Category: Climate Chaos

6.12.10
On 12 — 16th Octo­ber, respond­ing to the Min­ga Glob­al mobil­i­sa­tion in defence of moth­er earth and the Week of Action for Cli­mate Jus­tice, peo­ple around the world came togeth­er to take action. From Havana to Helsin­ki, Essex to El Alto, Mon­tre­al to Men­doza, peo­ple block­ad­ed oil refiner­ies, marched for indige­nous rights, hung ban­ners above motor­ways, held pub­lic meet­ings, and shut down cor­po­rate head­quar­ters. Atten­tion was drawn to the ongo­ing strug­gles in all parts of the world, with calls
for cli­mate jus­tice, indige­nous sov­er­eign­ty, pub­lic trans­port, and an end to fos­sil fuel extrac­tion. The week of action was in sol­i­dar­i­ty with all the diverse move­ments who fight for social and eco­log­i­cal jus­tice.

The strug­gles con­tin­ue..

South Africa
— Sasol Day of Action
Earth­life Africa Jhb and part­ner organ­i­sa­tions held a day of action to high­light the con­tin­u­ing cli­mate and envi­ron­men­tal atroc­i­ties com­mit­ted by Sasol. There was a march on Sasol’s head­quaters to high­light the fact that Sasol is one of the worst emit­ters of GHG on the African con­ti­nent and pro­duces about 75.4 mil­lion tonnes of green­house gas­es annu­al­ly – about 21% of South Africa’s total green­house gas emis­sions per year.

In recent months Sasol has claimed to be con­cerned about the envi­ron­ment and its impacts on cli­mate change, propos­ing that the delay of Project Mafutha is about its GHG emis­sions and the recent suc­cess using Sasol’s fuel for avi­a­tion. In real­i­ty how­ev­er, the delay may be due to the cost of the project and the dif­fi­cul­ty to obtain the coal and not about Sasol’s envi­ron­men­tal con­cern. Sasol Chief Exec­u­tive was report­ed as say­ing that the project would require exten­sive “sup­port” from gov­ern­ment.

In addi­tion, if Sasol was tru­ly con­cerned about glob­al GHG emis­sions it would have not gone ahead with its plans to build CTL plants in Chi­na and GTL plant in Uzbek­istan.

Mako­ma Lekalakala, Pro­gramme Offi­cer for Earth­life Africa Jhb, states, “Sasol talks green but their actions show lit­tle regard for peo­ple and the plan­et. It is time for South Africans to hold com­pa­nies like Sasol account­able for the dam­age they are caus­ing to the envi­ron­ment and to our peo­ple.”

Sasol is South Africa’s biggest source of volatile organ­ic com­pounds which include ben­zene, toluene and xylene (all can­cer caus­ing sub­stances). In addi­tion, dust from coal, slag and ash heaps blow across neigh­bour­ing set­tle­ments. Earth­life Africa Jhb and part­ners will con­tin­ue to high­light the truths and hold Sasol account­able for the ongo­ing pol­lu­tion in Sasol­burg and the
sur­round­ing areas.

web­site:
http://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/2010/10/14/protesters-march-for-environmental-justice

Cuba

- Sol­i­dar­i­ty day with Haiti and against mil­i­ta­riza­tion, the con­se­quence of cli­mate change and in sup­port of rights for Moth­er Earth.

12th. of Octo­ber in Havana, Cuba

For this activ­i­ty which occurred in the Mar­tin Luther King memo­r­i­al cen­tre, a net­work of pop­u­lar edu­ca­tors, groups of 100’s of peo­ple who work in diverse places and par­tic­i­pa­tive spaces in Cuba. We paid homage to Haiti with both songs and poet­ry. The idea for this was to inter­con­nect a day of sol­i­dar­i­ty with Haiti with the resis­tance in Quito, Ecuador and to join with the Glob­al Min­ga for Moth­er Earth, and to show our pres­ence for the COP-16 con­fer­ence in Can­cun. It is because of this that we invit­ed the ambas­sadors from the ALBA coali­tion coun­tries (Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and var­i­ous oth­er Caribbean coun­tries) and the stu­dents from the Latin Amer­i­can school for the Amer­i­c­as.

Loca­tion: Casa de ALBA.

Guatemala

- March in Sup­port of the day of dig­ni­ty and the resis­tance of peas­ant farm­ers and native peo­ples

The Nation­al Coor­di­na­tion and Mayan con­ver­gence “Waqib’ Kej” and their orga­ni­za­tions, call on the Mayan peo­ples, the Gar­i­fu­na, and the Xin­ka in Guatemala to march on the 12th of Octo­ber 2010 to com­mem­o­rate the day of dig­ni­ty and of resis­tance of peas­ant farm­ers and native peo­ples.

The march has the fol­low­ing objec­tives: to demon­strate our resis­tance to 500 years since the Span­ish inva­sion, the geno­cide com­mit­ted against our peo­ple, the threat which comes from the mega-projects to dri­ve us from our land and ter­ri­to­ry.

