Canadians tour U.K. to raise oilsands awareness

Three aboriginal women from Canada are visiting the United Kingdom and Ireland as part of a 10-day tour to raise awareness around human rights issues occurring in the Alberta tarsands.

The tour, made up of two women from northern Alberta and one from Saskatchewan, is timed to create awareness in the run-up to the UN climate talks in Copenhagen in December.

"The [Canadian] government is in an environmental catch-22 predicament," said Heather Milton-Lighting from the Pasqua First Nation in Saskatchewan.

"Its energy policy depends on further expansion of the tarsands and it's the emissions coming from the tarsands that is prohibiting Canada from fulfilling its legal commitments under the Kyoto Protocol to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions."

Milton-Lighting said Canada is affecting the whole world's ability to reach a climate agreement in Copenhagen.

Oilsands 'biggest environmental crime on the planet'

Activist Eriel-Tchekwie Deranger, a member of Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation, said oilsands development is having devastating health and environmental consequences in northern Alberta.

"I think it's really important that the international community has a full understanding of why Canada has been an objector to a lot of the emissions targets that are being proposed at the international level," she said.

"The main reason is because the Alberta tarsands obviously cannot meet those targets."

The delegation is targeting the U.K. because they say oilsands projects are largely financed and invested in by U.K. companies.

"British companies and investors … are driving this project, which is contaminating our land, food, water, air and forests and pushing wildlife out of our traditional territories," Deranger said.

"It is causing rare forms of cancer in our communities, which is why we call it 'bloody oil.' These companies are complicit in the biggest environmental crime on the planet and yet very few people in the U.K. even know that it's happening."

Tarsands a global concern

The women will visit Parliament to encourage U.K. citizens to get involved in the campaign for a tarsands moratorium, and to put pressure on the U.K. banks and companies involved.

"We're coming to the United Kingdom and Ireland because the tarsands should be everyone's concern," said activist Melina Laboucan-Massimo, from the Lubicon Cree in northern Alberta.

"Our communities live on the doorstep of this environmental devastation, but we are not the only ones who will suffer from it. The tarsands produce five times as much CO2 per barrel as conventional oil, and are contributing to catastrophic global climate change."

The women will tour the U.K. and Ireland from Nov. 13-23.