Justice before the Summit: citizens mobilize for global debt justice ahead of G7 Leaders’ Summit

Indigenous, Global South and youth voices gather in solidarity at Jubilee People’s Forum in Calgary, June 12-15

(Toronto – Treaty 13 with the Mississaugas of the Credit) – In the lead up to the G7 Leaders’ Summit in Kananaskis, Alberta, social and ecological justice activists and people of faith and conscience from across Canada and the world will gather in Calgary from June 12 to 15 for the G7 Jubilee People’s Forum, calling for global debt justice.

The G7 Jubilee People’s Forum is part of the Jubilee 2025: Turn Debt into Hope campaign, which is the Canadian component of a global petition campaign that calls for the cancellation of unjust global debt, as well as financial reform to prevent future debt crises. It is led by KAIROS Canada and its organizing partners: Development and Peace – Caritas Canada (DPCC), Citizens for Public Justice (CPJ), the Office of Religious Congregations for Integral Ecology (ORCIE), and the Canadian Council of Churches (CCC) and local partner, the Calgary Interfaith Council.

Today, 40 percent of the world’s population live in countries that spend more on debt repayments than on health, education or tackling the climate crisis.

The Canadian Jubilee 2025 campaign also emphasizes the urgent need to address ecological debt, which is the exploitation of resources by the Global North in the Global South and Indigenous territories in Turtle Island and world-wide and the resulting debt owed to impacted communities. The Jubilee 2025 campaign affirms the rights of Indigenous Peoples, as outlined in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, including the right to self-determination, land stewardship, and free, prior, and informed consent. It asserts that financial and ecological justice must include reparative measures for colonial extraction from Indigenous lands.

The G7 Jubilee People’s Forum will be held at Ambrose University, running from the evening of Thursday, June 12 to the afternoon of Sunday, June 15.

Highlights include powerful plenaries on the spirit of Jubilee and building a thriving movement, diverse workshops ranging from ecological debt to spirituality for activism, opening worship with the Calgary Interfaith Council, an Indigenous lead interfaith prayer gathering at Stoney Nakoda Medicine Wheel in Stoney Park, a young adult-led interactive visioning exercise, presentations from Global South partner organizations and public actions in downtown Calgary on June 15 to call for justice on the first day of the G7 Summit. 

Three KAIROS global partners will travel to Calgary to speak about the direct impacts of unjust debt on their communities and the need for financial reform. Partner representatives who will present at the People’s Forum are: Salome Owuonda, the Executive Director at the Africa Centre for Sustainable and Inclusive Development (Africa CSID), based in Kenya; Tarek Al-Zoughbi, the Project and Youth Coordinator at Wi’am: The Palestinian Conflict Transformation Center, based in the West Bank; and Sandra Xoquic Atz, a Mayan Kaqchikel lawyer who serves as the legal advisor for Kaji Ajpop, which is based in Guatemala. 

The Forum will explore the colonial legacy of debt and the continued impact of extractivist industries on Indigenous territories, both in the Global South and Turtle Island. Indigenous leaders will speak to the need for debt justice that recognizes Indigenous sovereignty and the inherent right to free, prior, and informed consent.

Visit the G7 Jubilee People’s Forum and Public Actions webpage for the schedule. 

In the lead up to the G7 Leaders’ Summit, participants will urge Canada to include the petition calls in the G7 agenda. This message has also been communicated through the Civil 7 (C7) Communiqué, which was delivered to Canada’s G7 sherpa, Cindy Termorshuizen, during the C7 Summit in Ottawa on April 15.

KAIROS and DPCC staff played key roles in C7 and Women 7 (W7) working groups, helping to secure strong, justice-driven language on debt reform and climate action in the C7 and W7 communiqués. 

Inspired by the biblical tradition of Jubilee—a time for debt release and renewal—the campaign urges systemic change to end recurring debt crises and global inequality. The campaign is part of an effort to collect 10 million petition signatures worldwide to build political will to realize the petition calls that urge world leaders to cancel unjust debts, establish a United Nations mechanism for debt resolution, and prevent future cycles of crushing debt. KAIROS with its partners DPCC, CPJ, ORCIE, and CCC lead the campaign in Canada. Collectively they aim to collect 100,000 petition signatures.

