Lakota File Federal Injunction to Remove Rainbow Gathering

LAKOTA WARRIORS FILE EMERGENCY INJUNCTION SEEKING RAINBOW REMOVAL;  PRESS CONFERENCE THURSDAY

MEDIA ADVISORY: July 1, 2015 – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Canupa Gluha Mani at 605-517-1547 or Email: cantetenza13@gmail.com

 WHAT: Press Conference

 WHO: International Treaty Defenders – a collaboration of the Lakota Strong Heart Warrior Society and the Lakota Rainbow Affinity group of supportive Rainbow Family members.

 WHERE: International Treaty Defenders Camp. From Hill City, SD take Deerfield Road until you see the camp.

 WHEN: Thursday July 2, 2015 at 11:00am

 Rapid City, SD – Wednesday afternoon the Strong Heart Warrior Society of the Independent Lakota Nation filed an Emergency Injunction in Federal Court to force action in removing the Rainbow Gathering from Lakota Territory in the Black Hills.

The nine page motion enjoins defendants, U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Park Service, South Dakota Division of Agriculture Conservation and Forestry, South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks, and Pennington County Sheriff, to take immediate action to remove the 1000 person Rainbow Gathering from a site near Deerfield Lake in the Lakota’s sacred mountains.

The motion for Emergency Injunction states that: “The Defendant’s failure to act will also result in the imminent threat of injury to the political, social, and cultural institutions and resources of Lakota Nation members including injury to Lakota tribal treaty rights, lands, assets, and resources; and, additional damage to Lakota historical and cultural sites which have not been fully identified and inspected on the site prior to the Rainbow encampment.”

The Lakota have never relinquished nation status or given up aboriginal title to He Sapa or the sacred Black Hills.  The warrior society has been working with the Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council and other traditional and grassroots Lakota people to remove the gathering.  The injunction is filed by the Independent Lakota Nation to more fully assert sovereign nation status.

Organizers for the Rainbow encampment failed to get permission following the customary law of the traditional Lakota Nation. Despite the rosy reports on social media, many grassroots and traditional Lakota are upset about the Rainbow incursion on sacred ground.

Holding the gathering in the Black Hills without an invitation from traditional Lakota people has also divided the Rainbow Family reducing attendance and causing the event to be labled an “unsanctioned” Rainbow gathering.

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