Canada

Jennifer Wickham, a member of the Wet’suwet’en people, explores her community's resistance to the CGL pipeline across their territory in Western Canada, the importance of the land to the Wet'suwet'en people, and the militarised response from Canada's militarised police units.

The Canadian government has maintained a ban of arms exports to NATO ally Turkey - including military drone technology - after "credible evidence" that Turkey had supplied weapons used by Azerbaijan in the recent conflict with Armenia.

The Canadian government has invested an additional US$70m to remain one of the nine partner countries in the development of the F35 fighter jet, despite not yet committing to purchase any of the planes.

The Canadian government has reinstated arms sales to Saudi Arabia, renegotiating a multibillion-dollar contract for light armoured vehicles built by General Dynamics Land Systems.

Canada’s supreme court has ruled that three Eritrean’s can cotinue their case against a minig company, despite their accusations of human rights abuses by the company taking place abroad.

Civil society organisations in Canada have written to the country’s Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, demanding an update on a review into a huge sale of arms to Saudi Arabia.

Activists have resisted and challenged arms fairs and exhibitions in Canada, Czech Republic, Israel and Spain in recent weeks.

In Canada, a court in British Colombia has rejected an appeal by Nevsun Resources, a large Canadian mining company accused of relying on modern slavery at it’s Bisha Mine in Eritrea.

In May and June 2017, activists in Canada, Israel and France have taken nonviolent direct action against arms fairs. In Ottawa, Canada, 40 activists blockaded the entrance to the CANSEC fair for over an hour. CANSEC is an annual two day event hosting 800 companies from across the arms industries, and attended by 12,000 people. As well as exhibits of weapons and other equipment, attendees were given the opportunity to hear presentations from government ministers and attend evening receptions sponsored by Lockheed Martin.

Nick Buxton

For anyone concerned with militarism, news of the terrorist attacks in Brussels brought a familiar sense of dread. We ache as we hear the stories of more innocent lives lost, and we feel foreboding from the knowledge that the bombings will predictably fuel new cycles of violence and horror in targeted communities at home or abroad. It creates the binary world that neocons and terrorists seek: an era of permanent war in which all our attention and resources are absorbed – and the real crises of poverty, inequality, unemployment, social alienation and climate crisis ignored.

Four days after the assassination of Berta Cáceres, a human rights and environmental activist from Honduras, activists in Canada entered the world's largest mining convention taking place in Canada, to protest extractivist projects that lead to militarisation, violence and human rights absuses. The group named some of those killed because of their activism against large-scale mining projects before being escorted from the event by police.

Tahoe Resources is a Canadian mining company. In mid-2010, Tahoe acquired the Escobal mine in southeast Guatemala from Goldcorp; Escobal is a 'high grade silver' mine, and also contains gold, lead and zinc. Some analysts believe it to be one of the biggest silver mines in the world. The Escobal mine is approximately 40km southeast of Guatemala City, and 3km from San Rafael los Flores.