” This is clearly an illogical and racist double standard.

Similarly, when a traditional news outlet that receives millions of dollars in fossil fuel advertising revenues calls Indigenous people on their unceded land “protesters,” that choice conveys a point of view just as much as when The Narwhal chooses to call those same people “land defenders.” One happens to come from a colonial, corporate worldview, while the other is more informed by an Indigenous worldview. But let’s be very clear: both represent a choice.

New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen has argued against the “view from nowhere” approach for years.

“What authority there is in the position of viewlessness is unearned,” he writes. “In journalism, real authority starts with reporting. Knowing your stuff, mastering your beat, being right on the facts, digging under the surface of things, calling around to find out what happened, verifying what you heard.”

These are the things we value at The Narwhal: knowing your beat, verifying your facts, diving deeper, finding angles not covered elsewhere and amplifying underrepresented voices to help rebalance our discourse — a discourse that “objectivity” has kept stacked in favour of those in power.  

By all means, we all make mistakes sometimes and we must always strive to do better. But doing better doesn’t mean doing the same thing as everyone else. In fact, nearly 5,000 people have donated money to support The Narwhal this year because we do something different.

“I value how hard your team works to report on topics that mainstream media won’t cover,” wrote one new member this month. “I support the rights of Indigenous people,” wrote another. “I value the way you report on the big issues, not just the juicy topic of the day,” another new member wrote.

The very fact that The Narwhal is a non-profit organization signals that we value different things than traditional news outlets, which rely on advertising revenues and are expected to turn a profit for owners and shareholders. Conversely, we don’t run any ads and our publication’s success is built upon our relationship with our audience, whose donations comprise our single largest source of revenue. We’re also radically transparent about our sources of funding, unlike virtually any other news publication in Canada.  

Being freed from the constraints of the advertising model allows us to think outside the box and focus on one job: serving our audience. In the three years since we launched The Narwhal, there have been dramatic shifts in the Canadian media landscape. What was considered pushing the boundaries a few years ago — say, connecting a catastrophic forest fire or flood to the root issue of climate change — is now considered best practice. 

And I have no doubt that what a small and shrinking group may consider to be “advocacy” today will likely be considered responsible journalism a few years from now. 

Thankfully, if there’s one thing we’ve never been afraid of at The Narwhal, it’s being ahead of the curve. 

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

All at once, RCMP officers came out of their hiding spots to fill the courtyard surrounding a tiny house at a site known as Coyote Camp in Wet’suwet’en territory. Police wore both regular blue uniforms and a militarized green version, the latter laden with assault rifles and tactical equipment. The scene has already become known across Canada — police dogs barking and whining as officers used an axe and a chainsaw to enter the small structure to arrest seven unarmed and peaceful individuals. 

Soon they would take my cameras from me. After that, my rights.

Some of the first advice I was given as a baby journalist was: “Don’t get arrested. You can’t make any pictures from the back of a police car.” This maxim has served me well most of my career, which has taken me into zones of conflict and protest across North America.

But covering the Wet’suwet’en pipeline opposition last month, I realized its limit: I could not both do my job as a journalist and avoid arrest. On Nov. 19, the RCMP made that impossible for me.

Being a photojournalist stripped of my gear in a moment of profound national importance heightened my senses. 

As I’m escorted away from the camp along the main access road, I began to register all the photos I couldn’t make: the mountain forest road lined with Coastal GasLink trucks, heavy machinery and workers. As we drive by, a worker waves to the RCMP officers. 

A Gitxsan woman holds her cedar headpiece in her hands, a discordant echo of the two tighter circles of the steel handcuffs on her wrists. In the back of a police van, strained faces turned to joy at the news that arrestees Jocey Alec, daughter of Chief Woos, and Teka’tsihasere (Corey Jocko), Haudenosaunee supporter of the Coastal GasLink opposition, were newly engaged, the big question being popped on the eve of RCMP enforcement. 

At the Houston detachment where we are processed, Gidimt’en spokesperson Sleydo’ (Molly Wickham) places her hand on a wall of thick glass brick, reaching towards a distorted view of her mother’s hand on the other side. Eyes peer through food slots and cheeks press against the floor, straining to see and hear past heavy metal doors. 

These are all images I couldn’t capture after I was arrested on the  second day of an RCMP raid of opponents to the Coastal GasLink pipeline that saw 30 arrests. I have been reporting on this national story for over three years, but that day, I was forced to become part of it. I watched in agony as so many poignant moments slipped by, only recorded in my memory. I felt kidnapped. Having never been arrested before, it is the best word I can think of to describe being taken so abruptly out of my life and work, in violation of Canadian Charter rights protecting freedom of the press.  

That day I was documenting as Sleydo’ and her supporters locked themselves inside a tiny house adjacent to the pipeline right of way. Next to me in the cramped space was freelance reporter Michael Toledano, filming a documentary for the CBC. After RCMP arrived by helicopter, they surrounded the building, cut all communications, then broke down the door. Chunks of wood flew across the small space, before they switched to a chainsaw. As soon as there was a big enough hole, they pointed weapons at the unarmed group standing inside with hands raised. I kept photographing but adrenaline vibrated my entire body as I contemplated but decided against the risk of turning my back to the door, officer and gun. 

Just outside, a police dog barked incessantly as police arrested everyone — including me. I clearly said “I’m a member of the media,” but one police officer responded, “well you’re under arrest right now, so step out. You’re under arrest.” 

It also didn’t matter that The Narwhal had notified the RCMP ahead of time I would be on site, that I was displaying a Narwhal press pass, or that the RCMP had been tracking me as a journalist. They knew exactly what I was doing there. My arrest, and the arrest of other media covering Wet’suwet’en, is part of a pattern of police interference with reporting on Indigenous resistance movements. 

Most of those arrested that day were treated worse than I was — officers cut a medicine bag and ripped cedar regalia from Sleydo’, a hereditary wing chief. She says it was the only time she cried during the whole experience. Afterwards, they put her in a cell alone to worry about her kids, since they had also arrested her husband. Two racialized trans women were asked invasive questions about their bodies, denied important medication several times, put into the men’s side of prison and addressed by male pronouns.

We were all detained for days in cold cells. If the charges had been criminal, rather than the less serious civil breach of injunction, we would have been afforded the right to see a judge within 24 hours — I could have signed release conditions and regained my freedom. They took most of our clothes, denied us soap and toothbrushes, and only allowed us to speak to our lawyers. We all listened as Wet’suwet’en, Gitxsan and traditional struggle songs reverberated through the metal and concrete halls, their rounds of harmony transforming the cell blocks into cathedrals of the human spirit. 

When I was released, headlines across the world celebrated my freedom, even as Sleydo’, the two trans women and several other supporters still sat in the Prince George correctional centre. 

One of my first freedom calls was from a good friend, who is Indigenous. She was proud of me for following the story, but joked “so, how does it feel to be treated like a native?” Her point was clear — Indigenous people are criminalized every day. 

My experience of jail is not unique, but RCMP efforts to suppress press freedom — especially around stories that focus on Indigenous issues — is critically important in this moment.

The police prevented me from doing my job. I should have been documenting as the RCMP arrested the other land defenders. I should have been there to photograph as police and industry workers dismantled Coyote Camp and burned another cabin to the ground. I should have been present to capture the Gitxsan nation organizing solidarity actions, militarized police patrolling them, and as supporters gathered on roadsides and at the jails to sing.

Instead, my camera sat in lockup. I sat on cinder block benches and was transported between detachments in metal boxes. 

