Author: earthfirst

Prosecution collapses in Superglue Penny trial

Dur­ing the Camp for Cli­mate Action at Heathrow last year, large num­bers of police invad­ed the site, only to be peace­ful­ly resist­ed by the Campers, and eject­ed from the site with impres­sive restraint. The pre­text for this attack by the police was so that the For­ward Intel­li­gence Team could “do a head­count” (in spite of the face that local police offi­cers were already patrolling the site, and were pre­sum­ably per­fect­ly capa­ble of ful­fill­ing this task). It is far more like­ly that the real rea­son behind the police action was their desire to pro­voke a riot, and thus have an excuse to destroy the camp and bang heads. After the incur­sion the Ter­ri­to­r­i­al Sup­port Group (riot police) were ordered to kit them­selves out in full gear, to pre­pare for a sec­ond assault on the camp.

Dur­ing the Camp for Cli­mate Action at Heathrow last year, large num­bers of police invad­ed the site, only to be peace­ful­ly resist­ed by the Campers, and eject­ed from the site with impres­sive restraint. The pre­text for this attack by the police was so that the For­ward Intel­li­gence Team could “do a head­count” (in spite of the face that local police offi­cers were already patrolling the site, and were pre­sum­ably per­fect­ly capa­ble of ful­fill­ing this task). It is far more like­ly that the real rea­son behind the police action was their desire to pro­voke a riot, and thus have an excuse to destroy the camp and bang heads. After the incur­sion the Ter­ri­to­r­i­al Sup­port Group (riot police) were ordered to kit them­selves out in full gear, to pre­pare for a sec­ond assault on the camp.

This would have come to pass if it had not been for the swift response of an activist who super­glued her hands to the gates in order to deny them access.
As a result of this action Pen­ny East­wood was charged with obstruct­ing the police in the course of their duty, and she entered a plea of inno­cent on the grounds that the police were not act­ing in accor­dance with their duty.

After months of delay, the tri­al took place at Uxbridge on 8th and 9th Jan­u­ary, at which the pros­e­cu­tion case col­lapsed. The dis­trict judge pre­sid­ing right­ly spot­ted that the police’s case was a load of rub­bish, because they pro­duced no evi­dence that they were pre­vent­ed from car­ry­ing out a law­ful duty.

This case proves (if any proof were need­ed), that the police are ever hap­py to employ vio­lence in pur­suit of their polit­i­cal aims. It also shows that the Met are spec­tac­u­lar­ly stu­pid. I sup­pose we should take some com­fort that there are still judges in Britain who think that the pro­vok­ing of riots is out­side a police officer’s nor­mal course of duty.

Pen­ny said “I was try­ing to de-esca­late the sit­u­a­tion after aggres­sive­ly over the top polic­ing had cre­at­ed ten­sion. There were riot police crouch­ing behind the hedgerow. It was very scary, par­tic­u­lar­ly as there were chil­dren on site”.

“I am a cli­mate activist because I am a moth­er and I want to ensure that my chil­dren have a half-way decent future — that’s why I see it as my duty to oppose acts of envi­ron­men­tal luna­cy, like air­port expan­sion. I thought that the riot police were try­ing to shut down the cli­mate camp, and I did­n’t think that that was right or fair. The tri­al has been hang­ing over me for sev­er­al months, and it is a huge relief that my action has been vin­di­cat­ed by the judge.”

CLIMATE ACTION NEWS SHEET 75, JANUARY 2008

CONTENTS:

———————————————-
UPCOMING ACTIONS AND EVENTS:
———————————————-
1) FOSSIL FOOLS DAY — NATIONAL, 1.4.08
2) LONDON RISING TIDE BENEFIT — LONDON, 11.1.08

CONTENTS:

———————————————-
UPCOMING ACTIONS AND EVENTS:
———————————————-
1) FOSSIL FOOLS DAY — NATIONAL, 1.4.08
2) LONDON RISING TIDE BENEFIT — LONDON, 11.1.08
3) NEWQUAY AIRPORT EXPANSION, PUBLIC DEBATE — CORNWALL, 12.1.08
4) RADICAL ACTION VS. CLIMATE CHAOS, NATIONAL MEET — NOTTINGHAM, 12.1.08
5) CLIMATE CAMP NATIONAL GATHERING — LEEDS, 26–27.1.08
6) BIOFUELWATCH WEEK OF ACTION — NATIONAL, 26.1.08 — 1.2.08
7) MANCHESTER CLIMATE FORUM — 1.3.08
8) DAY OF ACTION VS. GLOBAL AGRIBUSINESS — INTERNATIONAL, 26.1.08
9) LOW-IMPACT SMALLHOLDING — BUCKS, 11–13.1.08
———————————————-
RECENT HAPPENINGS:
———————————————-
1) NEWQUAY AIRPORT ROOFTOP OCCUPATION — 15.12.07
2) SANTAS AGAINST EXCESSIVE CONSUMPTION — NORWICH & LONDON, 15.12.07
3) BRISTOL RISING TIDE TAKES ACTION VS. SHELL GREENWASH — DECEMBER 2007
4) SHELL TO SEA SCALE GOVERNMENT OFFICE — IRELAND, 19.12.07
5) NATIONAL CLIMATE CHANGE MARCH AND ACTIONS — 8.12.07
6) DUTCH COAL ACTION — 8.12.07
7) FLIGHT CENTRES SHUT FOR BUSINESS — MANCHESTER, 7.12.07
8) CHEADLE-HIGH-STREET AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE — DECEMBER 2007
9) SUBVERTISEMENTS IN LONDON AND MANCHESTER — DECEMBER 2007
10) WOMEN’S BLOCKADE OF DEPARTMENT FOR TRANSPORT — 7.12.07
11) THE TIDE IS RISING! — 7.12.07
12) CLIMATE ACTIVISTS STOP WORK AT COAL MINE — SOUTH WALES, 5.12.07
13) INTERNATIONAL RT HOAX TARGETS BIG CARBON — 3.12.07
14) HOMELESS POLAR BEARS IN COURT — BRISTOL, 14.11.07
15) KEEP OIL UNDERGROUND — DECEMBER 2007
16) SIZEWELL NUCLEAR CLIMATE ACTION — 1.12.07
17) MANIAC MOTORIST MARS MASS — GLASGOW, NOVEMBER 2007
18) VIVA’S ‘HOT!’ CAMPAIGN — DECEMBER 2007
19) WHAT BETTER TIME? — DECEMBER 2007
20) BATH BOMB, ISSUE 5 — DECEMBER 2007
21) PACIFIC CURRENTS — DECEMBER 2007
22) A HOUSE OF CARDS — DECEMBER 2007
23) SOUTH WEST AIR ACTION — DECEMBER 2007
24) RISING TIDE LEAMINGTON SPA — DECEMBER 2007
25) RISING TIDE ON YOU TUBE

