By Catherine Ngai
VANCOUVER, Oct 27 (Reuters) - Canadian aboriginal and environmental groups filed lawsuits on Thursday seeking to overturn government approval of a $27 billion liquefied natural gas project led by Malaysia's Petronas, that they say will hurt the environment and destroy crucial salmon habitat.
The challenges, filed in the Federal Court in Vancouver, allege that the government's environmental assessment is invalid and that the project has significant and adverse environmental effects that were not considered.
In September, Canada gave the green light for the Pacific NorthWest LNG project in northern British Columbia, with 190 conditions, despite critics' concerns about environmental damage. The project is majority owned by Malaysian state oil firm Petronas. Canadian government said it will review the information outlined in the legal action and take appropriate steps, but said it stood by its decision, made after a three-year evaluation.
Petronas did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside its regular business hours.
The groups filing the lawsuits say that they plan to rally international opposition and hold civil disobedience events to disrupt plans to build the $11 billion facility on top of the Flora Bank, a habitat for millions of juvenile salmon.
"We attempted for a long time to be engaged on the project, to be consulted and worked with to accommodate the interests that we have," said Glen Williams, chief negotiator for the Gitanyow aboriginal community. "That didn't occur, or at least very little. They denied us that process. That's what we'll be seeking for in court."
Greg Knox, executive director of the SkeenaWild Conservation Trust, said that construction could permanently destroy 35,000 square meters of crucial salmon habitat.
The approval of the pipeline is considered the first major energy decision by the Liberal government since taking power last November.
Environmental and aboriginal activism against North American energy pipelines has stepped up in recent months.
On Oct. 11, climate-change activists disrupted flows on five Canadian-U.S. oil pipelines in a rare, coordinated action to support the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe protesting the Dakota Access crude pipeline. to Grand Chief Stewart Phillip of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs, who supports the opposition to Dakota Access, approval of the LNG project by the government was seen as a "betrayal."
"If we can't rely on (the government) to defend our rights, we'll have to do that ourselves," he told reporters outside the federal courthouse on Thursday.