The Klamath Tribes in south central Oregon have joined several others in the Northwest in supporting a tribe fighting an oil pipeline being built in North Dakota.
The Klamath Tribes wrote to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe supporting their protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline. The Standing Rock Sioux fear the oil pipeline will pollute their water, and say ancient burial sites have been disturbed by construction. These issues resonate with Klamath Tribal Council chairman Donald Gentry.
"We share those concerns and we believe as the host people of that land and that area, they need to be consulted and their interests need to be protected," Gentry told JPR.
The Klamath have their own troubled history with water, wrestling for decades with federal agencies over water flows and fish survival in the Klamath Basin. The Lummi, Karuk, Hoopa and other Northwest tribes have sent members to support the protest at the construction site in North Dakota.
