Straight Talk

RCMP resumes mass arrests at Kinder Morgan gates after MPs Elizabeth May and Kennedy Stewart taken into custody

Internationally acclaimed singer-songwriter Grimes is supporting the protesters

by Charlie Smith on March 24th, 2018 at 2:28 PM
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      The peaceful civil disobedience campaign appears to be growing in opposition to a controversial pipeline project.

      The Mounties have once again begun arresting people outside the Kinder Morgan tank farm gates for entering a five-metre zone in violation of a B.C. Supreme Court injunction.

      One of those offering support is Grimes, a highly regarded B.C.-raised singer-songwriter who was covered in a lengthy feature in the New Yorker magazine in 2015.

      Another musican who was speaking out is Sarah Harmer, who appeared live on Facebook with Greenpeace Canada.

      A news release from Kwekwecnewtxw—Protect the Inlet says approximately 60 people are in front of the gates.

      It stated that by the end of today, approximately 175 people will be arrested.

      Yesterday, Green Leader Elizabeth May and Burnaby South NDP MP Kennedy Stewart were among those taken away and charged with civil contempt.

      Among those arrested today is Vancouver architect Andrew Larigakis.

      “Never in the thirty years I’ve been an architect have I seen a project of this magnitude move forward without approval from the fire department,” he said in the Kwekwecnewtxw—Protect The Inlet news release.

      NDP MP Kennedy Stewart and Green MP Elizabeth May willingly faced arrest on Friday to express their solidary with First Nations and their opposition to the pipeline approval process.
      Green Party of Canada

      Also arrested was Vancouver Island resident Toby Reid.

      “In April 2010 I went to the Gulf of Mexico to help clean up Deepwater Horizon," Reid said. "Today, only about 18 pecent of that oil has been recovered. It’s scientifically impossible to clean up an oil spill.I have two young children. The future belongs to them. We all know catastrophic climate change is upon us, and we need to transition away from fossil fuels immediately. That’s the message we’re sending here today.”

      Tsleil-Waututh member Cedar George is one of the younger activists on the scene.

      The great grandson of legendary environmentalist and actor Chief Dan George, Cedar George was featured in a 2016 Georgia Straight feature "Young Vancouver environmentalists vie climate change and Kinder Morgan pipeline as a profound moral crisis".

      “Being from Tsleil Waututh and being on unceded land, I’m proud to be here to thank and support these people, who have come together from all over, and who are willing to put themselves over the injunction line and be arrested," George said. "We invite everyone to come support us here and to be a part of this moment in history—come be on the right side of history.”

      Kinder Morgan's Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion project will nearly triple diluted bitumen shipments from Alberta to the tank farm to 890,000 barrels a day.

      It will be shipped on about 400 oil tankers per year that will pass through the sensitive waters of Burrard Inlet and Georgia and Juan de Fuca straits.

      Approximately 23,000 people have signed a pledge saying they will "do whatever it takes" to prevent the pipeline, tank-farm expansion, and shipping-terminal expansion project from being completed.

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