———————————————-
UPCOMING ACTIONS AND EVENTS:
———————————————-
1) FOSSIL FOOLS DAY — NATIONAL, 1.4.08
Just three months to go — are you out prac­tis­ing your rou­tines? rehears­ing your songs? build­ing your props yet? I should get out more over Christ­mas…
How­ev­er, it will soon be time to hatch your mis­chie­vous scheme, so get your friends round and start plot­ting!
http://www.fossilfoolsday.org/

2) LONDON RISING TIDE BENEFIT — LONDON, 11.1.08
In sup­port of Lon­don Ris­ing Tide, AMP is organ­is­ing a night of live music at The Oth­ers, Manor Road, Stoke New­ing­ton. Entrance £5.
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=38074566

3) NEWQUAY AIRPORT EXPANSION, PUBLIC DEBATE — CORNWALL, 12.1.08
Organ­ised by Ris­ing Tide with speak­ers from Groundswell and Plane Stu­pid.
7pm St. Maw­gan Com­mu­ni­ty Hall, Nr. Newquay, Corn­wall. For more info. email; kernow@risingtide.org.uk

4) RADICAL ACTION VS. CLIMATE CHAOS, NATIONAL MEET — NOTTINGHAM, 12.1.08
11am — 6pm at The Sumac Cen­tre, 245 Glad­stone Street, For­est Fields, Not­ting­ham.
This meet­ing came out of the last Cli­mate Camp gath­er­ing in Novem­ber. It is focussed on grow­ing our move­ment — how can we encour­age more groups to form and more actions/campaigns to hap­pen? What things do we want to do to help build a vibrant net­work of region­al action groups doing actions local­ly and nation­al­ly?
For instruc­tion on how to get there: http://www.veggies.org.uk/sumac/map.html
Also, 11 peo­ple are going to tri­al in Not­ting­ham on Mon­day 14th for ‘shut­ting down’ the local coal pow­er sta­tion, If any­one wants to stay to sup­port them that would be great!

5) CLIMATE CAMP NATIONAL GATHERING — LEEDS, 26–27.1.08
The Cli­mate Camp on its own did­n’t stop cli­mate change — but it’s part of a grow­ing social move­ment that can! Come and take the next steps for­ward at the upcom­ing UK-wide meet­ing on Jan 26–27 in Leeds. Every­one is wel­come, whether you came to the camp, or were sim­ply inspired by it.
http://www.climatecamp.org.uk/nextmeeting.php

6) BIOFUELWATCH WEEK OF ACTION — NATIONAL, 26.1.08 — 1.2.08
Bio­fu­el­watch are call­ing for a nation­al week of local action on agro­fu­els between 26th Jan­u­ary and 1st Feb­ru­ary 2008. We will short­ly update our web­site to pro­vide more back­ground infor­ma­tion about the UK agro­fu­el indus­try and poli­cies, as well as a draft leaflet and oth­er resources. If you would like to get involved or find out more, please email us at info[at]biofuelwatch.org.uk.
http://biofuelwatch.org.uk/

7) MANCHESTER CLIMATE FORUM — 1.3.08
Man­ches­ter Cli­mate Forum “Cli­mate Change: it’s time to pre­pare”
9.15am at the Methodist Hall, Old­ham St, Cen­tral Man­ches­ter
http://www.manchesterclimateforum.org.uk/index.html

8) DAY OF ACTION VS. GLOBAL AGRIBUSINESS — INTERNATIONAL, 26.1.08
On Jan­u­ary 26 self-orga­nized groups from all around the world will take cre­ative action in their com­mu­ni­ty. This will man­i­fest in many ways, from non­vi­o­lent direct action, civ­il dis­obe­di­ence, street the­atre, con­ver­gences, teach-ins and oth­er activ­i­ties and events. Grass­roots move­ments around the world are mak­ing their voic­es heard and say­ing “Anoth­er World is Pos­si­ble”. In coor­di­na­tion with the World Social Forum.
http://www.risingtidenorthamerica.org/wordpress/category/front-page/

9) LOW-IMPACT SMALLHOLDING — BUCKS, 11–13.1.08
Next course by the Low-Impact Liv­ing Ini­tia­tive;
http://www.lowimpact.org/courseoutlinelowimpactsmallholding.htm

———————————————-
RECENT HAPPENINGS:
———————————————-
1) NEWQUAY AIRPORT ROOFTOP OCCUPATION — 15.12.07
For the recent­ly formed Ker­now and Ply­mouth Ris­ing Tide groups, this action marked an esca­la­tion in their fight against cli­mate change and for envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice. How­ev­er the planned rooftop protest at Newquay air­port was giv­en an unlike­ly boost when builders at the air­port left a lad­der propped up!
http://risingtide.org.uk/node/248
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cornwall/7146159.stm

2) SANTAS AGAINST EXCESSIVE CONSUMPTION — NORWICH AND LONDON, 15.12.07
Sub­ver­sive Singing San­tas Spread Sea­son­al San­i­ty in Lon­don and Nor­wich On one of the busiest shop­ping days of the year. Ris­ing Tide activists in both Lon­don and Nor­wich dressed up as San­tas Against Exces­sive Con­sump­tion and hit the high streets to sing a dif­fer­ent tune to the usu­al buy, buy,
buy mad­ness of the hol­i­day sea­son.
http://risingtide.org.uk/node/247

3) BRISTOL RISING TIDE TAKES ACTION VS. SHELL GREENWASH — DECEMBER 2007
A series of actions is being tak­en against the organ­is­ers of the Wildlife Pho­tog­ra­ph­er of the Year Award and Bris­tol Muse­um, in protest at the spon­sor­ship of the event by Shell. A grumpy polar bear vis­it­ed the offices of BBC Wildlife mag­a­zine, then activists dis­rupt­ed Bris­tol Muse­um’s posh recep­tion to kick off the exhi­bi­tion with a Yes Men-style inter­ven­tion. And on the open­ing morn­ing, dozens of humans, polar bears, a snow leop­ard and a tiger gath­ered (com­plete with the Shell’s Wild Lie counter-exhi­bi­tion) in front of the muse­um. They hand­ed out leaflets and cre­at­ed quite a spec­ta­cle. Protests are expect­ed to con­tin­ue through Jan. 13th.
http://risingtide.org.uk/bristol

