The Lubicon Crees are a small aboriginal society of about 500 people. Their 10 000 square kilometre traditional territory is located in northern Alberta east of the Peace River and north of Lesser Slave Lake.

The Lubicons have not ceded their traditional lands in any legally or historically recognized manner.

Between 1979 and 1983, annual trapping income dropped 90%. The number of moose killed for food dropped 90% and the number of people on welfare jumped from 10% to over 90%.

These negative developments are directly linked to resource exploitation on Lubicon land. Public pressure is needed to convince the federal government to negotiate expeditiously toward a settlement offering economic stability for the future and to encourage the province to honour its 1988 "Grimshaw Accord" commitment to make available 243 square km. (95.4 square miles) for reserve lands.

"In essence the Canadian government has offered to build houses for the Lubicon people and to support us forever on welfare - like animals in the zoo who are cared for and fed at an appointed time." - Chief Bernard Ominayak

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2001 - Negotiations are scheduled to resume on Mar.6, 2001.

2001 - Marathon Canada announces plans for a natural gas compressor and pipeline adjacent to the proposed reserve area; the Lubicons and supporters demand health and safety assurances.

2000 - The neighbouring Whitefish Lake band announces logging within the Lubicons' traditional territory. This is described by the Lubicons as "a transparent tactic ... on behalf of both levels of government" to encroach on the territory under negotiation.

2000 - Negotiations resume briefly but are soon suspended again, as the federal government regional office tries to impose a discriminatory social assistance policy. After 3 months of public pressure the government reinstates the exsisting social assistance funding policy.

1999/2000 - Daishowa appeals the court ruling in favour of Ontario Lubicon supporters. An out-of-court settlement is reached and Daishowa drops the appeal. Lubicon supporters agree to cease activities against Daishowa as long as it respects its commitment to stay out of Lubicon territory.

1999 - Talks with the federal government are suspended as the Lubicons are pressured to include the provincial government in negotiations before substantial agreement is reached with the federal government.

1999 - The Alberta goverment finances a challenge of the 1999 Lubicon election that saw Lubicon chief Bernard Ominayak acclaimed and 4 of the 5 councillors re-elected.

1998 - The court rules the Daishowa boycott legal calling it a "model of how such activities should be conducted in a democratic society." The judge notes the "tragic, desperate and intolerable" circumstances of the Lubicons.

1998 - Daishowa agrees not to log or buy wood cut on Lubicon land until the land rights are settled. The Lubicons and supporters call off the boycott.

1998 - A new federal negotiator is appointed and a new round of negotiations with the federal government begins in July. By September, the federal government has agreed to the reserve area defined by the Grimshaw Accord and an agreement in principle on Lubicon control over membership is reached.

1997 - The talks which started in 1995 break off.

1995 - Alberta falsely states that the 1988 "Grimshaw Accord" is based on population at the time of signing. Citing membership loss to the Woodland Crees and to the "Little Buffalo Crees" (still in fact Lubicons), the province announces that the "Grimshaw Accord is [off] the table". Former premier Getty and the Lubicons state that the size of the reserve negotiated at Grimshaw was not linked to Lubicon population.

1995 - Another major initiative to split Lubicon society commences. Supported by the Alberta government a minority group of Lubicons propose separating from the Lubicon Nation and taking land with them.

1995 - The federal government appoints a new federal negotiator closely associated with the Alberta provincial government and the oil and gas industry. A new round of talks begins.

1995 - Despite the concerns of the Lubicons and numerous groups and individuals who intervened on their behalf at the regulatory hearing, the Unocal sour gas plant is approved for operation and starts up.

1995 - Daishowa launches a lawsuit against the boycott organizers in Ontario, contending the consumer boycott is illegal and seeking a permanent ban.

1995/96/97 - Daishowa obtains interim and interlocutory injunctions shutting down the Daishowa boycott for over two years pending a full trial.

1994 - The Lubicons protest Unocal's plan to build a sour gas processing plant within 4 km of their proposed reserve. Sour gas plants are associated with serious health problems. Alberta's Energy Resources Conservation Board fails to convene a regulatory hearing until after the plant is built.

