APTN National News
The Iranian government is willing to back First Nations leaders if they want to address member nations of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries at its next summit, says former Roseau River chief Terry Nelson.
Nelson said Iran backs First Nations who want financial compensation for the 2.5 million barrels a day of oil that is pumped from Indigenous territories and sent by Canada to the U.S.
Nelson and former Dakota Tipi chief Dennis Pashe were in Iran this week meeting with Iranian government officials and academics.
The Canadian government has severed diplomatic ties with Iran, shut down its embassy in Tehran and kicked Iranian diplomats out of Canada. Canada has also imposed sanctions against Iran, joining its allies in applying pressure to the Islamic regime over fears the country is developing a nuclear weapons program.
Israel and the U.S. could launch military action against Iran if the country gets too close to producing nuclear weapons.
Nelson has been courting Iran for months and has said he hoped his trip to Tehran would open a door to First Nations to access OPEC-member countries.
Nelson said Iran would support First Nations chiefs if they wanted to go before the OPEC oil cartel and state their case that they are the true owners Canada’s petroleum resources.
“We call upon the government of Canada to consider the experiences of other countries regarding fair distribution of the natural resources’ income,” said Nelson in a statement crafted in part by the Iranian government. “The OPEC nations have had similar history in dealing with colonial powers.”
The next OPEC meeting is scheduled for Dec. 12 in Vienna, Austria.
Currently there are 12 member nations of OPEC and cartel exerts considerable influence over the price of oil in its decisions to increase or decrease oil production.
OPEC member countries include Saudi Arabia, Iran, Kuwait, Iraq, Venezuela, Qatar, Nigeria, Algeria, Angola, Libya, the United Arab Emirates and Ecuador.
Nelson also said in an interview with APTN National News that Iranian NGO Peace Lovers Society Organization had also agreed to provide university scholarships to 10 First Nations students to study in Iran in areas of oil and gas, medicine and economics.
Nelson said he read the statement Wednesday morning at a press conference with local Iranian television and print media.
Nelson, who is leaving Iran Wednesday, said he met with senior government officials and spoke to several university classes during his week-long stay in Tehran.
He also appeared on Iran’s English-language state-controlled network Press TV.
Press TV and other Iranian television networks were recently banned by the European Union and their satellite feeds have been cancelled.
“We had very productive meetings with the Iranian civil society and government,” said Nelson, in the statement. “We were warned not to go to Iran and Western media have consistently tried to dehumanize and demonize the Iranian people. The people of Iran are nothing like the lies told in Western media.”
Nelson also met Tuesday with Mohammad Javad Larijani, Iran’s secretary for the High Council for Human Rights.
Larijani, who is part of a conservative faction that has been at odds with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, issued a statement following the meeting that was posted on Press TV’s English-language website. Lirijani, a senior advisor to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatolla Khamenei, said the country would take up Nelson’s cause.
“As we defend the rights of people in Bahrain, Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine in the international organizations, we will also vociferously defend Canada’s Aboriginal population,” Larijani’s statement said. “Canada has exploited and even committed genocide against the Aboriginal people rather than investing in their treasure of cultural and civilization wealth.”
Larijani’s brother, Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani, is Iran’s head of the judiciary and a rumoured presidential candidate.
“(Mohammad Javad Larijani) was very friendly and straightforward,” said Nelson. “He spoke flawless English and he said he spent a lot of time in the U.S….but (he said) he didn’t know enough about Canadian Indigenous people.
Congratulations to Terry Nelson for breaking out of the concrete coffin of Canadian colonialism. And as predictably, Canada’s demonization machine includes the usual chorus of ‘friendlies’ cheering on their oppressor.
Terry Nelson represents NOBODY. He does NOT speak for Anishinabek or any other First Nation peoples, and Denis Pashe was removed as Chief for stealing from his own people. Nelson is an anti-Semite who supported David Ahenakew’s claims that the Jews got what they deserved in the Holocaust and his own people fought for years to have him removed as Chief. He is in Iran, a country with an atrocious human rights record, as some kind of self appointed representative of who? Who paid for his trip? If you wanna make him into some kind of hero, man are you barking up the wrong nDn.