Minn. rally backs Standing Rock Sioux fight

Jeff Schad Imagery

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Hundreds rallied at the Army Corps of Engineers offices here Nov. 15 to demand recognition of treaty rights and protection of water sources at Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota.

“I am here to bring awareness and to protect the water,” Verlin Wells, a Native American from Welch, told the Militant. Many thousands have visited Standing Rock to express solidarity with its fight against routing the Dakota Access Pipeline near the reservation. Wells has made three trips and said it is very powerful to have “every one there for the same reason, standing together.”

The Corps has called for more study and tribal input before issuing permits to Energy Transfer Partners to complete the pipeline. The company has asked U.S. District Judge James Boasberg to declare it has the right to continue the construction. “There’s not another way. We’re crossing at this location,” CEO Kelcy Warren told Associated Press Nov. 18.

— HELEN MEYERS