Native Leaders Bring Attention To Impact Of Fossil Fuel Industry On Missing And Murdered Indigenous Women And Girls
Lower Brule, SD — Yesterday, May 4th, Indigenous leaders and allies began convening at the Rosebud Sioux Nation, just miles from the proposed Keystone XL pipeline route, to call attention to the disproportionately high numbers of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls across North America. The gathering calls attention to the connection between pipeline construction and violence against Native women and girls. Construction of pipelines and other fossil fuel projects often brings an influx of male workers to rural areas near small towns and Reservations, where they live in “man camps” disconnected from the surrounding community. In North Dakota, a surge in rates of violent crime and aggravated assault have correlated with the Bakken “oil boom” and the subsequent arrival of thousands of new workers to the region.