Protestors look at a huge bucket-wheel excavator as they arrive for a demonstration at the open-pit coal mine near Garzweiler, western Germany Saturday Aug. 15, 2015. Several hundred environmental activists have stormed a lignite mine in western Germany to protest against the use of coal for electricity production. dpa via AP Marius Becker
August 15th, 2015
Environmental activists have stormed a lignite mine in western Germany to protest the use of coal, a major source of greenhouse gases.
The German news agency dpa reports that several hundred people from a group calling itself Ende Gelande — which loosely translates as “it’s finished now” — broke through a police line in Garzweiler, west of Cologne.
Police spokesman Anton Hamacher says officers used pepper spray to stop the crowd and are removing protesters from the site.
A spokesman for German energy company RWE says several huge bucket-wheel excavators used at the open-pit mine had to be shut down for safety reasons. Spokesman Lothar Lambertz says RWE has canceled plans to bring employees onto the site to rally in favor of coal mining.
Tarnac 9 Cleared of Terrorism Charges Over Rail Sabotage
An alleged “anarchist cell” at the centre of one of France’s most politically-charged legal sagas is finally to be tried for sabotaging high-speed train lines.
August 9th, 2015
An alleged “anarchist cell” at the centre of one of France’s most politically-charged legal sagas is finally to be tried for sabotaging high-speed train lines.
But in a major blow to police, who conducted a seven-year investigation into the group, the four will not face terror charges, judicial sources told AFP on Saturday.
The so-called Tarnac group was rounded up in high-publicised raids in November 2008 accused of sabotaging the TGV network around Paris, a powerful symbol of French national pride and technical know-how.
Thousands of passengers and more than 160 train services were delayed after steel rods were put across overhead power cables on three high-speed lines between Paris and London, Brussels and the French regions.
Then interior minister Michele Alliot-Marie branded the group a dangerous “ultra-left anarchist movement”, but the group — who lived in a rural commune in central France — and many on the French left, accused President Nicolas Sarkozy’s right-wing government of trying to frame them.
But in a major blow to the authorities, anti-terrorist judge Jeanne Duye came down against their demands in her long-awaited judgement Friday to try them for terror offences.
– ‘The Coming Insurrection’ –
She did, however, send the group’s reclusive leader Julien Coupat, his wife Yildune Levy and two others for trial on conspiracy charges, sources said.
The group’s lawyers called the decision a “total repudiation” of the allegations against the four.
“After nearly seven years of trying to pin the blame on them, we finally have a courageous judicial decision. It is a total repudiation of the prosecution case,” Marie Dose and William Bourdon said.
“From the beginning, our clients were considered and treated like terrorists. Finally they have realised that it doesn’t stick,” they added.
“Our arrest was purely political and was based on false testimony from the police,” said another of the accused, Mathieu Burnel. “All this will fall apart at our trial.”
The case centred on the charismatic figure of Coupat, 40, a far-left intellectual from a wealthy family who had gathered a group of 20 followers around him in a remote village in the Correze region of central France.
Relying heavily on passages from a 2007 book attributed to Coupat, “The Coming Insurrection”, investigators claimed the group — the “invisible committee of the imaginary party” — had tipped over from radical anarchist politics into terrorism.
The book discussed sabotage and other ways to “finalise the fall of the state”, and mentioned the high-speed TGV network as an “easy” target.
But Coupat, who refused to confirm he was its author, said it was “risible that terrorism charges could be brought on the basis on a book on public sale.”
Coupat and Levy, 31, admitted being close to TGV lines east of Paris when an iron bar was placed on the track on the night of November 7, 2008, but denied putting it there.
Coupet spent more than six months in jail as police tried to build a case against him, with Levy also locked up for more than two months.
The prosecution has five days to appeal the judge’s decision.
from AFP
Addition: their arrest was in part down to Mark Kennedy, the British undercover cop embedded in Earth First! and the wider ecological direct action movement for over 7 years. More info
Germany: Last Living Barricade in Hambach Forest Evicted; Freedom for Jus!
