A LEADER of the small, armed group that is occupying a remote national wildlife preserve in Oregon, the United States, said Tuesday that they will go home when a plan is in place to turn over management of federal lands to locals.

    Ammon Bundy told reporters at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge that ranchers, loggers and farmers should have control of federal land — a common refrain in a decades-long fight over public lands in the West.

    “It is our goal to get the logger back to logging, the rancher back to ranching,” said the son of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, who was involved in a high-profile 2014 standoff with the government over grazing rights.

    The younger Bundy’s anti-government group is critical of federal land stewardship, but environmentalists and others say U.S. officials should keep control for the broadest possible benefit to business, recreation and the environment.

    The armed activists seized the refuge’s headquarters about 500 kilometers from Portland on Saturday night. Roughly 20 people bundled in camouflage, ear muffs and cowboy hats are occupying the bleak high desert of eastern Oregon.

    As the takeover entered its third day, authorities had not moved in and had not shut off power to the refuge, Arizona rancher LaVoy Finicum said. On Tuesday evening, Finicum said he believes federal officials have issued warrants for the arrest of five group members.

    The FBI in Portland referred calls to the Harney County Joint Information Center, which said in a statement it had no information on arrests or arrest warrants and that authorities were “still working on a peaceful resolution.”

    Finicum, holding a rifle and a backpack, told reporters he would stay at the entrance to the refuge overnight so authorities could find him. Bundy said they would take a defensive position anticipating a possible raid.

    (SD-Agencies)