The 12th of Octo­ber rep­re­sents an day to pay homage to and to salute our mar­tyrs, grand­fa­thers and grand­moth­ers, who gave their lives in the fight for the defence of our land and ter­ri­to­ry decid­ing not to nego­ti­ate, not to com­pro­mise nor to sell their dig­ni­ty.

Also the date com­mem­o­rates and cel­e­brates the vic­to­ries and the advances made in our resis­tance, oppos­ing the trans­la­tion cor­po­ra­tions (TNCs) and the Guatemalan state that ren­ders to them.

The mobi­liza­tion is being orga­nized by The Nation­al Coor­di­na­tion and Mayan con­ver­gence “Waqib’ Kej”, and as such we wish to clar­i­fy that we have no links with oth­er orga­ni­za­tions that are not direct­ly asso­ci­at­ed with us but which join with us in the mobi­liza­tion.

We know of anoth­er sim­i­lar action which takes place in our Cap­i­tal (Guatemala city) and in oth­er parts of the coun­try but we con­sid­er it impor­tant that we clar­i­fy that they are quite dif­fer­ent to our orga­ni­za­tion and as such not relat­ed to our move­ment.

That said, we invite our broth­ers and sis­ters to join with us in our march, in defence of Moth­er Earth and our Ter­ri­to­ry, which are being threat­ened by mega-projects, with the Guatemalan state’s com­pli­ance, and we invite the nation­al media and their cov­er­age of our march.

The Nation­al Coor­di­na­tion and Mayan con­ver­gence “Waqib’ Kej”

Ixim Ulew, Kajib´ I’x, Sej

Trans­lat­ed from the orig­i­nal, pub­lished in Guatemala, 7th of Octo­ber 2010
http://waqib-kej.org/portal/2010/10/convocamos-a-marcha-reivindicativa-del-12-de-octubre-de-2010/

UK
— Crude Awak­en­ing
500 Cli­mate activists block­ad­ed the UK’s busiest oil refin­ery. The action start­ed with an all woman affin­i­ty group lock­ing them­selves to immo­bilised vehi­cles, pre­vent­ing oil tankers
from leav­ing the refin­ery to deliv­er oil to Lon­don. They were joined by hun­dreds more who set up a fur­ther block­ade.

Ter­ri Orchard, who took part, said:
“We don’t have a hope of tack­ling cli­mate change if we don’t find a way to start mov­ing beyond oil. But Big Oil is relent­less. From the Gulf of Mex­i­co to the Arc­tic to the Cana­di­an tar sands, oil com­pa­nies are dev­as­tat­ing local envi­ron­ments, tram­pling the rights of local com­mu­ni­ties, and push­ing us over the edge to cat­a­stroph­ic cli­mate change.

We are here at the source of the prob­lem, at the UK’s busiest oil refin­ery, to stop the flow of oil to Lon­don. We’re here to put a span­ner in the works of the relent­less flow of oil and to say no more. This place, this whole indus­try, must become a thing of the past.”

The Crude Awak­en­ing is sup­port­ed by a spec­trum of direct action groups includ­ing the Camp for Cli­mate Action, Plane Stu­pid, Ris­ing Tide, Space Hijack­ers, Lib­er­ate Tate, Lab­o­ra­to­ry of Insur­rec­tionary Imag­i­na­tion, Earth First! and the UK Tar Sands Net­work.

web­site:
www.crudeawakening.org.uk

— Avon­mouth tar­get­ed by Bris­tol and Bath Ris­ing Tide Activists from Bris­tol and Bath Ris­ing Tide (1) dropped a ban­ner read­ing ‘IMPORT CO2AL: EXPORT POVERTY’ from Avon­mouth bridge near the docks, as part of a glob­al week of action for cli­mate and envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice.

The Roy­al Port­bury Docks con­tains one of the largest coal import ter­mi­nals in the UK. Tra­cy Jones from Ris­ing Tide said “Fos­sil fuel extrac­tion dev­as­tates com­mu­ni­ties, from vil­lages destroyed by floods in Pak­istan to land grabs in Colom­bia, and is being resist­ed around the world. The fail­ure of the Copen­hagen cli­mate sum­mit shows that gov­ern­ments have their hands in the pock­ets of cor­po­ra­tions and can­not be trust­ed. It’s up to ordi­nary peo­ple to take direct action to stop cli­mate chaos.”

web­site:
risingtide.org.uk

— Action against RPS group Glas­gow in Sol­i­dar­i­ty with com­mu­ni­ties in Co. Mayo and South Lanark­shire
On Sat­ur­day the 16th, RPS Group’s offices in Glas­gow had its locks and sig­nage destroyed by peo­ple who are out­raged in their involve­ment with the Cor­rib Gas Pipeline in Co. Mayo Ire­land and the Open Cast Coal mines of the Dou­glas Val­ley, south Lanark­shire, Scot­land.