4) SHELL TO SEA SCALE GOVERNMENT OFFICE — IRELAND, 19.12.07
A spe­cial prayer and car­ol ser­vice was held on 16th Decem­ber at Bel­lan­aboy, Coun­ty Mayo, mark­ing the end of anoth­er year of com­mu­ni­ty strug­gle against Shel­l’s pro­posed raw gas pipeline and inland refin­ery.
On the 19th, a small group of Shell to Sea activists scaled the heights of the Depart­ment of Nat­ur­al Resources to place a ban­ner read­ing PROTECT IRISH NATURAL RESOURCES on the bal­cony out­side Eamon Ryan’s office.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17942
http://www.corribsos.com/

5) NATIONAL CLIMATE CHANGE MARCH AND ACTIONS — 8.12.07
Over 10,000 cli­mate cam­paign­ers took to the streets to take part in march­es in Lon­don and Glas­gow over the week­end, despite pour­ing rain. Pro­test­ers braved the weath­er in one the biggest demon­stra­tions call­ing for cli­mate jus­tice the UK has ever seen.
http://www.campaigncc.org/
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/12/387497.html
Envi­ron­men­tal activists from direct action group Plane Stu­pid shut down trav­el agents and air­line offices along the route of the Cli­mate March in Lon­don.
http://www.planestupid.com/
Mean­while, in Man­ches­ter air­line bill­boards adver­tis­ing cheap flights to Euro­pean cities were sub­vert­ed.

6) DUTCH COAL ACTION — 8.12.07
A col­lec­tive of twen­ty Dutch Earth­First! activists blocked the coal con­vey­or- belt to a plant owned by the Ger­man ener­gy giant E.on on the Maasvlak­te near Rot­ter­dam.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17893

7) FLIGHT CENTRES SHUT FOR BUSINESS — MANCHESTER, 7.12.07
All Flight Cen­tre branch­es in Man­ches­ter city cen­tre were super-glued shut in time for Sat­ur­day trad­ing and to coin­cide with the cli­mate march in Lon­don. They were past­ed with notices say­ing: “Closed — we want your kids to have a plan­et” The UK’s only Hum­mer deal­er­ship, Bauer Mil­lett, was also D‑locked shut.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17887

8) CHEADLE-HIGH-STREET AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE — DECEMBER 2007
Activists from Chea­dle-High-Street Against Cli­mate Change held a “A plan­et is not just for Xmas” cam­paign for a sus­tain­able Xmas.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17917

9) SUBVERTISEMENTS IN LONDON AND MANCHESTER — DECEMBER 2007
Two adverts pro­mot­ing DVD’s by Top Gear’s Jere­my Clark­son now have large stick­ers stuck on declar­ing “This caus­es cli­mate change”. Also, Fly­Be appears to have spot­ted the errors of their ways and can­celled their short-haul sum­mer routes. Bra­vo Fly­Be!
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17937

10) WOMEN’S BLOCKADE OF DEPARTMENT FOR TRANSPORT — 7.12.07
Women cli­mate activists block­ad­ed the Depart­ment for Trans­port pre­vent­ing staff from get­ting to work and car­ry­ing out their poli­cies which are cat­a­pult­ing us towards dan­ger­ous run-away cli­mate change. This action comes in response to the Trans­port Sec­re­tary Ruth Kel­ly con­firm­ing the gov­ern­men­t’s inten­tions to build a third run­way and a sixth ter­mi­nal at Heathrow and coin­cides with the open­ing of their first “con­sul­ta­tion”.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17883

11) THE TIDE IS RISING! — 7.12.07
A ban­ner with this warning/statement was dropped to wel­come all those enter­ing the city of Man­ches­ter on the Princess park­way.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17886

12) CLIMATE ACTIVISTS STOP WORK AT COAL MINE — SOUTH WALES, 5.12.07
More than thir­ty cli­mate activists, includ­ing mem­bers of the Ris­ing Tide net­work, joined with local res­i­dents from Merthyr Tyd­fil in stop­ping exca­va­tion work for a full day on Britain’s biggest ever open-cast coal mine at Ffos-y-fran in South Wales. Activists evad­ed police and secu­ri­ty before tak­ing over the 1,000 acre site on a hill­top near Cardiff. Dressed as clowns and polar bears, they chained them­selves to bull­doz­ers and oth­er heavy machin­ery to pre­vent work on the mine.
http://risingtide.org.uk/node/242

13) INTERNATIONAL RT HOAX TARGETS BIG CARBON — 3.12.07
Cli­mate activists with the inter­na­tion­al Ris­ing Tide net­work embar­rassed the U.S. Cli­mate Action Part­ner­ship (USCAP), a lob­by group com­posed of 33 promi­nent busi­ness­es and orga­ni­za­tions, by dis­trib­ut­ing a spoof press release declar­ing that the consortium’s mem­bers had com­mit­ted to a 90
per­cent reduc­tion in their green­house gas emis­sions by 2050. In addi­tion, the spoof release called for an imme­di­ate mora­to­ri­um on the con­struc­tion of all new coal-fired pow­er plants.
http://risingtide.org.uk/node/240
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/dec/03/oil.bp

14) HOMELESS POLAR BEARS IN COURT — BRISTOL, 14.11.07
Four home­less polar bears appeared before Bris­tol Mag­is­trates Court on 14th Novem­ber. They were arrest­ed after blockad­ing the Roy­al Bank of Scot­land cor­po­rate offices on Avon St. dur­ing the Ris­ing Tide nation­al day of action. After plead­ing guilty to charges of “wil­ful­ly obstruct­ing the pub­lic high­way with a non motor vehi­cle” (i.e. a suit case) they were giv­en a con­di­tion­al dis­charge and went on to pick­et the RBS branch on Bald­win Street!
http://risingtide.org.uk/node/243

15) KEEP OIL UNDERGROUND — DECEMBER 2007
The only way to fight cli­mate change. A new report by Oil­Watch.
http://www.oilwatch.org/doc/documentos/Keep_oil_underground.pdf
http://www.oilwatch.org/

16) SIZEWELL NUCLEAR CLIMATE ACTION — 1.12.07
What else would you do at this time in the morn­ing at a nuclear pow­er sta­tion, oth­er than lay on the road, lock your­selves togeth­er, unfurl your ban­ner read­ing “nuclear pow­er is not the answer to cli­mate chaos” and wait 15 min­utes for the secu­ri­ty to notice you.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17868

17) MANIAC MOTORIST MARS MASS — GLASGOW, NOVEMBER 2007
Unbur­dened with fes­tive spir­it, a mid­dle-aged woman leant out of her car and pulled a cyclist off his bike.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17889

