Police make arrests at Standing Rock in push to evict remaining activists

Only a few dozen people remained at the Dakota Access pipeline protest encampment on Wednesday night after the state’s eviction deadline saw most of the activists leave voluntarily amid a show of force from law enforcement in riot gear.

Ten activists were arrested on the road near the camp, but police did not enter the camp, according to North Dakota governor Doug Burgum, who spoke at a press conference Wednesday evening. Burgum said the eviction had gone “very smoothly” and that he expected the government to have “unfettered access to the camp starting tomorrow”.

The closure of Oceti Sakowin, the central camp in Cannon Ball, by officials in North Dakota marks yet another blow to the movement that attracted indigenous activists and environmentalists from across the globe to demonstrate against the oil pipeline.

In the final hours, some holdouts set fires to structures at the camp where thousands have built tipis, yurts, huts and massive shelters in recent months.

According to police officials and a witness, an explosion also ignited at the camp during the tense standoff with police. A seven-year-old boy and a 17-year-old girl were taken in an ambulance to a hospital for burns, according to the Morton County sheriff’s office. The 17-year-old was airlifted to Minnesota with “severe” burns, according to Burgum.

The cause of the explosion and severity of the injuries remain unclear. Sean Sullivan, a navy veteran from California, who recently returned to Standing Rock with a group of vets, said he saw the explosion inside a tipi and that he helped the two to safety.

“I was 25 feet away,” he said by phone. “There was a lot of screaming and panic.”

As the afternoon deadline passed, a group remained at camp, some singing and praying as police closed in . A sheriff’s spokeswoman told the Guardian that police began taking activists into custody after 4pm local time and that roughly ten people were arrested.

“Some people are trying to do final cleanup, and there are still people there who are going to remain until they are removed,” Stephanie Big Eagle, a member of the Yankton Sioux tribe, said Wednesday morning. “I’m worried for their safety, we all are. We’re praying for them.”

After leaving Oceti, she and others gathered on Wednesday morning at Sacred Stone, a separate anti-pipeline camp nearby.

Law enforcement officers set up extensive blockades and checkpoints in the area, following orders from Burgum and US army corps of engineers officials that the camp be evacuated. Dave Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, which is leading the courtroom fight to block the pipeline, has also supported the evacuation effort, sparking an intense backlash from other activists.

State and tribal officials have claimed that they fear flooding could endanger campers and possibly contaminate the nearby Missouri river, though the activists, who call themselves water protectors, have argued that the government is trying to quash the huge movement against the $3.7bn oil pipeline.

“Just because we’re getting removed from that area doesn’t mean it’s over,” said Big Eagle. “We just have to continue to work together as a whole for this common cause, which is protection of Mother Earth.”

The eviction comes less than a month after Donald Trump ordered an expedited approval of the pipeline, reversing the Obama administration’s last-minute decision to halt the project. The Standing Rock tribe and its supporters have long argued that the pipeline, which is routed upstream of the reservation, threatens its water supply and sacred sites.

Sioux leaders argue that indigenous people have treaty rights to the land where the Oceti camp is located – on property that the army corps now controls.

“People are crying and leaving in their cars,” said Sullivan, describing those he saw who chose to leave before the arrests. “It’s very emotional.”

Law enforcement – which has faced widespread criticism for using excessive force during demonstrations – has begun aggressively prosecuting and investigating the remaining indigenous activists since Trump’s inauguration.

“I’m praying for no loss of life. I’m praying that no one gets hurt,” said Floris White Bull, a 33-year-old Standing Rock member who stayed at her home just south of the camps on Wednesday. “I know for a fact that every single person that’s going to be forcibly removed … is going to be traumatized and suffer distress. That’s not easy.”

North Dakota officials said the government would give hotel and meal vouchers to activists who vacated, along with a bus ticket out of state.

“We’re saving taxpayer dollars any time we can buy a bus ticket and a hotel room rather than put people through the legal system,” Burgum said.

Ernesto Burbank, a member of the Diné tribe in Arizona, who has been at the camps on and off since last August, said many were surprised to see that someone had set a structure on fire. He said he didn’t support people setting fires on sacred grounds, but understood people’s emotions were high.

“These are individual people dealing with PTSD, dealing with sleep deprivation … people constantly being intimidated by officers,” he said by phone from Sacred Stone on Wednesday morning. “They are losing a place that is home. They don’t know how else to channel their frustration.”

Burbank, 35, said he hoped the momentum of Standing Rock, which attracted an unprecedented gathering of indigenous tribes, would not be lost.

“We can defeat the black snake,” he said, referencing the nickname for the pipeline that many use at Standing Rock. “It may not be today or tomorrow, but we can.”

White Bull said she hoped the campaign to push banks to divest from the pipeline would continue even if the Oceti camp was removed.

“I think it’s just the beginning of a global awakening,” she said, noting that similar camps have emerged in other communities to battle pipelines. “People are becoming more conscious of their choices and their own voice ... and realizing the power in unity.”