Police have moved in and arrested some of the Hawai’ian protestors against the construction of one of the world's largest telescopes on top of Mauna Kea in Hilo Hawai'i.
Oiwi TV in Hawai'i has reported that emotions were high in the exchange between police and people involved in the protest.
One of the protestors who spoke to Te Kāea yesterday, Kaho'okahi Kanuha was arrested along with another community member.
He told Wepiha Te Kanawa, "This is a desecration of the mountain and the indigenous people."
Native Hawaiians are angry with the construction of the telescope which will cost $1.4 billion on top of their scared mountain.
There are already telescopes on the mountain but the brand new telescope is expected to be one of the worlds tallest.
But Mauna Kea isn't the only place where protesting is happening, students from the University of Hawaii are also showing their support.
The call goes out to their sacred mountain Mauna Kea
Kaho'okahi Kanuha says, “They are attempting to build a very high telescope that goes 2 stories underground digging into and desecrating our Mauna, our sacred aina and again the home of our akua, so what we are attempting to do is to put a stop to that.They don’t understand the significances of the mauna. They don’t understand the traditions of it. They don’t understand the cultural, spiritual and genealogical connections that we have to it and they don’t understand what the TMT (Thirty Metre Telescope) is for.”
Japan, China, Canada and India hope to use the telescope for astrological research.
Kaho'okahi Kanuha says, “At this point there are already 13 telescopes on Mauna Kea and this will be the 14th one and to get an idea of how big this is you could combine every telescope on the mountain right now and it still wouldn't be as big as the telescope that they wish to build.”
Big Island Video News caught footage of the arrest on Mauna Kea this morning and the video can be viewed below.