18) VIVA’S ‘HOT!’ CAMPAIGN — DECEMBER 2007
“Livestock’s con­tri­bu­tion to envi­ron­men­tal prob­lems is on a mas­sive scale. The impact is so sig­nif­i­cant that it needs to be addressed with urgency.” Unit­ed Nations Food and Agri­cul­ture Organ­i­sa­tion 2006
find out more at
http://www.viva.org.uk/campaigns/hot/index.php

19) WHAT BETTER TIME? — DECEMBER 2007
A free news sheet from the Scot­tish Cli­mate Activist Net­work.
http://whatbettertime.livejournal.com/

20) BATH BOMB, ISSUE 5 — DECEMBER 2007
Christ­mas edi­tion of the month­ly Bathon­ian rab­bler­ousi­ness.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/17905

21) PACIFIC CURRENTS — DECEMBER 2007
For updates on the work of Pacif­ic Envi­ron­ment, a non-prof­it organ­i­sa­tion that pro­tects the Pacif­ic Rim’s wild places and wildlife, see;
http://www.pacificenvironment.org/article.php?id=2658

22) A HOUSE OF CARDS — DECEMBER 2007
From fan­ta­sy finance to glob­al crash.
Your guide to under­stand­ing the cri­sis that is sweep­ing through the glob­al finan­cial sys­tem and what it means for ordi­nary peo­ple.
Endorsed by Kevin Smith of Car­bon Trade Watch and film­mak­er Ken Loach.
http://www.aworldtowin.net/about/HouseOfCards.html

23) SOUTH WEST AIR ACTION — DECEMBER 2007
A new web­site.
http://www.swairaction.org.uk/

24) RISING TIDE LEAMINGTON SPA is born — DECEMBER 2007
The group had its first meet­ing on 3rd Jan­u­ary and is now swing­ing into action. If you live in the area and want to find out more or get involved con­tact becqke@riseup.net

25) RISING TIDE ON YOU TUBE
Ris­ing Tide action footage has been spring­ing up all over youtube — check out http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=RisingTideNetwork for some RT films, some of the lat­est actions and links to oth­er’s videos of RT actions.

———-

Please send any­thing you’d like includ­ed in this news sheet to:
newssheet@risingtide.org.uk

To view pre­vi­ous edi­tions of the Ris­ing Tide News Sheet, vis­it the News Sheet Archive at http://risingtide.org.uk/newssheet

This News Sheet was brought to you by Ris­ing Tide, a grass­roots net­work of groups and indi­vid­u­als com­mit­ted to tak­ing action and build­ing a move­ment against cli­mate change.

For more infor­ma­tion…
email: info@risingtide.org.uk
Phone: +44 (0)845 458 8923 / +44 (0)7708 794665
Address: 62 Fieldgate St, Lon­don, E1 1ES
Web site: http://risingtide.org.uk

PLEASE FORWARD THIS TO A FRIEND AND INVITE THEM TO JOIN THE LIST

To sub­scribe or unsub­scribe vis­it:
http://risingtide.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/rt-news

END

last tree in Bonn square Oxford occupied, eviction expected at dawn, friday — update

4.01.2008

The last tree left in Bonn square is being occu­pied in attempt to save it — please get sup­port down there

4.01.2008

The last tree left in Bonn square is being occu­pied in attempt to save it — please get sup­port down there

appar­ent­ly the tree is over 100 years old, and there is a preser­va­tion order on the memo­r­i­al to the tirah cam­paign in afghanistan, but not on the trees which are old and sig­nif­i­cant also.

If any­one can get media or sup­port down there urgent­ly please

The youtube ver­sion for online view­ing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5kGNDlOyN0

Full rez for screen­ing
http://blip.tv/file/get/Undercurrents-OxfordTree616.mp4

You can get more videos like this from http://visionontv.net
—

evic­tion now expect­ed Mon am

Text mes­sages from the Bonn Square tree protest say that evic­tion is expect­ed tomor­row morn­ing, around 8 or 9am.

If you are free, please go along and sup­port 🙂

—

10.01.2008

Today ten pro­test­ers turned up to resist the removal of beau­ti­ful, mature Lon­don Plains trees behind the West­gate Shop­ping Cen­tre in Oxford city cen­tre.

These trees, along with shel­tered hous­ing, and — I was told by a group of young peo­ple — the Oxford and Cher­well Val­ley Col­lege stu­dents’ pub are being cleared to make way for a gar­gan­tu­an cathe­dral to cap­i­tal­ism plus mul­ti-storey car park. As one stu­dent sar­cas­ti­cal­ly put it, “Yeah, ‘coz what we real­ly need are more shops”.

Most peo­ple spent all day observ­ing the goings-on of coun­cil employ­ees and tree ‘sur­geons’ and man­aged — albeit tem­porar­i­ly — to remove one guy rope from one of the trees along the west side of the West­gate car park.

How­ev­er, this did not deter the Leisure and Parks peo­ple from begin­ning to remove the trees on the north side.

Once they start­ed on the trees, emo­tions — which were already high — reached fever pitch. Coun­cil­lor Deb­o­rah Glass Wood­in was arrest­ed for aggra­vat­ed tres­pass (even though she did­n’t quite man­age to get into the fenced off area) and then held for 5 hours at St Aldates Cop Shop.

One oth­er pro­test­er is spend­ing tonight in the trees, brav­ing the gale force winds; I feel slight­ly guilty for being inside on my lap­top writ­ing this report. If you can get down to the site to join him and oth­ers please do.

Bruce and friends (not the cops, mind) are on the cor­ner of Nor­folk Street, near Cas­tle Street; around the back of the West­gate Cen­tre near the mul­ti-storey carpark. Map here:
http://openstreetmap.com/?mlat=51.75055&mlon=-1.2615&zoom=16

Video on YouTube ( http://youtube.com/watch?v=uXdLcAffXnE).

I count­ed the rings of the one of the first-felled trees, which you can see in the pic­ture. It was near­ly thir­ty years old; as old as I am.

—

10th: just heard that Bruce, who has been up one of the trees behind the West­gate shop­ping cen­tre in Oxford, has final­ly come down. He spent over 24 hours up the tree — brav­ing the freez­ing gales and lash­ing rain from last night and today.

He was joined this morn­ing by a fel­low pro­tes­tor; pics from today’s protest to fol­low soon.

And wor­ry­ing­ly, one of the pho­tog­ra­phers from the BNP protest in Novem­ber was on site too. This time he said he was from ITN rather than local news.

