The remains of 215 children are found in a school for Indigenous peoples in Canada

Rosanne Casimir, community leader in the city of Kamloops, British Columbia, said the preliminary discovery represented an unthinkable loss that had never been documented by school administrators.

Residential schools were compulsory boarding schools run by government and religious authorities during the 19th and 20th centuries with the goal of forcibly assimilating young Indigenous people into European culture.

The Kamloops Indian Residential School was the largest of this system. Opened under Catholic administration in 1890, the school had 500 students at its peak in the 1950s.

The central government took over the administration of the school in 1969, turning it into a residence for the region’s students until 1978, when the school was closed.

The Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nation said the remains were found using ground-penetrating radar during an investigation at the school.

“As far as we know, these missing children died without papers,” Casimir said.

“Some were only three years old.

“We have sought a way to confirm this with the utmost respect and love for these lost children and their families, knowing that Tk’emlups te Secwepemc is the final resting place for these children.”

Indigenous peoples said they were looking for communities of origin whose children were in school. They expect to announce preliminary results in mid-June.

British Columbia Chief Medical Examiner Lisa Lapointe told Canadian broadcaster CBC that “we are at the beginning of the information gathering process.”

The reaction to the discovery was a reaction of shock, sadness and regret.

“The news that remains was found in the old Kamloops residential school breaks my heart,” Trudeau wrote on Twitter.

Canadian Indigenous Affairs Minister Carolyn Bennett said residential schools were part of “shameful” colonial policy. The government is committed to “honoring these lost innocent souls,” she said.

Terry Teegee, regional chief of the Assembly of First Nations in British Columbia, called the discovery “urgent work” that “refreshes the pain and loss” of communities in the region.

These views have been echoed by other Indigenous groups, including the First Nations Health Authority (FNHA). on First Nations people, their families and their communities, ”wrote CEO Richard Jock in a statement.

From about 1863 to 1998, more than 150,000 indigenous children were taken from their families and placed in these schools.

Children were often not allowed to speak their language or practice their culture, and many were mistreated and mistreated.

A commission launched in 2008 to document the impacts of this system found that a large number of indigenous children have never returned to their communities of origin.

The landmark Truth and Reconciliation report, published in 2015, declared that this policy amounted to “cultural genocide”.

In 2008, the Canadian government formally apologized for the system.

The Missing Children Project documents the deaths and burial sites of children who died while attending school. To date, more than 4,100 children who have died while attending residential school have been identified, according to the report.

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