Action Reports – Page 69

Gas Pipeline Treesitter Arrested in PA, Resistance Continues

6 March 2013

Tree sit against Tennessee pipeline in PA Milford, PA – Yesterday, local hero and tree-sitter Gifford Pinchot was arrested on the ninth day of holding fast in a forest tree-sit meant to stop tree clearing for the Tennessee Gas Pipeline. This morning Pinchot was released from police custody, while workers were again turned away from the work site by local protesters. Last evening at approximately 6:00 p.m., Gifford Pinchot was apprehended in the forests of Pike County, PA on the ninth day of the tree-sit. He was charged with aggravated trespass, resisting arrest and disorderly conduct, but was released on his own recognizance this morning. Meanwhile, work crews returned to Cummins Hill Road to continue clearing trees along the Tennessee Gas Pipeline right of way and were turned away by emotional pleas and testimony from local residents. Local activists were able to appeal to their common interest in a safe, clean environment, and the workers walked away from the job of clearing one of the final stands of trees for this right of way. The arrest was part of a nine-day tree-sit blockade and two-week road blockade. Both actions supported a campaign opposing the Tennessee Gas Pipeline in the Delaware River Basin. The direct action campaign is taking place after nearly two years of local opposition from grassroots groups and political leaders in the courts, in public hearings, and through protest. When asked for a personal statement on his experience in the tree stand, his arrest, and future plans, Gifford Pinchot said, “Let this be a lesson to all those resisting ecological destruction. The state and their corporate cohorts will lie, coerce and intimidate us. But we must trust in our friends and the forest. Those are our only true allies in this fight. As these struggles continue and intensify, it is important to remember that we are not alone. We are just one link in a chain of resistance to those oppressing the earth, and this chain will not be broken until the earth and all her inhabitants are free at last.” For updates: http://www.notennesseepipeline.blogspot.com

Tar Sands Protestor Disrupts Transcanada Presentation

February 28th, 2013, 1:45pm — a protestor with Tar Sands Blockade this afternoon locked his neck to a projector screen in the middle of a TransCanada presentation at the North American Crude Marketing Conference in Houston. In taking direct action, Ethan Nuss confronted in-person Paul Miller, TransCanada’s Executive Vice President of Oil Pipelines, and a ballroom of tar sands industry investors, demanding a halt to the toxic Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.

Nuss successfully disrupted the second annual conference hosted by Platts. Among other things, the gathering is intended for fossil fuel industry executives and their financial backers to collaborate on schemes to transport dirty and dangerous tar sands from Canada to the Gulf Coast so it can be refined and sold on the international market, thereby expanding the industry.

“TransCanada’s ‘business as usual’ spells death and destruction for our communities,” said Ethan Nuss. “My conscience won’t allow me to watch this multinational corporation and their profiteers poison impacted communities from here in Houston’s polluted East End to indigenous people at the point of tar sands extraction in Alberta, Canada. This must stop.” Ethan further shares his reasons for taking direct action below:

At last year’s marketing conference, Paul Miller explained the necessity of the southern leg of Keystone XL through Oklahoma and Texas to the expansion of the exploitative tar sands industry. TransCanada’s own fourth quarter report, released last week, revealed that the controversial pipeline is less than half completed, despite the Canadian pipeline corporation’s previous projections for completion of the southern segment this April.

This revelation highlights that Tar Sands Blockade’s sustained civil disobedience campaign since last August has been successful in delaying Keystone XL construction. Today’s action is part of growing momentum for an upcoming national week of action called for by Tar Sands Blockade and allies from March 16-23, with over 60 actions currently reported nationwide.

“This is just a morsel of what TransCanada and other tar sands profiteers can expect in the coming weeks and months,” said Kim Huynh, a spokesperson with Tar Sands Blockade. “All over the country, communities are gearing up to take to the streets, offices, extraction sites and public events to show that our movement won’t relent until we’ve made this investment as toxic for TransCanada and its financial backers as the very tar sands being piped through Keystone XL. Our tar sands-free future begins now.”

Earlier this week, 20,000 gallons of crude oil leaked into Otter Creek in Tyler County, TX from a pipeline owned by Sunoco Logistics. Otter Creek flows into Russell Creek, which feeds the Neches River. The leak did not trigger Sunoco’s detection systems but was discovered by local residents reporting oil in their water.

Update 1:53pm — All press have been kicked out of the conference.

Update 2:05pm — More protestors are outside the conference lobby chanting “All night, all day, Tar Sands Blockade!”

Update — In solidarity with Ethan and other oil conference disruptors, Tar Sands Blockaders dropped banners in sight of two major Houston highways.

Update 2:15pm — Protestors continue to yell and chant outside of the hotel where the conference is being disrupted.

Update 2:30pm — All protestors are outside of the hotel now except for Ethan, who is still locked to the projection screen in the conference room.

Update 3pm — Ethan has just been extracted, taken into police custody, and removed from the building.

