Mounties spied on ‘Father of Nunavut’ in 1970s amid fears of Inuit-Dene alliance – CBC

Apr 22, 2026

RCMP Security Service watched as Inuit politicians developed 1976 Nunavut proposal, reports show

Surveillance had become so familiar to John Amagoalik it was, by the mid-1970s, something of a standing joke. From the Arctic to southern cities and back, Mounties followed the prominent Inuit rights advocate wherever he went. Day and night. Flight to flight.

The spying was so routine that Amagoalik and other Inuit Tapirisat of Canada members, when boarding those frequent north-south flights, even started smiling and waving at the men who shadowed them.

“They went where we went,” Amagoalik told CBC Indigenous in an interview last week in Ottawa.

Read More: https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/john-amagoalik-rcmp-surveillance-9.7171894