West­gate protest con­tin­ues; court on Mon­day
9.01.2008

Tree-sit­ters in Bonn Square (Oxford) oppos­ing the mas­sive expan­sion of the near­by West­gate shop­ping cen­tre were served with a court sum­mons today for an evic­tion hear­ing on Mon­day. More action is sore­ly need­ed.

Since last Thurs­day one of the large trees in Bonn Square has been occu­pied in an attempt to save it from the chain­saws. It is one of around 40 trees, includ­ing many large mature ones, in the West­gate area marked for destruc­tion as part of the grotesque expan­sion of Oxford’s plas­tic con­sumer­land.

More back­ground on the West­gate scheme is here, amongst oth­er places:
http://matthewsellwood.blogspot.com/2006/10/westgate.html

There have been sev­er­al evic­tion rumours in the mean­time, but the clear­est clue came today when the pro­test­ers were served with court papers. Since the hear­ing is on Mon­day, any evic­tion before then would be ille­gal, and seems unlike­ly, par­tic­u­lar­ly since the coun­cil can eas­i­ly con­tin­ue cut­ting down the oth­er ‑unoc­cu­pied- trees in the mean­time. In fact, work has already start­ed on felling the oth­er trees in the area.

If you want to help, or find out more, pop down to Bonn Square. They have a peti­tion which they are ask­ing peo­ple to sign and are col­lect­ing dona­tions to cov­er basic costs. If you’re feel­ing par­tic­u­lar­ly inspired, you could even organ­ise a bunch of peo­ple you know to go and dis­rupt the tree cut­ting which is tak­ing place right now. Or tar­get the ster­ile shop­ping cen­tres, cor­po­rate scum­bags and cor­rupt local politi­cians that are push­ing the scheme!

The West­gate Part­ner­ship are cur­rent­ly chain­saw­ing trees to make way for the West­gate expan­sion (this is slight­ly dif­fer­ent from the Bonn Square project, which is linked to the West End ‘regen­er­a­tion’ but not part of the West­gate expan­sion per se). This is despite the fact that a pub­lic enquiry is still going on over the demo­li­tion of Abbey Place hous­ing — a clear indi­ca­tion of what the devel­op­ers think of the legal process.…

—
9.01.2008

10am — trees being cut down in Par­adise Square.

We’ve had a mes­sage that trees are being cut down now to make way for the new bloat­ed West­gate shop­ping centre/temple to Mamon. If you can, get down there as soon as pos­si­ble.

At the moment tree sur­geons are at Par­adise square, but prob­a­bly won’t be for long. Maybe fol­low the sound of the chain­saws if they’re not there any­more.

—

Woman arrested at Tas forestry protest

Jan­u­ary 8, 2008

A 23-year-old woman involved in a forestry protest in Tas­ma­ni­a’s south has been plucked by a crane from her for­est perch, arrest­ed and charged.

A Tas­man­ian police search and res­cue squad arrived at the protest site in a remote for­est in the state’s south about 10am (AEDT) Tues­day to break up a four-day activist vig­il.

Jan­u­ary 8, 2008

A 23-year-old woman involved in a forestry protest in Tas­ma­ni­a’s south has been plucked by a crane from her for­est perch, arrest­ed and charged.

A Tas­man­ian police search and res­cue squad arrived at the protest site in a remote for­est in the state’s south about 10am (AEDT) Tues­day to break up a four-day activist vig­il.

The woman was sit­ting atop a 10-metre tall tree trunk which had been con­cret­ed into the mid­dle of a major access road.

She has been charged with tres­pass­ing, obstruct­ing police, and dis­obey­ing direc­tions, Inspec­tor Mark Mewis of Kingston Police said.

She will be bailed to appear in court at a lat­er date.

Two pro­test­ers remain sit­ting in trees at the Weld Val­ley site, which activists say is under threat from log­ging.

Police con­tin­ue to nego­ti­ate with the pro­test­ers while cables which had con­nect­ed the tree-borne activists to the road below have been removed.

Huon Val­ley Envi­ron­ment Cen­tre activists say about 1,000 hectares of untouched “wilder­ness” could be logged, with plans by Forestry Tas­ma­nia to build a bridge across the Weld Riv­er to access the area for the first time.

Spokes­woman Jen­ny Weber said Forestry Tas­ma­nia had indi­cat­ed it planned to start build­ing the bridge before Christ­mas, and although work has yet to start, it could begin any day.

About a dozen peo­ple were at the protest when it got under­way on Sat­ur­day.

Six peo­ple left on Mon­day after a Forestry Tas­ma­nia heli­copter hov­ered over the area and anoth­er woman left on Tues­day morn­ing.

The con­ser­va­tion group says the North Weld wilder­ness includes some of the best exam­ples of ancient forests in Tas­ma­nia.

Forestry Tas­ma­nia said vast areas of the Weld were already pro­tect­ed.

It said 88 per cent of the val­ley was pro­tect­ed, with only 12 per cent of the area, in forests out­side these zones, avail­able for log­ging.

It said the des­ig­nat­ed forestry area would be logged for spe­cial tim­bers to be used for crafts and design, an impor­tant indus­try for the state.

Forestry Tas­ma­nia spokesman David Tuck said the pro­test­ers had been told repeat­ed­ly to leave.

“They have been told for four days to clear out,” he told AAP.

Mr Tuck said pro­test­ers wore bal­a­clavas and hurled insults at Forestry Tas­ma­nia work­ers.

The activists were tres­pass­ing and had van­dalised gates, he said.

“The incred­i­ble irony is that they’ve cut down trees in order to con­struct a tree-sit and put the for­est in dan­ger by hav­ing a camp­fire in peak bush­fire sea­son,” he said.

http://news.smh.com.au/woman-arrested-at-tas-forestry-protest/20080108–1ksf.html

=====
JAN 9 2007 — Tas­ma­nia Police have con­firmed that three anti-forestry pro­test­ers were arrest­ed in the Weld Val­ley, south of Hobart, yes­ter­day.

Police and emer­gency work­ers used a crane to forcibly remove a 23 year old woman from a block­ade yes­ter­day after­noon.
She has been charged with tres­pass, caus­ing injury to prop­er­ty, obstruct­ing police and dis­obey­ing police direc­tions.

A 29 year old woman and a 26 year old man were arrest­ed last night and charged with tres­pass.

All three are from Lucas­ton, in Tas­ma­ni­a’s south. They will appear in the Hobart Mag­is­trates Court in Feb­ru­ary.

source abc

Squatters Needed!

A new Social Cen­tre in Wilt­shire requires voloun­teers. Accom­mo­da­tion is of course free.

Hap­py Januyear!

