Traffic blocked on King Street due to rally in solidarity with Wet’suwet’en First Nation

About 150 Hamilton residents took to the street in to rally at about four this afternoon and blocked traffic on King Street from James Street to John Street.

Solidarity march on the move along King St in #hamont. King is closed between James and John at the moment. #Wetsuweten. I’ll be live from the rally at 6. pic.twitter.com/D5qs2WpnO1

— Diana Weeks (@MamaJournalist) January 8, 2019

The rallies are in response to arrests that were made on the Wet’suwet’en First Nation in Northern British Columbia, after the RCMP broke through an anti-pipeline checkpoint.

Officers climbed over the barricade that was constructed and arrested 14 people. The barriers were put there to try and keep workers from coming onto the land to begin construction of TransCanada’s 670km Coastal Gaslink Pipeline, that would carry natural gas across northern B.C. to the coast.

Last night’s arrests come after a British Columbia Supreme Court injunction was revised last week, that prohibits anyone from physically interfering with the construction of the project. Members of the Wet’suwet’en First Nation say it will jeopardize the land’s natural resources.

The pipeline would run from Dawson Creek to Kitimat, going right through unseeded indigenous territory, carrying natural gas to the liquid natural gas or LNG Facility on the coast in Kitimat.

A statement from TransCanada in response to the RCMP arrests read in part “this is not an outcome we ever wanted. Instead we have always strived for opportunities to have an honest, open discussion about how to resolve this issue. They also called the incidents unfortunate.”