earthfirst – Page 263

Success for City Indians: 4WD targetted in Denmark

4th January 2008

Originally from Sweden a movement of “city indians” targetting large 4WD cars has spread widely in Denmark, while in Sweden a truce has been declared.

The number of attacks on high pollution 4WD city cars have been increasing steadily in Denmark since the city indians first began in Sweden some months ago. New year’s eve saw another wave of actions in Copenhagen.

4th January 2008

Originally from Sweden a movement of “city indians” targetting large 4WD cars has spread widely in Denmark, while in Sweden a truce has been declared.

Meanwhile in Sweden where the actions started a truce has been declared by the CI. “It seems our actions have had effect, the message that city jeeps have no place in our cities has gotten through. But if we don’t continue to see decreasing sales of the cars the hatchet is easily unburied”, the CI in Sweden said in a statement on their website.

The CI in both Sweden and Denmark have received countless death threats on their websites.

Rainforest chief killed in Borneo for his opposition to logging

January 3, 2008
Keleasu Naan, a Penan chieftain and longtime activist against logging, disappeared in October while checking animal traps. His
tribes’ worst fears were confirmed when they found what they believed to be Naan’s remains last month. According to the Associated Press, the chieftain’s nephew, Michael Ipa, has stated that the body had several broken bones, leading Ipa to believe that “he has been killed by people involved in logging”.

Keleasu Naan had been one of the key figures in the Penan community’s fight against logging. He was also a plaintiff and witness in a land rights claim that has been awaiting trial since 1998.

One-hundred Penan villagers walked sixty miles this week to lodge a report at the closest police station and demand an investigation into Naan’s death. This is not the first time that Penans involved in anti-logging activity have disappeared under mysterious circumstances. Two activist Penans disappeared in the 1990s. In 2000, Bruno Manser, a Swiss environmentalist and champion of Penan rights, also disappeared in the jungle. No sign of him has been found, and some believe he was assassinated.

Logging in Borneo has been rampant since the 1980’s. In 2005 just over 50% of Borneo’s forest remained. More recently palm oil
plantations have increased pressure on the forests. Naan’s Penan community had managed to keep logging out of what the villagers claim is their ancestral land, but they now believe that several timber companies plan to resume logging. Aboriginal peoples of the Malaysia’s Sarawak region, the Penans number around 10,000. They currently live in settlements, but have not completely abandoned their traditional nomadic ways. They subsist off small gardens, hunting, and gathering. Since so much of the Penan’s resources come from the forest, its disappearance may mark their own.

http://news.mongabay.com/2008/0103-borneo_hance.html

Celebrating the end of the carbon economy

This afternoon, at 5pm. members of Groenfront will join together in the centre of capitalism in the Netherlands: the Beursplein in Amsterdam. Here they will bring out a toast to the record-high price of oil of $100 per barrel. Since 2003 the price of oil has sky-rocketed, with the rate sometimes climbing several dollars a day. GroenFront-activist Rogier: “What the earth needs is economic ‘shrinkage’. The climate crisis and the peaking oil production show us that we need to adjust to the limits of our ecosystem”.

Peakoil is the geologically determined peaking and – after that – shrinking of oil production. The remainder of oil becomes harder and harder to retrieve, demanding a still greater technological and financial effort.
It looks as if the worldwide production of oil has reached that peak. Every following year, the production will decrease. The decreased supply in combination with an ever increasing demand will push up the price of oil. Executives of, among others, Total, Conoco, Philps, Saudi Aramco and the Libyan National Oil Corporation have already stated that they are not able to meet the current demand for oil. The last few years have seen lower yields from oil fields in the US, Mexico and the North Sea. The International Energy Agency expressed its concerns over the ever growing gap between supply and demand in the global oil market.

Whether the record-high price of $100 is beneficial to the environment depends on the way the oil-addicted societies react. If the shortage in oil will be compensated for with pollutive replacements, like agrofuels, unconventional oil and synthetic diesel from coal and natural gas, the world still has not learned its lesson. This record-high price should be used as a wake-up call: fossil fuels are limited and already we are faced with the consequences.

