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Aboriginal campaign heads to Europe

21 August 2001 - Co-ordinators of the Aboriginal tent embassy are to establish a European consulate and hope to lobby the Queen on indigenous rights before she travels to Australia in October.

Isabell Coe and supporters displaying the Aboriginal flag outside Westminster parliament, before their meeting with Jeremy Corbyn MP

A delegation led by indigenous activist Isabell Coe will travel to Europe this week to lobby the Queen ahead of her visit to Australia in October for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting.

The Aboriginal tent embassy team has employed lawyers to help begin court action in the International Courts of Justice to have the Crown and British governments stand trial for stealing sovereign lands, genocide and mistreatment of Aborigines.

Ms Coe will also embark on a speaking tour of universities throughout Europe to talk about Aboriginal sovereign rights, human rights and the history of the tent embassy.

"A five-year campaign by the Aboriginal tent embassy in The Hague is anticipated with the overall view of building and maintaining an international platform so the issues that have to be overcome become evident to the people and governments of Australia, Britain, and just as importantly, the rest of the world," a tent embassy statement said.

"The Aboriginal tent embassy will light the sacred fire for peace and justice at the United Nations office in Geneva."

The delegation will also travel to Ireland to trace the whereabouts of the head of the warrior, Pemelwuy.

"Pemelwuy fought the British for 14 years when the colony of Australia was set up in 1788," the embassy said.

"The embassy believes that any true reconciliation can only begin after this gracious and humane act is carried out."

The embassy has already questioned in the Supreme Court the validity of the legal claim of sovereignty that the British Crown asserted over Australia in 1770.

"The Aboriginal tent embassy has already been to the highest courts in Australia and believes that truth, peace, justice and sovereignty can never be achieved here in the Australian courts," it said.

"The establishment of an Aboriginal tent embassy consulate in The Hague would be to lobby the world courts to intervene in these paramount and sacred rights."

relative links:

• Flame of reconciliation ends its trek to Sydney
  4 September 2000 - The Olympic torch is not the only flame that has traversed New South Wales. The alternative flame is a humble glow - it was not accompanied by a convoy of shiny vehicles, you can't buy it, and famous people are not queueing to run with it.It's a small flame, flickering on a piece of old wood cradled to the chest of Kevin "Uncle Kev" Buzzacott, a South Australian Arabunna elder.
• Aboriginal fire ceremony on Dover's beach
  3 September 2001 - An Aboriginal fire ceremony , was performed yesterday on Dover's beach by a delegation from the Aboriginal Tent Embassy, Canberra. Isabell Coe, Leader of the delegation explained that the traditional fire ceremony was to "let the land know we are here.''
• Flame of Freedom burns in Victoria Park
  23 August 2000 - The last time an Aboriginal campfire burned in Victoria Park could well have been more than 200 years ago. The Gadigal tribe of the Eora people, traditional Aboriginal inhabitants of the area now known as Sydney's inner west, are known to have used the park as a meeting place long before European settlement. The fire then would have been for utility and warmth as well as a place to gather in tribal community.
• Aboriginal Tent Embassy; The Hague Consulate Decleration 2001
  August 2001 - The Aboriginal Tent Embassy would like to inform you that a delegation led by Isabel Coe , with 'the sacred fire for peace and justice", will be going to the Hague, the Netherlands, to establish a consulate on neutral diplomatic ground. The purpose is to lobby the Crown and the Queen of England on the issue that the Aboriginal people who belong to the land known as Australia, never ceded their sovereign rights to the land known as Australia.

Further information: British responsibility issues page - includes news index and external links

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