MONTREAL – Shirley Pien spends much of his time at Cabot Square, a park in downtown Montreal where many homeless people gather.
The woman works as a health navigator for the city's Indigenous-led health clinic, and makes coming to a place where she meets every week a priority. It's a site until many missing Indigenous women who she knows were using frequently disappeared.
“In recent months, there are women who have been watching regularly what we haven't seen anymore. No one knows where they are,” said Pien, who is from Nazcapi Country in northern Quebec.
She was among many who took part in the march in Montreal on Saturday.
“Hopefully one day people will hear us and start doing something about it,” Pien said, adding that Montreal police haven't done enough to respond to the loss-disappearance.
The march was one of several events that took place across Canada on Friday and Saturday, acknowledging the National Action Day held on October 4th.
Organizers behind the protests in Montreal say that all levels of government were unable to implement recommendations on the missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls in a 2019 national investigation.
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The investigation concluded that “continuous and discreet” human rights violations are to condemn the high rate of violence facing Indigenous women, girls and two spirit people.
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A total of 231 calls to justice have occurred, including many people targeting governments and social service providers.
The protest organizers, including a local native women's shelter and a association representing Inuit people in southern Quebec, said.
Simone Page leads the team in a shelter advocating for families looking for loved ones.
She said sex trafficking is a major problem between unnatural Inuits in the city and other indigenous women. People who are frequently frequent in the area around Cabot Square are routinely targeted by traffickers and conceal their intentions by approaching them romantically or as friends, she said.
Hotels for medical patients and Montreal airport and bus terminals are also areas where indigenous women should be required, she added.
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When these women go missing, police aren't always quick to respond, she said. In her experience, she noticed that it started only 24 to 48 hours after a general search was reported.
“The first 24-48 hours are essential, especially when it comes to human trafficking,” Page told the Canadian press.
Native Nam, the author of Kittigan Zibi, from the Outauas region of Quebec, said he believes the number of missing people and murdered Indigenous women reported by authorities does not match reality.
“Activist groups suggest that there may be more and more true numbers,” she said the crowd gathered. “These are more than just numbers. They are our daughters, mothers, aunts, cousins. They are us.”
In a statement issued Saturday, the federal crown and Northern relations and Northern issues are committed to ending the national crisis.
“The most important work is guided by Indigenous people at the community level,” said Minister Rebecca Arti for Indigenous Services, Mandy Garmasti, Mandy Garmasti, Rebecca Chartland, Rechie Valdes for Women and Gender, Crown and Inzigen Relations, Mandy Garmasti, in the statement in the statement.
The statement mentioned funding committed to shelters and other projects aimed at improving community safety as part of Canada's response to the crisis.
In August, Canada said $8.5 million, for example, to establish a transition housing unit for women and children in St. Andrews.
The government has also appointed a national plan of action to host indigenous, federal, local and territorial gatherings to talk about the crisis, creating a national action plan to end gender-based violence, and also appointed a chief advisor to combat domestic human trafficking, the minister emphasized.
The report, which was first published on October 4, 2025, by Canadian report.
& Copy 2025 Canada Report