RPS is a large plan­ning, engi­neer­ing and envi­ron­men­tal con­sis­ten­cy that attempts to legit­imize these con­tro­ver­sial projects. Local resis­tance to these projects has arisen for many rea­sons, includ­ing their detri­ment to the envi­ron­ment. RPS claim to con­sult the local com­mu­ni­ties affect­ed and use plen­ty of envi­ron­men­tal rhetoric in their reports but in fact work with gov­ern­ments and big busi­ness to jus­ti­fy devel­op­ments that are ruin­ing peo­ples health, lifestyles and their envi­ron­ment.

web­site:
coalactionscotland.org.uk/?p=2185

— Action against Ayr­shire Pow­er and Peel Hold­ings
UK-wide coor­di­nat­ed direc­tion actions tar­get­ing the head­quar­ters of Clyde­port, Ayr­shire Pow­er, and the com­pa­ny that owns them, Peel Hold­ings. A 30-metre ban­ner has been unfurled from the icon­ic Clyde­port crane on the Riv­er Clyde, and the head­quar­ters of all 3 com­pa­nies have been shut down in Glas­gow and Man­ches­ter. These actions were tak­en in sol­i­dar­i­ty with com­mu­ni­ties resist­ing coal around the world.

Coal min­ing and burn­ing dam­ages the social, envi­ron­men­tal and phys­i­cal health of com­mu­ni­ties in Scot­land and else­where. With plans to build a new coal-fired pow­er sta­tion at Hunter­ston to burn import­ed coal, Peel Hold­ings and its sub­sidiaries are under­min­ing coher­ent action on Scot­land meet­ing our cli­mate change oblig­a­tions. Coal import­ed by Clyde­port at Hunter­ston is also linked to human rights abus­es of min­ers attempt­ing to unionise in Colum­bia.

We are call­ing for an end for the indus­tri­al-scale burn­ing of coal for prof­it, whether import­ed or domes­tic, and we call for work­ers and com­mu­ni­ties to cre­ate a socialised renew­able ener­gy sys­tem for a fair and sus­tain­able future.

We have closed down these offices to open up a long-term strate­gic direct action cam­paign against all links in the indus­try chain lock­ing us into a car­bon-inten­sive future.

web­site:
coalactionscotland.org.uk/?p=2177

Uruguay

- Indige­nous Peo­ples Resis­tance Day

518 years after the start of the Euro­pean inva­sion, our Indige­nous Amer­i­ca resists.

For the defence of our “char­rue” land!
We meet on Cagan­cha square at 17 hs.
We share: procla­ma­tion, music and singing, artis­tic expres­sions and reflec­tions.
Artists: Oscar Mas­sit­ta, Pocho Per­al­ta, Iya Comu­na y Basquadé.
Who calls: Adench and Basquadé Inchalá (Coun­cil of the Char­rúa Nation) Mon­te­v­ideo, Plaza Cagan­cha, Uruguay

web­site:
http://www.servindi.org/actualidad/33624

France
— arret total!
A hun­dred of cli­mate activists gath­ered this after­noon in front of the Total refin­ery of Nor­mandy. The aim of the action, that had been planned since sev­er­al months, was to shut it down. The activists found an unex­pect­ed help in the work­ers of the refin­ery. On strike against the pen­sions reform, they have block­ad­ed the refin­ery and stopped pro­duc­tion. The activists tried to enter the site to show their deter­mi­na­tion to see it per­ma­nent­ly shut. They are accus­ing oil indus­try of con­tribut­ing dan­ger­ous­ly to cli­mate change. The activists have tried to get to the site, past the police lines that have cir­cled a 150 meters perime­ter around the refin­ery, for sev­er­al hours. Thir­teen pro­test­ers on bikes have man­aged to do so and have joined the strik­ers at the entrance of the refin­ery and made a bike bar­ri­er.

At the same time, three activists had entered the Le Havre site of the Chevron plant, the sec­ond largest oil com­pa­ny in the U.S, plan­ning to drop a ban­ner.

In the morn­ing, a demo had tak­en place in Le Havre and demon­stra­tors had lead sev­er­al protest activ­i­ties through­out the city (such as replac­ing adver­tise­ments with mes­sages against Total, a “gar­den­ing gueril­la” or veg­etable plan­ta­tions in the city, the reg­is­ter­ing of a com­plaint against Total…)

One of the par­tic­i­pants in the day of action, Emmanuel Verg­er, says: “We can’t solve the issue of cli­mate change with­out find­ing a way to move beyond our oil-depen­dent soci­ety.

“Oil com­pa­nies destroy local envi­ron­ments in extrac­tion zones, they tram­ple local and indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties rights, and they are push­ing us beyond the thresh­old of cat­a­stroph­ic cli­mate change.

“ We are at the source of the prob­lem, at the largest refin­ery in the coun­try, that is also one of the country’s major green­house gas emit­ter. We are here to put the brakes on oil pro­duc­tion and to say “enough”. We need to make this place and this indus­try become his­to­ry.”