Families in the United States are seriously concerned with the oncoming winter because of the greatly increased cost of petrol. Transport and fishing sector in Europe are anticipating protests against the risen price of diesel fuel. In Third World countries – where fuels are usually subsidised – governments are faced with a choice: an empty treasury or uprising. In Africa and Asia a growing amount of fishermen are forced to stay ashore because of the high costs of fuel. Farmers are not able to bring their products to the market place. Peakoil starts to rear its ugly head everywhere.

“The climate crisis and the depletion of fossile fuels show us that a radical change in our economic system is an absolute necessity,” says GroenFront activist Rogier. “Failing to do so means waiting for an economic recession which will hit the people who are already having difficulties to cope. A redistribution of wealth is necessary, but most of all a choice has to be made for a little less wealth. We can do that now, voluntarily and peacefully, or wait until both economy and ecology force us to do so.” In conclusion, Rogier states: “Economic shrinkage is the only real solution to the approaching economic and ecologic crisis.”

Hunger strike in France to protest gene-altered crops

PARIS: The militant French sheep farmer Jose Bove and as many as 15 of his supporters were expected to begin a hunger strike Thursday aimed at raising pressure on the French government to impose a long-term ban on growing genetically modified crops.

In a newspaper interview published Wednesday, the anti-globalization activist vowed not to eat again until a ban was in place.

Bove captured worldwide attention for helping to organize the ransacking of a McDonald’s restaurant nine years ago to protest the influence of multinational corporations. Since then he has served time in a French prison for damaging gene-altered crops.

While his campaigns have struck a sympathetic chord in many parts of France and Europe where gene-altered foods are widely mistrusted – and where Bove is something of a folk hero – the latest protest against altered crops comes as divisions over the potential benefits of the technology appear to be deepening across the region.

Some European Union officials remain wary of using products that could endanger insects and fish and disturb ecosystems, but others have redoubled calls to ease restrictions on altered seeds as a way of keeping farming globally competitive at a time of skyrocketing food prices.

The European agriculture commissioner, Mariann Fischer Boel, warned farm ministers in November that Europe’s resistance to importing genetically modified products like livestock feed was contributing to the rising cost of raising pigs and chickens and could pose a threat to the meat industry.

In October, the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, disappointed supporters of a long-term ban by announcing a temporary freeze on genetically modified seeds pending the outcome of a review of the technology that is expected early this year.

Bove has said he is undertaking his hunger strike to push the French government into making a much longer-term commitment to end seed cultivation.

Genetically modified corn is already imported into several EU countries, including France and Germany, where it is used to feed animals like cows and chickens. But only one genetically modified crop is currently grown in Europe, a form of corn produced by Monsanto and nine other companies called Mon 810 that is the main target of Bové’s protest.

Austria, Hungary and Poland are among countries that already have banned the Monsanto corn.

A long-term ban ‘is the only thing that will put an end to this hunger strike,’ Bove told the French daily Sud Ouest in an interview published Wednesday. ‘Promises won’t be satisfactory.’

Bove told Sud Ouest that he would conduct the hunger strike in a well-known public location in Paris where he would not cause any security problems. He declined to reveal the whereabouts of the location before Thursday.

Bove began reducing his intake of alcohol, meat, eggs and cheese at the end of December to start accustoming his body to the fast, during which he said he expected to lose half-a-kilogram, or about one pound, of weight each day, he told another French newspaper, Midi Libre.

‘This hunger-strike is a well-considered commitment, not a suicidal act,’ Bove told Midi Libre.

By James Kanter International Herald Tribune, January 2 2008 http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/01/02/europe/gmo.php

ELP Information Bulletin (29th of December 2007)

Dear friends

ELP has just received two bits of American news. First off ALF/ELF prisoner, Jonathan Paul, has released his first prison dispatch. Secondly, we have been infored that ALF/ELF prisoner. Chris McIntosh has been moved to a new address:

Dear friends

Firstly here is the dispatch from Jonathan Paul….

*********************************************

11.14.07

Friends, supporters and family,

This is the first of 51 monthly dispatches I will be writing until I am released in 2011. Although I will be writing to let everyone know how I am doing while incarcerated at FCI Phoenix, the purpose of these dispatches are not going to be about me, but about the real issues that threaten life as we know it on this planet.

