http://ottsun.canoe.ca/News/National/20 ... 7-sun.html

Minutemen take patrol to Cornwall area

October 22, 2005
By MARK BELLIS

AKWESASNE -- American border watchers known as the Minutemen will be patrolling near the Akwesasne Mohawk Reserve south of Cornwall this weekend.

"We're just trying to bring attention to the fact that anyone wanting to do harm to our country can get in," said Peter Lanteri, a former marine from Long Island, N.Y., who will be among 14 Minutemen patrolling the border between the Mohawk Reserve and Massena, N.Y., looking for illegal immigration and drug smuggling.

The Minuteman Civil Defense Corps., based in Tombstone, Ariz., was formed earlier this year to monitor U.S. borders. It is not associated with the U.S. government.

Many Americans have protested the Minutemen, calling them racist. President George W. Bush has called them "vigilantes."

Lanteri denied they're vigilantes or racists.

"Anybody who wants to join have to go through a background check," he said, adding anyone with a criminal record or membership in a racist group is not allowed to join.

Lanteri said the Minutemen will not enter the reserve this weekend, saying they don't want to interfere with Natives crossing the border.

Grand Chief Angela Barnes, of the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne on the Canadian side, said the Minutemen "have not been invited to Akwesasne, and would not be welcome on the reserve."

The St. Regis Mohawk Tribal Council and Tribal Police, who represent the U.S. side of the reserve, said they feel they're doing a good job of monitoring the border and that the Minutemen were not needed.