The pro­test­ers also express their sup­port of the strik­ers of the oil refiner­ies that are cur­rent­ly strug­gling to keep a fair pen­sions sys­tem: “Envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice won’t hap­pen with­out social jus­tice, adds Emmanuel. “Those who exploit work­ers, threat­en their rights, and those who are destroy­ing the plan­et, are the same peo­ple. We need to move towards a soci­ety and ener­gy tran­si­tion and to do it coop­er­a­tive­ly with the work­ers of this sec­tor.

“The work­ers that are cur­rent­ly blockad­ing their plants have a cru­cial pow­er into their hands ; every liter of oil that is left in the ground thanks to them helps sav­ing human lives by pre­vent­ing cli­mate cat­a­stro­phes such as the recent floods in Pak­istan from hap­pen­ing.”

web­site:
www.campclimat.org/spip.php?article209

Cana­da
— Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice Toron­to ban­ner drop
Activists from Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice Toron­to risked arrest by walk­ing on to the Gar­diner Express­way to hang a ban­ner say­ing “Free Alex Hun­dert,” a com­mu­ni­ty activist who has been in jail since being re-arrest­ed after speak­ing at a pub­lic pan­el at Ryer­son Uni­ver­si­ty in mid-Sep­tem­ber.

“Alex Hun­dert is a strong voice for indige­nous sov­er­eign­ty and envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice. His work with AW@L in Guelph is an inspi­ra­tion for all who are work­ing to build a bet­ter world,” says Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice Toron­to activist Brett Rhyno. “All charges against Alex should be dropped.These arrests, deten­tions, and false charges are part of a greater attempt to iso­late effec­tive and vocal com­mu­ni­ty activists, and to crim­i­nal­ize dis­sent against the vio­lent poli­cies of the G20, poli­cies that per­pet­u­ate envi­ron­men­tal degra­da­tion, mil­i­ta­riza­tion, labour exploita­tion, and the theft of indige­nous lands.”

Octo­ber 12 is also the date of a glob­al call for actions in sup­port of Cli­mate Jus­tice, led by the Glob­al Min­ga and Cli­mate Jus­tice Action net­works. Glob­al­ly, envi­ron­men­tal and cli­mate jus­tice activists are mark­ing this day in 1492 as the land­ing of Christo­pher Colum­bus on what is now known as the Amer­i­c­as, mark­ing the begin­ning of cen­turies of colo­nial­ism. The exten­sion of Euro­pean greed into the West­ern Hemi­sphere glob­al­ized the exploita­tion of the Earth and its indige­nous peo­ples in the end­less pur­suit for growth and prof­it. Today this trans­lates to a neo­colo­nial sys­tem of over-con­sump­tion, over-pro­duc­tion, and over-extrac­tion of the Earth’s finite nat­ur­al resources.

“Only pow­er­ful cli­mate jus­tice move­ments can achieve the struc­tur­al changes that are nec­es­sary to con­front the cli­mate cri­sis,” says Julien Lalonde, also from EJ Toron­to. “All around the world today, cli­mate jus­tice activists are work­ing col­lec­tive­ly towards end­ing our addic­tion to fos­sil fuels, replac­ing indus­tri­al agri­cul­ture with local sys­tems of food sov­er­eign­ty and self-suf­fi­cien­cy, halt­ing sys­tems based on end­less growth, and address­ing the his­tor­i­cal respon­si­bil­i­ty of the glob­al elites’ mas­sive eco­log­i­cal debt to the glob­al exploit­ed.”

web­site:
http://toronto.mediacoop.ca/story/environmental-justice-toronto-activists-drop-banner-gardiner-expressway-demanding-freedom-g20-

— Shell Sta­tion Bloack­ade, Cli­mate Jus­tice Lon­don Ontario and the Latin Amer­i­can-Cana­di­an Sol­i­dar­i­ty Asso­ci­a­tion (LACASA)
A Shell gas sta­tion in Lon­don Ontario Cana­da was closed down by activists from Cli­mate Jus­tice Lon­don Ontario and the Latin Amer­i­can-Cana­di­an Sol­i­dar­i­ty Asso­ci­a­tion:

“We rode and ral­lied in the streets, with a vision of live­able envi­ron­ments for every­one, every­where. Through these actions, we fol­lowed up the Thanks­giv­ing week­end by shar­ing our con­cerns about threats to native peo­ples across the world.”

The local ral­ly was orga­nized to join a day of action for indige­nous rights, cli­mate jus­tice, and Latin Amer­i­can sol­i­dar­i­ty. At the protest Jonathan O’Glaisne (pro­nounced O Glaw-shnee) spoke about cap­i­tal­ist and impe­ri­al­ist inter­ests invad­ing and abus­ing Coun­ty Mayo in Ire­land. Jonathan also talked about how cor­po­ra­tions like Shell are being met with wider oppo­si­tion, as these com­pa­nies try to exploit more and more peo­ple and envi­ron­ments, across the world. Shell to Sea, for exam­ple, has been chal­leng­ing Shell in west­ern Ire­land, and a Shell sta­tion protest in Kitch­en­er-Water­loo was anoth­er note­wor­thy case of resis­tance from south­ern Ontario. Oth­er sol­i­dar­i­ty protests with­in the last month (Sept-Oct 2010) have tak­en place in Bris­tol and in South Lon­don, Eng­land.

