First Nations and Tribal Leaders Stand Their Sacred Ground in Washington DC – Idle No More
FIRST NATIONS, TRIBAL LEADERS, & LANDOWNERS SEND MESSAGE TO CANADA, STOP TAR SANDS AT THE SOURCE
Idle No More stands in solidarity with the mass mobilization Reject and Protect happening in Washington, Deceit, as well as the Moccasins on the Ground blockade training in Red Shirt, South Dakota, and the Sacred White Buffalo Calf Woman Pipe Spiritual Encampment in Green Grass, South Dakota, and recognizes the words of Protect the Sacred spokesperson, Faith Spotted Eagle, “These three encampments represent the physical, spiritual, and political manifestations of our movement.”
Moccasins on the Ground
The Moccasins on the ground training developed by Owe Aku’s Sacred Water Protection Project focuses focuses on skills, tactics, and techniques of nonviolent direct action in three day training camps. The skills that are discussed include such things as blockading heavy equipment, workshops on strategic media, street medic training, knowing your legal rights with respect to civil disobedience, building solidarity and alliances, applicable international human rights and the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Lakota sacred teachings on water, and many other topics under the umbrella of direct action. Moccasins on the Ground
Sacred White Buffalo Calf Woman Pipe Spiritual Encampment: U-WI-TA – COMING TOGETHER
In 1994, the birth of a white buffalo calf revealed Pte San Win’s (White Buffalo Calf Woman’s) prophecy: “when a white buffalo calf stands upon the Earth it will be the sign of great changes to come”. – Chief Arvol Looking Horse, 19th Generation Keeper of the Sacred White Buffalo Calf Pipe Bundle.
We are inviting all Nations to the home of the Sacred White Buffalo Calf Pipe Bundle to pray with the sacred fire and one another. This gathering will take place here in Green Grass, SD, lighting the sacred fire on April 23rd, 2014 and ending on the 26th of April. Facebook Event
Stand Our Sacred Ground and Reject and Protect Actions in DC
Throughout this week of sustained action in DC, Idle No More will be reporting out on the vision, leadership, and organizing happening of this unprecedented alliance between Natives and ranchers in opposition to the KXL pipeline.
Yesterday, Day 2, representatives of the Dakota, Lakota, Nakota, Ponca, Ojibway, and Cree Nations stood at the Canadian Embassy alongside ranchers and farmers to hold up huge letters spelling out “Honor The Treaties” and blown-up images of Treaty 8, Treaty 6, and the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868, which cover Indigenous people’s lands affected by the controversial Canadian tar sands and the Keystone XL pipeline.
The Canadian government is currently spending 20 million taxpayers’ dollars in a public relations campaign in the United States aimed at attracting investment into Canada’s tar sands and other harmful developments in Native lands titled Connect2Canada. This direct action at the Canadian embassy marked a launch of the #Connect2Truth twitter campaign to counter this propaganda.
“It’s time for our people to start developing our own policies and enforcing our inherent Treaty rights. It is time for us to start defining what that relationship looks like for our visitors and remind our visitors that they came here and we are the ones, as Indigenous people, that gave them the permission to settle here on Turtle Island,” said Crystal Lameman, member of Beaver Lake Cree Nation.
Heather Milton Lightening, co-director of the Indigenous Tar Sands campaign of the Polaris Institute, stated, “We need to stop tar sands at the source. We are going to do that as a solid movement from coast to coast from east to west. We are going to shut down the tar sands. We are going to stop it!”
Check out press release from the action. See pictures from the action.
For more information
Reject and Protect (check out the camp schedule)
Other important video resources
A message to President Obama from members of the Great Sioux Nation and many other Indigenous relatives and allies!
