Opinion: Walk in honor missing and murdered Native women

For many women Feb. 14 each year means boxes of chocolate and dinner with their special someone. But for thousands, Feb. 14 is set aside as a day to remember the hundreds of missing and murdered Native American and First Nations women. Every year, hundreds of Native women go missing. Most of them are kidnapped near or on Native land. Some of the women are lead to believe they will find better lives in the big cites. Most of these women will be sold into the international sex trade. Others will be raped, murdered, or left for dead. The Native women who escape and survive will live with pain and fear caused by their attackers. The ones who lost their lives are remembered in the hearts of the communities that they are from. The pain this issue has caused is leaving a deep wound in the hearts of the Native American community.

In March 2010, the Native Women's Association of Canada (NWAC) created a database of information they gathered covering 582 cases of missing and murder native women and girls. They found that 67 percent are murder cases meaning "death as the result of homicide or negligence." Also they found that 20 percent are cases of missing women and girls, and four percent are cases of suspicious death. The NWAC's research goes on to show that between the years 2000 and 2008, Native women and girls make up around 10 percent of all female homicides in Canada. However Native women are less than three percent of the total female population. Most of these cases are Native women and girls under the age of 30.

The study showed that Native women are three times more likely to be killed by a stranger then non-Native women. Native women also face the harsh reality at home on the reservations. Some are victims of domestic abuse.