Jonathan has fam­i­ly from the area of Coun­ty Mayo that Shell has been tar­get­ing. His fam­i­ly had no choice but to leave Ire­land due to the pres­sures of cap­i­tal­ism and impe­ri­al­ism in Ire­land dur­ing the after­math of the Anglo-Irish trade war between Ire­land and Great Britain in the 1930s.”

web­site:
http://london.actforclimatejustice.org/events/october-12th-day-of-action/
http://withoutyourwalls.wordpress.com/2010/10/15/oct-12th-2010-global-day-of-action-for-climate-justice-protesters-close-down-a-shell-gas-station-london-canada/

— Cli­mate Jus­tice Mon­tre­al state­ment on indige­nous strug­gles
Cli­mate Jus­tice Mon­tre­al backed the call to action and issued a state­ment of sup­port, high­light­ing 10 indige­nous strug­gles tak­ing place in Cana­da:

“These ten Indige­nous strug­gles, which could eas­i­ly be twen­ty or thir­ty oth­ers, are chal­leng­ing the sta­tus quo of fos­sil-fuel addic­tion and resource pil­lage in this coun­try. Stand­ing up to gov­ern­ments and cor­po­ra­tions, strug­gling for their moun­tains, waters and cli­mate, Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties deserve the sup­port of every­one who cares about the health of our plan­et. As these com­mu­ni­ties bat­tle to regain con­trol over their lands, they strug­gle for us all.”

Lubi­con Lake (Alber­ta): www.lubicon.org/
Grassy Nar­rows (Ontario): www.freegrassy.org
Pimi­cika­mak (Man­i­to­ba): www.pimicikamak.com/
Wet’suwet’en (British Colum­bia): http://on.fb.me/bekx2K
Gwich’in (North­west Ter­ri­to­ries): http://www.thebigwild.org/act/peel
Bak­er Lake (Nunavut)
Bar­riere Lake (Que­bec): www.barrierelakesolidarity.org
Innu (Quebec/Labrador): http://teztanbiny.ca/
Bear Riv­er (Nova Sco­tia): http://www.defendersoftheland.org/bear_river
Defend­ers of the Land (Nation­al): www.defendersoftheland.org
web­site:
http://global.climate-justice-action.org/reports/view/28

Philip­ines
— Philip­ine Move­ment for Cli­mate Jus­tice
The Philip­pine Move­ment for Cli­mate Jus­tice held Rally/Picket at Mala­canang, Men­di­ol

Web­site:
http://focusweb.org/philippines/content/view/395/52/

Fin­land
— Octo­ber 12: Green­wash action in Helsin­ki, Fin­land
On 12th Octo­ber 2010, the inter­na­tion­al day of cli­mate action, a group of activists spent the after­noon doing a pub­lic green­wash­ing action in the city cen­tre of Helsin­ki, Fin­land. The police arrest­ed sev­en peo­ple on sus­pi­cion of van­dal­ism.

The action con­sist­ed of “Green­Wash­Stream” com­pa­ny rep­re­sen­ta­tives strolling the cen­tral com­mer­cial streets in Helsin­ki, offer­ing passers-by free green­wash coupons which would allow peo­ple to cling to their over-con­sum­ing lifestyle with a clean con­science. On the back­side of the coupon, one would find a cri­tique against car­bon trad­ing, off­set­ting and oth­er false solu­tions to cli­mate change. While the dynam­ic mar­ket­ing team was hand­ing out coupons, a group of painters used water­buck­ets and sponges to give a shiny “green­wash­ing” to the bill­boards and win­dows of com­pa­nies with bad envi­ron­men­tal and social rep­u­ta­tions. Final­ly the police were called and the whole Green­Wash­Stream crew was tak­en to the police sta­tion for ques­tion­ing.

This action was aimed to remind peo­ple that while indus­tri­alised coun­tries bear the pri­ma­ry respon­si­bil­i­ty for the cli­mate cri­sis, car­bon trad­ing com­pa­nies like Green­Stream are divert­ing our atten­tion away from real solu­tions to the cli­mate cri­sis, such as rapid­ly reduc­ing emis­sions in the indus­tri­alised North.

Fur­ther, pol­lut­ing com­pa­nies claim to reduce their car­bon foot­print by fund­ing “sus­tain­able” projects in devel­op­ing coun­tries. These projects are often relat­ed to ener­gy pro­duc­tion, such as mod­ern coal pow­er plants, wind farms or gigan­tic dam projects, which have a dev­as­tat­ing impact on local com­mu­ni­ties. Only by stop­ping the vicious cir­cle of unnec­es­sary pro­duc­tion, work and con­sump­tion can we curb cli­mate change.

web­site:
www.hyokyaalto.org

Ger­many
— “Berlin fährt frei” (Berlin rides for free)
With the mot­to “Think glob­al – Act local!” the Berlin based cam­paign “Berlin fährt frei” (Berlin rides for free) informed inter­est­ed Berlin­ers dur­ing its kick­off action on the glob­al action day for cli­mate jus­tice. The “Berlin fährt frei” cam­paign puts its action in the con­text of the glob­al action day for cli­mate jus­tice.