So we’re look­ing at set­ting up a social cen­tre in wilt­shire, busy town so we should be good but i think some added sup­port for the first few days would be great­ly appre­ci­at­ed. Do you know any­one who might be inter­est­ed? We’ll be dec­o­rat­ing, cel­e­brat­ing, gar­den­ing, hav­ing a film night, for­ag­ing and cook­ing etc! fun times for all. If you can help please email yarrow@mail.com.

A new Social Cen­tre in Wilt­shire requires voloun­teers. Accom­mo­da­tion is of course free.

Hap­py Januyear!

So we’re look­ing at set­ting up a social cen­tre in wilt­shire, busy town so we should be good but i think some added sup­port for the first few days would be great­ly appre­ci­at­ed. Do you know any­one who might be inter­est­ed? We’ll be dec­o­rat­ing, cel­e­brat­ing, gar­den­ing, hav­ing a film night, for­ag­ing and cook­ing etc! fun times for all. If you can help please email yarrow@mail.com.

Thanks!

Surrey Union Foxhunt — Caught Bloody Red Handed

Not 30 miles from the politi­cians in West­min­ster; the Sur­rey Union hunt chased a ter­ri­fied fox along the A29 and around Ock­ley vil­lage green before rip­ping it apart on the crick­et pitch. This was the real­i­ty in Eng­land on Sat­ur­day Jan­u­ary 5th 2008 (3 years after hunt­ing was banned)

Surrey Union hunt sabbedNot 30 miles from the politi­cians in West­min­ster; the Sur­rey Union hunt chased a ter­ri­fied fox along the A29 and around Ock­ley vil­lage green before rip­ping it apart on the crick­et pitch. This was the real­i­ty in Eng­land on Sat­ur­day Jan­u­ary 5th 2008 (3 years after hunt­ing was banned)

What does it say about the law when the most piss-poor hunt in the coun­try can hunt with impuni­ty under the noses of the police and man­age to kill a fox in full view of hor­ri­fied vil­lagers and motorists. Using the same hounds, con­tin­u­ing to hunt where they know they’ll find fox­es, chas­ing them or putting them to ground, con­tin­u­ing to dig with ter­ri­ers, they then expect you to believe this was an acci­dent.

Any­one with any sense knows what is going on; it just needs you to do some­thing about it. It’s not trendy or easy, but you can make a real dif­fer­ence — Join us and stop the killing NOW! http://hsa.enviroweb.org/features/joinleaf.html

HSA News Release 14th Jan­u­ary 2008

Remem­ber that hunt­ing ban?

The Sur­rey Union fox­hunt man­aged to kill yet again in pub­lic last Sat­ur­day 5th Jan­u­ary. For the sec­ond year run­ning they allowed their hounds to pur­sue and kill a fox in open view.

Last year it was after tres­pass­ing on a golf course at Newdi­gate.. This time it was in Ock­ley, Sur­rey. The hounds chased a fox into the mid­dle of the vil­lage and caught and dis­em­bow­elled it in the cen­tre of the crick­et pitch. The police even­tu­al­ly turned up after a 999 call and took a state­ment from a bystander who wit­nessed the hor­rif­ic scenes as the ani­mal was ripped apart by a full pack of hounds.

This hap­pens almost every day the length and breadth of the coun­try, but usu­al­ly safe­ly away from pub­lic scruti­ny.

Hunt Sabo­teurs have to wit­ness such scenes week in and week out, near­ly three years after the Hunt­ing Act came into force. Not sur­pris­ing­ly, fox­hunts in Eng­land feel they are above the law. The Sur­rey police present in three vehi­cles on Sat­ur­day were miles away from the hounds when the fox was killed. The hunt packed up straight away, leav­ing the car­cass in the vil­lage.

Based on the pre­vi­ous treat­ment of numer­ous sub­mis­sions of video evi­dence, the police inves­ti­ga­tion will lack the grav­i­tas and scruti­ny it deserves.

Lee Moon, spokesman for the Hunt Sabo­teurs Asso­ci­a­tion said: “Fox­es are hunt­ed and killed as if the ban nev­er came into effect. By lay­ing a trail through fox habi­tat, or hav­ing an owl in a box, the hunts can kill with impuni­ty.

We have tried to let the law work, but with the police not inter­est­ed, and a pal­try num­ber of cas­es brought to court, it has to be the time for a return to direct inter­ven­tion; to no longer put up with the cosy rela­tion­ship the hunts seem to have with the local con­stab­u­lar­ies; to make sure the wildlife of this coun­try is safe from the bar­barous prac­tices of the past.

Ani­mals are pro­tect­ed from hunts by law, but if the law won’t help them then hunt sabs will have to.”

All press enquiries 07779 580 544

http://hsa.enviroweb.org/hsa.shtml

Actions against the motorway through Tara, Ireland — reports and upcoming

This morn­ing, mon­day 6th jan ’08 at 7 am, 11 of us split up into two groups. We went to the Ard­sal­lagh Com­pound (site entrance 2.10) and Roestown (site entrance 2.1 ) . All the machin­ery was parked at these two sites for the past two weeks over Christ­mas.

Ardsallagh compound diggerThis morn­ing, mon­day 6th jan ’08 at 7 am, 11 of us split up into two groups. We went to the Ard­sal­lagh Com­pound (site entrance 2.10) and Roestown (site entrance 2.1 ) . All the machin­ery was parked at these two sites for the past two weeks over Christ­mas.

Ard­sal­lagh ; four of us went on site into the com­pund and blocked a lowloader in the gate, pre­vent­ing any more machin­ery being brought off to oth­er sites. They then head­ed across coun­try towards the Riv­er Boyne at site no. 2.9 . While two held the gate, two fol­lowed them across the field ‚stop­ping them before they reached the next stretch.Construction work­ers at the gate , try­ing to intim­i­date the pro­test­ers assault­ed one man , drag­ging him to the ground and pulling out of the way allow­ing the lowloader past. In the mean time, off route down the road two of us were wait­ing to be picked up (help with trans­port need­ed), when we saw a dig­ger com­ing towards us along the hedge line. The dri­ver pro­ceed­ed to dri­ve up to us near­ly kock­ing us over. when we stood our ground in front of the machine, he got out and ver­bal­ly and phys­i­cal­ly asault­ed us. The gau­rds then arrived treat­en­ing arrest on any­one who stayed under the Mis­cel­la­neous Act2004 sec­tion 19c but were help­ful and co oper­a­tive when told about the assaults , tak­ing the dig­ger dri­vers name.