Believe it or not, today is actually Ethan’s 29th birthday! Show your

Update 5:15pm — We’ve just heard from Ethan that he’s been charged with criminal trespass.

Update 8pm — Ethan still hasn’t been officially charged yet.

He’s in high spirits and sends along his deepest gratitude for all the love and birthday well-wishes:

“I turned 29 today, and there is nowhere that I’d rather spend my birthday than locked to that projector screen, speaking truth to power.”

Update Friday, March 1st, 1:15am — Ethan is expected to be in jail through the night.

Update 8:30am — Ethan’s just been bailed out!

Arson Attack on Seattle “Green” Development

5 March 2013

The arson of some townhouses under construction was recently claimed by anonymous Seattle Anarchists. This is the communique they left, citing their reasons and expressing their joy:

“Just before midnight, Monday Feb 25, we strolled over to the townhouses under construction on 24th and Norman in the Central District. After slipping inside, we set one ablaze. Oh what ease! Oh what fun!

Sustainable development is a myth that makes us sick. By furthering gentrification and ecological destruction, these buildings dress disaster up as progress, promising a “green” future that will never be.

Our attack was just one more opportunity to joyously reject the status quo. It was another attempt to shed the subjugated subjectivity forced upon us by Capital and the State. We act against civil society and its attempts at domestication. Fuck that shit.

Solidarity with Maddy, Kerry, and all the silent ones still facing repression by the Federal Grand Jury. We will not cower in fear. We will not remain docile in the face of State terror.

Now is the time to attack! Enemies abound. Weapons are everywhere.

Join us?

Some Anarchists.”

Corporate news coverage reports:
The fire that caused extensive damage to an under-construction townhouse project at 24th and Norman last week was intentionally set, fire department investigators say.

Now a post signed only by “Some Anarchists” on the Puget Sound Anarchists website claims responsibility for the arson.

The townhouse project developer Benjamin Custom Homes describes the homes as “efficient green homes with approximately 2500sf of modern living, attached parking and private roof-top deck with views of the Seattle skyline.”

The case is under investigation by SPD’s arson team. We have attempted to contact SPD to ask them about the PSA post and will update when we hear back. (UPDATE: Seattle Police said investigators are aware of the post, but have no additional information on the investigation at this time.)

Details from SFD:

Seattle Fire Investigators determined a fire at an under construction house in Judkins Park was intentionally set.

The initial 911 call came in at 12:28 a.m. reporting flames coming from a single family home located at the corner of South Norman Street and 24th Avenue South. While responding to the scene, fire officers could see the flames shooting into the night sky from several blocks away.

Engine 6 arrived first to find a full involved 3-story home that was under construction. Flames from the home were exposing to a second under construction house. Using multiple hose lines, firefighters were able to control the flames in 7 minutes. Embers from the fire landed on a nearby houses roof causing a temporary evacuation of the residents. The residents were eventually allowed back in.

The fire also damaged a piece of construction equipment, a port-a-potty and burned through a power line to a home. There were no reported injuries.

Firefighters conducted an overnight fire watch to make sure the embers don’t reignite in the home.
Fire investigators estimate the damage at $30,000 to the structure and contents. The case has been turned over to the Seattle Police Department’s Arson Bomb Squad who will be investigating.

The Bolt Weevils and the Simplicity of Sabotage

Resistance against exploitation is nothing new. History is full of examples of people—perfectly ordinary people—fighting back against injustice, exploitation, and the destruction of their lands and communities. They move through whatever channels for action are open to them, but often, left with no legal or political power, they turn to militant means to defend themselves.

It is hardly a simple decision, and rarely the first or preferred option, but when all other paths have been explored and found to lead nowhere, militant action becomes the only realistic route left. Movements and communities come to that truth in many different ways, but almost without fail, they come to it borne by a collective culture of resistance. One inspiring example is the Bolt Weevils.

The Bolt Weevils were a group of farmers in Minnesota who spent several years in the late 1970s perfecting the fine art of sabotaging interstate electrical transmission lines. Their efforts have been memorialized in numerous books and songs, and their story is a hopeful one we would do well to remember and re-tell.

The story of the Bolt Weevils begins in the mid-1970s, when the Cooperative Power Association (CPA) and United Power Association (UPA) proposed construction of a new interstate high-voltage transmission line. Taking its name from the two cooperatives, the CU Powerline would carry current from a generating station in North Dakota across west-central Minnesota to feed the urban centers of the Twin Cities.
In determining a route for the powerline, small farmers land was rated less important than large industrial farms, and as a result, the proposed route crossed the property of nearly 500 landowners. Outraged at being trodden over to for the benefit of industry and urbanism, resistance against the project began immediately in earnest.

Once residents found out about the project, they refused to sign land easements. Local towns passed resolutions opposing the project and reject construction permits. The powerline went to review before the State’s Environmental Quality Council, which went ahead and granted the necessary permits in the face of overwhelming public opposition.