The public record of what happens in Wet’suwet’en territory should be beyond police interference. The arrest of Indigenous Peoples on their land concerns every single person in Canada as we wrestle with our collective history and future. 

The Wet’suwet’en Nation has never signed a treaty or ceded their territory, a vast area of 22,000 square kilometres, roughly the size of New Jersey. In the 1997 Delgamuukw decision, a case brought by Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan hereditary chiefs, the Supreme Court of Canada affirmed both nations’ Aboriginal Rights and Title are intact and that the nation’s territory had never been ceded to the Crown. In the Delgamuukw case the hereditary chiefs established that the Wet’suwet’en have a system of Indigenous law that existed before the creation of elected band councils enacted under the Indian Act. ​​​​​​Within Wet’suwet’en law, hereditary chiefs hold responsibility for territorial lands. These hereditary chiefs are the forces leading the opposition to the Coastal GasLink pipeline.

At the time of the Delgamuukw decision the Supreme Court also said that a second case would be needed to define the territory’s exact boundaries, but the nation’s claim was clear enough that the B.C. government and various industries began scrambling to try and extinguish that title to create more certainty for development. Although much has been made of the Wet’suwet’en elected chiefs who vocally support the pipeline project and the benefit agreements they’ve signed, the question of whether or not the project’s approval is in violation of Wet’suwet’en rights has not been resolved in the courts. The hereditary chiefs maintain, however, that the pipeline being forced through their territory is in violation of Wet’suwet’en law. 

The elected system was imposed along with the Indian Act and reservations, while the hereditary system predates colonization. Elected Wet’suwet’en chiefs fulfill a crucial role for their respective communities on multiple reserves. But the Coastal GasLink pipeline route doesn’t cross Wet’suwet’en reserve land, it crosses traditional territory where it’s hereditary chiefs who are tasked with ancient responsibilities, and where they have been recognized as stakeholders by B.C.’s Supreme Court. 

Despite the staunch opposition of the hereditary chiefs, the government has permitted a project through the most intact portion of Wet’suwet’en territory without consent — and the RCMP has been directed by the courts to suppress pipeline opposition, a task they’ve taken on with paramilitary force.

Regardless of who has a right to consent to the project, the show of force against Wet’suwet’en occupation camps — and the suppression of related coverage — is in itself worth talking about. 

The North-West Mounted Police formed in 1873 “to bring Canadian authority” to present day Alberta and Saskatchewan. Later they would be renamed the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and gain national jurisdiction. This paramilitary force was instrumental in pushing Indigenous people from their land to make way for settlers and the railway. 

On Wet’suwet’en territory 150 years later, RCMP are back in military formation, with guns in hand, to remove people from the land. Over the last three years, police with authority to use lethal force have arrested more than 60 people on behalf of Coastal GasLink. 

This reality, especially images of militarized officers wielding advanced weapons, is an uncomfortable one for both the RCMP and governments in an era enamoured with the concept of reconciliation. British Columbia recently passed its two-year anniversary of codifying Indigenous rights in the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act. In June Canada implemented the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which calls for free, prior and informed consent of natural resource and development projects on Indigenous lands. With Canada’s minister of Crown-Indigenous relations acknowledging “it’s time to give land back,” it’s no wonder Canadians and Indigenous Peoples are experiencing a kind of reconciliation disorientation. 

Stories that fit the comfortable reconciliation narrative are much easier for reporters to tell. I’ve never seen tactical weapons at a press conference announcing a benefits agreement between an industry company and a First Nation. I’ve never been arrested reporting on new federal funding for Indigenous protected areas, or when politicians are included in First Nations’ ceremonies. 

Coastal GasLink, operated by TC Energy, formerly TransCanada, also runs a sophisticated press strategy. Its narrative — of economic benefit for all, including nearby First Nations — gets coverage in the regular news grind, often generated by industry-supplied press releases. It’s much more difficult to tell the untold sides of the pipeline story. I’ve talked to journalists from multiple outlets who have also been frustrated by half answers or no answer at all to questions about the pipeline from company spokespeople. And forget about any unsupervised conversation with workers or a chance to get a close look at what’s actually unfolding on project sites and in construction zones.

For a full understanding of this issue, what actually happens to Indigenous people who assert land rights or challenge official narratives, it’s critical every Canadian has the opportunity to see and viscerally understand what’s happening on the ground. 

I was eventually released from Prince George, some four and a half hours from where I had been arrested. I had to literally dig my personal belongings out of the wreckage from Coyote Camp, which had been scooped up with heavy machinery and dumped along with ice, rocks and mud at the bottom of the mountain. Now that I’m safely back home, I’m finally catching up with the notes of concern and notes of solidarity from other journalists in Canada who have been through similar experiences. The following are just a few notable examples. 

The most famous photograph of a standoff between Canadian force and Indigenous land defenders — the young military man facing off with an Ojibwe warrior at Oka, Quebec, in 1990 — was taken by a photographer named Shani Komulainen, but not many people realize she was arrested, strip searched and detained for five hours as she left the scene. Army operatives tried their best to discredit Komulainen and the other journalists who ventured inside the razor wire. Officers were annoyed at contradictions to their official account. They spied on journalists. They ordered reporters to leave. They blocked supplies and the outflow of stories and film. They denied members of the media re-entry if they left the protest zone. 

Months after her arrest, Komulainen was charged with possession of a weapon or an imitation of a weapon, threatening and interfering with the work of a peace agent and participating in a riot. It cost The Canadian Press and its members over $100,000 to defend Komulainen, but the charges against her were eventually dropped. Komulainen says she had so much pent up emotion from the months of the trial (and her recovery from a terrible car accident) that she surprised herself by bawling, instead of celebrating, when the ‘not guilty’ verdict was read.

At the 1995 Gustafsen Lake standoff, a dispute over land rights for a Secwepemc Sun Dance ceremony, RCMP responded to the group of 24 with at least 400 heavily armed officers. No media was present when, on Sept. 11, the situation culminated in a 45 minute firefight, where police deployed land mines and thousands of rounds of ammunition. RCMP are alleged to have prevented media from speaking to Indigenous leaders during the standoff. At trial, a video was entered into evidence showing RCMP officers discussing “a disinformation or a smear campaign.” RCMP would later disavow it as “a joke.” Despite the incredible show of militarized police force and continued calls for an official inquiry, there is no public record of that day. Gustafsen Lake remains one of the most obscured Indigenous land rights disputes in Canada.

Much more recently, in 2016, Justin Brake, working as a freelancer for The Independent, followed a group of Inuit and their supporters into the Muskrat Falls dam site, and spent several days inside as the occupation stopped work on the project. When an injunction named and accused him of trespassing, Brake had to decide if he would face arrest in order to cover the story. He decided to leave before police enforced the injunction, but was still burdened with both civil and criminal charges.

It took four long years, but again, all of the charges against Brake were dismissed. When the civil charges were dismissed in 2019 in the Newfoundland and Labrador Court of Appeal, the ruling definitively affirmed the rights of journalists in Canada to report from within injunction zones, like I did. In his judgement, Justice Derek Green outlined specific parameters that apply to journalists following newsworthy stories. Notably, he emphasized that “particular consideration should be given to protests involving Aboriginal issues.” 

When I speak to police officers, I bring up the Brake decision all of the time — very few have even a peripheral awareness of the case. 

In the summer of 2020, Ontario police waited until Oneida journalist Karl Dockstader had already returned home before telling him to turn himself in after he covered LandBack Lane. Dockstader was arrested and charged with mischief and failure to comply with a court order, again for reporting from within another injunction zone. His charges were also dropped months later, along with charges against 24 other people.

