WANA (Oct 02) – Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Esmail Baghaei said questions surrounding the treatment of Indigenous children in Canada continued to haunt the world’s conscience, stressing that reconciliation could not be achieved without truth and accountability.

 

In a message posted on X marking September 30, Canada’s National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, Baghaei said Indigenous children had been taken from their families, stripped of their names, languages, cultures and identities, and subjected to a system of forced assimilation.

 

He said many Indigenous children had suffered abuse and neglect, while many others had died far from home and been buried in unmarked graves.

 

Baghaei said September 30 was intended to honor residential school survivors and their families and remember Indigenous children who never returned home, but argued that reconciliation could not be reduced to a commemorative day or political rhetoric.

 

He said serious questions remained unanswered and that the history of residential schools was subject to dispute or obscured in some cases, arguing that reconciliation therefore remained incomplete.

 

“The suffering of Indigenous children is not a culture war. It is a matter of historical truth and accountability,” Baghaei said.

 

He said questions surrounding unmarked graves required evidence, transparency and an honest examination of the historical record rather than denial, distortion or silence.

 

“No reconciliation without truth. No justice without accountability,” he concluded.