1994 - The Daishowa boycott in Canada costs the company $20 million in lost sales. Daishowa continues to stay out of Lubicon land.

1993 - The Lubicon Settlement Commission of Review report finds Lubicon settlement proposals reasonable and that the federal government has not negotiated in good faith. It recommends that royalties from Lubicon territory be held in trust until a settlement is in place, that extinguishment of aboriginal rights not be precondition for settlement, and that settlement be referred to a third party if not concluded within six months.

1993/94 - A newly elected federal government states that resolving the Lubicon situation is a top priority. However an initiative to dismember Lubicon society is launched. "Little bribes" of reserve land, housing and cash are offered to one of the main Lubicon family groups to join the Woodland Cree. After Lubicon supporters worldwide protest, the government backtracks.

1992 - Prominent Albertans convene a Settlement Commission of Review to study the Lubicon situation and recommend possible solutions. Federal and provincial governments refuse to appear before the commission.

1991 - Ottawa announces negotiations with the Loon River Cree, a neighbouring nation. Again the federal government argues that Loon River members include some Lubicons and therefore a settlement at Loon River will decrease any future Lubicon settlement.

1991 - The federal government offers the Woodland Cree a proposal similar to the 1989 "take-it-or-leave-it" offer. To ensure acceptance, the federal government offers voters $1 000 payable to each member when the deal is accepted. After the vote, Ottawa reduces their welfare payments by $1 000.

1991 - An international boycott of Daishowa is launched to protest the company's plan to resume clear-cutting on Lubicon land. In response, Daishowa stays out of Lubicon land in the '91/ 92 winter logging season, saying they will review logging plans on a yearly basis.

1990 - After six years of deliberation, the United Nations charges Canada with a human rights violation under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, stating that, "recent developments threaten the way of life and culture of the Lubicon Lake Cree and constitute a violation of Article 27 so long as they continue." The charge stands to this day.

1989 - The federal government promises a solution but instead tables a "take-it-or-leave-it" offer that is described by Premier Getty as "deficient in the area of providing economic stability for the future." The federal "offer" does not provide a basis for the Lubicons to re-establish economic self-sufficiency.

1989 - Using an obscure clause of the Indian Act, Indian Affairs creates the "Woodland Cree" in the region to draw members away from the Lubicon Nation. With unprecedented speed, Ottawa recognizes this group of disparate individuals as a "band" while ignoring seventy aboriginal societies waiting fifty or more years. A conference of thirty international organisations that support Indian land rights concludes that Canada is using "fraudulent and criminal action to deliberately split the Lubicon Cree Nation."

1988 - Daishowa announces a pulp mill near the Lubicon territory which requires trees equal to 70 football fields daily. The province grants Daishowa timber rights to an area including the entire Lubicon traditional territory. Oil and gas revenues continue at about $500 million a year. Not a penny goes to the Lubicons.

1988 - After fourteen years getting nowhere in the courts, the Lubicons drop court action and assert sovereignty over their land. A peaceful blockade of access into their traditional area stops all oil activity for 6 days. The barricades are forcibly removed by armed RCMP. Premier Don Getty meets with Chief Ominayak in Grimshaw, Alberta; the result is an agreement on a 243 square km (95.4 sq. mile) reserve area called the "Grimshaw Accord."

1987 - Tuberculosis is present in a third of the community and active in a tenth - the worst outbreak in Canada since the depression. Ottawa reacts by appointing a new negotiator.

1987 - After three years of study, a United Nations Human Rights Committee states that the Lubicons cannot achieve effective legal or political redress in Canada and instructs Canada to do no further irreparable damage to the Lubicons pending a human rights hearing. Canada ignores the ruling.

1986 - At a meeting to discuss pre-conditions for negotiations with the federal government, the Crees are told to knuckle under to the government or "go to the end of the line."

1986 - The Lubicons boycott the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary and its Shell Oil-sponsored Indian art exhibit. Museums world-wide respond by refusing to lend artifacts to the exhibit. Talks proposed by Ottawa quickly break down when promises to negotiate on the basis of the Fulton Report are not honoured.

