Cowichan Tribes is urging the federal government to ensure that a growing mountain of construction waste and garbage that threatens to leach toxic chemicals into the Cowichan River is cleaned up and the owner prosecuted.

“The tools to combat the pollution of reserve lands are primarily under federal jurisdiction, including the Indian Act and the Indian Reserve Waste Disposal Regulations,” the nation said in a statement on Monday. “However, the government of Canada is reluctant to prosecute polluters.”

The garbage pile is on three lots on Cowichan Tribes reserve land near the Allenby Road Bridge over the Cowichan River.

The province’s Environment Ministry has ordered James Anthony Peter, who lives on one of the lots and controls access to all three, to submit a plan by Nov. 17 to clean u

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