Since 2018, Jesse Winter, Jerome Turner (who is Gitxsan), Melissa Cox, Dan Loan and at least two other filmmakers have all been corralled, detained, removed from the area or arrested while covering the Wet’suwet’en reoccupation camps. Media have routinely been denied access to RCMP “exclusion zones.” In 2020, I was threatened with arrest for having stepped on a blocked road as I documented police apprehending Howilhkat (Freda Huson), her family and supporters. I believe I was only saved from that set of handcuffs because of scrutiny on RCMP at the time, who were being criticized for their deployment of illegal media exclusion tactics and vocal threats of media arrests. 

And most recently, over this past spring, the ongoing protest against old-growth logging at Fairy Creek, became notorious for RCMP harassing and unreasonably restricting journalists. One reporter, Paul Johnson of Global News, compared the situation to his experience in China and other repressive countries. 

The situation was so bad that a coalition of media organizations, including the Canadian Association of Journalists and The Narwhal, launched a successful legal challenge against the RCMP’s illegal suppression of press freedoms at Fairy Creek. 

On July 20, 2021, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Douglas Thompson addressed the RCMP practice of creating vast exclusion zones and media access points, stating the “geographically extensive” areas weren’t necessary for police operations. He also reminded the RCMP of “the media’s special role in a free and democratic society, and the necessity of avoiding undue and unnecessary interference with the journalistic function.” This was a way past due affirmation of press freedoms in Canada and journalists were collectively pretty excited.

But less than a month later, on August 10, 2021, Victoria Buzz photojournalist Colin Smith was arrested at Fairy Creek. He was detained in the back of a prisoner transport in the hot sun. As he became claustrophobic, feeling faint, sweaty and visibly shaking, Smith says an officer advised him to take deep breaths but didn’t open the doors. Eventually Smith was released without charges but the experience left a mark — he says that when he went back to the site his fear of the police and the looming threat of being put back in the metal wagon interfered with his ability to document what was going on. At least two other independent media photographers were also arrested and detained at Fairy Creek, and many more have been threatened or severely limited.

Mere months after Thompson’s decision, and two years after Green’s decision on considerations for journalists covering Indigenous protest in injunction zones, the state of press freedom in Canada is worse than ever. 

On the first day of enforcement of the Coastal GasLink injunction in November, filmmaker Melissa Cox was the first person arrested at another Wet’suwet’en camp. Her footage wasn’t released until days later and as a result those 15 arrests, that included Wet’suwet’en Elders, legal observers and some people who were hit with clubs, punched, thrown on the ground and contorted, did not see as much coverage.

For two days in a row during the enforcement, APTN journalist Lee Wilson’s attempts to report on the situation were blocked by RCMP. The first day, the officers on the ground told him “no,” he couldn’t go up the access road, such decisions were left up to the local detachment. The next day he was told “no” by the local detachment, because the decision had to come from officers on the ground. Those officers finally gave him a flat “no” — he would absolutely not be getting access to the area. 

Wilson had found himself in a similar situation in 2020: the only difference was that now, instead of explicitly calling the area “an exclusion zone” or an “injunction zone,” RCMP were now conscientiously using the term “police checkpoint.” 

It seems the only thing the RCMP have learned from Fairy Creek is to police their language. 

Hours after Wilson was prevented from doing his job, an officer told me that if I was “any credible media person [I] would have left.” 

The threat of arrest does have a dampening effect on reporting. Karyn Pugliese, now at the CBC, was at APTN when she jumped in to support Justin Brake back in 2016. In an interview with Canadaland, Pugliese spoke about her anxieties as an assigning editor, forced to contend with escalating police tactics as she sends journalists into the field: “What if she ends up in jail? I’m responsible for that. What if I can’t protect her? And that’s where you start creeping into this police state.”

Police use exclusion zones, arrest and the threat of arrest to control media access to newsworthy places: places where Indigenous people and land defenders are resisting industry, government and corporate mandates on their territories, and where the RCMP or the OPP are spending millions in militarized response. No one in Canada should tolerate police efforts to intimidate journalists or limit news coverage.  

There is no doubt in my mind that my arrest was intended to frighten, humiliate and deter me from continuing to cover this story. Both Toledano and I faced police interference with our ability to report. We both now face civil charges. 

One of the more surreal moments of this experience was at the Prince George courthouse. When it was my turn to see the judge, sheriffs escorted me in socked feet down a series of institutional hallways and up a narrow staircase. At the end a door abruptly opened from the echoing gloom onto a bright room hushed by thick red carpet, upholstery and courtroom protocol. By that point, I had been wearing my now filthy nylon-thin leggings and sweatshirt for days. They had taken my glasses, my hair tie and my bra. I wouldn’t have opened the door for a delivery driver dressed like that — I felt indecent. The oak-panelled room held very few observers, including Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs Woos and Madeek. Everyone else was fully clothed, as were the sheriffs and the court reporter. Madam Justice Marguerite Church presided from the raised bench in her black judge’s robes, as I sat barely dressed and cold in the prisoners box. I was supposed to feel small. 

But my arrest actually makes me a big part of a national reckoning with press freedoms, and what reconciliation means for journalism. I know I am not alone in doing this work or in dealing with the fallout. So many media friends and colleagues have rallied behind us. I am eternally grateful. 

Many more have said it — “truth before reconciliation” but that can’t happen if journalists are routinely criminalized in pursuit of this truth. 

Our courts affirm the rights of journalists to access and report on these issues, Indigenous people are shouting to be heard and yet we let police be the arbiters of this crucial conversation. Let this be the last time. 

Police put me in handcuffs when I should have been doing my job. I wanted to be doing my job. And I am furious.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

Police in Canada have been collecting information about their interactions with at least two journalists in a database that tracks law enforcement investigations, an RCMP officer revealed in affidavits released in court on Monday.

The revelation adds a new twist to a case that has triggered widespread criticism, including in a scathing letter signed by more than 40 news organizations on Monday that urged the federal public safety minister, Marco Mendicino, to intervene. 

The RCMP submitted the affidavits in support of its actions over the previous week on unceded Wet’suwet’en territory, where officers arrested more than two dozen people, including journalists, in response to requests from a Canadian oil and gas company to enforce a court injunction so that it can build the Coastal GasLink natural gas pipeline project.

Award-winning photojournalist Amber Bracken, who was on assignment for The Narwhal, and documentary filmmaker Michael Toledano were among those arrested on Nov. 19 and detained for several days in custody. Both were scheduled to be released on Monday after agreeing to abide by conditions of the injunction and to be available for a future court appearance if the Crown proceeds with charges.

“On November 19, 2021, PRIME database queries were conducted on Bracken who has several police interactions in the… area since 2020,” Cst. Benjamin Laurie wrote in one of the affidavits, dated Nov. 20.

PRIME stands for Police Records Information Management Environment and it contains information related “to police investigations, the originating agency and complete police investigational reports, along with specific entity particulars such as birth dates, telephone numbers, addresses and persons associated to the event,” Laurie wrote.

In a separate affidavit, Laurie wrote he had conducted a similar search on PRIME for Toledano, noting the documentary filmmaker had “extensive police interactions” in the region as well as a “police history in Toronto.” The affidavit didn’t specify what “history” Laurie was referring to, but he noted that neither Bracken nor Toledano have a criminal record.