Roestown: As today was the first day of con­struc­tion since before Christ­mas, we need­ed to block­ade the machin­ery from enter­ing the val­ley again. From the N3 we could see the machin­ery mov­ing towards Trevet from the Roestown com­pound. We arrived there just as the first dig­ger was approach­ing. There were 5 of us. We all went into the site and approached the dig­ger. The dri­ver com­plied with health and safe­ty reg­u­la­tions and stopped his machine imme­di­ate­ly. We made a block­ade in front of the machine with traf­fic cones, poles and safe­ty notices. Mark Cleary and his com­rades entered the site, along with secu­ri­ty. They filmed us and removed the block­ade. One pro­tes­tor was stand­ing on the block­ade, Mark Cleary pushed him off. A jeep com­ing from the Roestown direc­tion passed us by, the dig­ger dri­ver had switched back on his machine. Anoth­er pro­tes­tor on bail con­di­tions stayed at the site entrance with ban­ners on the pub­lic road, play­ing his tin whis­tle. Mark Cleary and this pro­tes­tor had a cam­er­al duel! The Gar­dai arrived and asked us to leave the site, quot­ing the Hous­ing and Misc Act 2004, sec­tion C. We were told we would be arrest­ed if we were seen again today on a M3 site. The Gar­dai fol­lowed us to the Ard­sal­lagh com­pound. We held a ban­ner protest there on the side of the road. The same Gar­dai were very inter­est­ed in the Tara issue, and asked us ques­tions about archae­ol­o­gy and Lis­mullen. Nobody was arrest­ed.

Relat­ed Link: http://www.tarapixie.net

»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»

Call­ing all War­riors!!!

Action called for tom­mor­row morn­ing 6am and all this week.

Sup­port and sup­plies need­ed. Num­bers are low on the ground and resources spread thin. Help need­ed in the camps , trans­port, media ,

cyber-world and dig­ger divin’.

Spe­cial Call-Out to any­one who has vis­it­ed the camps before. Your expe­ri­ence on the issue is need­ed now more than ever.

A new year and a new begin­ing, its time to show these ”short sight­ed, nar­row mind­ed, moth­er fuckin hyp­ocrits!” that this

cul­tur­al apartheid will end here!
Tara Call­ing !!!

As you may know on St. Stevens Day 2007, the NRA hand­ed over the archae­o­log­i­cal site at lismullen,with its wood henge

(which was des­ig­nat­ed a nationa lmon­u­ment in may 2007)

and an amaz­ing sub­ter­rain com­plex

(destroyed in ear­ly decem­ber 2007 with out any inde­pen­dent archae­ol­o­gy car­ried out)

con­tain­ing mega­lith­ic art from much ear­li­er mon­u­ments, to SIAC/FERROVIAL the con­struc­tion con­sor­tium

to face its faith as yet anoth­er mon­u­men­tal diaster in the gabhra val­ley,

at the hands of gov­ern­ment appoint­ed van­dals!

This is because the twelve weeks giv­en to the NRA archae­ol­o­gists to exca­vate and destroy the two thirds of the henge

lieing in the path of the pro­posed motor­way is up and under the Nation­al Mon­u­ments Act 2004

it now belongs to SIAC/FERROVIAL.

Con­struc­tion Work­ers return to work tom­mor­row morn­ing Mon­day 7th of Jan at 7am after two weeks of bliss­ful

silence in the Val­ley.

Call­ing all War­riors!!!

Action called for tom­mor­row morn­ing 6am and all this week.

Sup­port and sup­plies need­ed. Num­bers are low on the ground and resources spread thin. Help need­ed in the camps , trans­port, media ,

cyber-world and dig­ger divin’.

Spe­cial Call-Out to any­one who has vis­it­ed the camps before. Your expe­ri­ence on the issue is need­ed now more than ever.

A new year and a new begin­ing, its time to show these ”short sight­ed, nar­row mind­ed, moth­er fuckin hyp­ocrits!” that this

cul­tur­al apartheid will end here!

!!!!END TRANSMISSION!!!!

Ogoni Day remembered as Shell fail to honour promise to halt gas flaring

Today is Jan­u­ary 4th 2008.

On this day in 1993, 300,000 peo­ple in Nige­ria marked the Unit­ed Nations Year of Indige­nous Peo­ples by protest­ing against Shel­l’s activ­i­ties and the envi­ron­men­tal destruc­tion of Ogo­ni­land in the Niger Delta.

2008 was sup­posed to be the dead­line for the end­ing of gas flar­ing by Shell in Nige­ria, but the com­pa­ny now says that this dead­line will not be met.

Let­ting the com­pa­ny have a taste of its own med­i­cine

Shell Dublin HQ Ogoni Day flaringToday is Jan­u­ary 4th 2008.

On this day in 1993, 300,000 peo­ple in Nige­ria marked the Unit­ed Nations Year of Indige­nous Peo­ples by protest­ing against Shel­l’s activ­i­ties and the envi­ron­men­tal destruc­tion of Ogo­ni­land in the Niger Delta.

2008 was sup­posed to be the dead­line for the end­ing of gas flar­ing by Shell in Nige­ria, but the com­pa­ny now says that this dead­line will not be met.

Let­ting the com­pa­ny have a taste of its own med­i­cine

At just before 8.30 this morn­ing, as staff were arriv­ing for work at Roy­al Dutch Shel­l’s Irish head­quar­ters in Dublin, they were treat­ed to a taste of what life is like for those who have to live and work near Shell instal­la­tions in oth­er parts of the world.

Short ver­sion of video (45 sec­onds) here: http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=u4uZDvA5WY4

Long ver­sion (2 minute) here: http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=597hkm9MuTo

More infor­ma­tion on Shell in Nige­ria here: http://www.foeeurope.org/press/2007/May3_DU_Flaring.htm

Gas Flar­ing is sim­ply the releas­ing of excess gas and liq­uids asso­ci­at­ed with oil and gas pro­duc­tion pipelines and refiner­ies into the atmos­phere. The main pur­pose of gas flar­ing is to pro­tect pipelines and infra­struc­ture from over-pres­sur­ing

The released gas­es are burned off, releas­ing any by-prod­ucts into the air. These include nitro­gen diox­ide, sul­phur diox­ide, and volatile organ­ic com­pounds like xylene and hydro­gen sul­fide. Car­cino­gens such as ben­za­pyrene are also released. Peo­ple exposed to these sub­stances can suf­fer from a vari­ety of res­pi­ra­to­ry prob­lems, which have been report­ed amongst many chil­dren in the Niger Delta but have but have nev­er been sys­tem­i­cal­ly inves­ti­gat­ed. These chem­i­cals can also aggra­vate asth­ma, cause breath­ing dif­fi­cul­ties and pain, as well as chron­ic bron­chi­tis.