Germany: Last Living Barricade in Hambach Forest Evicted
July 28th, 2015
On the 22nd of July the tower – to this date the only remaining living barricade – got evicted. The tower blocked an important access way to the Hambach Forest [previously on S!N]and its occupation.
During the 14 hours of the eviction, four activists were arrested of who three have been released, while one is in detention awaiting trial in the JVA (jail) in Köln-Ossendorf. Jus is accused of resisting the eviction. The cops are trying to justify the detention by claiming that Jus doesn‘t have a legal address and allegedly “no social obligations in Germany”. Therefore, they think that it’s likely that he will “stay away from trial”.
Innu Blockade Hydro-Quebec Construction in Northern Quebec
July 17th, 2015
Quebec’s Minister of Aboriginal Affairs is urging members of Natashquan’s Innu Community to stop their blockade near the La Romaine construction site.
The group of protesters set up a barricade Thursday near Havre-Saint-Pierre in eastern Quebec, about 200 kilometres east of Sept-Îles.
It says Hydro-Québec is not respecting an agreement it signed with the community before work on the hydroelectric project began.
The protesters have been letting workers out of the site, but they say they will not let anyone in until Premier Philippe Couillard speaks with them in person on the North Shore.
Rodrigue Wapistan, the chief of Natashquan’s Innu band council, said Hydro-Québec has flooded basins near the worksite without the community’s consent.
He said that will drown more than half the trees in the area.
“They have completely trampled on our rights. It is something that is unacceptable in my book — all while creating a situation that is catastrophic for our next generation,” Wapistan said.
Aboriginal Affairs Minister Geoff Kelley said he recognises there are differences between the Innu community and Hydro-Québec, but said protesters should try to resolve its issues through negotiations.
map thanks to Warrior Publications
from CBC News
Meuse, France: Nuclear Waste Landfill Project Sabotaged
July 14th, 2015
anonymous report / Contra Info
Not far from Bure, an analysis site of ANDRA was attacked by a few determined night owls.
At Bure, in Meuse, power is trying by all its means to have accepted a nuclear waste landfill project 500 meters underground.
Despite that the project has not yet officially started, that of the nuclear waste not arriving before 2025, the ANDRA installations (the National Agency for Radioactive Waste Management, in charge of the landfill project) are already swarming in the area.
One night around the 25th June, a construction site containing multiple electrical installations and a well, to analyse the condition of the rock and water table, was devastated.
The well was then forcibly blocked up with concrete, and all the cabinets were fractured and destroyed by the rage of those who don’t want to wait for the exhaustion of legal resorts to attack this project.
Attack the infrastructure of power wherever they are, in Meuse like elsewhere.
Against Cigéo and its world, resistance and sabotage!
Germany: Hambach Forest Defenders Occupy Four Bucket Wheel Excavators for July 4th Climate Games
July 14th, 2015
At the Climate Games in Amsterdam today countless playgroups make their moves. Team Blue (the police) and the team of industrial companies play their usual strategy: In Amsterdam they want to expand the West port for coal transshipment and in the resident companies they strongly contribute to the fact that the world’s climate passes several points of no return. Thereafter, the further warming would get unpredictable and irreversible. Our teams hamper them, as far as possible without being beaten by Team Blue. Their game objective is to enable a smooth flow of the work of destruction.
This year, a team in the Rhineland has stumbled over the fact that the playing field is not limited to the Amsterdam West Port. While it is folded by all sorts of boundaries together, but we can unfold and make our move at any time, anywhere – after all, the other side also works as good as anywhere in the world.
Our “new” expansion pack is the Rhenish lignite mining area between Aachen and Cologne. This industrial-scale clockwork (consisting of five power stations, three mines, a network of coal railways, tens of kilometers of conveyor belts and pipelines for pumped off groundwater) is the largest single source of greenhouse gas emissions in Europe – and in many places it is damn easy to attack for sabotage! A good man on this game board is the occupation of excavators: In the largest machines in the world, that [destroy] landscape around the clock here and produce coal, a lot of capital is at work – until we stop them! On the occasion of the last occupation, a spokesperson of the group publicly confirmed, that RWE can not stop actions of this kind in the future just because of the huge dimensions of the open pits.