Police also seized the professional equipment and possessions of both journalists. The arrests prevented The Narwhal from obtaining and publishing Bracken’s photos showing what police did during arrests on Nov. 19.

The arrests were made with the use of canine units and snipers. RCMP broke down the door to a tiny home with an axe and chainsaw to remove land defenders as well as the journalists who were there to observe and report on the events.

Although PRIME-BC is primarily used by police in British Columbia, the database is linked to police systems across Canada, according to a 2017 report by the provincial auditor general. The PRIME system is managed by PRIMECorp, an organization that is governed by a board with representation from the RCMP, other law enforcement stakeholders, municipalities, as well as the provincial Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General.

CAJ ‘troubled’ by tracking of journalists

The RCMP did not respond to a request for comment on Monday and it is not clear why police were tracking the two journalists who have received widespread praise and recognition for their work.

“We are very concerned to learn that the RCMP was tracking Amber’s activity in an active investigations database,” said Emma Gilchrist, editor-in-chief of The Narwhal. “Amber has always conducted herself as a professional journalist and there is no excuse for the RCMP to track the activities of journalists.”

Brent Jolly, president of the Canadian Association of Journalists, added that he was troubled to learn the RCMP was logging information about journalists in a database.

“It’s one of those issues that makes me wonder what other information is being collected and what are they planning to do with that,” Jolly told The Narwhal. “Are they trying to use this to demonize Amber and Michael, for example, to tar and feather them for future reference so that they can be painted as activists or delinquents or something else? It just makes me wonder what other motives are there.”

In a statement posted online late on Monday afternoon, Eric Stubbs, an RCMP assistant commissioner, denied arresting anyone for being a journalist or doing their job. 

The statement did not explain what the journalists did wrong or why they were detained for several days. But it noted police secured their personal belongings, did not interfere with these possessions and were prepared to return them after court proceedings.

“Moving forward, I remain available and willing to work with the media on ensuring there are clear communications, processes and understanding for all those involved,” Stubbs said in the statement.

Your browser does not support iframes. Please visit https://protectpressfreedom.good.do/stopillegalarrestsjournalists/mendicino/

B.C. ministry won’t say if it spoke to police or TC Energy about arrests

The office of B.C. Public Safety Minister and Solicitor General Mike Farnworth, who is responsible for RCMP activities in the province under a federal-provincial agreement, declined to respond to questions from The Narwhal about whether he or any other ministry official had communicated with the RCMP or TC Energy about recent events, sending a general statement.

“Police operate at arms length from government and the solicitor general does not direct police operations,” said the statement, sent by spokesman Travis Paterson. “As this matter is before the courts, we will not be making any further comment.”

Farnworth’s office also declined to comment about the collection of information about journalists in the police investigations database.

If completed, the 670-kilometre Coastal GasLink project would be operated by Calgary-based energy company TC Energy, which owns a 35 per cent stake in the project. TC Energy sold a majority share in a 2019 deal involving an Alberta Crown Corporation, AIMCo, in partnership with investment firms, financial institutions and pension funds in Canada, the U.S. and South Korea.

TC Energy set aside up to $3.3 billion for cost overruns

Coastal GasLink, which would connect natural gas producers in northeastern B.C. to an LNG Canada terminal in Kitimat, on the northwest Pacific coast of the Canadian province, has been mired in delays and cost overruns which prompted TC Energy to set aside up to $3.3 billion to cover increased costs, the company said as it released its third quarter results in early November.

“We respect the rights of individuals to lawfully, safely and peacefully express their point of view and our top priority remains the safety of those in the area,” said an unsigned statement sent to The Narwhal by TC Energy. “When the safety of our workforce is compromised and our ability to build our fully authorized and permitted project is stopped by individuals acting outside the law, we must rely on the authorities to ensure that the rights of all individuals are respected and protected.”

The company also declined to respond to questions about RCMP officers acting to enforce the injunction, saying that those questions should be directed to the police force.

While some local community members and elected leaders support the project, land defenders say the Coastal GasLink approval was unlawful, violating the hereditary rights of Wet’suwet’en members.

AIMCo, the stakeholder that leads the group with the majority share in Coastal GasLink, declined to comment, referring questions about the recent events to TC Energy.

Mendicino and Miller said journalists shouldn’t be detained

Federal Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Marc Miller and his cabinet colleague, Minister Mendicino, both posted comments on Twitter defending the rights of journalists to cover current events in Canada.

“This right is essential to our democracy,” Miller wrote. “They should not be held or detained any longer than is necessary to verify that they are journalists.” 

For his part, Mendicino also noted the Coastal GasLink project was under provincial jurisdiction.

The Narwhal and several independent media outlets recently won a separate court battle against the RCMP after successfully arguing that the police force was interfering with the rights of journalists to cover civil disobedience at the Fairy Creek logging blockades on Vancouver Island.

In 2020, charges against journalist Justin Brake were dismissed under similar circumstances related to an injunction and action by Indigenous land defenders in Newfoundland and Labrador. A provincial judge noted that officials needed to be careful not to use an injunction as a “blunt instrument” that could violate rights such as freedom of the press. The court also noted, at the time, that it was important to protect freedom of the press related to coverage of Indigenous land defenders since Indigenous communities have been historically under-represented in Canadian media.

- with files from The Narwhal's Matt Simmons

Updated Nov. 22, 2021, at 8:20 p.m. PT: This article was updated to include a statement posted online by Eric Stubbs, RCMP assistant commissioner.

Updated, Nov. 24, 2021, at 8:18 a.m. PT: This article was updated to add additional details about the nature of the PRIME-BC police database and its links to other police systems in Canada.

Updated, Dec. 16, 2021, at 2:57 p.m. PT: This article was updated to include new details revealed in an article by Amber Bracken.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

RCMP arrested two journalists, including photojournalist Amber Bracken, on assignment for The Narwhal, during police enforcement of a Coastal GasLink injunction in northwest B.C. Friday. 

The arrests of Bracken and Michael Toledano have prompted widespread condemnation from media rights organizations, with the Committee to Protect Journalists and the Canadian Association of Journalists both calling for their immediate release.

“The RCMP, for whatever reason, continues to act with impunity and they are continually working to subvert law and best practice and that can’t be tolerated,” said Canadian Association of Journalists president Brent Jolly, pointing to RCMP limits on press freedoms at Fairy Creek logging blockades earlier this year. 

Prior to Bracken’s arrest, RCMP told The Narwhal they were aware journalists were at the site and said they conveyed the information to the officers before units advanced.

“As long as she is clear with the members on the ground there shouldn’t be any issues. I will pass along the information to the officers out there,” Staff Sergeant Janelle Shoihet wrote in an email Friday morning.

Tactical units advanced on the occupation of the pipeline drill site near the Wedzin Kwa (Morice) River on Friday morning, and in the early afternoon Sleydo’ Molly Wickham, a wing chief in Cas Yikh house of the Gidimt’en clan, was arrested, along with Jocey Alec, daughter of Hereditary Dinï ze’ (Chief) Woos, and 13 others, including Bracken and Toledano.

The arrests were made with the use of canine units and snipers. RCMP broke down the door to a tiny home with an axe to remove Wickham, Bracken and others, while officers used a chainsaw to extract Alec from a cabin on the drill site. Dinï ze’ (Chief) Woos was prevented from accessing his territory as police made the arrests.

RCMP refused to release Bracken from custody Friday evening and told The Narwhal she would be transferred to the Smithers detachment, then to Prince George where she would be held until a bail hearing on Monday. The RCMP would not disclose the details of why they were detaining the two journalists.

