[News] Wet’suwet’en activists retake checkpoint a month after police crackdown

[Anti-Imperialist News]

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<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2021/12/22/wetsuweten-activists-retake-checkpoint-a-month-after-police-crackdown/>
Wet’suwet’en
activists retake checkpoint a month after police crackdown
December 22, 2021
------------------------------

Wet’suwet’en activists after reclaiming Camp Coyote. Photo: Gidimt’en
Checkpoint/Twitter

On Saturday, December 19, activists leading the Wet’suwet’en resistance
against the Coastal GasLink (CGL) pipeline project declared that they
evicted workers of the project from the drill site. This development comes
exactly a month after the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) violently
dismantled a blockade led by the Gidimt’en clan near Camp Coyote and
arrested dozens of protesters and even bystanders.

The declaration of reclaiming Camp Coyote was made over a statement
released by the Gidimt’en Checkpoint, on Sunday, December 20. “This
courageous action took place one month after a wave of militarized raids on
Gidimt’en land,” the statement read.

Between November 18 and 19, in repeated attacks to dismantle the protest
site in Camp Coyote, the RCMP made 30 arrests, including several
traditional leaders of the Wet’suwet’en tribes, along with other land
defenders, journalists, and legal observers. The crackdown came at the
behest of the CGL that had secured an injunction against the anti-pipeline
protesters by the provincial supreme court.

The RCMP crackdown came after weeks of protest in the Wet’suwet’en lands,
upon which a major portion of the CGL pipeline is proposed to be built. On
November 14, a notice was sent to CGL reinforcing a 2020 evacuation notice,
issued by the hereditary chiefs of Wet’suwet’en, against the construction.

Tribal leaders and protesters insist that the evacuation order is still
effective and supersedes the court’s injunction. “The Wet’suwet’en people
have never sold, surrendered, or in any way relinquished title to
Wet’suwet’en land,” argued the December 20 statement, reiterating the
long-standing assertion of sovereignty over the traditional lands by the
Indigenous community.

“Coastal GasLink does not and will never have the consent of the
Wet’suwet’en Hereditary governance system and should expect that
Wet’suwet’en law will prevail on our lands”, said Sleydo’ Molly Wickham,
spokesperson for the Gidimt’en Checkpoint, in the statement. “No amount of
state violence against us will make us forget our responsibility to protect
the water for all future generations.”
*International Call for Action*

Wet’suwet’en activists have also launched an international week of action
calling on supporters to exert pressure on key shareholders and financiers
of the CGL project. The call for action specifically named one of the
crucial financiers of the project, RBC (Royal Bank of Canada), which is
among the 27 banks that provided the project with a loan of CAD 6.4 billion
(around USD 4.95 billion).

Moreover, RBC along with others in the league of Canada’s “Big Five” banks
– BMO, Scotiabank, CIBC and TD – also have reportedly offered over USD 200
million in working capital on the project.

In the statement released for the International Week of Action,
Wet’suwet’en activists have called for different forms of demonstration to
hold RBC accountable, including demonstrations at its headquarters and
flooding them with phone calls, among other things. The call for action has
also pointed to the immense harm done by big banks and investors when
investing in projects like CGL, that is set to contribute to the rising
consumption of fossil fuel.

“We are all in this together and we all have a responsibility to stand up
to big financial institutions that invest and keep the fossil fuel industry
going full force,” read the statement. “With no green sustainability
transition in the foreseeable future, all of humanity and our kin are at
dangerous risk.”

According to the *National Observer*, RBC has also been the biggest
financier of fossil fuel projects among Canadian banks, since the Paris
Agreement of 2014.
*Assertion of sovereignty rights*

The reclamation of Camp Coyote also closely followed the 24th anniversary
of the landmark Delgamuukw v British Columbia judgment passed by the
Supreme Court of Canada in 1997. The judgement had the first comprehensive
judicial account of Aboriginal Title, as a part of Aboriginal rights in
Canada, and defined its principles which were later expanded in another
ruling by the court in 2014.

The Wet’suwet’en tribe, along with the Gitxsan tribe, were plaintiffs in
the Delgamuukw case and laid sovereign claims over 58,000 sq.km. of land in
British Columbia province. The judgment was one of the key judicial
precedents used by activists and Wet’suwet’en leadership against the
controversial Band Council decision to allow for pipeline construction and
the provincial supreme court injunction.

“The Supreme Court of Canada recognized the Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs
as representatives of the Wet’suwet’en title holding collective, and Anuc
‘nu’at’en (Wet’suwet’en law) as the basis of Wet’suwet’en society,” read
the statement released by Gidimt’en Checkpoint over their official Twitter
handle.
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