When surveyors showed up out of the blue in one farmer’s fields, he smashed their equipment with his tractor and rammed their vehicle. The action of that one farmer helped catalyze popular sentiments into action. Farmers began using CB radios to notify one another about surveying activities, and would turn out in groups to stop the work. As resistance began to build, local radio stations would broadcast times and locations of protestor gatherings. Farmers and others who opposed the project began meeting every morning in the Lowry town hall, hosting others who’d come from neighboring counties, to make plans for each day.

As surveying and construction continued, the locals escalated their efforts. They would erect signs in their fields to block the sightlines of the surveyors, and stand next to survey crews running their chainsaws to disrupt their work. Survey stakes disappeared overnight. Farmers used their trucks to make roadblocks and their tractors to pile boulders in the construction sites. One group even gained permission from the county to improve a rural road—they dug a ditch across it to stop all traffic.

They filed more lawsuits, and the issue was eventually taken up by the Minnesota Supreme Court, which in the spirit of everything it represents, decided against the farmers and in favor of the powerline. Many of the citizens opposing the pipeline had earnestly believed in institutions like the Supreme Court and the structures of power. After their battles through the courts, many of them were disillusioned and had been radicalized.

Law enforcement began escorting construction and survey workers, and the situation came to a head on January 4th 1978, when 100 farmers chased powerline crews from three different sites, fought with police, and even tore down part of a tower. The next week, the Minnesota Governor ordered the largest mobilization of the State Troopers in Minnesota’s history, with 200 Troopers—fully half of the force—descended on the rural area to ensure construction continued.

Protests continued and grew, as the issue began to draw national and international media attention; hundreds turned out for rallies at survey sites, and some schools even let out so students and teachers could attend. In St. Paul, thousands of farmers rallied and demonstrated, and in March of 1978 more than 8,000 people marched almost ten miles through freezing temperatures from Lowry to Glenwood to protest the CU powerline.

It was in the heat of August that the kettle boiled over. Bolts on one of the transmission towers were loosened, and soon afterwards, it fell over, as the Bolt Weevils entered the scene. Then three more fell over. Guard poles and bolts were cut and loosened, insulators were shot out. Over the next few years, 14 towers were felled and nearly 10,000 insulators were shot out. Soon, helicopters patrolled the powerline, and it was made a federal offense to take down interstate transmission lines.

There were numerous arrests, some 120 in all, but only two individuals were ever convicted on felony charges, and even then they were only sentenced to community service. Opposition to the powerline was so common that in some instances, witnesses refused to testify against farmers.

In the End, unfortunately, the powerline was built and went into operation, despite the protests and the disruptions by the Bolt Weevils. While they were unsuccessful in ultimately stopping the project, there’s much from their efforts that we can learn and apply to our work today against exploitation and civilization.

As in most social struggles that turn to property destruction and militancy, that wasn’t the first choice of tactics for those on the ground. They fought for years through accepted legal and political avenues, turning to material attacks after all other courses of action had proven ineffective. But more than that, the popular agitation and organizing in the years leading up to the emergence of the Bolt Weevils didn’t merely precede militant direct action: it laid the groundwork for it.

The work of the local farmers—their protests, demonstrations, civil disobedience, and community organizing—paved the way (forgive the phrase) and set the conditions for the sabotage that would later occur. By mobilizing residents and community members against the project, building social networks, and agitating and raising opposition against CU powerline, a collective culture of resistance was created, planting and watering the seeds from which the Bolt Weevils were born.

With civilization churning onwards towards biotic collapse and underground resistance the only real hope left, caring for those seeds is our primary duty today. The story of the Bolt Weevils—like countless other stories of resistance—shows that militant resistance emerges from strong and supportive cultures of resistance. The time to start building such a culture was yesterday. For those of us who choose to organize and work in an aboveground and legal way, building such a culture that embraces and celebrates sabotage and the use of any means necessary to stop the omnicide of industrialism is our foremost task.

The story of the Bolt Weevils isn’t empowering and inspiring because they “fought off the bad guys and won.” They didn’t win. The power lines were built, forced down their throats in the face of their resistance. No, their story is inspiring because it so clearly and undeniably demonstrates how simply feasible sabotage and material attacks truly are. Often, we talk about militant resistance and direct action as mysterious and abstract things, things that wouldn’t ever happen in our lives or communities, things that no one as ordinary as any of us would ever do.

Whether we romanticize underground action or are intimidated by it, we generally talk about it as though it is something out of a movie or a novel. The truth is that such actions are simply tactics—just like petition-drives or street marches—that can be used to dismantle systems of power. The Bolt Weevils—a group of farmers with hunting rifles and hacksaws*—serve as a stark reminder that one doesn’t require military training and high-tech gadgets to act in direct and material ways against the infrastructure of destruction. We’re all capable of fighting back, and while sabotage against industrial infrastructure can be daunting for many valid reasons, technicality isn’t one of them.