The Narwhal provided @photobracken with press passes, a formal letter of assignment and notified the RCMP that she was reporting on our behalf from within the injunction zone and none of that stopped them from arresting her.

— Carol Linnitt (she | her) (@carollinnitt) November 20, 2021

The arrests of Bracken and Toledano come in the same year a coalition of media organizations, including The Narwhal, launched and won a B.C. Supreme Court case against the RCMP after police restricted journalists’ access to the Fairy Creek blockades.

“Every time this happens, the RCMP seems to want to hide behind a curtain and execute their orders in complete darkness,” Jolly said. “Maybe that’s okay in a dictatorship, or in a totalitarian country, but it’s not acceptable here in Canada. Transparency matters.”

Last year, Bracken won the Charles Bury award from the Canadian Association of Journalists for her “outstanding contributions to journalism” covering the events of early 2020 on Wet’suwet’en territory for The Narwhal. In her acceptance speech, she said, “Considering the times we’re living through, it’s more important than ever that we be really tenacious about defending our right to report.” 

On Thursday, when the RCMP moved in to enforce the Coastal GasLink injunction, police arrested land defenders, legal observers and a journalist. The journalist was subsequently released, with no charges, and nine others were held overnight and released after a court hearing in Smithers on Friday afternoon.

Reactions to the ongoing police action on Wet’suwet’en territory include rail and road blockades across the country. On neighbouring Gitxsan territory, heavily armed RCMP officers removed a blockade on the CN Rail line in New Hazelton early Friday afternoon.

Human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, are calling on the province and the federal government to withdraw police and security forces. In an open letter on Nov. 18, Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs, condemned the actions. 

“We are absolutely outraged that the province of B.C. authorized a military-style raid on peaceful land defenders in order to allow Coastal GasLink to build their liquified natural gas pipeline, while much of the province is suffering from life-threatening, catastrophic flooding related events.”

The Coastal GasLink pipeline, owned by TC Energy, would span 670 kilometres and cross 190 kilometres of unceded Wet’suwet’en territory, connecting natural gas sources in the province’s northeast with the LNG Canada facility currently under construction in Kitimat.

“We are calling on B.C. and Canada to recognize and uphold Indigenous Title and Rights, including the right to self-determination, and institute a moratorium on fossil fuel expansion in the wake of clear and present climate catastrophe,” Phillip wrote.

Gidimt’en land defenders and supporters first occupied the drill site on Sept. 25, 2021, to prevent the company from drilling under the river.

Wickham, who is the Gidimt’en camp spokesperson, said they had no choice but to enforce an eviction order — first issued by Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs issued on Jan. 4, 2020 — after 50 days of occupying the site without meaningful response from B.C. and the federal government.

“It just got to the point that we’d had enough and it seemed like the right time,” she told The Narwhal in an interview before the arrests. “We cannot afford for Wedzin Kwa to be destroyed.”

Wickham, acting under the authority of Dinï ze’ Woos, Frank Alec, gave workers eight hours, plus a two-hour extension, to “peacefully leave the territory” on Sunday, Nov. 14, but only a handful complied. When the deadline lapsed, Wet’suwet’en, Haudenosaunee and supporters seized a Coastal GasLink excavator and dug up the road, the only access route to Coastal GasLink project sites and work camps housing some 500 people.

Four days later, RCMP tactical units responded. 

“Today’s enforcement was dictated by the actions taken by protesters that blocked the Morice River Forest Service Road that jeopardized the safety and wellness of hundreds of people whose provisions were at critical levels,” Eric Stubbs, officer in charge of criminal operations for the RCMP wrote in a statement Thursday. “We have made significant efforts to facilitate meaningful dialogue between all stakeholders, and specifically with the group opposing this pipeline project, to no avail. It was no longer possible to delay our efforts to rescue the workers. As such, our enforcement operation had to proceed immediately.”

The occupation of the drill site, where RCMP cut off all power, phone and internet access to the land defenders Friday before making the arrests, did not impede access to the Coastal GasLink work camps, which regained access to food and supplies.

Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs, and their supporters, have voiced their opposition to any pipeline construction on the territory for over ten years. In December of 2019, a court issued an injunction against blockaders, giving RCMP officers authorization to make dozens of arrests last year, when land defenders blockaded the road and prevented work by the pipeline company and contractors.

During both the 2020 police action and current enforcement, RCMP set up exclusion zones, preventing the media from accessing and documenting the events. 

“Every day is turning into Groundhog Day,” Jolly said. “We’re continually going through the same arguments, the same practices, the same channels over and over and over again, and we’re not seeing anything different happening. In fact, it’s getting worse.”

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On Valentine’s Day, a small group of Wet’suwet’en people gathered outside a Coastal GasLink pipeline work camp in northwest B.C. to hold a ceremony to remember Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. They chose the site because of the connection between work camps and violence against Indigenous women. 

It was a Sunday and no work was happening, which they confirmed with a Coastal GasLink employee before starting the ceremony. But just moments after starting, Coastal GasLink security officers approached the group, asked them to leave and said they were going to call the police, according to Sleydo’ Molly Wickham, a supporting chief in the Cassyex House of the Gidimt’en Clan. A security officer recorded the entire ceremony, she said, and when they left, security and police were waiting on the road, watching as the group left the site. 

The police and security presence on Wet’suwet’en territory has been constant since last February, when heavily armed RCMP descended on the Morice River forest road to enforce a Coastal GasLink injunction against land defenders who were blocking work on the pipeline. Twenty-eight people were arrested, including matriarchs. Today, the territory is still monitored daily by police and private security officers, despite calls from the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination for police and security forces to withdraw.  

A Coastal GasLink worker looks at a sign hung by land defenders as part of a Feb. 14 ceremony to remember Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. Photo: Michael Toledano

“I just get so mad and frustrated because we’re living with it every day,” said Wickham, who lives with her family in a cabin on the territory and is the spokesperson for the Gidimt’en Checkpoint, one of the sites of the police raids. “They’re patrolling all the roads. You could get pulled over at any point in time for no reason at all. If you go anywhere, they’re going to follow you.”

Jeffrey Monaghan, an associate professor at Carleton University’s Institute of Criminology and Criminal Justice and co-author of Policing Indigenous Movements, told The Narwhal there’s systemic racism in the RCMP and the “localized harassment” happening on Wet’suwet’en territory is common.

“I would characterize it as petty, retaliatory attacks,” he said.

 UN committee first asked Canada to stop construction on Coastal GasLink, withdraw police in 2019

The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has been calling on Canada to withdraw police and security forces from traditional lands since 2019. It has also been calling on the government to stop construction on the Coastal GasLink pipeline — as well as the Trans Mountain pipeline and the Site C dam — until it receives free, prior and informed consent from First Nations. 

Before the arrests last year, the committee issued a decision statement, which is an official call for urgent action, saying it is disturbed by the “forced removal, disproportionate use of force, harassment and intimidation by law enforcement officials against Indigenous Peoples who peacefully oppose large-scale development projects on their traditional territories.”

It called on Canada to “guarantee that no force will be used against the Wet’suwet’en and guarantee that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and associated security and policing services will be withdrawn from their unceded traditional lands.”

An RCMP officer holds a land defender’s drum during the February 2020 raids of Wet’suwet’en camps, which were intentionally situated to block work on the Coastal GasLink pipeline. Photo: Amber Bracken / The Narwhal

Amnesty International echoed the committee’s concerns in a statement and said when Canada committed to reconciliation, the government said it would respect and protect Indigenous Rights. 