First, I would like to thank everyone who has written me in the last few weeks. Your letters of support have overwhelmed me with emotion and have given me strength and hope. I thank all of you from the bottom of my heart. From the Anarchist writing group in NY, to my tribe of friends and to those I have never met, the time you took to write to me has given me much strength. I would like to put out special thanks to my sisters, Caroline and Alexandra, my wonderful Mom (Mumsie) and my dear sweet wife, Tami. I understand your love is unconditional and with that I am blessed to have you as my family. To my wife Tami – who has been by my side since 1999, your devotion and commitment to me is unmatched by anyone, ever. Thank you for helping me pick up the mess left in the wake of this very difficult time in our life. To those who are supporting Tami on a daily basis – I thank you also. All I can to all of you is I would do the same for you and I am in your debt.

As for life here in prison, I want you all to know I am okay. Every day that passes is a day closer to my freedom. I look forward to that day and that day will come.

I want to say a few words about someone who has inspired and amazed me over the years, a committed
activist who has been “down” for a very long time. Moved to activism after experiencing the brutal
poverty and racism experienced as a part of everyday life, American Indian Movement warrior, Leonard
Peltier, has been in prison for over 30 years and is serving two life sentences for crimes he did not
commit. Leonard worked to protect his people and the earth from the powerful energy corporations and the
government they rule. On the Pine Ridge reservation in the 1970’s the traditional Native Americans fought for their way of life while under attack from the government sponsored goons, the FBI and the coal and uranium energy corporations that wanted the Black Hills for resources. The Native Americans of this land have been systematically destroyed and oppressed in a genocidal campaign since the white man first stepped his ugly foot on North America.

Leonard was accused and convicted of killing two FBI agents during a shootout on the Pine Ridge reservation in 1975. Leonard was wrongly convicted in 1977 based on coerced testimony and suppressed evidence. Leonard’s case is one of the most egregious examples of prosecutorial and investigative misconduct in the history of American jurisprudence. I first became aware of the struggles of the American Indian Movement when I was in jail for resisting a political grand jury in 1992-1993. I read In the Spirit of Crazy Horse by Peter Matthiessen while incarcerated and couldn’t put it down. Leonard’s story gave me strength during my 6 months resisting the grand jury. When I was released from jail I was complimented on my strength and all I could think of was Leonard’s strength.

When I turned myself into prison last month, one of the first books my wife sent me was In the Spirit of
Crazy Horse. I read this book, for the second time, behind bars and finished it in the first two days. I
consider the struggles of AIM and think about their fight not only against genocide, but also ecocide.
Our struggles are one struggle.

To my supporters and friends – when you sit down to write me a letter, please put the paper aside and
write to Leonard Peltier. He has been in prison for more than 30 years – he has remained strong with
unprecedented integrity. If you support me, please support him. He has sacrificed his freedom for his
people and for mother earth. Leonard needs to hear from our “tribe”…the environmental and animal rights movements for his struggle is our struggle. Show him and his people that we are all part of one movement – a movement to stop the genocide, ecocide, and oppression of all beings. We are one and when we join into one we may actually move forward and be able to effect change. By supporting Leonard, you are supporting me. If Leonard hears from you and it makes him smile, gives him some hope and strength, and lets him know that he is not and never will be forgotten, then you are giving me the strength and strength to our movements.

Please write to Leonard at the following address:

Leonard Peltier

# 89637-132

USP LEWISBURG

U.S. PENITENTIARY

P.O. BOX 1000

LEWISBURG, PA 17837

In solidarity for the earth and animals,

Jonathan Paul

#07167-085

FCI Phoenix

Federal Correctional Institution

37910 N. 45th Ave.

Phoenix, AZ 85086

Jonathan’s co-defendants:

Daniel McGowan
#63794-053
FCI Sandstone
Federal Correctional Institution
PO Box 1000
Sandstone, MN 55072

Nathan Block #36359-086
FCI Lompoc
Federal Correctional Institution
3600 Guard Road
Lompoc, CA 93436

Joyanna Zacher #36360-086
FCI Dublin
Federal Correctional Institution
5701 8th St – Camp Parks- Unit E
Dublin, CA 94568

Friends and Family of Jonathan Paul
PMB# 267
2305 Ashland St., Ste. C
Ashland, OR 97520

Secondly, an ELP supporter has informed us that Chris ‘Dirt’ McIntosh has moved. Chris’ new address is:

Chris McIntosh
#30512-013
FCI Fairton
Federal Correctional Institution
PO Box 420
Fairton, nj 08320
USA

According to www.BOP.gov Chris is expected to be at this address until 2012.

