In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:*
- Killing members of the group;
- Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
- Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
- Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
- Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
The Canadian Indian residential school system is all about number 5 on that list and is unquestionably genocide, and the residential schools are only one aspect of the genocide that occurred.
Here’s a pretty good summary from Canadian law professor Fannie Lafontaine…