Canada’s Indigenous services minister expressed anger Friday at recent incidents of police violence against Indigenous people.
“I’m pissed, I’m outraged. There needs to be a full accounting of what has gone on,” said Marc Miller during a news conference.
Miller said he watched “in disgust” a video showing a man being hit by an RCMP cruiser in Nunavut earlier this week, calling it a “disgraceful, dehumanizing and violent act.”
He also commented on the fatal police shooting of a 26-year-old Indigenous woman in Edmundston, N.B., early Thursday.
Police said officers were called to do a well-being check when the woman allegedly armed with a knife started making threats.
“I don’t understand how someone dies during a wellness check. When I first saw the report, I thought it was some morbid joke,” said Miller.
Police in both Nunavut and New Brunswick have asked external agencies to investigate the incidents. Miller said those independent inquiries “need to bring justice.”
“Police serve Canadians and Indigenous peoples of Canada, not the opposite. It’s something that we need to reckon as a society as we look south to the disgraceful acts that are occurring down there,” said Miller.