Please send letters of support to Chris, Jonathan Paul, and all the other prisoners. Remind them they are not forgotten.

ELP Support Network

+++++++++++++++++

Earth Liberation Prisoners Support Network
BM Box 2407
London
WC1N 3XX
England
www.spiritoffreedom.org.uk

Shoshone Defenders of Mount Tenabo Constructing Encampment (occupied North America)

December 1, 2008
At some point today, several men will begin constructing a permanent arbor on the Southern flank of Mt. Tenabo, where they will camp and monitor the Canadian mining company Barrick Gold.

The encampment was called on during last week’s protest, where Shoshone Grandmothers and their supporters attempted to confront Barrick Gold and bring an end to the destruction of the pinion forest – which began almost immediately after the company got approval to go ahead with its ‘Cortez Hills Expansion Project.’

A massive cyanide heap leach gold mine, the project will ultimately destroy approximately 6,800 acres of land — fracturing along with it, the spiritual life and cultural practices of the Shoshone People.

“This is our treaty land. It was a treaty made with the federal government. It was not made with a foreign nation. And it is a foreign mining company that has come into our country and is destroying our mountain, our land, our food, our medicine and they have no respect,” stated one Grandmother at the protest.

“…It can’t go on. It’s perpetrating genocide against the Native American people. And we are not the only Native people suffering this distress,” said another. “It is happening world over; but we happen to be Western Shoshones and this is our land and we’re protesting the poisoned water, the destruction of the land, the road we’re standing on here, the big machines: everything that the mining industry stands for. They say they’re doing it responsibly, but they’re not because when they leave the Western Shoshone people will still be here and the land will be barren.”

To help make sure this doesn’t happen, the Western Shoshone Defense Project (WSDP) asks that you help by making any of the following the donations:

24 Nuts and Bolts (bolts need to be 1 foot in length with matching nuts)
Gasoline for saws and hauling costs.
Food items such as eggs, bacon, meat, potatoes, beans, etc. (including some sweets!)
Helpers — to assist with construction of arbor and for support in the encampment
Monetary donations for all of the above
Moral support and prayers

You can contact Joyce McDade for additional information, e-mail: EJMcDade20@wmconnect.com

Happy Valley Occupation Celebration – Two Years! (Aotearoa/New Zealand)

SAVE HAPPY VALLEY!
OCCUPATION CELEBRATION – TWO YEARS!
THE WEEKEND OF FEBRUARY 2nd-3rd, 2008

You are invited to the Save Happy Valley Coalition’s celebration of our SECOND successful year of occupying Happy Valley. We have been continuously occupying Happy Valley since January 28th 2006 in order to prevent Solid Energy from turning it into an environmentally devastating opencast coal-mine. Despite spies, 6000 snails from Augustus transferred in icecream containers, the destruction of a nearby mountain, Solid Energy’s plans for massive expansion, and the October 15th raids on activists, people have managed to keep Happy Valley safe so far! Yay for train track blockades, film nights, alternatives to minerals forums, demos, radio interviews, everyone’s actions, and the OCCUPATION!

The Save Happy Valley Coalition, and anyone who wishes to join us for the weekend celebration, will be meeting at Les Warren Park, in Westport, at 8am on Saturday 2nd Feburary 2008. (The majority of us will travel to Westport from Christchurch on the Friday night, car pooling can be arranged thru the coordinator).

You will need all of your own tramping/camping gear and food, enough for the duration of your intended stay and you need to be prepared for unpredictable weather; rain; sun; hot and cold. This means that you must have have suitable footwear, waterproof and warm clothing, a sleeping bag and a tent (unless you have arranged to share with someone else). An extended gear list will be made available to you when you confirm plans with the occupation coordinator. If you do not have the required gear we may be able to provide it for you, but please ensure that by the Friday you have the correct gear.

