Dakota-Access-Pipeline

by Noah Weber On Sunday, March 7, 1965, roughly 600 African Americans and their allies gathered and marched towards Montgomery, Alabama in order to take a stand and draw attention to the fact that 99% of Selma, Alabama’s registered voters were white, and that the African American community was being denied their legal right to vote. The unarmed men and women who marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge were met by a heavily armed police force and were tear gassed and beaten horrifically. In the end, 17 marchers were hospitalized, and another 50 were treated for injuries caused by the police. ...

by Indigenous Environmental Network Cannonball, ND - At approximately 3PM CST a group of about 30 people gathered to create a protective prayer line on the Backwater Bridge, the site of the November 20th attack on peaceful and unarmed water protectors by militarized police. Wesley Clark Jr., an organizer of Veterans Stand with Standing Rock, Kandi Mossett of the Indigenous Environmental Network, and Brenda White Bull who served 20 years in the Marine Corps and is also a direct descendant of Chief Sitting Bull, delivered a message to representatives of the National Guard, the Veterans Association, Tigerswan Private Security, who is hired by DAPL, and North Dakota law enforcement. ...

Featured image: The Oceti Sakowin camp is currently home to thousands of water protectors and allies. (Photo: Reuters) by Deirdre Fulton / Common Dreams The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Friday informed Indigenous water protectors and their allies that they have nine days to vacate the main Dakota Access Pipeline protest camp—or else face arrest. “This decision is necessary to protect the general public from the violent confrontation between protestors and law enforcement officials that have occurred in this area, and to prevent death, illness, or serious injury to inhabitants of encampments due to the harsh North Dakota winter conditions,” Col. John Henderson of the Corps said in a letter to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe chairman Dave Archambault II. ...

by Indigenous Environmental Network Cannon Ball - On November 20th at approximately 6PM CST over 100 Water Protectors from the Oceti Sakowin and Sacred Stone Camps mobilized to a nearby bridge to remove a barricade that was built by the Morton County Sheriff’s Department and the State of North Dakota. This barricade, built after law enforcement raided the 1851 treaty camp, not only restricts North Dakota residents from using the 1806 freely but also puts the community of Cannon Ball, the camps, and the Standing Rock Tribe at risk as emergency services are unable to use that highway. ...

by Kiana Herold / Intercontinental Cry If treaties are the supreme law of the land, as the U.S. Constitution states, then how is it that treaties can be so easily broken by a government that claims to uphold a respect for the law? An even more unsettling question: how is it that the trail of broken treaties has been able to span generations under an outdated, imperial logic unknown to the majority of the U.S. citizens? The founding of the United States is predicated on this painful contradiction between principles of equality and rule of law on one side, and the colonial appropriation of land from native peoples who have inhabited them for millennia, on the other. ...

by Cultural Survival “We call upon all member states, to condemn the destruction of our sacred places and to support our nation’s efforts to ensure that our sovereign rights are respected. We ask that you call upon all parties to stop the construction of the Dakota Access pipeline and to protect the environment, our nation’s future, our culture and our way of life.” - Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Chairman Dave Archambault II ...

by Intercontinental Cry From acclaimed documentary filmmaker Shannon Kring comes END OF THE LINE, the incredible story of a group of indigenous women willing to risk their lives to stop the Dakota Access oil pipeline construction that desecrated their ancient burial and prayer sites and threatens their land, water, and very existence. https://youtu.be/SCxZepDj78A But there was another prophecy: the women, as the guardians of the waters and protectors of all life, would rise. ...

by Natalie Hand / Lakota Media Project 1851 Ft. Laramie Treaty Territory, Cannon Ball, ND—Hundreds of tribal members and allies marched onto active and ongoing construction sites of the Dakota Access Pipeline yesterday. Water protectors brought offerings of prayer, ceremony, drums, and tribal nation flags to construction sites to expose illegal company actions. Julie Richards, founder of Mothers Against Meth Alliance (M.A.M.A.) based in Pine Ridge, South Dakota stated, “Our ancestors fought for our rights to clean water and to have a good way of life and now we’re fighting to make sure that our daughters and great granddaughters can also have those rights and a better life. All this land is sacred to us—it’s our ancestral homelands and part of the designated treaty territory.” ...

by Red Warrior Camp Mandan, ND… Water protectors stopped construction at two Dakota Access Pipeline sites on September 13, northwest of Mandan through nonviolent direct action. At approximately 10:30 a.m. CST, two water protectors “locked down” to heavy equipment at the first action site. One of the individuals was locked onto the machine for nearly 7 hours. Trained medics, media, legal observers and police liaisons were on hand to offer support and were also arrested. ...

Featured image by Tony Webster / Flickr by Steve Horn / Desmog In the two months leading up to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ decision to issue to the Dakota Access pipeline project an allotment of Nationwide 12 permits (NWP) — a de facto fast-track federal authorization of the project — an army of oil industry players submitted comments to the Corps to ensure that fast-track authority remains in place going forward. This fast-track permitting process is used to bypass more rigorous environmental and public review for major pipeline infrastructure projects by treating them as smaller projects. ...