Protesters blocking a train near a nuclear processing facility in Toronto, Canada on February 3, 2013.
Canadian natives and anti-nuclear activists have blocked a rail line, demanding the shutdown of a nuclear processing facility in the country.
The protesters, including the members of the Idle No More movement, blocked a train, on Sunday, near the General Electric-Hitachi nuclear plant in Toronto, after staging a demonstration at the facility and a march earlier.
“Uranium is stolen from indigenous lands and it leaks radiation all along the fuel chain,” said anti-nuclear activist Zach Ruiter.
Another protester from Serpent River First Nation said, “I’m here because uranium, it really affected my reserve back home,” and added, “It did a lot of damage to our river. We can’t use the river no more, we can’t fish in it. We can’t drink the water.”
Under the Canadian law, the government has the right to seize or sell land from the indigenous people to the private sector.
The aboriginal people say the government is using the law to force them flee their land.
Legal experts have called the law unconstitutional and potentially genocidal piece of legislation that is intended to do away with the collective rights of Canada’s 1.2 million natives.
The Idle No More Movement was inspired by the six-week hunger strike of Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence, which began on December 11, 2012, as a protest against the violation of the rights of the Canadian natives.