We will be leaving the valley / returning to Westport on Sunday the 3rd but it would be awesome if you are able to stay longer in the valley!! Please let the coordinator know.

We hope you can join us. Please RSVP so we can coordinate easily 🙂 Please let us know if you have any special needs that are of concern, we will be as accommodating as possible and we can provide you with as much information as you require.

For more information please contact the occupation coordinator.

Thanks for your support!

Frances Martin
Occupation Celebration Coordinator
frances.crayon@gmail.com
021 2037040

www.savehappyvalley.org.nz/occupation

If you cannot make it for this weekend but are able to visit the valley at another time please contact us! 🙂

York & Ainsty South Hunt Sabbed – Hunt Slash Tires Following Sab Success

26.12.2007
SABOTEURS FROM THE YORK HUNT SABS GROUP TODAY MONITORED THE YORK AND AINSTY SOUTH HUNT, SAVING LIVES AND CONFRONTING THEIR ILLEGAL ACTIONS

York & Ainsty South Hunt today met in Easingwold Market Square for their annual PR stunt and Boxing Day Hunt. The Master put on a show whilst doing a speech, trying to act welcoming to the “antis” and ranted how they should be tolerated as the hunt always welcomes opposing views. Whilst he was busy talking to the supporters, hunt sabs fed the hounds dog biscuits to make them more responsive to monitors in the field and laid a non-harmful citronella scent which stops them smelling foxes. The two police officers present had already told people they wouldn’t be following the Y&AS to enforce the ban.

As they set off, to a slow start, the master became very intolerant and raised his whip to hit a sab as more citronella was laid in front of the hounds – funny how their attitude changes when there’s no public round.

About an hour in, the hunt begun flushing covers with a full pack of hounds – something which is illegal under the hunting bill – and there was no drag anywhere in the area, nor seen throughout the day. As hounds went into cry, sabs were on the otherside of the cover ready to get between the fox and hunt pack when they broke cover and went into chase. Following this, sabs made howls (a noise made by followers if a fox is seen) to distract the hunt master who was unaware of the sabs on the otherside. He then began rallying the hounds towards the direction of the noise and encouraging them, only to be caught on video camera by the monitors when he, and the full pack of hounds, broke cover. Fox burrows in the woods were filled in – something done the morning of the hunt so no chased animals can get down the holes – this makes them easier to find, chase and kill as they have nowhere to hide. After this, the master (who coincidentally claimed to be legally hunting in his earlier speech!) was asked about the ban and points of law were put to him as he was being filmed; his reply – a middle finger and muttering of “Fuck Off”. This was then changed to pointing and saying he’ll speak later when he realised he was being filmed.

They then moved onto another, bigger cover and did the same but chased a fox. Due to sabs’ intervention and laying of citronella, two chased roe deer and foxes escaped from the hounds. Due to the covering of the scent by monitors, the pack was confused and the hunt moved on to try and avoid being filmed breaking the law. The land owner then came to escort sabs out of the cover and was confronted about his allowance of an illegal activity occurring on his land; unable to answer he began ranting on about trespass and tried grabbing the video cameras.

Later on as the Y&AS headed back towards Easingwold to pack up, hunt supporters slashed two tires on the land rover used by sabs – obviously in envy of their days lack of success and sabs disrupting their illegal hunt.

THE YORK AND AINSTY SOUTH, LIKE MANY OTHER HUNTS, ARE CLAIMING IN THE PRESS THEY CONTINUE TO HUNT WITHIN THE LAW. THIS IS NOW EXPOSED AS A LIE. WE WILL CONTINUE TO MONITOR HUNTS WITHIN THE AREA AND INTERVENE, SAVE LIES AND ENFORCE THE LAW.

YORK HUNT SABS

http://www.huntsabs.org.uk

December’s Greek round-up of bank, cash machine & Group 4-Wackenhut vehicle attacks

Arson at a bank’s ATM (Athens, 24/12/2007)

Source (greek only-page bottom): http://www.enet.gr/online/online_text/c=112,id=91228912

At 4:43 in the morning, the ATM of a Kyprou Bank subsidiary in central Athens, was set on fire. There was no responsibility claim.

