Enbridge spilled drilling chemicals in river    (Image Credit: Twitter: @ResistLine3)

Minneapolis, July 8 (RHC)-- In the U.S. state of Minnesota, Indigenous-led water protectors continue to take nonviolent direct action to stop construction of Enbridge’s Line 3 tar sands pipeline. 

On Tuesday, activists locked themselves to drilling equipment and built blockades on access roads in a bid to stop Enbridge from drilling under the Willow River. 

Water protectors say construction crews appeared to puncture an aquifer, discharging drilling mud and chemicals into the river. 

Winona LaDuke, an Anishinaabe activist and executive director of Honor the Earth, told reporters: "The rivers belong to the fish.  They belong to the animals, and they belong to the people.  And they don’t belong to Enbridge.  So, we the people protect the rivers.”

If completed, Enbridge’s Line 3 pipeline would account for carbon emissions equivalent to 50 new coal-fired power plants.