INUIT AND THE NUNAVUT LAND CLAIMS AGREEMENT: SUPPORTING CANADA’S ARCTIC SOVEREIGNTYNunavut Land Claims Agreement • November 21st, 2007
Contract Type FiledNovember 21st, 2007Although the ice-strengthened navy patrol vessels to be deployed from Ikpiarjuk on Baffin Island are an important component of Canada's Arctic sovereignty strategy, there is more than one way to skin a cat, says Terry Fenge, formerly with the Inuit Circumpolar Conference Canada. The federal government should involve the Inuit in Canada's Arctic sovereignty, as supported by provisions in the 1993 Nunavut Land Claims Agreement dealing with monitoring and offshore management, he says. Yet, these have not been implemented, and Ottawa seems to have forfeited the opportunity to use them to shore up sovereignty. “[E]ngaging the region’s Inuit with a view to jointly ensuring that the obligations, duties, and objectives of the Nunavut, Inuvialuit, Nunavik and Nunatsiavut Land Claims Agreement are fulfilled,” he says, is key to the Integrated Northern Strategy, promised in the recent Throne Speech.