Atuagagdliutit - 26.06.1980, Blaðsíða 20

Inuit Circumpolar Conference/lnuit Issittormiut Ataatslmeersuarnerat
V

The first Inuit Circumpolar Conference in Barrow fotographed toward the end of the conference, just after it
had been decided that an inuit organizaton should be founded. At that time no one would have believed that
three more years would have to pass before agreement about a new charter for the organization could be rea-
ched.
Inuit Circumpolar Conferencet sujugdlersåt Barrowime naggatårnermingne éssilisisimassut, aulajangerxå-
merdlugo inuit-kåtuvfiånik pilersitsissoxåsassoK. taimane isumaKartoKånglkaluarpoK kåtuvtigssap inatsisig-
ssaisa sananigssåt ukiut pingasut ingerdlénexésassoK
Den første Inuit Circumpolar Conference i Barrow fotograferet ved afslutningen, hvor man netop havde ved-
taget at der skulle grundlægges en inuit-organisation. Dengang troede ingen, at det skulle tage endnu tre år
før man blev enige om organisationens vedtægter.
Experts in international law
have studied the new charter
After two years' work agreement was reached
about a joint proposal from Alaska and Greenland,
but a proposal from Canada gad not been received.
After it had tacitly been accepted
that the Resolutions Committee
took over the Interim Commit-
tee’s work of writing a charter for
the new inuit organization, the
Resolutions Committee got off to
a slow start with this important
work.
The first meeting was held in
February 1979, and at that time
it was decided that the two exi-
sting proposals from Alaska and
Greenland should be merged to
constitute one proposal. No pro-
posal had yet been received from
Canada.
At a meeting in Inuvik in Cana-
da in March 1979 the two propo-
sals were combined. But at that
meeting a one-year old Canadian
proposal was suddenly discove-
red.
That proposal had come from
COPE, the regional inuit organi-
zation for the MacKenzie Delta,
which has its headquarters in I-
nuvik. COPE was at that time op-
posing the Canadian Inuit’s nati-
onal organization, Inuit Tapirisat
of Canada, because they diagreed
about their common battie for
ownership of the land. COPE had
agreed to undertake its own nego-
tiations with the Canadian go-
vernment in return for a promise
of a settlement within a relatively
short time; and the Inuit Tapiri-
sat of Canada had protested aga-
inst COPE’s independent ways.
— Just when we thought we
had worked our way through to
one proposal on the basis of the
two we had from Greenland and
Alaska, we again had two propo-
sals, Robert Petersen States. —
We decided to get both proposals
translated and mailed to the diffe-
rent organiztions and political in-
stitutions concerned.
Lawyers get into the picture
Since no proposal had been recei-
ved from Canada as such, the
joint proposal from Alaska and
Greenland naturally received
most of the attention. However,
then a number of lawyers got into
the picture, and that caused new
changes.
— First the North Slope Bo-
rough sent our combined proposal
to its lawyers, and that brought
about a number of changes — in
the wording at any rate, Robert
Petersen says, and he continues:
— In Greenland the legislative
assembly had in the meantime ac-
cepted official responsibility for
inuit co-operation, which also was
mentioned in the report of the Ho-
me Rule Commission. Therefore
we also sent the proposals to the
newly established legislative as-
sembly of Greenland, and during
its fali session it appointed a spe-
cial committee to study the char-
ter proposals.
The members of the commit-
tees were: Robert Petersen, Ove
Rosing Olsen and Jørgen Hert-
ling. Hans-Pavia Rosing and Karl
Kristian Olsen (Pujo) were alter-
nates, and Alibak Steenholdt was
secretary.
— At one of our. meetings we
concluded that we would like a la-
wyer who was familiar with inter-
national law to look at the propo-
sal, and we decided to send it to
Professor Isi Foighel, PhD Law,
Robert Petersen explains.
The Nordic Council
— Isi Foighel had a number of ob-
jections, Hans-Pavia Rosing ex-
plains, — and the outcome of this
was that we asked Foighel to pre-
pare a draft for the charter.
AG: — And what did he sug-
gest?
— He suggested a model com-
parable to that of the Nordic
Council, and in many respects
that complied with our wishes.
We wanted a form of organization
that built on mutual exchange of
ideas and experiences.
AG: — What about the powers
of the organization. The Nordic
Council doesn’t have the powers
to do anything whatever?
— One of the problems we have
had in putting together a charter,
Hans-Pavia Rosing continues, —
was that we wanted both a strong
organization, and at the same ti-
me wanted to avoid that a single
group, such as Greenland for in-
stance, simply could be forced to
adopt any given policy.
Robert Petersen adds: — One
of the problems has been that so-
me of the participants from North
America have suggested that it
should be possible to make decisi-
ons on the basis of a simple majo-
rity vote, whenever all three
countries are represented. We are
of the opinion that there has to be
a veto-right as well, so that for in-
stance the home rule government
cannot be forced to comply with
policies which it finds itself unab-
le to support. We do not believe
we can or ought to form an orga-
nization which is able to bind one
of the groups of people against its
will.
AG: — Who have wanted the
strong organization with power
over the individual groups?
— Well, among others, there
have been Canadian representa-
tives who have suggested that.
-lip.
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