11-year-old girl detained after crossing police line at pipeline protest

Two 11-year-old girls were among the protesters who crossed a police line Sunday to protest pipeline surveying on Burnaby Mountain.

While seven people were arrested Sunday for defying the injunction protecting Kinder Morgan workers drilling test holes, preteens Kate Fink-Jensen and Naomi Cech, and Fink-Jensen’s mother Kim, were not arrested, police said.

Arrests continued over the weekend as protesters continued to defy an order by the BC Supreme Court to leave the area. Kinder Morgan is testing soil on Burnaby Mountain for the construction of a $5.4 billion pipeline. Burnaby RCMP has been on the scene and started arresting protesters on Thursday.

The two girls came with Kate’s mother to the mountain to exercise their right to protest against Kinder Morgan. In a video at the protests, the girls vow to cross the police line to make a statement against the project. “Every time that drill goes down, that’s one part of my green future being taken away from me,” says Kate.

Burnaby RCMP’s last official count came out Saturday, saying that 53 people had been arrested at the protests so far. Their report says that most were arrested peacefully, under civil contempt charges for violating the court injunction. They did say that two protesters were arrested on criminal charges, one man for assault when he spat at an officer and another man for obstruction when he attempted to interfere with the first arrest. Police say that investigations are ongoing and the charges “are being contemplated”.

“The injunction directs the RCMP to arrest and remove any person who is contravening the provisions set out in the order,” says Burnaby RCMP. “Anyone who continues to contravene the order will be arrested. And certainly anyone engaging in criminal behaviour will be arrested.”

“We continue to facilitate peaceful and lawful protest, but we want to emphasize that criminal behaviour will NOT be tolerated.”

Agencies/Canadajournal