November 12, 2005
NOW AVAILABLE IN BULK
Ottawa to unveil Italian redress package (Campbell Clark, Globe and Mail, November 12th, 2005)
The federal government will recognize today the wrong done to Italian Canadians who were interned in the Second World War as part of a $50-million package designed to redress the historic grievances of seven ethnic groups.Today's package will not include an outright apology or financial compensation for the survivors. Instead, the government is planning to recognize the injustice committed against hundreds of Italian Canadians and create a $12-million fund for commemorative exhibits, signs and other historical material.[...]
The announcement will be followed at later dates by similar commemoration for the head tax on Chinese immigrants, the internment of Croatian Canadians during the First World War and German Canadians during the Second World War, the refusal to allow a ship of Jewish expatriates fleeing Nazi Germany, the St. Louis, to land in Canada, and the turning back of a ship carrying hundreds of Sikhs, the Komagata Maru, in Vancouver in 1914.
Solemn.
Posted by Peter Burnet at November 12, 2005 7:28 AMUnable to recall what connection the then geographical expression, "the Ukraine," had to do with Canada in WWI, I delved a bit into the background of this story.
Canada did in fact intern certain enemy aliens, citizens of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, with which it was then at war, who happened to have been ethnically Ukrainian. Perfectly legal, then and now.
It's the Canadian people's money, if they want to give it away, and it makes them feel good, go to it.
Posted by: Lou Gots at November 12, 2005 8:01 AMWouldn't it be better to spend this money on daycare centers and abortion clinics and just name them after Italian Canadians who were dissed sixty years ago. Kill two birds with one stone, so to speak. Or in the case of the abortion clinics, kill three birds ...
Posted by: erp at November 12, 2005 8:25 AMWhat about redress for the Americans killed or injured during the wars of 1812 and the American Revolution? With interest, Canada should owe us quite a sum by now.
Posted by: pj at November 12, 2005 10:01 AMpj:
That money has been re-directed to the coffers of the ruling LIEberal Party.
Posted by: obc at November 12, 2005 9:19 PMPJ:
Not until your president makes a full public apology on behalf of all of you to old Mr. Crysler's great-great-great-great-great-great-great-granddaughters. The old dears insist that is the only way they can have closure and get on with their lives.
Posted by: Peter B at November 12, 2005 10:23 PM