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Protestors block railway near Montreal in solidarity with Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs

Quebec protestors erected a blockade Saturday morning across a strip of Canadian National (CN) rail south of Montreal in solidarity with Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs in the midst of an ongoing standoff with the RCMP and a major oil and gas company in B.C.

The protestors described themselves in a Saturday press release as non-Indigenous “settler allies who stand in solidarity with Indigenous peoples who are defending their territories from colonial violence and industrial destruction.”

The protest began at 9:30 a.m. in Saint-Lambert, Que., a city on Montreal’s South Shore, and will continue “for as long as the RCMP remains on the territory of the Wet’suwet’en and the construction of the Coastal GasLink pipeline continues” said one of the blockade participants, Marianne Côté, in the release.

In a statement, CN confirmed it was aware of the blockade, but did not specify whether it was disrupting service.

It’s the latest of several solidarity protests which took place across the country in recent weeks. Kahnawake, the Kanien’kehá:ka (Mohawk) community also on Montreal’s South Shore, held a rolling blockade in late-November on a prominant stretch of highway.

The Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs, who are the traditional leaders of the territory are standing in opposition of a pipeline being built by Coastal Gaslink, despite it being approved by the elected council. In November, Mounties in northern B.C. said they were enforcing an injunction barring protests from blocking an access road used by Coastal GasLink pipeline workers. Several people were arrested, including two journalists.

The 670-kilometre pipeline will transport natural gas from Northern B.C. Coastal Gaslink says construction is more than halfway done.

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