From 5 o’clock on Tues­day after­noon humor­ous small the­atre per­for­mances and var­i­ous infor­ma­tion mate­r­i­al enlivened the Berlin sub­way lines and sta­tions and many pas­sen­gers. The aim and focus of the action were to crit­i­cize the impact of pri­vate motorised trans­port on the one hand and the moti­vate a change to sol­i­daris­ti­cal­ly, demo­c­ra­t­i­cal­ly organ­ised free pub­lic trans­port that is not based on eco­nom­ic growth on the oth­er.

The cam­paign found much res­o­nance for its ideas: there was not only unan­i­mous sup­port that pub­lic trans­port in Berlin was too expen­sive and as first step we need to hin­der next year’s planned price hikes, but one pas­sen­ger doubt­ed that the CO² goals of the Berlin Sen­ate could be reached only with insu­la­tion and boil­er replace­ments. A young father remarked that free pub­lic trans­port would reduce traf­fic in Berlin and make the streets safer for his chil­dren. There was a par­tic­u­lar­ly good recep­tion of the colour­ful­ly clad cam­paign­ers in the S‑Bahn (the region­al train, which last had a major cri­sis due to dwin­dling secu­ri­ty stan­dards), with one pas­sen­ger assert­ing: “It can’t be that pub­lic ser­vices serve the prof­it inter­ests of large con­cerns.”

Dieter Hart­mann, active in “Berlin fährt frei” com­ment­ed on the pos­i­tive feed­back from pas­sen­gers dur­ing the action: “It is espe­cial­ly the link between envi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion, social jus­tice, demo­c­ra­t­ic con­trol of com­mon goods and the per­spec­tive of a live­able city excites peo­ple about the cam­paign. Only by rethink­ing our way of life and econ­o­my are we able to ful­fil our glob­al respon­si­bil­i­ty on a local lev­el. We’re quite hap­py about the start of the cam­paign and invite every­body to make Berlin a poster child for a tru­ly envi­ron­men­tal friend­ly free pub­lic trans­port.

web­site:
http://berlin-faehrt-frei.de/

Peru
Native orga­ni­za­tions pre­pare for the march on the 12th. of Octo­ber, Lima,

AIDESEP, 2nd of Sep­tem­ber 2010. The nation­al front for sov­er­eign­ty and for life — FRENVIDAS meets today in an ampli­fied meet­ing to coor­di­nate the nation­al march for the 12th. of Octo­ber and to dis­cuss the steps toward the orga­ni­za­tion for indige­nous protests; such as, form­ing into work com­mis­sions. Present at the meet­ing were social groups, stu­dents, wom­en’s groups, work­ers and col­lec­tives.

This protest is a response to the fact that the cur­rent Peru­vian gov­ern­ment has­n’t the slight­est inten­tion to change their pol­i­cy of attack­ing and dis­crim­i­nat­ing against indige­nous peo­ples; a pres­i­dent that sev­ers dia­logue and that only receives transna­tion­al cor­po­ra­tions work­ing in pri­ma­ry extrac­tive and envi­ron­men­tal­ly dam­ag­ing indus­tries into his pres­i­den­tial palace, but does­n’t even allow the indige­nous pro­tec­tors of life even to come close to him.

FRENVIDAS (The front in sup­port of life) was found­ed on the 4th of June 2009, as an off­shoot of the resis­tance of the Ama­zon­ian groups and a con­gre­ga­tion of var­i­ous social move­ments, work­ers, women, youth, stu­dents, vil­lage and city dwellers and var­i­ous col­lec­tives.

It has a nation­al exec­u­tive com­mis­sion made up from the fol­low­ing orga­ni­za­tions:
AIDESEP, CCP, CNA, CONACAMI, SUCHOCOP, COICA, GIU and the DESC Alliance.

— Mar­cha de los Pueb­los / March of the Peo­ples, Lima
The rat­i­fy­ing of an agree­ment of region­al fronts South Macrore­gion took place in Tac­na and then in Huan­cayo, around five thou­sand pro­test­ers marched in the cap­i­tal of the coun­try main­ly to demand that the Peru­vian gas is to sup­ply the domes­tic con­sump­tion. And also against the elec­toral fraud against the can­di­da­cy of Susana Vil­laran / Con­flu­ence of the Left under the name of “March of the Peo­ple”

PLATFORM OF STRUGGLE:

1.- In defence of Moth­er Earth.

2.- Con­stituent Assem­bly: Multi­na­tion­al and Inter­cul­tur­al Con­sti­tu­tion.

3.- Right to sov­er­eign con­sul­ta­tion for the peo­ples.