Ben­zene, which is known to be emit­ted from gas flares in undoc­u­ment­ed quan­ti­ties, is acknowl­edged as being a causative agent for leukemia.

Gas flar­ing of course, also con­tributes to glob­al warm­ing and cli­mate change.

Togeth­er with oil spills, gas flar­ing is seen as a major cause of envi­ron­men­tal degra­da­tion. In Nige­ria, the prac­tice is sup­posed to be ille­gal, but there is no sign of the Niger­ian gov­ern­ment being able to enforce this law. Here in Ire­land we know all about how Shell can manip­u­late the world of pol­i­tics and the legal process to suit the needs of the com­pa­ny’s share­hold­ers.

In Nige­ria in 1995 how­ev­er, it appears that Shel­l’s PR peo­ple slow­ly realised that their part in the hang­ing of Ken Saro Wiwa and eight oth­er activists was a pub­lic rela­tions dis­as­ter, and in the after­math the com­pa­ny made var­i­ous con­ces­sions to its crit­ics, in a vain attempt to undue some of the dam­age it felt had been done to its brand. One of the promis­es made was the announce­ment of an end to gas flar­ing.

Shell of course, is not well known for liv­ing up to its promis­es, and so flar­ing is still going on today. In the year 2000, Shell for­mal­ly announced that it would stop gas flar­ing by 2008. Inter­est­ing­ly, since 2000, gas flar­ing in the Niger Delta has actu­al­ly increased (accord­ing to the 2005 Shell Sus­tain­abil­i­ty Report).

In Novem­ber 2005, the Fed­er­al High Court of Nige­ria stat­ed that Shell and oth­er oil com­pa­nies
should end gas flar­ing in the Niger Delta. In a case brought against Shell, the court ruled that the dam­ag­ing and waste­ful prac­tice of flar­ing could not law­ful­ly con­tin­ue and must stop. Shell appealed against the deci­sion.

At the demon­stra­tion on Jan­u­ary 4th 1993, an Ogo­ni elder said:
“We have wok­en up to find our lands dev­as­tat­ed by agents of death called oil com­pa­nies. Our atmos­phere has been total­ly pol­lut­ed, our lands degrad­ed, our waters con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed, our trees poi­soned, so much so that our flo­ra and fau­na have vir­tu­al­ly dis­ap­peared”.

Jan­u­ary 4th became known as Ogo­ni Day.

For more infor­ma­tion see:

www.remembersarowiwa.com

greenwash guerillas hit shell hq

4.01.2008
at lunchtime yes­ter­day, a small band of green­wash gueril­las entered the lob­by of the lon­don shell hq to high­light the mas­sive amount of tox­ic green­wash ema­nat­ing from the build­ing. once eject­ed they con­tin­ued their work out­side, warn­ing the pub­lic of the dan­gers of green­wash

Shell HQ greenwashGreenwash leaflet4.01.2008
at lunchtime yes­ter­day, a small band of green­wash gueril­las entered the lob­by of the lon­don shell hq to high­light the mas­sive amount of tox­ic green­wash ema­nat­ing from the build­ing. once eject­ed they con­tin­ued their work out­side, warn­ing the pub­lic of the dan­gers of green­wash

full green­wash film in mp4 for­mat — video/mp4 8.2M
full green­wash film in wmv for­mat — video/x‑ms-wmv 8.8M

shell secu­ri­ty got into quite a tizz over the four pro­tes­tors and rather too many police arrived. the police (once the gov­ern­ment secu­ri­ty zone map was shown to them) “facil­i­tat­ed law­ful protest” as long as it did­n’t go too near the poi­so­nous shell build­ing. this may have been for the safe­ty of the pub­lic or for oth­er rea­sons.

the gueril­las’ the­atrics attract­ed quite a lot of pub­lic inter­est and loads of leaflets were hand­ed out

green­wash gueril­las are asso­ci­at­ed with ris­ing tide and you can find out more about what they do and when, by get­ting in touch via their web­site at www.risingtide.org.uk

the vid is post­ed in quick­time mp4 and wmv for­mats and is 6′30″
quick­time can be viewed on any com­put­er (any plat­form) with vlc play­er avail­able for free down­load from vide­olan

London Rising Tide activists ‘die’ in the Tate Britain (4 January 2008)

Activists ‘die’ in the Tate Britain

Activists from Lon­don Ris­ing Tide staged a ‘die-in’ in the BP spon­sored Tate Britain this after­noon. Bob Jones from LRT said “we’re here to demand that the Tate cut it’s ties with BP, an art gallery is no place for an envi­ron­men­tal haz­ard such as an oil com­pa­ny”. “BP are here to Green­wash their image and dis­tract from the eco­log­i­cal dev­as­ta­tion they’re caus­ing around the world”. The pro­test­ers hand­ed out lots of leaflets and urged patrons to demand the end of Oil Com­pa­nies spon­sor­ship of Art Gal­leries.

Activists ‘die’ in the Tate Britain

Activists from Lon­don Ris­ing Tide staged a ‘die-in’ in the BP spon­sored Tate Britain this after­noon. Bob Jones from LRT said “we’re here to demand that the Tate cut it’s ties with BP, an art gallery is no place for an envi­ron­men­tal haz­ard such as an oil com­pa­ny”. “BP are here to Green­wash their image and dis­tract from the eco­log­i­cal dev­as­ta­tion they’re caus­ing around the world”. The pro­test­ers hand­ed out lots of leaflets and urged patrons to demand the end of Oil Com­pa­nies spon­sor­ship of Art Gal­leries.

The ‘corpses’ were dressed in t‑shirts dis­pa­ly­ing the logos such as ‘art not oil’, ‘bp — fos­sil fools’ and ‘bp out of the tate’. Their epi­taphs was fit­ting for the loca­tion. Once dead the staff on site took the pre­cau­tion of shout­ing to every­body to leave which only attract­ed more peo­ple, and over 200 fly­ers were giv­en out inside the build­ing.

Sev­er­al mem­bers of the pub­lic were very sup­port­ive and even told the staff to stop try­ing to move us ; “these peo­ple are mak­ing more of a state­ment than most of the art in this room” was some­thing i heard being said.

After ask­ing the TATE for a rep­re­sen­ta­tive to dis­cuss the pol­i­cy of accept­ing mon­ey from social crim­i­nals, but they refused as all direc­tors were ‘still on hol­i­day’. A shame.…and i bet they flew too!

All in all, a good day with excel­lent pub­lic response.
we will be back.

20080104_RT_GG_Tate_Invasion — video/x‑ms-wmv 15M
20080104_RT_Tate_QT — video/quicktime 14M