The motto of this year’s Climate Games is “BIGGER, BOLDER, STRONGER”, and so we want to do things in style. Therefore, this time since 2:55 h we are occupying four excavators : The first as usual at the rim of the open pit, where now it can not swallow any more landscape for a while. The three other occupied excavators are at the bottom of the open pit: This means that in the Hambach mine, for the first time in the Rhenish mining area, among other things, the two coal diggers themselves are occupied! At least one person did not reach her/his destination and now supports others by bugging her/his warders of Team Blue. He/she will certainly not be alone a very long time …
The game goes on – also in the Rhenish lignite mining area. From august 14 to 16, our friends of the Campaign “Ende Gelände“ (“end of the area”) mobilize to a mass blockade action in the Rhineland, and we are very keen to see what is about to happen around there. In october, a Skills Sharing Camp will be held again on the occupated meadow at the rim of the Hambacher Forst, which is acutely threatened by deforestation. And in December delegations of the United Nations gather in Paris on the question of how to talk climate change away, without changing anything in their exploitative economic systems – and, of course, many other teams are also there to play to unmask the lies. Make Your Move!
If you have got time and desire, we would be glad if you look in on the meadow to support the occupations and retain the ticker track of when solidarity is needed outside the police station!
Here you will find pictures of the most recent similar occupation of a single excavator. (Click in thumbnails to enlarge.) Pictures of the current action will follow here.
Please spread out the Action Statement (above) and also the press release and communication.
Dear Sir or Madam!
We hereby send you a press release entitled “Four bucket wheel excavators occupied in open-cast mine Hambach”.
You can reach us at the following phone number:
+49 1573 7181446
You are also invited to visit us for more information or sound bites at the meadow occupation in Morschenich. On our blog
www.hambacherforst.blogsport.de
incoming news are switched in a live ticker.
Best Regards,
Kathrin Schneider
Tino Sturm
Four bucket wheel excavators occupied in open-cast mine Hambach
Düren – Last night 2:55h climate activists started again to occupie bucket wheel excavators of RWE. This time it were four excavators in the open pit mine near Hambach. Two of them are located on the bottom of the mine in depth 450 m, where the coal layer is. For the first time, the declared aim is to stop coal production. With the action they are protesting against the mining and burning (electricity production) of lignite and this way they offer direct resistance.
As with previous excavators occupations, the activists climbed up the stairs, ladders and walkways on the machines to the top.
At 70 meters high they installed themselves, with tarpaulins for sun protection, and they rolled out banners on which they demanded once more an immediate withdrawal from coal mining and a clearing stop in the Hambach forest. “It has long been known that the habitability of the planet is at stake. Is just as clear that there are alternatives to inefficient electricity production out of coal,” said an activist who wants to remain anonymous, and added: “An economic system that is dependent on constant growth, cannot do anything else than exploit the environment at the expense of us all.”
The action statement puts these occupations in the context of the “Climate Games” in Amsterdam. There, the West Port will be expanded, which is an important coal trading center. Via Amsterdam among others coal from South America is transported to the Rhineland to be incinerated together with lignite.
The action ended at 9 pm, July 4th, when the last arrested activists left the police station.
Panama: Indigenous Activists Block Entry to the Barro Blanco Hydro Dam
Ngäbe activists standing in front of the Barro Blanco dam site
Ngäbe activists standing in front of the Barro Blanco dam site (Photo Jennifer Kennedy)
July 14th, 2015
A 30-strong splinter group of Ngäbe from the M10 resistance movement has blocked the entrance to the Barro Blanco hydroelectric dam in western Panama, preventing workers from entering the site. The 15 year struggle of the Tabasará river communities to protect their livelihoods, their culture, and their ancestral heritage now appears to be entering a tense new phase. With negotiations exhausted and the dam 95% complete, M10 has an issued an ultimatum for the government to cancel the project by Monday, June 15, 2015. It is unclear how the government will respond.