Arson at a bank’s ATM (Athens, 24/12/2007)

Source (greek only-page bottom): http://www.enet.gr/online/online_text/c=112,id=91228912

At 4:43 in the morning, the ATM of a Kyprou Bank subsidiary in central Athens, was set on fire. There was no responsibility claim.
—
Molotov cocktail attack against security vehicles (Athens, 24/12/2007)

Source (greek only): Eleftherotypia – http://www.enet.gr/online/online_text/c=112,id=91228912

According to “Eleftherotypia newspaper report the “Revolutionary Attack Groups” (Epanastatikes Omades Epithesis) claim responsobility for the arsons of “Group 4 Securicor” vehicles in Kolonos, Athens. “On Dec. 24 we attacked the private guard company “Group 4-Wackenhut” headquarters destroying around 15 vehicles used in money transfers. This company, apart from owning private prisons in America and England, in our country constitutes the most important piece of the growing police-like corp of security professionals that floods the streets, breeding the big brother shoving cameras, circulating the banks’ wealth and guarding diverse capitalist targets contributing in the increasing social control and repression.”
They also mention:
“The message here is clear. When dealing with the rage of insurgents they cannot be safe, even in their headquarters. Our attack was an action of solidarity to our emprisoned comrades: Giannis Dimitrakis, Giorgos Voutsis-Vogiatzis, Marios Tsourapas, Chrissostomos Kontorevithakis, Vaggelis Botzatzis as well as to the prisoners of the Revolutionary Organisation November 17 that are being kept under a state of total isolation. It is an action of solidarity to the insurgent prisoners of April, many of whom face torture and constant transfers. It all continues…”
—
Police camera supply box on fire (Thessaloniki, 21/12/2007)

According to reports at http://athens.indymedia.org/front.php3?lang=el&article_id=807773 a group of individuals set on fire a police camera power supply box, on Ethikis Amynis Street, Thessaloniki.
—
Arson at an Emporiki Bank (Volos, 21/12/2007)

Source: (greek only-page bottom: http://www.taxydromos.gr/article_detail.asp?node_serial=001001&node_id=2&article_id=7803)

Unidentified persons caused a gas canister explosion at a bank subsidiary in Volos, around 4:30 in the morning, at Emporiki Bank on Iolkou and Konstanta street, causing damages to the bank’s ATM. Police suspects individuals from the city’s antiauthoritarian milieu.
—

Potatoes to Heavy Industry – Xmas blockade in Iceland with video

24 December 2007
On Saturday nine ‘jólasveinar’ wandered into the Hellisheiði Powerplant by Mount Hengill, expressing their opposition to the rise of heavy industry and other nature devastating activities in Iceland, as well as solidarity with human nature conservationists. (The jolasveinar are 13 Icelandic santas, born of a child-eating troll mother, who descend from the mountains in the days before christmas to sneak through the houses, stealing, teasing and causing mischief.)

“We decided to take a stroll by there before coming to town, and give out rotten potatoes to the naughty industrialists, and maybe a gift or two to the workers that do their jobs badly” said Pottaskefill (Pot scraper) on behalf of the group. Naughty Icelandic children such as these traditionally get a rotten potato in their christmas shoe.

—
The Jule Lads, Nordic trolls who’s tradition preceed Father Christmas, descended upon a geothermal power station which is being enlarged to power the enlargement of an aluminium smelting factory by RUSAL/Nordural. Hengill was once a beautiful mountain range, at the edge of a highly volcanic area in Iceland, a ski resort peppered with natural hot pools and steaming rocks. Now it is nothing but a screaming factory.

The Jule lads join up for a special direct action with the Saving Iceland collective as they left to town… the video can be found here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfY5Ou31SWE

Please consider coming out to Iceland for our 2008 action camp, we need all the help from activists we can get. This island is Europe’s last wilderness and with huge dams, geothermal power plants, power lines, tarmac roads, polluting factories, not to mention all the terrible affects on the surrounding sea, and a whole host of other forms of destruction.

More photos at:
http://www.savingiceland.org/node/1077