4.- No to the pri­va­ti­za­tion of nat­ur­al resources and indige­nous ter­ri­to­ries.

5.- No gas export, gas is for the Peru­vians.

6.- Repeal of Supreme Decree No. 003‑2006.PCM.

7.- No to the destruc­tion of the Nation­al Sanc­tu­ary of Megan­toni.

8.- For decent employ­ment, salaries and wages.

9.- No to the crim­i­nal­iza­tion of social protest and polit­i­cal per­se­cu­tion.

10.- No to pri­va­ti­za­tion of land up to 40,000 hectares

11.- No expro­pri­a­tion of land in the rur­al com­mu­ni­ties of Olmos.

12.- Defence of the Andean peo­ples’ lands against min­ing con­ces­sion.

13 .- No to hydro­elec­tric dams at Inam­bari Paquitza­pan­go, Salta Pucara, Lan­gui Lan­gu­na of Laius.

14.- No to elec­toral fraud by region­al and munic­i­pal gov­ern­ments.

Organ­ised and sup­port­ed by the fol­low­ing:

CONACAMI, AIDESEP, CNA, CCP, FRENVIDAS, TAHUANTINSUYANOS, CGTP, CUT, UFREP, CONAFREP. FRENTE UNICO DE LOS PUEBLOS DEL PERU, FONAVISTAS, CORECAMIS DE AREQUIPA, TACNA, MOQUEGUA, PUNO, CUZCO, APURIMAC, JUNIN, PASCO, HUANCAVELICA, ICA, LIMA, ANCASH, PIURA Y LAMBAYEQUE, RONDAS CAMPESINAS- CUNARC Y CONARC, FRENTE DE DEFENSA DE LOS RECURSOS NATURALES-LIMA, etc.

web­site:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/reinadelascoronas/5121363818/
http://www.conacami.org/site/

Catalunya/Spain

- Glob­al Min­ga for Moth­er Earth and her Peo­ples at Barcelona city

Who is the call from: Barcelona Tran­si­ció
Tues­day, 12th octo­ber, 17h: March for an ant­i­cap­i­tal­ist, antifas­cist and antiracist
12th of Octo­ber. Catalun­ya Square (Tele­fóni­ca)

“For com­mon strug­gles, sol­i­dar­i­ty and ten­der­ness between Peo­ples”

Tues­day, 12th of Octo­ber, 17 hs.. March from Catalun­ya Square (Tele­fóni­ca) to Ram­bla del Raval.

web­site:
http://repsolmata.ourproject.org/spip.php?article171
http://revoltaglobal.cat/article3149.html
http://barcelonaentransicio.wordpress.com/2010/10/09/minga-global/
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=145197678850368&ref=mf

USA
— Peo­ple Across the U.S. Cel­e­brate Indige­nous People’s Day Through Cli­mate Jus­tice Edu­ca­tion

Indige­nous people’s move­ments around the globe have called for a day of action for cli­mate jus­tice on Octo­ber 12, Indige­nous Peo­ples’ Day. “As we pre­pare for the next round of U.N. Cli­mate Nego­ti­a­tions in Mex­i­co next month, we are voic­ing our clear oppo­si­tion to false mar­ket-based cli­mate poli­cies,” said Jihan Gearon, Ener­gy Orga­niz­er for the U.S.-based Indige­nous Envi­ron­men­tal Net­work (IEN). “Our actions and those of our allies this Octo­ber 12 are part of the grow­ing momen­tum in favour of real sys­tem change.”

In response to the Octo­ber 12 call, many groups are engag­ing in edu­ca­tion­al work­shops to stim­u­late long-term action for cli­mate jus­tice. The Los Ange­les-based Bus Rid­ers’ Union and Labor/Community Strat­e­gy Cen­ter and the Black Mesa Water Coali­tion on the Nava­jo Nation in Ari­zona will hold work­shops on the Cochabam­ba Peo­ples’ Dec­la­ra­tion on Cli­mate Change and the Rights of Moth­er Earth; the San Anto­nio, Texas-based South­west Work­ers Union will host a com­mu­ni­ty gar­den work­day and ongo­ing edu­ca­tion link­ing Texas oil com­pa­nies Valero and Tesoro to California’s Propo­si­tion 23. The objec­tives of these edu­ca­tion­al activ­i­ties is to build grass­roots capac­i­ty to address the cli­mate cri­sis direct­ly.

These local strug­gles and oth­ers around the globe are linked by a com­mon com­mit­ment to glob­al well-being, human rights and the rights of nature, and the grow­ing aware­ness that efforts to mit­i­gate the cli­mate cri­sis must be root­ed in equi­ty, eco­nom­ic jus­tice, and the dig­ni­ty of all peo­ples.

The Octo­ber 12 events occur fol­low­ing anoth­er day of cli­mate action, the 10/10/10 Glob­al Work Par­ty. “How­ev­er,” says Jihan Gearon, “the call to action for Indige­nous Peo­ples’ Day is dis­tinct. Native peo­ple are not ‘just get­ting to work’ to stop glob­al warm­ing. We’ve been care­tak­ing the nat­ur­al envi­ron­ment since the begin­ning of time. Only now that it’s almost too late, peo­ple out­side our com­mu­ni­ties are begin­ning to get the mes­sage.”