“If promises to do so are not met with concrete action, including tough and challenging decisions such as those required here, then the words remain empty.”

A brief by Lawyers’ Right Watch Canada, a committee of lawyers and human rights defenders, said Canada is legally required to implement the recommendations of the UN committee.

“Canada has consistently failed to take appropriate measures to combat and eliminate all forms of discrimination against Indigenous Peoples.”

In November, the UN committee reiterated its requests in a letter to Canada’s permanent representative to the UN office in Geneva, stating the federal government “has provided no information on measures taken to address the concerns raised by the committee.” 

RCMP works with industry and province to patrol logging roads

Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs have also been calling for the police to get off their land. Following the 2020 arrests, the RCMP agreed to remove the temporary detachment it set up on the Morice River forest service road, the main access road to the Coastal GasLink work site. 

However, in late November, the RCMP re-established the detachment, which is known as the Community-Industry Safety Office. In an email to The Narwhal, RCMP spokesperson Cpl. Madonna Saunderson said the intent was to reduce the chances of COVID-19 exposures between local RCMP officers and members of the RCMP’s quick response team, which is composed of officers from across the province. 

A temporary RCMP detachment on the Morice River forest service road was closed in February 2020, following the arrests of land defenders and at the request of Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs. However, it reopened in November to prevent transmission of COVID-19 between local officers and members of the RCMP’s quick response team. Photo: Amber Bracken / The Narwhal

Saunderson would not divulge information on how many officers are assigned to the unit, citing operational reasons.

Wickham said based on her observations, there are six or seven vehicles on duty per shift, with two officers assigned to each vehicle. She said she has also seen a canine unit on the territory and believes the RCMP have access to armored vehicles, snowmobiles and ATVs.

A helicopter flies overhead during the February 2020 raids of Wet’suwet’en camps blocking working on the Coastal GasLink pipeline. More than a year later, RCMP patrols of the territory continue, with land defenders saying officers have access to armored vehicles, snowmobiles and ATVs. Photo: Amber Bracken / The Narwhal

Saunderson said the unit’s mandate is to “conduct safety check stops for compliance” with laws and regulations. She stressed that check stops are conducted at major intersections and include industry traffic.

The RCMP aren’t alone in policing the territory. TC Energy, the company behind Coastal GasLink, employs multiple private security forces, according to Wickham. She said one is Forsythe Security, a company that specializes in working for the oil and gas industry. The company is operated by a retired RCMP officer, Warren Forsythe. According to Canada’s National Observer, Forsythe worked for Kinder Morgan during 2018 protests against the Trans Mountain pipeline. 

Coastal GasLink did not respond to requests for interviews or information. In an email, a Forsythe representative said it does not discuss companies it may or may not work for.

Vehicle inspections are costing community members thousands of dollars

In addition to stopping Wet’suwet’en people on the territory, the RCMP has recently started serving vehicle inspection notices, according to Wickham. Anyone who receives a notice has to take their vehicle into an approved mechanic for a full inspection and fix anything noted on the report.  

“Most of the stuff is not mechanical,” she said, explaining that a full vehicle inspection will note minor damages like chips in the windshield. She said an inspection costs around $200 and a second inspection is required to confirm the repairs have been made. As a result, she said, the inspections are costing community members thousands of dollars and three people have already had to take their vehicles off the road. 

According to Monaghan, this a common police tactic used against activists. 

“If you did those kinds of vehicle patrols in affluent neighbourhoods, you’d find all kinds of stuff,” he said in an interview. “You could get people on this anywhere, but if you only enforce it in one community, then that is really oppressive.” 

Wickham believes the recent tactics are designed to prevent opposition to the pipeline from growing. “They’re scared of any build up like it turned into last year,” she said. 

RCMP oversight commission agreed policing activity infringes on charter rights 

Monaghan said the only action an individual can take against police activity like random stops and inspections is to file a lawsuit or a complaint with the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP, both of which would take years to complete. 

For example, it took seven years for the commission to wrap up a review of RCMP policing during the 2013 Elsipogtog Mi’kmaq First Nation anti-fracking protests in New Brunswick. The commission concluded that random stop checks and searches were “inconsistent with the charter rights of the vehicle occupants.” 

The British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs and the Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs wrote a letter to the commision prior to the 2020 arrests, expressing concerns about RCMP activity on Wet’suwet’en territory police and requesting a formal investigation. 

The Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP said the police raids of Wet’suwet’en camps in February 2020, shown here, were reminiscent of how the RCMP responded to Elsipogtog Mi’kmaq First Nation anti-fracking blockades in New Brunswick in 2013. Photo: Amber Bracken / The Narwhal

In a response letter sent a few days after the arrests, the commission agreed that many of the policing activities on Elsipogtog and Wet’suwet’en territories bore a striking resemblance. It said, however, it would not conduct a formal investigation on the grounds that it had “already provided extensive guidance” to the RCMP through its review of the 2013 protests. The guidance included “12 recommendations on a variety of topics related to the policing of protests, particularly with regard to Indigenous-led protests.”  

Monaghan called the commission a “toothless organization” and said despite 20 years of critical media coverage of policing of Indigenous communities, very little has changed.

“We’re stuck with this system where there’s not really much an everyday person can do if they have a shitty run-in with the police.”

Police and security presence is changing Wet’suwet’en relationship with the land 

Earlier this month, while on assignment for Al Jazeera for a story about Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, journalist Brandi Morin and photographer Amber Bracken were driving on the Morice River road when they were waved over to a pullout by RCMP officers. An industry truck was parked beside the unmarked police vehicle and when they pulled in, the industry truck drove in a circle around both vehicles and left. 

“It was almost like he was corralling us in,” Morin said in an interview. “It was really strange.”

Morin, who is Métis, told The Narwhal the officer asked them their names and why they were there. She said the whole situation made her nervous, especially given her Indigeneity and the remoteness of the location. The exchange was brief and the police left. A few minutes after Morin and Bracken started down the road, the unmarked vehicle appeared behind them and followed them for the next 30 minutes. 

Photographer Amber Bracken — who took this photo of red dresses, which signify Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls — was recently pulled over by RCMP on Wet’suwet’en territory while working on a story with Métis journalist Brandi Morin. Photo: Amber Bracken / The Narwhal

“I report on violence against our people by police on a regular basis and I felt afraid,” Morin said. She said she later called the RCMP to complain and was told the officers followed them to make sure they got out safe, but she said it was clearly an intimidation tactic.

“I felt it in my spirit and I didn’t like it at all. I had a freaking panic attack that night.”

Wickham said the continued harassment has changed her connection to the territory and is impacting her personal life. 

“It used to be so relaxing, and I could feel my body changing the closer to home that we got before all this started — now it’s just stress.” 

Updated Feb. 23 at 10:37 a.m. PST: This story was updated to include that Morin and Bracken were on assignment for Al Jazeera.

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As police enforce a court injunction against two Indigenous camps standing in the way of a proposed B.C. pipeline, the authors of a new report say their research indicates the RCMP’s action against Wet’suwet’en land defenders will be neither fair, nor objective.

Jeffrey Monaghan of Carleton University and Miles Howe of Queen’s University outline in a new report published in the Canadian Journal of Sociology how RCMP assess individual activists according to political beliefs, personality traits, and even their ability to use social media.

The report says government and RCMP documents uncovered through access to information requests indicate the police are not assessing Indigenous protests in Canada based on factors of criminality but are more concerned about the protestors’ ability to gain public support.

