Photo: Nunavut MLAs vote against EU observer status at Arctic Council

These sealskins at the North American Fur and Fashion Exposition in Montreal, tanned and imprinted with patterns, hardly look like sealskins, but they wouldn’t be allowed into any of the 27 nations which are part of European Union. Despite the ban’s exemption allowing Inuit sealers to trade seal products, Nunavut MLAs voted in favour of a May 9 motion asking for the EU to be denied observer status at the Arctic Council, whose top ministers meet May 15 in Kiruna, Sweden. There, they’ll decide whether to accept 14 applications for observer status. All Nunavut MLAs except for Amittuq MLA Louis Tapardjuk, who abstained, supported the motion to deny the EU observer status. Read more later about the motion on Nunatsiaqonline.ca. (PHOTO BY JANE GEORGE)