We may have to fail working through other channels (as if we haven’t already) before collectively turning to sabotage and attacks on industrial infrastructure as a strategy, and we will certainly need to build a supportive and strong culture of resistance. But if we’re serious about stopping the destruction and exploitation of civilization, we will be left with no other choice.

*This is speculative. I don’t actually know how they shot out insulators or cut through guard poles, although there are plenty of accounts of hunting rifles and hacksaws being used in this fashion, and it’s from those stories that I hazard this guess.

Reclaim the Fields:Spring into Action Gathering!FoD

:Reclaim the Fields : Spring into Action Gathering! 16th-25th March:

:Reclaim the Fields : Spring into Action Gathering! 16th-25th March:
Yorkley Court is hosting the Reclaim the Fields 'Spring into Action' gathering, on Saturday the 16th of March- 25th! The Gathering aims to be a platform for sharing practical land-based skills, crafts and related knowledge. We intend to 'get on with it' whilst continually seeking to create a popular discourse/ debate on the issues of land access, the right to food autonomy/ sovereignty and the right to build and dwell within a low-impact home on the land.

Yorkley Court Community Farm is a growing grass-roots farm in the Forest of Dean, interested in developing resilient agro-ecological systems, that are both productive and ecologically regenerative.

The Seed Camp will start on the 8th of March, with a two day Permaculture course by Tomas Remiarz. The rest of the week will focus on setting up infrastructure and openly, inclusively organising the Gathering. Anyone interested and able to help get the Gathering off to a great start, should come along for this week, prior to the main Gathering! Lots of skill-sharing and fun will be had!

We are currently looking for people interested in doing talks, running workshops and skill-sharing during the main Gathering… everyone will have the opportunity to share their skills and knowledge at the gathering, but we can publicise the workshops/talks offered before the gathering! So let us know what you'd like to offer or to see, in the way of workshops/skillshares asap!

The weekends of the Gathering will be focused on talks, presentations, workshops and discussions. The week days between will be more focused on practical activities.

Please get hold of us, if you're planning to come to the Seed Camp, or are wanting to do talk, run a workshop, etc…

:Contact Details:

yorkleycourt@gmail.com

yorkleycourt.wordpress.com < our main, local community facing website!

rtfspring2013.wordpress.com < the gatherings own website! programme still under-construction!

reclaimthefields.org.uk < our constellations website

:A bit about the Forest:

The Forest of Dean is a land betwix two rivers, a secret Wilderness in West Gloucestershire, right on the Welsh boarder.

The Forest of Dean has historically been the home of many radical land-rights struggles and was settled by 'the cabiners', people who built their homes "by right" instead of through state dependence. They were treated by the state with the same distain as 'squatters' are today, albeit with more direct violence and less PR spin.

As one Oxford prof. put it, after moving here recently, because…
"The Forest and it's people have a healthy disregard for the rule of law!"

Resistance is Fertile!

Reclaim the Fields!

"Reclaim the Fields is a constellation of people and collective projects willing to go back to the land and reassume the control over food production. "

Huila Community of Colombia Continues to Defend the Earth from Mega-Development. 28th Feb

The New Year in Huila started as 2012 finished, with the National Authority of Environmental Licenses’ (ANLA) refusal to hold the energy company Enel-Endesa-Emgesa accountable for failing to comply with the environmental license for the Quimbo Hydroelectric Project.

The Comptroller’s Office has continually studied the information put forth by Association of Affected Peoples of the Quimbo Hydroelectric Project (Asoquimbo), and has backed the local communities’ demands that the environmental license be respected in regards to resettlement, compensations and environmental mitigation. Meanwhile in Huila, local media have falsely reported that nothing is wrong in the region and have irresponsibly reduced their reporting to nothing more than public relations on behalf of the company’s image.

Nonetheless, throughout Huila, the resistance has not only manifested from the communities affected by the Quimbo Dam, but also from the communities in Gigante and Garzón affected by petroleum company Emerald Energy, as well as communities in southern and central Huila resisting the Master Advantage Plan of the Magdalena River which would hand over the country´s largest and most important river in concession to the state-owned company HydroChina. In addition to the invasion of extractive industries to Huila, the regions large amount of coffee growers have been impacted by the falling price in coffee which has progressively gotten worse since the signing of the US free trade agreement. As a result, Huila and all of Colombia’s coffee growers have also started pressuring the Colombian State that has resulted injuries in recent days as coffee growers have had clashes with the riot police (ESMAD).

Visit Asoquimbo’s site for more info.

In the coffee lands, fruit orchards, and vegetable fields maintained by the campesinos around the Miraflores Peak, members of the Inter-sectoral Association Garzón & Gigante (ASIEG), continue to fight to have the environmental license that would permit Emerald Energy, a subsidiary of the Chinese chemical company, Sinochem to drill for oil in the Paramo of Miraflores ecosystem. Currently AISEG along with the Regional Autonomous Corporation of the Upper Magdalena (CAM) along with CORPOAMAZONIA from the Department of Caqueta, are pushing the Office of National Natural Parks to declare the 122,000 HA of the Paramo de Miraflores Peak a National Natural park to help create a stronger legal mechanisms for protecting this area and effectively excluding it from any form of oil extraction.

