Following controversial Environmental Impact Statement, indigenous communities and environmental groups prepare to mobilize
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| (Photo: AP) |
That's the call of concerned people across the United States following the Friday release of the U.S. State Department's widely criticized environmental impact statement on the controversial pipeline.
Over 17 groups — including CREDO, Rainforest Action Network, and Forest Ethics — are urging nationwide vigils the night of Monday, February 3 to protest the pipeline.
"This is an all-hands-on-deck moment to send the message to President Obama that Keystone XL fails his climate test and he must reject it," reads a joint statement about the day of action.
Members of seven Lakota nation tribes, as well as indigenous communities in Idaho, Oklahoma, Montana, Nebraska and Oregon, are preparing to take action to stop Keystone XL, Aboriginal Peoples Television Network reports. This includes “moccasins on the ground” — a Lakota Nation program to train and support indigenous communities in taking action against the pipeline — as well as plans to set up spiritual camps along the proposed route.
“[The pipeline] poses a threat to our sacred water and the product is coming from the tar sands and our tribes oppose the tar sands mining,” said Deborah White Plume, of the Oglala Sioux Tribe of the Lakota Nation in South Dakota, in an interview with APTN. “All of our tribes have taken action to oppose the Keystone XL pipeline.”
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