Canada minister says number of native women killed or gone missing may be 4,000

Canada says the number of the native women who have been murdered or gone missing over the past three decades in the country may stand at four thousand, much higher than currently believed.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in 2014 put the figure at above 1,200.

On Tuesday, however, the country’s Minister of Status of Women Patricia Hajdu said the figure may not be accurate as the police towed a history of underreporting murders or failing to investigate suspicious deaths.

She suggested that fear of persecution or prosecution may have also forced many native families to allege that the women had either taken their own lives or died as a result of exposure to fatal elements or circumstances.

“When you actually start to add in, you know, disputed cases, for example, people that have claimed it’s a suicide or death due to exposure, but in fact there’s symptoms or signs that maybe it wasn’t, then of course the numbers jump,” she said.

Four thousand could be a correct figure, she assumed.

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) reported that activists with the Walk 4 Justice initiative had collected at least 4,232 names of missing or murdered indigenous women. The Vancouver-based Walk 4 Justice seeks to create awareness and demands social changes in favor of the families of the missing and murdered women.

Ottawa has been increasingly pressed for answers concerning the cases of death or disappearance that occurred between 1980 and 2012.

Aboriginals account for nearly 4.3 percent of Canada’s population of over 35 million. The community struggle with poverty and desperation as well as high rates of crime.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has, however, promised a “total renewal” of the country’s relationship with its aboriginal population.

“The victims deserve justice, their families an opportunity to heal and to be heard,” he has said.

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