CANNON BALL, NORTH DAKOTA-- September 2016 Standing Rock Says No to Dakota Access Pipeline Photos by Sunshine Velasco and Emma Cassidy | Survival Media Agency In North Dakota, thousands of people from Native Nations around North America have gathered at Sacred Stone Camp to stop the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline. If built, the pipeline would carry Bakken oil upstream of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. The Sacred Stone Camp began its resistance to the pipeline in April and continues to grow larger each day. It is located at the edge of the Missouri and Cannonball rivers on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, in Cannonball, North Dakota. On September 4th, hundreds of people marched to protect the water and the sacred land near Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, and ended the march with with prayers and ceremonies for the recently damaged sacred land. The march took place over Labor Day Weekend after the Dakota Access Pipeline construction irreparably harmed Native historic and sacred sites. Working on a Saturday, the corporation bulldozed the land and damaged sacred sites along a 150 foot corridor running more than a mile. This happened the day after Standing Rock Sioux notified officials in Washington, DC, of the existence and importance of those sites. Native Nations from the Pacific Northwest offered their prayers to the sacred waters of the Standing Rock Sioux to show solidarity in the fight against Dakota Access pipeline construction. They paddled, prayed, and sang while indigenous people and allies cheered from the shore and held banners that read "Mni Wiconi, Water is Life." "We fail to appreciate and honor our Sacred Sites, ripping out the minerals and gifts that lay underneath them as if Mother Earth were simply a resource, instead of the source of life itself." Chief Arvol Looking Horse, of the Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota Nations. Indigenous leaders marched from the Standing Rock resistance camp to Dakota Access pipeline construction zone. Earlier that week, the Dakota Access private security officers “Thousands have gathered peacefully in Standing Rock in solidarity against the pipeline,” said Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman David Archambault II, as he address the United Nations Human Rights Council. “And yet many water protectors have been threatened and even injured by the pipeline’s security officers. One child was bitten and injured by a guard dog. We stand in peace but have been met with violence.” Photos by Sunshine Velasco and Emma Cassidy | Survival Media Agency