Chicago Sun-Times

Dakota protest ranks grow

Veterans, urging peace, converge on camp of oil project’s opponents

- Kevin Hardy The Des Moines Register

OCETI SAKOWIN CAMP, N. D. Tasheena Cloud said Saturday she and the hundreds of other veterans who have been filing into this protest camp near the Dakota Access Pipeline will remain peaceful when they put themselves between law enforcemen­t officers and passionate demonstrat­ors in coming days.

But she said she has no idea how police and the North Dakota National Guard will respond.

“I don’t know what to expect,” she said. “I just know I’ll put myself in harm’s way.”

In the snowy prairies of North Dakota, the Oceti Sakowin Camp has become the longest- running protest in modern history as thousands of American Indians and environmen­talists seek to halt completion of the 1,172- mile pipeline.

In the coming days, the demonstrat­ors will be aided by military veterans who have come to give occupiers a respite and call attention to what they say are human rights violations committed by local law enforcemen­t. Demonstrat­ors have described being attacked by security dogs, sprayed with tear gas, shot with rubber bullets and blasted by water cannons.

Police officials have defended their tactics and promised the veterans’ demonstrat­ions will be peaceful.

Members of the nearby Standing Rock Sioux tribe began the occupation of Army Corps of Engineers land, arguing that the pipeline’s crossing under the Missouri River threatens their drinking water.

The corps has told protesters they must leave the camp by Monday as brutally harsh winter conditions set in.

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