Morning Update: Saskatchewan First Nation details plan of how it will test for unmarked graves at former residential school site – The Globe and Mail
January 13, 2023
Good morning,
A Saskatchewan First Nation that announced it had discovered hundreds of subterranean “anomalies” during a search for unmarked graves is the first in almost two years of such discoveries in Canada to offer a clear blueprint to determine what definitively lies underground.
With the help of ground-penetrating radar, the Star Blanket Cree Nation said it found a child’s jawbone on the surface and more than 2,000 underground abnormalities at the site of a former residential school. Since the radar can’t differentiate human remains from other soil disturbances, the First Nation said it plans to deploy cutting-edge DNA identification techniques in the coming months to determine what, or who, lies beneath.
Its plan could provide a template for other communities searching for unmarked graves across the country.