The Magdalena River, born in south Huila, flows north some 1,528 kilometers to its delta in the Caribbean Sea. Its drainage basin is nearly a quarter of the country´s national territory and two-thirds of the nearly 46 million Colombians live in this region which produces about 86% of the country´s GDP. This year, the Magdalena River will be handed over in concession to the company HydroChina whose plans for the river are to turn a living ecosystem that supports human and nonhuman communities into the country´s most important transportation corridor for cheap goods.

The plan will include dredging the river from Honda, Tolima all the way to its delta to allow large barges to enter that far up-river from the caribbean delta within Colombia. Honda will be connected via high-speed railways to the Pacific-coast port city of Buenaventura as a connection between eastern and western markets. For the upper area of the Magdalena River Valley the concession involves a total of 11 medium to large hydroelectric dams to generate electricity for use elsewhere. Communities in southern Huila such as Oporapa, San Agustín, and San Jose de Isnos have all become active in the local resistance since the plans for the river were announced last year.

The Impacts are being felt

With sadness, members and allies of the Asoquimbo paid farewell to Sain Pedrazo, a farmer and day laborer from Veracruz, Gigante. Don Sain, known by all who knew him as a sweet, loving and noble man, was an elder and steadfast warrior of Asoquimbo. He joins at least seven other older adults from the affected population that have passed due to the physiological trauma that the place where they were born, grew up, raised their families and have lived in always, might possibly be erased. In his own words he said that he would pass before the Dam could be completed. “If everyone thinks like me, I am leaving before it is my time. I´d rather that no one mention that Quimbo to me, because God does not want it. Though based on what I feel, I am leaving here early. I will not wait for this disaster to happen. Me with my 72 years of birth and life here, I do feel it and it hurts me hard.” Don Sain is greatly missed though his legacy of his fight and struggle for the love of our territory till the very end accompany those that continue to struggle for the liberation of Mother Earth in Huila.

On January 16, Moises Sanchez, a sharecropper on the Chagres Farm in Gigante, along with his family and cattle, was forcibly removed from his home by the ESMAD by order of the Gigante’s mayor Ivan Luna. Brutalized during the process, this is another example of how laws are applied when they favor Emgesa-Endesa-Enel, though when it comes to the sanctions placed against the company and making sure they are adhered to, the necessary State institutions are nowhere to be found. To date there is still an open investigation by the Comptroller´s Office of the ANLA for the violations of social and environmental rights caused by the Quimbo Hydroelectric Project and damages totaling an amount over $175 billion (USD) that the company has yet to respond to and the Ministry of Environment has also been silent on.

In mid-February a massive die-off of Tilapia and Bass occurred in the floating aquaculture cages in the Betania Reservoir that belong to local elites. Over 300 tons of fish destined to export to foreign countries died due to anaerobic conditions in the reservoir found down river from the Quimbo construction site. A local aquaculture business owner who asked to remain anonymous accused the National Fishing and Aquaculture Authority (Aunap) of doing nothing. “The uncontrolled growth of aquaculture in Betania threatens the ecological balance as well as industrial aquaculture,” said the business owner.
In 2005, according to the Plan of Fish and Aquaculture Order, there were 1,686 cages, eight years later there are 7,000 cages. This overproduction along with pollution and higher sediment content in the water lowered the water quality and caused the water to lose Oxygen provoking the massive die off.

Regional Political Corruption and a Challenge

On January 9th, 2013 Cielo Gonzalez was finally removed from her position as governor of Huila and her former Secretary Julio César Triana, was appointed by President Santos as the new interim governor in early February. Prior to Triana, Luis Guillermo Vélez Cabrera was serving as interim governor when he visited the construction site of the Quimbo telling local media the “Quimbo must happen, but the right way.” He also noted that while there had been progress, the company´s delay in the creation of the irrigation district Paicol-Tesalia was especially worrying. Since Triana has come into office as interim-governor, he has only mentioned that Vélez Cabrera would be the “point person” to continue working on the project.

On April 14 there will atypical elections held in Huila to pick the new governor. Asoquimbo is calling on the people of Huila to vote in blank and for the Defense of the Territory. Currently all the candidates from the different parties support and helped create the Departmental Plan of Development 2012-2015 “Making Change,” which seeks to use extractive industries as part of President Santos “Mining-Energy Locomotive” as a major force in regional and national development. On the ballot, listed as a viable option is the “Program of Unity for Territorial Defense” that is registered with the National Civic Registry. The outlined platforms the make up the “Program of Unity for Territorial Defense” were created through open assemblies in the communities of Agrado, Garzón, Gigante, Hobo, La Plata, San josé de Isnos, Tarqui and San Agustín, Huila from February 9-17th that focus on protecting the local communities, economies and the environment.

