Amnesty International is urging Canada to respond to a recent report card given to it by the United Nations.
On Friday, Canada’s human rights record was examined in a peer review process by its closest friends and trading partners.
Among the criticisms was a call to boost federal funding for child and family services on-reserve and to remedy inequalities in education, health and drinking water.
Amnesty International’s Craig Benjamin says 20 countries also called on Canada to launch in inquiry into the issue of missing and murdered Aboriginal women:
“The issue of violence against Indigenous women in Canada was raised repeatedly by a wide range of governments. Ireland supported the call for a national inquiry. A wide range of other governments went ever farther and said that Canada needs to put in place a comprehensive national action plan to stop violence against Indigenous women.”
Benjamin says Canada was already taken to task by the peer review process in 2009 when many of the same concerns were raised.
He says Canada accepted the recommendations given to it by the group, but has failed to implement specific actions on many of them.