Video: Riot police charge journalists and protesters at Standing Rock

“I do not want to get arrested, but at the same time, this is worth standing and reporting on,” says a woman as she videos a line of law-enforcement officers in riot gear standing menacingly still a few metres away. “Police standing off with journalists? I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

The tense deployment was ostensibly to clear the handful of protesters who remained at the all-but-abandoned Standing Rock camp on 22nd February 2017, resolutely opposing plans to run the Dakota Access oil pipeline through Native American tribal territory. But in the footage below, captured by photographer Michael Nigro, it seems there were more journalists than demonstrators in the riot police’s sights when they eventually charged, using “military force, as if they were in Fallujah,” according to Michael.

Michael’s remarkable reportage from inside the camp features in Delayed Gratification #25 – along with photography from December by David Jackson showing happier times for the protesters – in our photostory ‘Two tales from Standing Rock ’.

To see more of Michael’s reporting and updates on the Standing Rock protests, look at his Facebook feed. And for the full context on this dramatic end to months of protest, read ‘Two tales from Standing Rock’ in Delayed Gratification #25, available now from our online shop.

Posted on Friday, March 24th, 2017 - Categories: Extras, Video.