It began in a remote community in northern British Columbia, when hereditary chiefs of the Wet’suwet’en nation declared their opposition to the construction of a C$6.6bn (US$5bn) pipeline through their territory. Members of the band and their supporters established a string of roadblocks and camps to block pipeline workers’ access.
Since a police raid on the blockade at the start of February, a wave of civil disobedience has surged over Canada. The response from the Mohawks – thousands of miles across the country – was immediate and uncompromising, perhaps because they had lived through something similar. In 1990, the Mohawks of Kahnawake and Kanesatake near Montreal participated in a 78-day revolt known as the Oka Crisis, over the planned expansion of a golf course on to a burial ground.
Mohawks in Ontario and Quebec have erected rail blockades that paralyzed passenger and freight travel on some lines. Other protesters – Indigenous and non-Indigenous – have followed suit, blockading tracks across the country. Thirty-seven people were arrested in Toronto this week for standing on commuter tracks during evening rush hour, paralyzing the city’s Union Station.
Article submitted by, Great Gazoo.
