OFFICE OF THE GRAND CHIEF DEHCHO FIRST NATIONS BOX 89, FORT SIMPSON, N.W.T. XOE 0N0 TEL (867) 695-2355/2610 FAX (867) 695-2038 EMAIL: February 12, 2015 Premier Robert McLeod Legislative Assembly Yellowknife, NT X1A 2L9 Fax: (867) 873?0385 Dear Premier McLeod: I am writing in response to your letter of January 8, 2015, and to follow up on our meeting of February 11 in Yellowknife. We appreciate you taking the time to meet with us and look forward to continuing discussions with you on these important issues. First of all, everyone must understand that nothing is more important to us than our land. We have a solemn duty to protect all of our territory, and we intend to honour our duty. Our approach to negotiations on land ownership and jurisdiction will always be based on this basic principle. While we want an agreement with Canada and the GNWT which recognizes our role in governing and protecting our lands, we are not desperate for an agreement at any price. Regardless of whether we choose to pursue a settlement based on ownership of subsurface and surface lands, similar to the Tlicho, or a model based on surface only lands with a generalized interest, we are unanimous that we will not support any agreement which leaves our people with less than our fair share of land. Therefore, the next step in our negotiations should be to agree on a land quantum for the Dehcho based on fairness. Once we have agreed on a quantum, we will discuss whether some of the subsurface might be exchanged for greater surface lands and/or a generalized interest. When we look at other land claim settlements and at the unique conditions in the Dehcho, we come to the conclusion that a fair and equitable agreement would recognize Dehcho title to at least 50,000 sq km of surface and subsurface lands. At an absolute minimum, the Dehcho First Nations deserve no less than equality with our Tlicho brothers and sisters, on a per capita basis. We were encouraged when you said in our meeting that these issues should be resolved at the negotiating table, but we are perplexed by your comment that the DFN has abandoned negotiations. In fact, it was your negotiators who informed us that the GNWT would not attend any more negotiations unless the Dehcho accept your land quantum ultimatum. Your letter seems to confirm this stand when it says that if we do not accept your ultimatum we should agree that negotiations have failed. We have never abandoned negotiations and remain ready to resume the Dehcho Process tripartite negotiations at any time. Government ofDenendeh The truth is, there never were any negotiations on the land quantum "offer". Your government merely tabled a single offer in October, 2014, then declared it ?final? a few months later without ever holding any negotiations on it. Suspending negotiations, without even attempting to negotiate an agreement, cannot be called ?good faith? negotiations and is not conducive to building a healthy relationship between the GNWT and the Dehcho. Your government has already suspended negotiations and your letter infers that the GNWT intends to terminate the Dehcho Process if we do not agree to your ultimatum. However, at the conclusion of our meeting yesterday, after we had outlined the issues which need to be addressed in order to reach agreement on a quantum, you said ?let the negotiators deal with it?, which we assume means that you are prepared to send your negotiators back to the negotiating table. We agree that the negotiating table is the best place to address this issue, as well as the other issues which we need to resolve in order to complete the Dehcho Process, and our ntegotiators are prepared to attend the next scheduled main table session scheduled for March 9 . We ask for your response by February 27, 2015 so that we can plan our next steps accordingly. cc: DFN Leadership DFN Negotiators Government ofDenendeh