RPT - Cheyenne River Sioux To Fight Dakota Access Pipeline After Court Halts Shutdown - Official

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 13th August, 2020) The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe will persist with challenges to the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) after a Federal appeals court said it could continue operating for now, the tribe's intergovernmental affairs coordinator Remi Bald Eagle told Sputnik.

On August 5, a US federal appeals court blocked a lower court's decision to temporarily shut down the Dakota Access Pipeline pending additional environmental review.

"The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe will continue to fight DAPL and any other pipeline attempting to run through the Great Sioux Nation territory," Bald Eagle said on Wednesday.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe did not respond to inquiries from Sputnik seeking comment on the matter.

The tribes have been in a three-year legal battle with the Trump administration and the pipeline's parent company, Energy Transfer Partners, to prevent the $3.7 billion Dakota Access Pipeline from passing through their sacred land, which they also say threatens vital water resources.

Between 2016 to 2017, protesters participated in mass demonstrations against the pipeline, which resulted in law enforcement using force against protesters in order to allow the construction of the pipeline to be completed.

The Dakota Access Pipeline is used to move some 570,000 barrels of oil per day from North Dakota through South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois.