So yeah, so we scaled back our barricades
on Argyle Street, Mckenzie and the Highway 6 bypass.
Roads that we've seen dug up now for the last four months.
And so we've done our best to make sure we're listening to the community
folks that are interested in seeing those roads open,
and wanting to see us move towards a peaceful resolution of this.
The OPP still have warrants for all of us.
As well as the permanent injunction that still remains in place on Land Back Lane.
And so we are quite hesitant in our trust of the police at this moment.
And I think it's a matter of time before the OPP start getting pressure again
to enforce that injunction, as well as enforce the warrants on myself
and many others here.
They've given some assurance,
to say that they're not trying to escalate things further.
But at the same time,
we've heard those assurances before.
We heard those assurances before August 5th,
when our people were shot at and tasered, and dragged from our lands.
This was a peaceful camp.
100 OPP officers came in that day to arrest 9 of us.
Shot at our people, tasered our people.
One guy was tasered in the neck and in the head.
The other was dragged along the pavement.
He's got scars down the side of his face now
that he'll have for the rest of his life.
The OPP have a choice to make
as to whether or not to escalate this situation
into something that has been for the last seven months now.
That has seen roads dug up.
That has seen highways and railways shut down.
I think a message has been made loud and clear
that if you continue to do this, this will not be tolerated
and we will do everything that we can to defend our people and our lands.
There's nothing that those guns and those cops,
their jails, their courts, or their injunctions can do
to dissuade us from pushing forward.
This is our land.
This is Haudenosaunee territory, and it's going to stay that way.
All of these agreements that have been made with our ancestors,
these ancestors gave their blood, their sweat, their tears for this land.
What kind of disrespect would that be for me
to say that they did that for nothing?
And so for us, the end goal in all of this is land back.
Whatever it takes to make that happen is what we're willing to do.
The OPP has an opportunity
to force their government to come to the table
with a nation-to-nation relationship-building process
that sees our nation recognized as it is.
As a nation.
It really doesn't matter to us whether you vote in band council
or you are a Confederacy supporter,
or you're a Mohawk worker.
These are all divisions that have happened in our community
by the hand of the federal government.
By the hand of the RCMP, before the OPP.
We've said over and over again that this has been about unity,
and this is for everybody.
It doesn't matter which family, which faction,
we all know that this is our land.
We all know, unequivocally, that this is Haudenosaunee territory.
We've had a ton of solidarity statements
put out by lots and lots of folks across the country.
The Wet'suwet'en, the Secwepemc, Mi'kmaq, folks from Kitigan Zibi.
And all these folks have come out and visted
and came out to Land Back Lane to express that solidarity.
I think this is one thing that was made really clear last year
with #ShutDownCanada
that seen, y'know, railways and highways and waterways
blocked from coast to coast.
Our people, regardless of what nation you come from across this country,
there were more than 300 nations here before settlers arrived.
And those nations had many, many old alliances between them.
And so those alliances are something that we look to uphold.
When the OPP come into here, or the RCMP in Wet'suwet'en
or in Secwepemc territories, or Kitigan Zibi
like... trust me.
We will do whatever we can to lift their voices as well.
This idea that you can take advantage of Indigenous communities across the country
with pipelines, and highways and railways -
those days are over.