‘Going After Canada Where it Hurts the Most’: GTA Rail Blockade Supports B.C. Pipeline Protest

Screen-Shot-2020-02-15-at-3.00.56-PM-300x224.png?profile=RESIZE_710x

We’re working apart but together in solidarity for the Wet’suwet’en land defenders,’ organizer says

By Desmond Brown, CBC News, February 15, 2020

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/gta-protesters-ontario-rail-blockade-1.5465525

Protesters gathered at a rail yard in Vaughan, Ontario, on Saturday, vowing to continue the pop-up protests in solidarity with the hereditary chiefs of the Wet’suwet’en who oppose a natural gas pipeline to be built across their traditional territory in northern B.C.

With the blockade on Tyendinaga Mohawk territory near Belleville, Ont., in its 10th day, the Vaughan protest was one of several similar blockades across the country that have cut both passenger and freight rail services, with pressure mounting on the federal government to end them.

There were also protesters gathered in downtown Toronto and some blocking rail tracks carrying GO trains in northwest Toronto.

“We are going after Canada where it hurts the most,” Vanessa Gray, an environmental and Anishinaabe activist from Aamjiwnaang First Nation in southwestern Ontario told CBC News.

“There are many groups, many networks organizing. This is across the nation, across the world. We’re working apart but together in solidarity for the Wet’suwet’en land defenders.”

Saturday’s protest coincided with a meeting between the federal Indigenous Services minister Marc Miller and representatives of the Mohawk Nation to discuss the Belleville blockade.

The blockades support efforts by the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs in B.C., who have been protesting the Coastal GasLink pipeline scheduled to be built across their land. Armed RCMP officers have moved in on the protesters and arrested several in an attempt to clear the way for pipeline construction.

“I hope the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs’ demands are met, that the RCMP leave the Wet’suwet’en territory immediately, and I would like to see all those cops who were involved, who are involved, see consequences for their actions,” Gray said.

Screen-Shot-2020-02-15-at-3.00.23-PM-500x280.png?profile=RESIZE_710x

Vanessa Gray, an environmental and Anishinaabe activist from Aamjiwnaang First Nation, is one of the protest organizers. (CBC)

“We are just standing up and fighting back for our sovereign Indigenous right to be on our own territory without a military police raid or response.

“Canada’s relationship to the oil industry is the deepest relationship that they have and we’re here today to talk about the deep relationship Wet’suwet’en people have with their water. The urgency to protect that is dire right now. This is an emergency,” Gray added.

Protesters burn injunction

The protesters said in a tweet that they were served an injunction by police on Saturday, which they burned.

Screen-Shot-2020-02-15-at-3.00.36-PM-500x497.png?profile=RESIZE_710x

‘Settlers need to stop and listen’

Sarah Rotz, a professor at York University who’s been supporting and helping to organize the protests, said “it’s important that settlers consider and take seriously” what’s going on across Canada.

She said using terms like “the rule of law” to justify the crackdown in Wet’suwet’en territory is not helping.

“When we use terms like the rule of law, we’re ignoring Indigenous legal systems and we’re assuming that the colonial legal system is the only legal system, so really undermining Indigenous legal systems,” Rotz told CBC News.

Rotz said she is “standing in solidarity” with Indigenous peoples and nations who are defending their land and their legal system and trying to educate settlers about their traditional governance systems and cultures and ways of being.

“Settlers need to stop and listen,” Rotz said.

Screen-Shot-2020-02-15-at-3.00.46-PM-500x281.png?profile=RESIZE_710x

Sarah Rotz, a professor at York University, says it’s not up to the Canadian government to decide for Indigenous peoples what kind of resource allocations and proposals should be approved on Indigenous lands. (CBC)

The York professor said it is not up to the Canadian government to decide for Indigenous peoples what kind of resource allocations and proposals should be approved on Indigenous lands.

“You can talk about reconciliation as much as you want and use really kind, nice words, but how are you going to actually change your mechanisms, your systems of governance? You can’t talk about reconciliation and then impose your system of governance on Indigenous peoples and then approve or deny a corporate proposal to build a pipeline on Indigenous lands,” Rotz added.

Screen-Shot-2020-02-15-at-3.00.56-PM-500x373.png?profile=RESIZE_710x

A group of protesters at a rail yard in Vaughan, Ont. on Saturday. (Colin Côté-Paulette/CBC)

At another protest at the Bloor and Spadina intersection in downtown Toronto, a group of noisy protesters shouted, “How do you spell racist? RCMP,” and “It’s not their land, not then, not now. Coastal GasLink, shut the f–k down.”

Natali Euale Montilla, who was at the downtown protest, said the government does not respect hereditary chiefs or colonial law.

“The Canadian government has no jurisdiction over their lands, it is the hereditary chiefs who have rule of law in those territories,” Montilla told CBC News.

“What Canada is doing is totally unlawful and they’re violating the right to live and the right to survive that the folks out there have, and all over what we now call Canada.”

Shortly before 3 p.m. (ET) on Saturday, Anne Marie Aikins, spokesperson for Metrolinx, said there were approximately 80 people on the GO tracks north of York University GO Station on the Barrie corridor.

“We have to cancel some trains and modify others. Our priority is to ensure everyone near [the] tracks remains safe,” Aikins wrote in an email to CBC News.

Metrolinx is a government transportation agency that manages and integrates road and public transport in Ontario, including GO Transit.

Share

E-mail me when people leave their comments –

You need to be a member of Ashtar Command - Spiritual Community to add comments!

Join Ashtar Command - Spiritual Community

Copyright Policy: Always Include 30-50% of the source material and a link to the original article. You may not post, modify, distribute, or reproduce in any way any copyrighted material, trademarks, or other proprietary information belonging to others without obtaining the prior written consent of the owner of such proprietary rights. If you believe that someone's work has been copied and posted on Ashtar Command in a way that constitutes copyright infringement, please Contact Us and include the links to these pages and relevant info. 

Latest Activity

Justin89636 liked AlternateEarth's discussion Weirdness at the Baltimore bridge collapse
26 minutes ago
Movella left a comment on Comment Wall
"Oh yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised if they do.. x"
29 minutes ago
Drekx Omega replied to AlternateEarth's discussion Weirdness at the Baltimore bridge collapse
"Clayton Morris of Redacted, discusses the salient points surrounding the Baltimore bridge destruction, including asking the question, as to why Biden would volunteer US taxpayer money, when the insurance company for the ship, would normally pay for…"
36 minutes ago
Justin89636 left a comment on Comment Wall
"Good video Drekx. You posted a few videos with these two and they seem like a good and honest channel. Will definitely check out their news more often."
41 minutes ago
Drekx Omega left a comment on Comment Wall
"I'm just waiting for that imbecile and his low IQ "press secretary" (Karine Jean Pierre,) to accuse Russia or Trump, of the cyber attack upon that ship..."
41 minutes ago
Movella left a comment on Comment Wall
"Yes exactly, Biden can blame all of the upcoming issues on the bridge collapse all he likes, but we already know that he is just incompetent! Now he wants the people to pay to cover his tracks and clear up his mess.. Just vile.."
54 minutes ago
Drekx Omega left a comment on Comment Wall
"Clayton Morris of Redacted, discusses the salient points surrounding the Baltimore bridge destruction, including asking the question, as to why Biden would volunteer US taxpayer money, when the insurance company for the ship, would normally pay for…"
1 hour ago
Justin89636 replied to Justin89636's discussion Informative Sheldan Nidle and Galactic Federation of Light videos tons of great information about what's going on on our planet and galaxy right now and what happened in our past.
"Sheldan talks about the truth of our RNA/DNA here. https://youtu.be/vMtzOAHDzms?si=jwo398TPOL3Ip5jk"
1 hour ago
More…