“Being Ngäbe-Buglé cultural patrimony,” said Clementina Pérez, part of the group camped at Barro Blanco’s gates. “Our river, our mother earth, our ecology, our existence, we are here to make known to the national and international community that this patrimony belongs to us and to the church of Mama Tata. With the conservation of peace, liberty, justice and unity, liberation and social justice… [we ask] the President of the Republic the cancellation and removal of the dam from our communities, our river and our mother earth, which belong to us as original people of the Americas…”Funded by European banks – the German Investment Corporation (DEG) and the Dutch Development Bank (FMO) – the dam is set to inundate a string of Ngäbe and campesino communities, all of whom have voiced their objections from the outset. The flood will destroy ancestral petroglyphs, fertile agricultural grounds, and Mama Tata cultural centres, including a unique school where the emerging written script of the Ngäbere language is being developed and disseminated. The dam will significantly impact the river’s marine life, wiping out migratory fish species which many communities – both up and down stream – rely upon for essential protein. None of the Tabasará communities have provided their free, informed and prior consent to the dam, a fact recently confirmed by the FMO’s own independent complaints mechanism (ICM).
“Lenders should have sought greater clarity on whether there was consent to the project from the appropriate indigenous authorities prior to project approval,” said an ICM report, published on May 29, 2015. “[The plan] contains no provision on land acquisition and resettlement and nothing on biodiversity and natural resources management. Neither does it contain any reference to issues related to cultural heritage…”
The report is the latest in a series of professional analyses that pour a thick layer of scorn over the dam project’s owner, Generadora del Istmo (GENISA). Demonstrably unlawful, GENISA has been condemned by numerous independent investigators, the United Nations, several international NGOs, and Panama’s own environmental agency, ANAM, who found a raft of flaws and short-comings in their environmental impact assessment.
But despite failing their own due diligence, the banks appear to have shrugged off the ICM report with an insipid call for ‘constructive dialogue’ and ‘a solution for a way forward’. In February this year, the FMO chose to threaten the government of Panama after building work was temporarily suspended on the recommendation of ANAM. Writing to the Vice President, the FMO warned that the suspension “May weigh upon future investment decisions, and harm the flow of long-term investments into Panama.”
The government seems to have taken this threat to heart. Panama’s president, Juan Carlos Varela, who was elected to office in 2014, flip-flopped on Barro Blanco before finally falling in line. Last week, while proffering flimsy reassurances about having found a human rights solution, his government left the negotiating table and signaled an end to the suspension of works. M10 claims the work never stopped and has been continuing clandestinely. They are now mobilising for action.
Clementina Perez (Photo: Oscar Sogandares)
“If this situation is not resolved,” said Clementina Pérez, “We will go to the Panamerican highway to ask together, at a national level, the cancellation of Barro Blanco…”
Rising with stark grey walls above the denuded banks of the Tabasará, Barro Blanco has become a symbol of the previous administration, its fundamental violence and contempt for the rule of law. The former President Ricardo Martinelli – now on the run in the United States and facing a corruption probe back home – provoked no less than four major uprisings as he grasped for land and resources in Panama’s indigenous territories. Heavy-handed repression resulted in the deaths of several protesters and bystanders, including an unarmed teenage boy who was shot in the face by police. Barro Blanco is the visible legacy of a proudly thuggish President who serially abused Panama’s Indigenous Peoples and plundered the country at will. Thus far, Varela has been keen to strike a more decent and humane tone. How he now handles the crisis evolving on the banks of the Tabasará River will be a demonstration of his sincerity, or lack of.
by IC Magazine
Plane Stupid activists on Heathrow runway in climate protest
13th July 2015
12 climate change activists from anti airport expansion direct action group, Plane Stupid, got onto the north runway at 03:30am this morning at Heathrow Airport by cutting through a fence, in a peaceful protest against proposals to build a new runway.
The protesters say that going ahead with the recent Airports Commission recommendation that a third runway should be built at Heathrow will make it impossible for the UK to meet its climate change targets.
The skies above Heathrow are already the busiest in the world, and demand for flights is driven by air fares that are kept artificially low by generous tax exemptions. The activists say that if the aviation industry paid more of its environmental costs then there would be no pressing need for a new runway. Nine of the top ten most popular routes out of Heathrow are short haul, including destinations such as Paris, Manchester and Edinburgh which all have existing rail alternatives.
