Authorities called Wednesday on anti-government protesters refusing to leave a US federal wildlife reserve in Oregon to "move on," after a member of the group was killed as police tried to arrest him.
"It's time for everybody in this illegal occupation to move on. There doesn't have to be bloodshed in our community," Harney County sheriff David Ward told reporters.
He spoke a day after police stopped several members of the group driving on a highway outside the refuge in rural Oregon and moved to arrest them. One was killed by gunfire in a dramatic twist to the three-week standoff.
Eight members of the group are currently in custody, including two arrested in Burns, the town nearest to the refuge, and one who surrendered to police in Arizona.
Authorities have now blocked the access road leading into the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, but the occupiers are free to leave and authorities want to end the ordeal peacefully, said Greg Bretzing, head of the FBI's Portland office.
Authorities called Wednesday on anti-government protesters refusing to leave a US federal wildlife reserve in Oregon to “move on,” after a member of the group was killed as police tried to arrest him.
“It’s time for everybody in this illegal occupation to move on. There doesn’t have to be bloodshed in our community,” Harney County sheriff David Ward told reporters.
He spoke a day after police stopped several members of the group driving on a highway outside the refuge in rural Oregon and moved to arrest them. One was killed by gunfire in a dramatic twist to the three-week standoff.
Eight members of the group are currently in custody, including two arrested in Burns, the town nearest to the refuge, and one who surrendered to police in Arizona.
Authorities have now blocked the access road leading into the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, but the occupiers are free to leave and authorities want to end the ordeal peacefully, said Greg Bretzing, head of the FBI’s Portland office.