The Constant Hypocrisy of the National Authority of Environmental Licenses

The lack of consistency of the Director of the ANLA, Luz Helena Sarmiento, has only made evident that her role is that of a puppet for transnational companies more than a true authority who absurdly has been delegated the responsibility of protecting the needs of the human and nonhuman communities in Colombia. In late December yet another resolution was passed modifying the Quimbo´s Environmental License through Resolution 1142 attempting to help Enel-Endesa-Emgesa remain unaccountable to the demands placed on it by the comptroller´s Office. As a result, Comptroller Sandra Morelli has declared that the ANLA was deepening the country’s environmental crisis that it had already brought on by its faulty policies. This critique helped eliminate an eco-tourism hotel known as “Los Ciruelos” that was planned for the Tayrona National Park on the Caribbean Coast by the ANLA through Resolution 0024.

The critiques of Sarmiento´s hypocrisy is that the environmental impact of the Quimbo is much greater than that of Los Ciruelos taking into account the over 800 Ha of dry-tropical forest will be destroyed (the same ecosystem that Los Ciruelos would affect) and large portions of the Amazonian Protection Forest Reserve. Since early February the ANLA has denied licenses for numerous companies including Drummond, CCX, Prodeco and Goldman Sachs, who all had plans for coal mining in the Department of Cesar. ANLA denied these solicitations citing these companies did not follow regulations. This incoherence that directly impacts communities is what is pushing so many to take more direct actions after more than four years of internationally recognized evidence of countless violations of the Quimbo´s environmental licenses even after the licensing has been changed no less than four times always in benefit of the company.

Huila, won’t take it no more

On February 25, a national strike was organized by coffee growers in Antioquia, Huila, Quindío, Risaralda and other coffee growing regions. Tens of thousands of campesinos throughout Huila blocked roads to pressure the government to take action in helping coffee growers as a result of the falling prices. In Garzón, clashes led to over 25 people being injured and curfews being called; meanwhile in Neiva and the roads connecting Huila with Caqueta and Putumayo, all transportation is paralyzed in the region as a result of the strikes. Asoquimbo and AISEG are in solidarity with the coffee growers strike and participate, as well as prepare for more upcoming mobilizations. Mercedes Ninco, a resident of La Jagua, explained “we are supporting the coffee growers and striking as well. The State´s policies that hurt them are also hurting us.”

What continues to be apparent is that the Quimbo and other extraction projects in Huila are only the tip of the iceberg. Regionally and globally, the methods that governments are using to disguise corporate land grabs, resource extraction, environmental destruction and forced displacement as a minor part of “progress” and “development” has never been akin to the worldviews of most communities affected by these projects. In fact, the struggle of movements like Idle No More in Canada against the Tar Sands and other extraction projects on indigenous lands, the efforts in the US against the Keystone Pipeline, or the incalculable amount of communities standing up against mines, dams, pipelines, agro-industry throughout the world are the same fight.

Since the uprisings led by the Gaitana in the 1530s against Pedro de Añasco and the invading Spanish forces, the people of Huila have never been Idle. While the Coffee Growers Strike is building strength and shows no sign of subsiding anytime soon, throughout Huila communities are gathering forces and preparing for the regional strike to be initiated on March 14, the International Day against Dams and For Rivers, Water and Life. The Communities affected by the Quimbo Dam and other extractive industries in Huila call for international direct actions in solidarity with the people of Huila with a simple message, “extractive industries out of the territory, repeal the free trade agreements and land reform now”. Just like last year when there were numerous international solidarity actions, the peoples of Huila are asking for all others in struggle for the Liberation of Mother Earth to “flood” Colombian Embassies, Consulates and the facilities of the companies Enel, Endesa, Emgesa, Emerald Energy and HydroChina.

Red Lake Pipeline Blockade. 28th feb

Enbridge Energy LP has been trespassing on Red Lake Nations Ceded lands in Minnesota by operating multiple pipelines without an easement. Nizhawendaamin Indaakiminaan, a group of grassroots Red Lake tribal members and allies, demand that the flow of oil through these pipelines be stopped. Enbridge Energy LP purchased these oil pipelines from Lakehead Pipeline, who originally built these pipelines in 1949 on Red Lake land without obtaining the permission of the Red Lake sovereign nation. According to Marty Cobenais, pipeline organizer for Indigenous Environmental Network and a tribal member of Red Lake, “Enbridge Energy LP still does not have permission to have these pipelines” on an eight acre piece of Red Lake land just southeast of Leonard, Minnesota.

Today Nizhawendaamin Indaakiminaan have occupied the land directly over these pipelines on Red Lake land. They demand that these pipelines be shut down immediately. “The goal is to stand in solidarity not only with our first Nation brothers and sisters in Canada but also to protect our Mother Earth and all of our children and future generations on this earth,” says Tito Ybarra, a member of Nizhawendaamin Indaakiminaan and an enrolled member of the Red Lake band of Ojibwe.

