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In a move that could affect thousands of aboriginal people across Canada, the federal government announced Wednesday it will amend sections of the Indian Act that discriminated against the descendants of bi-racial marriages.

News of the amendments comes six months after a Quebec judge ordered the government to revise segments of the law that violate the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The federal government’s lawyers had immediately appealed the Aug. 3 ruling and were set to fight it in court.

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But Monday they withdrew their appeal and now the Liberal government is set to form a parliamentary committee tasked with re-drafting sections of the Indian Act, according to a government source.

Wednesday’s announcement was a welcome development for 47-year-old Stéphane Descheneaux, an Abénaki who fought for years to have his three daughters recognized as Status Indians—a legal designation that comes with land and treaty rights. Until the Aug. 3 ruling, Descheneaux did not have enough indigenous ancestry to pass Indian Status along to his children.