“Our approach is not sim­ply to address the symp­toms of the prob­lem,” adds Gearon, “but to attack the root caus­es.”

“We need deci­sive action, and not in the form of mis­lead­ing poli­cies like the U.N. REDD pro­gram (Reduc­tion of Emis­sions from Defor­esta­tion and Degra­da­tion), said Tom Gold­tooth, Direc­tor of IEN. “While it pre­tends to pro­tect forests, REDD and sim­i­lar car­bon-off­set schemes allow con­tin­ued destruc­tion of our atmos­phere and put our forest­land and indige­nous people’s homes, liveli­hoods, and cul­tures in con­tin­ued per­il.”

Indige­nous Envi­ron­men­tal Net­work is part of a grow­ing coali­tion of com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tions across the U.S. who affirm that those who must lead the way to cli­mate sta­bil­i­ty are those who’ve been most direct­ly impact­ed, both by tox­ic indus­try and by his­toric appro­pri­a­tions of land and resources. Fol­low­ing the Cochabam­ba World People’s Con­fer­ence on Cli­mate Change and the Rights of Moth­er Earth con­vened by Boli­vian Pres­i­dent Evo Morales this past April, IEN and com­mu­ni­ty-based groups world­wide are pro­mot­ing the Cochabam­ba Dec­la­ra­tion, the pop­u­lar response to the wide­ly ill-regard­ed Copen­hagen Accord, as offer­ing the most real­is­tic approach to cur­rent eco­log­i­cal and social threats.

web­site:
http://climatevoices.wordpress.com/2010/10/12/people-across-the-u-s-celebrate-indigenous-peoples-day-through-climate-justice-education/

Bolivia
— March in Defence of Moth­er Earth, El Alto

Con­vened by the Nation­al Coun­cil of Qul­la­suyo Ayl­lus and Markas, the march called for the adop­tion of a Law of Moth­er Earth in the nation­al and inter­na­tion­al agen­da and fun­da­men­tal­ly affect the Multi­na­tion­al Leg­isla­tive Assem­bly for approval of a law to pro­tect and pre­serve Pachama­ma.

The mobi­liza­tion went to the Plaza Muril­lo in the city of La Paz and includ­ed the par­tic­i­pa­tion of the Nation­al Fed­er­a­tion of Peas­ant Women of Bolivia Indige­nous Native — “Bar­toli­na Sisa”-, the Inter­cul­tur­al Com­mu­ni­ties Con­fed­er­a­tion of trade unions of Bolivia (CSCIB), the farm work­ers sin­gle Con­fed­er­a­tion of trade unions of Bolivia (CSUTCB) and the Con­fed­er­a­tion of Indige­nous Peo­ples of Bolivia (CIDOB), among oth­ers.

The con­cen­tra­tion was on the Mul­ti­func­tion­al Herib­er­to Ceja Gutier­rez of the city of El Alto.

Web­site:
https://nacla.org/node/1460
http://www.cscbbol.org/
http://www.csutcb.org/
http://www.cidob.org/

Argenti­na
— Sec­ond Act in front of the con­sulate of Chile in Men­doza

Orga­nized by the Coor­di­na­tor of Native Iden­ti­ties and Field, was a demon­stra­tion because the 518 years of Euro­pean inva­sion of Chilean lands and a peti­tion with sig­na­tures demand­ing free­dom of the Mapuche Polit­i­cal Pris­on­ers on hunger strike in Chile was deliv­ered.

web­site:
http://www.mapuche-nation.org/

— Infor­ma­tion share Argen­tine Group: Move­ment for the defence of Moth­er Earth
Here in Buenos Aires four peo­ple from the Cochabamba.org.ar group manned/womanned a stand in the con­trafeste­jo (Indige­nous move­ments against Colum­bus Day) in the Avel­lane­da Park.

The group spoke to about 100 peo­ple giv­ing them infor­ma­tion about Cli­mate Jus­tice and the People’s Move­ment for Defence of Moth­er Earth.

web­site:
Cochabamba.org.ar

Ecuador

- Glob­al march of peo­ple’s move­ments and peas­ant agri­cul­tur­al groups for peo­ple’s self-man­age­ment and the con­struc­tion of pluri­na­tion­al states

Call­out from Via Campesina, for the first time dif­fer­ent orga­ni­za­tions such as rur­al farm work­ers, migrants, refugees, agri­cul­tur­al work­ers, the land­less move­ments, and the dis­placed con­duct­ed a glob­al move­ment togeth­er to reaf­firm the iden­ti­ty of Abya Yala (Pre-Columbian term for the Amer­i­c­as).

Meet at Par­que El Arboli­to, in the city of Quito, Ecuador at nine AM.

web­site:
http://viacampesina.org/sp/