Guelph, ON: Community Members Occupy Royal Bank of Canada in Solidarity with Wet’suwet’en

Report back from recent Wet’suwet’en solidarity action in Guelph, Ontario at a branch of the Royal Bank of Canada. Originally posted to NorthShore Counter-Info.

The Wet’suwet’en Nation is currently engaged in an ongoing struggle to protect their unceded, sovereign territory from the Coastal Gaslink pipeline project (CGL) and the Canadian State. Although the hereditary chiefs of the Wet’suwet’en Nation have not consented to the CGL pipeline, the BC Supreme Court has violated Wet’suwet’en Law by allowing the RCMP to invade Wet’suwet’en sovereign territory to pave the way for Coastal Gaslink’s construction of a natural gas pipeline. In an era of so-called “reconciliation” the Canadian state continues to occupy unceded Indigenous lands while violating and dismissing Indigenous sovereignty.

One year after the Wet’suwet’en people experienced a violent, militarized RCMP raid of their territory, there are threats of another raid. Updates from the Unist’ot’en Camp have revealed that the RCMP are blocking media, food, medicines and important winterizing gear from entering the camp as well as not allowing Wet’suwet’en people and their allies to leave the camp. Now more than ever we must stand with the Wet’suwet’en Nation as allies and accomplices in their resistance against industry. Following a call for solidarity actions from the Wet’suwet’en Nation in what we now know as Northern British Columbia, around 40 community members occupied RBC in protest of its role in financing CGL and fueling the ongoing violence on the Wet’suwet’en Nation and their lands.

The aim of occupying this space is to send a clear message to RBC, as well as all other financial institutions involved, those being TD and HSBC, to stop funding the violence and destruction that Coastal GasLink and the RCMP are inflicting upon Wet’suwet’en people on their unceded lands. We know that RBC, TD and HSBC are currently acting as financial advisers to the shareholders of the Coastal Gaslink Pipeline Project. By helping to fund the CGL pipeline project, RBC, TD and HSBC are directly implicated in and responsible for the criminalization of Wet’suwet’en land defenders, the violation of Wet’suwet’en law, the RCMP’s ongoing attacks and the destruction of unceded Indigenous lands.