It also shows the government’s risk assessments of Indigenous protests, court injunctions initiated by private corporations against Indigenous people, and RCMP policing tactics all favour corporate interests and private property rights over Indigenous rights and title.

This includes the current resistance by land defenders and hereditary chiefs to the Coastal GasLink LNG pipeline slated to run through unceded Wet’suwet’en territory.

Intelligence compiled on Indigenous activists

Checklists developed by RCMP Director of Research and Analysis Dr. Eli Sopow as part of the National Intelligence Coordination Centre’s 2014-2015 Project SITKA reveal “it’s not criminality the RCMP are focused on, it’s the ability of that group to create and craft a counter narrative to the one that suggests whatever the police do is across the board legitimate,” Howe told APTN News in a phone interview.

Howe, a former journalist with the Halifax Media Co-op, covered the Mi’kmaq resistance to fracking in New Brunswick in 2013 and was arrested during a military-style raid of land defenders near Elsipogtog.

He wrote a book detailing the anti-fracking movement and the RCMP’s response to Indigenous people asserting their Indigenous and treaty rights.

Howe, a 2018 Vanier scholar and PhD candidate in Queen’s department of cultural studies, is delving deeper into the state’s policing and surveillance of Indigenous protests and movements.

His collaboration with Monaghan, an assistant professor of criminology, builds on a body of work developed by Monaghan and Andrew Crosby, a coordinator with the Ontario Public Interest Group at Carleton University.

Monaghan and Crosby used access to information laws to uncover thousands of pages of documents from the RCMP, CSIS and government agencies. They detailed their findings in the 2018 book “Policing Indigenous Movements.”

They paint a picture of how government departments, police, intelligence agencies and private sector interests work together to compile intelligence on activists — including Indigenous land defenders — and rate them according to the risk they pose to “critical infrastructure” such as pipelines, and to Canada’s “national interest.”

The authors write that the efforts represent a “new dynamic of policing” that aims to “suppress efforts [by Indigenous people] that challenge colonial control of land and resources.”

They say the RCMP are “not merely [part of] an objective or neutral policing entity but an active supporter of extractive capitalism and settler colonialism.”

RCMP efforts to control the public narrative

Their findings counter a common narrative communicated by the RCMP when responding to Indigenous land defence actions — that the federal police respect people’s right to protest and only act in the interests of public safety.

As part of their research Monaghan and Crosby uncovered previously classified documents on the Unist’ot’en clan of the Wet’suwet’en Nation, some of whose members have built dwellings, a healing centre, and have blocked industry access on their unceded lands for almost a decade.

The bunkhouse at the Unist’ot’en camp. Photo: Unist’ot’en camp / Facebook

Unist’ot’en ‘ideological and physical focal point of Aboriginal resistance’: government report

The researchers shared some of those documents with APTN, including a Government Operations Centre (GOC) report that labelled one of the Unist’ot’en leaders an “aboriginal extremist” and assessed the group based in part on the level of public support they had at the time, in 2015.

The document anticipated that TransCanada, the company overseeing the project — which would carry fracked natural gas from Dawson Creek, B.C. through Wet’suwet’en territory to tidewater at Kitimat — might apply for an injunction in April of that year.

That didn’t happen, but the document reveals that the government, based on information provided by the RCMP, considered the Unist’ot’en the “ideological and physical focal point of Aboriginal resistance to resource extraction projects” and acknowledged that arresting Unist’ot’en members had potential to trigger protests in other regions of Canada.

Monaghan said the document included revealing language, including reference to the pipeline as “critical infrastructure” and “risk to the national interest resulting from a blockade or protest against the proposed TransCanada Coastal Gaslink liquefied natural gas (LNG) pipeline” (which at the time they determined was “medium-low”).

He said the intelligence-gathering and GOC risk assessment are “not to govern some kind of national security threat or stop crime,” but are instead “about getting this project through, making sure that the enforcement of [an eventual] injunction happens, and that it happens with a low media cost, a low negative public opinion.”

Crosby said the public should anticipate police raids of the Unist’ot’en camp, or of the recently erected Gidimt’en check point along the same access road near Smithers, B.C., will be accompanied by an effort to control the public narrative around the events.

“We can be sure that whatever happens, [authorities are] going to want to ensure that it’s their spin, their version of what happens,” he said.

He said Indigenous sovereignty and the principle of free, prior and informed consent “have become obstacles to Canada’s ambitions to produce and export [fossil fuels].”

On Nov. 26 Coastal GasLink applied to the B.C. Supreme Court for injunctive relief, arguing that if further prevented by the Unist’ot’en from doing necessary work the LNG project could suffer “irreparable harm.”

B.C. Supreme Court Justice Marguerite Church approved the injunction application in mid-December.

Days later members of the Gidimt’en clan of the Wet’suwet’en Nation set up an access point in their own territory, about 20 kilometres down the same road as the Unist’ot’en camp.

The court injunction was then amended to include that blockade.

On Monday, January 7, RCMP conducted an armed raid of the Gidimt’en checkpoint, arresting 14 individuals. Another raid on the Unist’ot’en check point is expected to take place.

RCMP pass the Gidimt’en checkpoint on January 7, 2019. Photo: Michael Toledano

The Unist’ot’en and Gidimt’en, with the support of their hereditary chiefs, maintain that the band council system — created under Canada’s Indian Act — only has jurisdiction over reserve lands, not the 22,000 square kilometres of unceded Wet’suwet’en territory.

They have repeatedly referred to the 1997 Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) Delgamuukw decision, which acknowledges their traditional governance system and the names of hereditary leaders who now oppose the LNG pipeline.

The Unist’ot’en began constructing their camp in 2010 and in recent years have brought a healing centre to fruition, where they use traditional medicines and land-based practices to heal members of their Nation from addiction and other health issues rooted in the traumas of residential schools and colonization.

Carmen (1 of the 14 arrested, in the #Gidimten raid by police), had her restrictions lifted, and looks forward to going back out to the #Yintah We stand with #Unistoten #WetsuwentenStrong pic.twitter.com/oMPExVZQoP

— Gidimt’en Checkpoint (@gidimt) January 14, 2019

While band leadership has said their communities need the money and short-term jobs the project will create, traditional leaders say Wet’suwet’en laws place a duty on their people to protect the land, water and wildlife for future generations.

RCMP worked to ‘surprise and overwhelm the Wet’suwet’en poeple’

But none of this — from the Supreme Court of Canada’s acknowledgement of Wet’suwet’en territory and traditional governance systems in the Delgamuukw decision, to the question of who makes decisions on behalf of the wider Wet’suwet’en Nation — are factored into the police and government intelligence that is informing the RCMP in their approach to dealing with the Unist’ot’en and Gidimt’en.

The 2015 Government Operation’s Centre document describes the unnamed “aboriginal extremist” leading the Unist’ot’en as an individual “who rejects the authority of the Crown over his perception of what constitutes traditional territories.”

Sabina Dennis from the Dakelh Cariboo Clan at the Gidimt’en checkpoint, January 7, 2019. Photo: Michael Toledano

In early January, responding to a request for information about police presence in the area, an RCMP spokesperson told APTN she understood there were “less than a dozen officers in the Smithers’ area,” and that they were “continuing to monitor the situation.”

Cpl. Madonna Saunderson said the injunction and accompanying police enforcement order from the court “recognize the RCMP’s discretion to decide how and when to enforce the injunction…within a reasonable time.”

“The primary concerns of the police are public safety, police officer safety, and preservation of the right to peaceful, lawful and safe protest, within the terms set by the Supreme Court in the injunction,” she said.