Ella Gilbert, an activist from Plane Stupid who is on the runway, said:
“Building more runways goes against everything we’re being told by scientists and experts on climate change. This would massively increase carbon emissions exactly when we need to massively reduce them, that’s why we’re here.We want to say sorry to anyone whose day we’ve ruined, and we’re not saying that everybody who wants to fly is a bad person. It’s those who fly frequently and unnecessarily who are driving the need for expansion, and we cannot keep ignoring the terrifying consequences of flying like there’s no tomorrow.
No ifs, no buts, no third runway. And we mean it.”
Updates – https://twitter.com/planestupid
BUILD GARDENS, NOT PRISONS: International Reclaim the Fields Action Camp 2015
International Reclaim the Fields Action Camp 2015
International Reclaim the Fields Action Camp 2015
When: Friday 28th August (From 6pm) – Wednesday 2nd September 2015
Where: Dudleston Community Protection Camp, Shropshire (near the Wales/England Border).
About:
Reclaim the Fields UK (RTF) was born in 2011, as a star in a wider constellation of food and land struggles that reaches around the globe. Since 2011, camps and other RTF gatherings have helped support local communities in struggle, share skills, develop networks, and strengthen the resistance to exploitation, in Bristol, west London, Gloucestershire, Nottingham and Fife, among other locations.
Every two years there is also an international camp, where people from around Europe and beyond meet together to support a local struggle (standing against exploitative gold mining in Romania, and open cast coal mining in Germany, are some examples). People at these camps have shared their local stories and grown their ideas about resistance and reclaiming our food system, beyond national borders. This year, an international gathering will be held in the UK, in Dudleston, Shropshire, on the Welsh/English border.
The aims of the camp are:
• To support local communities in the west and north west of England, and the north of Wales with their struggles against fracking
• To increase participation in Reclaim the Fields
• To demonstrate visible, active opposition to prison construction
• To support Dudleston Community Protection Camp build a garden and infrastructure to become more self-reliant
• To demonstrate the interconnection between these struggles
• To inspire and radicalise everyone involved
What is happening:
• Two days of Action – Tuesday 1st & Wednesday 2nd September – demonstrations & actions against companies involved in the construction of the North Wales prison, as well as local fracking-related targets.
• Workshops & Skillshares – Over the bank holiday weekend there will be abundant opportunities to learn, share, discuss and connect with other people.
• Building & Growing on the site – Be part of installing gardens & low impact infrastructure at the community protection camp. Learn about permaculture, agroecology, forest gardening, mushroom growing, pallet construction, compost toilet making, off-grid electrics and more.
Why:
• This camp has been organised to support the local community in Dudleston to resist fracking in their area (as well as working with other local anti-fracking groups & protection camps in the North West who have been resisting extreme energy developments for a number of years). To find out more about their struggle visit: http://frack-off.org.uk/blockade/dudleston-community-protection-camp/
• It has also been organised to give attention to the North Wales Prison Project that is being constructed. This will be Europe’s second largest prison holding 2100 prisoners and the first of a number of ‘mega prisons’ that the UK Government wish to build. Click here for more information about the prison, why we are against it & links to articles about the prison industrial complex in the UK
How to get involved:
Click on the links below to find more practical information about the camp and how to get involved:
- Workshops & programme – what’s happening & how to contribute
- Planning Actions
- Directions & public transport information
- What to bring
- Safer Spaces Agreement
- Accessibility of the site
- Food & donations
This is a DIY/DIT(ogether)* camp and everyone is needed to get stuck in to make it happen. People are needed to:
• Support with publicity before the event – sharing the gathering online, putting posters up, encouraging your local group to get involved. People are also needed to help design the programme, respond to emails & plan facilitation.
