Canadaland

canadaLANDBACK is a co-production of Canada’s National Observer and Canadaland.Since 2019 five journalists have been arrested at land defenses, several others have been detained or threatened with arrest - why?Host Karyn Pugliese believes the answer is to be found in two land defenses that unfolded in the 1990s. KanesatakeGustafsen LakeOf all the things journalists have to cover in Indigenous communities, land actions are the most complicated, involving a tangle of history and relationships journalists trip into unprepared. Landback movements question Canada’s legitimacy as a nation, and its character as a champion of human rights. How the media understood and told these stories mattered.  State violence as a response to a human rights issue is indefensible, but it is a justified response to a criminal matter.So what are land defenses? Is the state enforcing the rule of law against armed terrorists?Or is Canada using violence to crush human rights defenders? This episod