It is expected if the occupation proceeds for three days, the flow of oil – which may include controversial tar sands bitumen extracted from Alberta, Canada – will have to be shut down. The 72-hour countdown has started around roughly 3PM Thursday.

Supporters have been invited onto the site by tribal members to support the blockade, and currently volunteer media from the new UneditedMedia collective, TC Indymedia & [informally] OccupyMN are on site. Internet access appears stable enough for @uneditedcamera to periodically livestream as the camp takes shape for the long haul, also aided by mild weather. Also @samRichards10 and Robert DesJarlait (@r_desjarlait) are providing updates. Desjarlait tweeted "This isn't a blockade, as some have reported. There is nothing to block. It is a non-confrontational protest." However, it does have potential consequences akin to that created by a blockade.

Additionally it appears that Enbridge recently scrubbed some content pertaining to controversial "Line 67" from their website. With the dangerous Transcanada Keystone XL pipeline intend for tar sands bitumen mired in political controversy, the prospects for extending the capacity of Line 67, are relevant to the situation. (There are several public hearings in the region scheduled on Line 67 in coming weeks.)

// UPDATE 3/1/13 11:30AM : Marty Cobenais of the Indigenous Environmental Network issues statement on behalf of blockade protesters http://www.ustream.tv/uneditedcamera

Red Lake Pipeline Blockade Initiated in Northern Minnesota

28 February 2013

28 February 2013
Posted from Twin Cities Indymedia

#RLBlockade begins!

On the Red Lake sovereign nation land located in what is today known as northern Minnesota, an occupation has started at a location above the Enbridge-owned pipeline built without permission of the Red Lake Nation in 1949 (hashtag #RLblockade). Already a helicopter from Enbridge briefly landed next to the site (video), near the town of Leonard.

Supporters have been invited onto the site by tribal members to support the blockade, and currently volunteer media from the new UneditedMedia collective, TC Indymedia & [informally] OccupyMN are on site. Internet access appears stable enough for @uneditedcamera to periodically livestream as the camp takes shape for the long haul, also aided by mild weather. Also @samRichards10 and Robert DesJarlait (@r_desjarlait) are providing updates. Desjarlait tweeted “This isn’t a blockade, as some have reported. There is nothing to block. It is a non-confrontational protest.” However, it does have potential consequences akin to that created by a blockade.

Additionally it appears that Enbridge recently scrubbed some content pertaining to controversial “Line 67″ from their website. With the dangerous Transcanada Keystone XL pipeline intend for tar sands bitumen mired in political controversy, the prospects for extending the capacity of Line 67, are relevant to the situation. (There are several public hearings in the region scheduled on Line 67 in coming weeks.)

Official press release:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Deanna Lasley (218)-766-4500

Tito Ybarra (218)-209-6918

Marty Cobenais (218)-760-0284

Date: February 28th, 2013

RED LAKE PIPELINE BLOCKADE

Enbridge Energy LP has been trespassing on Red Lake Nations Ceded lands in Minnesota by operating multiple pipelines without an easement. Nizhawendaamin Indaakiminaan, a group of grassroots Red Lake tribal members and allies, demand that the flow of oil through these pipelines be stopped. Enbridge Energy LP purchased these oil pipelines from Lakehead Pipeline, who originally built these pipelines in 1949 on Red Lake land without obtaining the permission of the Red Lake sovereign nation. According to Marty Cobenais, pipeline organizer for Indigenous Environmental Network and a tribal member of Red Lake, “Enbridge Energy LP still does not have permission to have these pipelines” on an eight acre piece of Red Lake land just southeast of Leonard, Minnesota.

Today Nizhawendaamin Indaakiminaan have occupied the land directly over these pipelines on Red Lake land. They demand that these pipelines be shut down immediately. “The goal is to stand in solidarity not only with our first Nation brothers and sisters in Canada but also to protect our Mother Earth and all of our children and future generations on this earth,” says Tito Ybarra, a member of Nizhawendaamin Indaakiminaan and an enrolled member of the Red Lake band of Ojibwe.

#RLBlockade

TC Indymedia and Unedited Media members will continue to provide updates as they can. This post should also be updated as matters develop. Stay tuned!

