Responding to reports that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will not release a report on the environmental effects of a possible leak in the Dakota Access Pipeline, Tarah Demant of Amnesty International USA made the following statement:
“The Dakota Access Pipeline poses a potential catastrophic danger to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the very water that they drink. The Indigenous community deserves to know exactly how this pipeline will affect their ancestral lands and water supply and what steps are being taken to protect them. If the Army Corps of Engineers is withholding this information, they are violating the tribe’s rights and sovereignty. This pipeline cannot be allowed to go forward without transparency and respect for human rights.”
AIUSA previously sent human rights observers to the construction siteto monitor policing of protests against the pipeline. Earlier this year, AIUSA sent a letter to the acting Secretary of the Army saying that construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline should not resume until the Army’s environmental impact review was completed and the consent of the tribe was sought.
AIUSA continues to call for misdemeanor charges to be dropped against protesters, who call themselves water protectors, and to open investigations into allegations of excessive force by law enforcement.