“We are very hopeful that there will not be violence or disorder as we enforce the court order; however, the safety of the public and our officers is paramount when policing demonstrations, particularly due to the remote area in which the bridge is located.”

Members of the Gidimt’en clan offered a different account.

They said a meeting with members of the RCMP Aboriginal Police Liaison Unit prior to the RCMP’s enforcement of the injuction  indicated to them that “specially trained tactical forces will be deployed to forcibly remove Wet’suwet’en people from sovereign Wet’suwet’en territory,” according to a post on the Gidimt’en clan Facebook page.

“Police refused to provide any details of their operation… including the number of officers moving in, the method of forcible removal, or the timing of deployment,” the Facebook post reads.

“By rejecting the requests for information… the RCMP indicated that they intend to surprise and overwhelm the Wet’suwet’en people who are protecting their territories on the ground,” the post added.

“The RCMP’s ultimatum, to allow TransCanada access to unceded Wet’suwet’en territory or face police invasion, is an act of war.”

Hereditary Chief Na’Moks said he believes the RCMP’s coordination of action was timed with personal grievances within the Unist’ot’en clan’s membership, including the recent illness and death of one leader’s mother.

“They’re well aware of what’s going on; this is part of their strategy,” he said, adding the RCMP indicated it would deploy officers from outside the region.

“Mounties stated it would not be local officers that would move in,” he said. “They would bring in outside RCMP.”

“Personally, I believe — and so do the other chiefs — [that] they don’t want to have local police targeted or identified.”

Over the weekend, prior to the RCMP action, images and rumours circulated on social media that RCMP officers had begun to arrive in the region.

Responding to those reports the Gidimt’en posted the following message on their Facebook page: “We are not protesters. We are Wet’suwet’en. We are lawfully and peacefully living on our lands as we have since time immemorial. We call for all that can join us to do so immediately, on our homelands or where you stand. These lands will always be Wet’suwet’en.”

The day before the RCMP raid, one of the people managing the Gidimt’en Facebook page said there were currently women and elders at the camp, and that visitors have been bringing their children. They did not confirm the number of individuals at the camp.

A spokesperson for the Unist’ot’en camp and access point said as a policy they do not disclose the number of people at their location at at given time.

Howe called the RCMP’s statement to APTN “classic” and said they’re following the same pattern discussed in his, Monaghan’s and Crosby’s research.

“They’ve cast the notion that there’s a rational group, and that rational group can protest in a manner defined by the law.”

“There’s a law on the books now and we have to enforce it,” he continued, referencing the injunction and paraphrasing the RCMP’s perceived logic. “And we hope that nothing happens to anybody, but if it does it’s because we’re there to protect public safety.”

Howe says the statement is part of the police’s effort to construct a narrative that depoliticizes Indigenous peoples’ defence of their lands and rights, while justifying the RCMP’s potential removal of Indigenous people from their territory.

“So you’ve removed any reference at all to the very fact that all they’re doing is simply enforcing the desires of a resource extractive company, which is to get that pipeline built,” he said.

With files from Kathleen Martens.

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Elections BC will refer its ongoing investigation into potentially illegal political donations made to the BC Liberals to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, British Columbia’s Chief Electoral Officer, Keith Archer announced Friday.

“This investigation has been referred to ensure that it will in no way impede Elections BC’s administration of the provincial general election scheduled for May 9,” an Elections BC bulletin states.

“This referral will also ensure that there is no perception that Elections BC’s ability to administer the general election in a fair, neutral and impartial manner is in any way compromised. The potential scope and timing of this matter make the RCMP the most appropriate agency to continue this investigation.”

Donations by lobbyists have come under scrutiny after a recent Globe and Mail investigation revealed that lobbyists are often being illegally reimbursed by corporations or special interests for donations made under their own names. B.C. has some of the weakest political donation rules in all of Canada. Individuals, corporations, unions and foreigners can donate unlimited amounts to political parties, yet it is illegal to contribute on another's behalf or conceal the true source of a donation.

Elections B.C. launched an investigation into the BC Liberals last week, stating there “appears to be a systemic problem that needs to be addressed.” That investigation will now be carried forward by the RCMP.

As DeSmog Canada recently reported, the democracy advocacy organization Dogwood, registered a formal complaint with Elections BC this week regarding personal donations to the BC Liberals from high-ranking Kinder Morgan staff.

Kai Nagata, Dogwood’s communications director, said recent revelations of indirect political donations, or ‘straw donors,’ is “just the tip of a very filthy iceberg.”

“What we’re seeing this week is the early chapter of what is going to become a massive exercise in piecing together the money train in B.C. politics,” Nagata told DeSmog Canada.

A report released this week by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) and the Corporate Mapping Project found the fossil fuel industry donated $5.2 million to political parties in B.C. since 2008 — 92 per cent of which went to the BC Liberals. The BC Liberals fundraised an incredible $12 million in the last year alone.

The CCPA report found "a remarkable and disturbingly close relationship between industry and the provincial government — one that not only contradicts the province’s stated aim to fight climate change but also undermines democracy and the public interest."

Nagata said with the influx of corporate cash in B.C. it's difficult to identify if government is making major decisions — from the granting of road construction contracts to pipeline approvals — in the public's interest.

"Only way to stop that freight train is to conduct an investigation," Nagata said.

.@BCLiberal Political $$$ Scandal Investigated by RCMP https://t.co/ZOnlCGp6qd @dogwoodbc @DemocracyWatchr @E4Dca @ClimateVoters #bcpoli pic.twitter.com/ctt6iVn9lv

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) March 13, 2017

The problem of uninhibited political donations in B.C. "is very dangerous to democracy," he added. "This kind of activity leads to the detachment of people from the political process that results in perverse political outcomes we don’t want to see in B.C."

"This is an issue that underlies every other issue in B.C. and has shaped the province and the lives of the people who live here. We’re not going to be satisfied until there is an inquiry or investigation to uncover the root of this problem."

Image: Christy Clark. Photo: Province of B.C. via Flickr

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Far more disturbing than what’s in Bill C-51 is the fact that most Canadians don’t seem to care about it. I don’t know if they’re scared, or uninformed, or think Earth will soon be knocked off its axis by a rogue planet sending us all hurtling into the sun so nothing matters anyway. In any case, here are a few reminders.

Free speech is important. Once you allow speech you don’t like to be criminalized, you’re allowing the government to create a list of illegal ideas. That list will expand no matter which party is in power. Once a state outlaws a few kinds of speech, it gets all jacked up and has to keep that buzz going and before you know it they’ve snorted up a whole pile of them and have you cornered at a party talking your ear off about politics.

Civil disobedience is important. Some will say if you’re not doing anything wrong you have nothing to fear from bill C-51, but “wrong” and “illegal” are not the same thing. If they were, when someone guesses incorrectly on Jeopardy Alex Trebek would say “Ohhh, I’m sorry, that answer is illegal. We were looking for Topeka. You are under arrest.” The point is, sometimes things are illegal AND morally right. Most social advancement starts with some kind of civil disobedience.

Intelligence agencies are not your friend. I’m not against them in principle, but if we’re going to allow people to exercise power in secret, we need to give them a laser-like focus and keep them on a short leash. We’re on the cusp of giving them a fog-like focus, and instead of democratic oversight we’re installing an applause sign.

And a final reminder, keeping Canadians safe is not the most important function of government. And if you think it should be, then please lock yourself up in a nice, safe bomb shelter and stop ruining the country for the rest of us.

This video was originally produced for the Toronto Star.

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