B.C. Indigenous Nations call on feds to stop Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion

A group of B.C. Indigenous Nations were involved in a joint call for the Canadian government to stop the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion built through their traditional lands.

This comes after a letter from the United Nations’ Human Rights Commission condemned the feds for not getting consent for the project, the third sent since 2019.

Rueben George of the Tseil-waututh Nation says it’s high time the government listened to the UN.

” What we’re working towards is protecting our law, everything has spirit and that’s what we protect. This colonial system has been suppressing Indigenous Peoples too much, just like we were going through here today. Because the historically oppressive system that was there is the same system that we’re dealing with here now today,” George told CityNews.

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The federal government said in February that no more public money would go toward the pipeline as its new projected price tag increased to $21.4 billion.

George says the project now relies on funding from investors and the hopes to send the message that it is a “stranded asset” and should not be built.

“What this International governing body is saying is to treat us fair. If you treat us fair and look at the facts, everybody would be better off. I said this before, when we win, everybody wins. And then and then when they win, everybody loses including them. And that’s the change that we want to create. Save what we have, look how much has died. Look how much is going away.”

The Trans Mountain pipeline carries 300,000 barrels of oil per day, and is Canada’s only pipeline system transporting oil from Alberta to the West Coast.

It was bought by the federal government for $4.5 billion in 2018, after previous owner Kinder Morgan Canada Inc. threatened to scrap the pipeline’s planned expansion project in the face of environmentalist opposition.

Under the ownership of Trans Mountain Corp., a federal Crown corporation, the Trans Mountain expansion project is currently underway, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has indicated that he is open to ownership of the pipeline by Indigenous groups.

“It’s not a good project in multiple ways. And it’s breaking laws in multiple ways. It’s a warning, the time of reconciliation, and climate change. We’re going to continue to stand up against this for the best interest of everybody and everything, especially our law and our livelihood, in a reciprocal connection to spirit of all those things that we love,” George added.

 

– With files from Canadian Press

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