New Report Confirms What First Nations Have Long Known: MMIWG2S+ Crisis Is Fuelled by Human Trafficking and Inaction
July 30, 2025
Treaty One Territory, Manitoba
AMC Communications
Treaty One Territory, Winnipeg, MB – The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs (AMC) is responding to the July 28, 2025, report by Thomson Reuters that confirms a direct link between the epidemic of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and Two-Spirit people (MMIWG2S+) and human trafficking across Canada. The report identifies Manitoba as one of the hardest-hit provinces, accounting for 21% of all cases nationwide, with Winnipeg alone representing 14%.
“This is not new information. It is painful confirmation of what our families, survivors, and Nations have been telling governments for decades,” said AMC Grand Chief Kyra Wilson. “Our women and girls are being targeted, trafficked, and discarded — and Canada still has no comprehensive, resourced plan to stop it. As Nations, we have the solutions to keeping our families safe. Canada needs to work with First Nations leadership to understand the critical resources needed in community.”
The report names Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Ontario as focal points, with Indigenous women moving swiftly from ‘missing’ to being exploited in the online sex trade. It also reinforces earlier findings that man-camps — temporary industrial work camps tied to resource development projects — are consistently linked to increased violence and trafficking near First Nations communities.
“These aren’t random cases. This is systemic. The presence of industry man camps on or near our territories directly contributes to this crisis,” said Grand Chief Wilson. “And yet, major projects continue to get the green light without enforceable safety guarantees or protections for our people. That’s what colonialism looks like in 2025.”
Despite the 2019 Final Report of the National Inquiry into MMIWG and its 231 Calls for Justice, very few recommendations have been implemented. Canada has failed to spend committed funding, particularly for shelters and emergency supports for Indigenous women, and has not established the national, Indigenous-led MMIWG alert system demanded by families and advocates.
“We just held a historic First Nations Summit with the Prime Minister and our Chiefs did raise these exact concerns,” said Grand Chief Wilson. “Our voices were clear: the MMIWG2S+ crisis must be treated as a national emergency – not buried in bureaucracy, not delayed by jurisdictional confusion, not exacerbated by funding cuts and certainly not ignored until the next tragedy.”
The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs continues to call for the full implementation of the National Inquiry’s 231 Calls for Justice and in light of the Build Canada Act, mandatory social impact assessments for all resource projects including fast tracked National Interest Projects, to ensure enforceable conditions around the operation of man-camps.
If you think you might be a victim of human trafficking or think someone else may be, contact the Canadian Human Trafficking hotline: Call: 1-833-900-1010 or email hotline@ccteht.ca.
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For more information, please contact:
Communications Team
Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs
Email: media@manitobachiefs.com
About The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs:
The AMC was formed in 1988 by the Chiefs in Manitoba to advocate on issues that commonly affect First Nations in Manitoba. AMC is an authorized representative of all 63 First Nations in Manitoba with a total of more than 172,000 First Nations citizens in the province, accounting for approximately 12 percent of the provincial population. AMC represents a diversity of Anishinaabe, Nehetho / Ininew, Anisininew, Denesuline, and Dakota Oyate peoples.