By Aaron Hemens  Local Journalism Initiative Reporter During a sentencing for two Indigenous land defenders, a B.C. Supreme Court judge described the women’s lifelong obligation to protect their territories as a belief system not “materially different than the beliefs or views of most other Canadians.” On May 19 at a courthouse in Tk’emlups (Kamloops) in Secwepemcul’ecw, Justice Shelley Fitzpatrick sentenced Secwepemc Matriarch April Thomas to 32 days in jail and Red Deer Billie Pierre of Nlaka’pamux Nation to 40 days of house arrest. Prior to her decision, Fitzpatrick heard evidence from Secwepemc knowledge-keepers about the nation’s ancestral laws, ceremonies and generational connections to the land and water. However, in the end, she grouped together Indigenous land stewardship with “Canadian” environmentalism and boiled the decision to oppose the pipeline down to

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