1985 - The Honorable E. Davie Fulton is appointed by the federal government to study the situation. After a year's study, the Fulton inquiry report confirms Lubicon rights and outlines proposals for a settlement. Indian Affairs prematurely scraps the inquiry and suppresses Fulton's report.

1985/86 - Out of 21 Lubicon pregnancies, 19 result in stillbirths or miscarriages and two are premature.

1984/85 - The Lubicons appeal the denial of the injunction. The head of the appeal panel was earlier a partner of the lawyer representing the oil companies and before that had been close to Premier Lougheed. He died before the appeal and is replaced by a judge also clearly connected to Mr. Lougheed. The ruling again goes against the Lubicons. The court writes that the Lubicons can "restore the wilderness" if they win damages in their 1980 aboriginal rights court case.

1983 - An ex-oil company lawyer turned provincial court judge denies the injunction. Despite substantial uncontested evidence to the contrary, he states that "the evidence simply does not establish a way of life which is being destroyed ..."

1983 - The World Council of Churches investigates claims that government and oil company actions "could have genocidal consequences." It concludes "the band needs immediate financial, political and legal support merely to survive the Provincial and oil company onslaught."

1982 - The Lubicons apply for an emergency injunction to prevent further resource extraction pending the outcome of the 1980 land rights case.

1981 - Alberta declares the community to be "an official provincial hamlet and therefore no longer available for purposes of establishing an Indian reserve." The province fraudulently solicits people for a land tenure program. Residents face fines and demolition orders if they don't comply.

1980 - The Lubicons take federal court action to gain a judgment regarding Lubicon land rights. A parallel action in provincial court commences in 1982.

1979 - The all-weather road is completed. Resource exploitation activity explodes. This drives away the animals and causes the traditional hunting and trapping economy to collapse. By 1983, there are more than 400 oil wells within a 15 mile radius of the Lubicons community. From 1979 to 1983, the moose killed for food drops 90% from 219 to 19, trapping income drops 90% from $5000 in 1979 to $400 per family. The welfare rate shoots up from under 10% to over 90%.

1977 - A court ruling in a similar caveat case indicates the law is clearly in favour of the Lubicons. Premier Lougheed's government responds by passing a bill rewriting the law governing caveats and makes it retroactive to a time before the Lubicons attempted to file the caveat. The Lubicons caveat court case is dismissed as no longer having any basis in law.

1975 - The Lubicons try to file a caveat - a notice that land title is contested - but Alberta refuses to accept it. The matter goes to court.

1973 - A federal Order-In-Council reaffirms that the Lubicons are a separate and distinct aboriginal society.

1971 - To ease resource extraction, Alberta begins building an all-weather road into Lubicon territory without Lubicon consent. The federal government claims Lubicons are "merely squatters on Provincial crown land with no land rights to negotiate."

1953 - Indicating that the proposed reserve will be struck from the record if no reply is received, Alberta gives the federal government thirty days to report on its status. Ottawa does not reply. Alberta strikes the proposed reserve from the books.

1953 - The Department of Indian Affairs cuts the Lubicon membership list down to 30 through transfer of members to other band lists.

1952 - The discovery of oil on Lubicon territory motivates the government of Alberta to question the federal government about the reserve.

1943/44 - A federal judicial inquiry regarding membership decides in favour of the Lubicons but the ruling is largely ignored by the Department of Indian Affairs.

1942 - The federal government begins its policy of undermining Lubicon land rights by arbitrarily reducing the incomplete Lubicon membership list from 154 to 64.

1939/1940 - The Lubicons are visited by Indian Affairs officials who recognize them as a separate, distinct indigenous society and who promise them a reserve on the shores of Lubicon Lake. A membership list is drawn up, left open to permit the addition of members out hunting and trapping.

1899/1900 - Living in an inaccessible area, the Lubicons are missed by government of Canada treaty commissioners and therefore do not sign Treaty 8. No treaty has been signed with the Lubicons to date.