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182 Indigenous Children Remains Found At Former Residential School in Canada

On Wednesday a Canadian Indigenous community said a search using ground-penetrating radar has found 182 human remains in unmarked graves.

The remains were found near a former residential school that housed Indigenous children that were taken from their families.

The latest discovery of graves near Cranbrook, British Columbia follows reports of similar findings at two other such Catholic Church-run schools, one of more than 600 unmarked graves and another of 215 bodies.

The Lower Kootenay Band said in a news release it began using the technology last year to search the site close to the former St. Eugene’s Mission School, which was operated by the church from 1912 until the early 1970s.

The release said it’s believed the remains are those of people from the bands of the Ktunaxa nation, which includes the Lower Kootenay Band, Aq’am and other neighboring First Nation communities.

Last week, Chief Cadmus Delorme of the Cowessess First Nation said ground-penetrating radar located 600 bodies that were buried at the Marieval Indian Residential School, which operated from 1899 to 1997.

The Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops said Pope Francis has agreed to meet with Indigenous survivors of Canada’s notorious residential schools in December.

After last month’s discovery, Pope Francis expressed his pain and pressed religious and political authorities to shed light on “this sad affair,” but didn’t offer an apology.

Since the discovery of unmarked graves at the sites of former residential schools, there have been several fires at churches across Canada. Most of the fires have been on First Nations.

Churches and statues in cities have been a target for vandalism.

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