Violence against First Nations peoples

Lawyers For Peace is fully committed to scrutinising Australia's longstanding history of violence against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, including the Frontier Wars.

These injustices have resulted in violence, systemic discrimination and entrenched disadvantage against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.

The path towards justice begins with truth telling.

Lawyers For Peace is embarking on a process of community engagement and education to tread this path. We are actively seeking input from all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. We also recognise that it is first and foremost up to those who have arrived on these shores in the past 250 years to address the wrongs of the past. Lawyers for Peace is committed to ensuring these voices are heard by engaging in a process of community consultation. As lawyers and law students, we are particularly focussed on how laws imposed since colonisation contribute to the ongoing violence against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.

This violence takes many forms, and is state-sanctioned and deeply ingrained in existing legal and political structures. We will critically examine existing and proposed legislation, and identify ways in which these laws and their enforcement perpetuate the injustices towards Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.