Stop the Tennessee Pipeline. 26th Feb

Gifford Pinchot, the Pennsylvania tree-sitter that is blockading the route of the Tennessee Pipeline from logging, stays strong and gives us this update from the trees:

“Right now there is a march going on across the Delaware River to stop the pipeline. I wish I could join but I’m afraid that those trees around me wouldn’t still be standing when I returned. It’s wet and rainy and there are no chain saws that I can hear, but I know they are running somewhere and so the fight must continue. Tennessee Gas may not care about these hills and this community, the state and national government may not care, but we care and people who are being poisoned by the gas industry, forced to sell their homes and relocate or live next to the destruction wrought in the name of profits only the executives will see…”

Pinchot is still in the tree stand as tree crews cut toward him. No tree crews have showed up on the Pike County side of the clearing project yet this morning, and activists are prepared to call OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) if loggers attempt to complete the steep slope above Cummins Hill Road. …

These actions are part of a campaign opposing the Tennessee Pipeline in the Delaware River Basin. The direct action campaign is taking place after nearly two years of local political leaders and grassroots opposition in the courts, public comment, and protest. …

A Gang of Greek Activists Torch the Skouries Gold Mine – 24th Feb

Last Sunday, 50 masked people armed with Molotov cocktails stormed a gold mine in northern Greece. After torching bulldozers, trucks, and portacabins belonging to Canadian mining company El Dorado and its Greek subsidiary Hellenic Gold, the group used tree trunks to block police and firefighters from reaching the site. If all that destruction of machinery and reliance on the bountiful gifts of Mother Nature for protection sounds like the work of an incensed rattan basket of ecocampaigners, that’s because it was. In fact, it was just one of many recent moments of drama unfolding around the opening of a gold-mining site in Skouries, one of the oldest forests in Greece.

In 2003 Hellenic Gold, followed by El Dorado, obtained the rights to mine the $12 billions’ (£7.8 billions’) worth of gold and copper snoozing beneath the mountain area. The deal saw the Greek state receive just €11 millions’ (£9.5 millions’) worth of compensation for the mines, and, in addition to losing the government some money they could have probably done with, pissed off all the local residents. Besides a part of the ancient forest being uprooted, residents are also worried about the mine’s effect on tourism, agriculture, and fishing. They’re all pillars of the local economy, and they’re all at risk of being devastated by the pollution a mine tends to churn out.

Last October, in the largest protest yet against the proposed mine, riot police attacked demonstrators, broke the windows of parked cars, dragged old women to the ground, attacked a left-wing politician who was protesting outside the police department, and threw tear gas at the crowds, the canisters of which ended up burning down part of the forest. Unsurprisingly, these tactics did little to appease the demonstrators.

Since then, areas of the forest have been cordoned off with barbed wire, checkpoints are everywhere, and private security guards wearing full-face masks patrol the area harassing locals, demanding to see their identification. That last bit is illegal under Greek law, but minor issues like what’s legal and what’s not don’t seem to faze El Dorado. The company claims that the mines will create more than 1,000 new jobs, their investment billowing much needed oxygen into the gasping lungs of an ailing local and national economy.

The mine’s critics, however, claim that more jobs will be lost than gained due to the pollution and environmental destruction that comes from digging into a mountain and building a mine. And they may be right. Unfortunately for the Greco-Canadian gold panners, the numbers just don’t add up. From the potential $12 billion to be made, Greece only gets the $11 million it secured in 2003 and a mere ten percent of revenue tax. So, once the millions of tons of waste start to pile up and the local economy is devastated, Greece stands to lose far more than it will make.

Seeing as the Greek subsidiary company is owned by Giorgos Bobolas, Greece’s mini-Murdoch—a man who owns little chunks of pretty much every mainstream media company in the country—reporting on the story has been spotty at best. Bobolas’s political connections are what secured the involvement of police in such large numbers, and operations in the area over the last few months are on a scale that only tends to be bankrolled if the beneficiary holds the kind of political sway that Bobolas does.

What did get reported was that Greek Minister of Citizen Protection Nikos Dendias’s going to Skouries and demanding arrests after Sunday’s attack. This resulted in the detention of 33 local activists with little justification other than their politics. Among them was Lazaros Tsokas—a member of SYRIZA, a Greek left-wing party—who was labelled an “abettor” and arrested. Those detained accuse the police of taking DNA samples from them even though they were only charged with misdemeanours, which—again—is illegal under Greek law.

The police also attempted to detain the two people who run antigoldgreece, a blog that aims to expose Hellenic Gold’s corrupt dealings with local officials. The authorities have so far been unable to detect them, but one of the bloggers, Maria Kadoglou, told me:

“The accusations are unfounded. The atmosphere here is already polarized between those who believe that the mine will be good for the area and those of us who oppose it. We’re trying to use legal methods to stop the mining operations, but the local authorities take months to answer our petitions. When they do, the answers are irrelevant and laughable. In the meantime, the company has already set up camp and intimidates the locals with the draconian security methods it uses.”

Many foreign companies are leaving Greece, looking abroad for access to capital and more stable tax codes. But if you have the right insider connections, then tax exemptions and access to European funding schemes present an opportunity to get into Greece, exploit its shitty financial situation, and get out again significantly richer. While the news media feeds Greek families a jolly TV dinner of xenophobia, imminent financial meltdown, and dog-eat-dog party politics, the real crimes—the ones ripping everyone off—take place in the background, in places like Skouries.