To date, more than 23,000 Canadians have signed the Jubilee 2025 petition.  

Quotes:

“The People’s Forum is a faithful, hope-filled response to the injustices of our time and a key moment in a growing, coordinated international movement to reform the financial system into a system of equity and justice, where all nations have a seat at the table. The invitation to join an interfaith prayer gathering hosted by the Stoney Nakoda Medicine Wheel is core to the People’s Forum. Indigenous rights and ecological justice are central to both the biblical and the modern Jubilee.” – Shannon Neufeldt, KAIROS Canada’s Member Relations and Network Coordinator and Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee campaign project lead.

“Global debt justice cannot be achieved without reckoning with the colonial foundations of the global economic system, which continue to dispossess Indigenous Peoples of their lands and rights. Justice begins with listening to and centering Indigenous voices.” – Brandi Bilodeau, KAIROS Canada’s Indigenous Rights Coordinator.

“It is a measure of the unfairness of our world that the leaders of just seven wealthy countries will make decisions of potentially global consequence at the G7 summit. But we, the people, can redress this imbalance at the G7 Jubilee People’s Forum. It’s a powerful avenue at which we can speak so loudly for debt justice that the G7 delegates are forced to hear the ‘cry of the earth’ and the ‘cry of the poor.’” – Luke Stocking, Development and Peace ― Caritas Canada’s interim executive director.

“The ecological debt owed by Global North countries to the Global South is rooted in decades of exploitative policies, historical emissions, and extractivist industries that have enriched wealthy nations at an immense human and environmental cost. These actions have created sacrifice zones in the Global South, where ecological destruction and weakened labour protections have become the norm. Debt justice is not charity: it’s genuine justice, and it’s the only sustainable pathway to freeing countries from the suffocating quicksand of debt, enabling them to invest adequately in climate adaptation and resilience. Addressing this ecological and financial injustice is crucial if we genuinely aspire toward global equity and sustainability.” – Maryo Wahba, Citizens for Public Justice (CPJ)’s Climate Justice Policy Analyst.

“True justice demands the cancellation of unjust financial debts and recognition of the ecological debts owed by industrialized nations to the Global South and Indigenous communities. Ecological debts are rooted in a colonial legacy of exploitation, dispossession, and systemic inequality. From colonial times to today’s globalized extractivism, natural and financial resources have poured from the South to enrich the North while the rights of Indigenous peoples have been undermined. As wealthy nations continue to consume and pollute disproportionately, these injustices are also driving climate change which most harms the countries least responsible for its causes. Confronting this reality requires a fundamental shift in global power relations and a transformation of the financial systems that sustain exploitation. At the G7 meetings, we call on wealthy nations to reform these extractive systems and to forge pathways of justice and hope so that all people may live with dignity and in harmony with the earth.” – Sue Wilson, CSJ, the Office of Religious Congregations for Integral Ecology (ORCIE)’s Chair of the Board.

Related: 

January 15, 2025 Press Release: Canadians join global movement for debt justice with Jubilee 2025 petition drive 

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Media Contacts:
Cheryl McNamara, Communications and Advocacy Coordinator, KAIROS Canada, cmcnamara [at] kairoscanada.com

Development and Peace – Caritas Canada: English: Minaz Kerawala, Communications and Public Relations Advisor, mkerawala [at] devp.org; 438-943-6796 | French: Romina Acosta Bimbrera, Conseillère en communications et relations publiques, rabimbrera@devp.org; 514-257-8710 x 327.

Maryo Wahba, Climate Justice Policy Analyst, Citizens for Public Justice, maryo [at] cpj.ca; 778-700-9204

The Office of Religious Congregations for Integral Ecology: Sasquia Antúnez Pineda, Advocacy and Communications, sapineda [at] orcie.org; 647-782-8068.

The Canadian Council of Churches: Marina Fanous, Communications Coordinator, fanous [at] councilofchurches.ca