Photo: Arctic leaders make show of unity

Despite undercurrents of disagreement, Arctic leaders from Canada, Alaska, Greenland and Russia put on a display of unity at the Inuit and Arctic Indigenous Peoples Day event held Dec. 16 at North Atlantic House in Copenhagen. “There is a paradox of development amongst us,” said Aqqaluk Lyge, the chair of ICC-Greenland. “Those that are the most vulnerable, in particular indigenous peoples, are the ones that need sound sustainable development the most. And we are told by the colonizers and the developed part of the word we can’t.” (From left, bottom row: Mary Simon, president, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami; Tatiana Achirgina, chair, Inuit Circumpolar Council-Russia; Eva Aariak, premier of Nunavut; Jimmy Stotts, chair, ICC; Rodion Sulyandziga, Russian association of indigenous peoples of the North. Top row: Aqqaluk Lynge, chair, ICC-Greenland: Floyd Roland, premier of the Northwest Territories; Olav Mathis Eira, president of the Saami Council: Kuupik Kleist, premier of Greenland. (PHOTO BY JANE GEORGE)