• Helping with site set up & building infrastructure (planning this in advance & being on site a few days before the gathering)
• Signing up to a shift over the weekend to help with cooking, site set up & safety, being on the welcome tent & so forth
• Supporting local groups to organise actions
If you can help with any of these tasks please email info@reclaimthefields.noflag.org.uk
Spread the word:
• Poster design here: reclaimthefields.noflag.org.uk/wp-conte…
• Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/560637597407933/
Reclaim the Fields International Gathering 2015
Reclaim the Fields
About the camp
Reclaim the Fields (or RTF) UK was born in 2011, as a star in a wider constellation of food and land struggles that reaches around the globe. Since 2011, camps and other RTF gatherings have helped support local communities in struggle, share skills, developed networks, and strengthened the resistance to exploitation, in Bristol, west London, Gloucestershire, Nottingham and Fife among other locations.
Every two years there is also an international camp, where people from around Europe and beyond meet together to support a local struggle (from gold mining in Romania to open cast coal mining in Germany, for example). People share share stories and ideas about resistance and reclaiming our food system beyond national borders. This year, an international gathering will be held in the UK, in Dudleston, Shropshire, on the Welsh/English border.
The aims of the camp are:
- To support local communities in the west and north west of England, and the north of Wales with their struggles against fracking
- To increase participation in Reclaim the Fields
- To demonstrate visible, active opposition to prison construction
- To support Dudleston Community Protection Camp build a garden and infrastructure to become more self-reliant
- To demonstrate the interconnection between these struggles
- To inspire and radicalise everyone involved
What’s taking place?
- Two days of Action – Tuesday 1st & Wednesday 2nd September – demonstrations & actions against companies involved in the construction of the North Wales prison, as well as local fracking-related targets.
- Workshops & Skillshares – Over the bank holiday weekend there will be abundant opportunities to learn, share, discuss and connect with other people.
- Building & Growing on the site – Be part of installing gardens & low impact infrastructure at the community protection camp. Learn about permaculture, agroecology, forest gardening, mushroom growing, pallet construction, compost toilet making, off-grid electrics and more.
Why this camp? Why now?
- This camp has been organised to support the local community in Dudleston to resist fracking in their area (as well as working with other local anti-fracking groups & protection camps in the North West who have been resisting extreme energy developments for a number of years). To find out more about their struggle visit: http://frack-off.org.uk/blockade/dudleston-community-protection-camp/
- It has also been organised to give attention to the North Wales Prison Project that is being constructed. This will be Europe’s second largest prison holding 2100 prisoners and the first of a number of ‘mega prisons’ that the UK Government wish to build. Click here for more information about the prison, why we are against it & links to articles about the prison industrial complex in the UK
Practical Information about the Camp
Click on the links below to find more practical information about the camp and how to get involved:
- Workshops & programme – what’s happening & how to contribute
- Planning Actions
- Directions & public transport information
- What to bring
- Safer Spaces Agreement
- Accessibility of the site
- Food & donations
Getting involved
This is a DIY camp and everyone is needed to get stuck in to make it happen. People are needed to:
- Support with publicity before the event – sharing the gathering online, putting posters up, encouraging your local group to get involved. People are also needed to help design the programme, respond to emails & plan facilitation.
- Helping with site set up & building infrastructure (planning this in advance & being on site a few days before the gathering)
- Signing up to a shift over the weekend to help with cooking, site set up & safety, being on the welcome tent & so forth
- Supporting local groups to organise actions
If you can help with any of these tasks please email info@reclaimthefields.noflag.org.uk
Who are Reclaim the Fields?
- Click here to read a history of Reclaim the Fields in Europe
- Click here to read a history of Reclaim the Fields in the UK
We are a group of peasants, landless and prospective peasants, as well as people who are taking back control over food production.
We understand “peasants” as people who produce food on a small scale, for themselves or for the community, possibly selling a part of it. This also includes agricultural workers.
We support and encourage people to stay on the land and go back to the countryside. We promote food sovereignty (as defined in the Nyéléni declaration) and peasant agriculture, particularly among young people and urban dwellers, as well as alternative ways of life. In Europe, the concept ‘food sovereignty’ is not very common and could be clarified with ideas such as ‘food autonomy’ and control over food systems by inclusive communities, not only nations or states. We are determined to create alternatives to capitalism through cooperative, collective, autonomous, real-needs-oriented, small-scale production and initiatives. We are putting theory into practice and linking local practical action with global political struggles.
In order to achieve this, we participate in local actions through activist groups and cooperate with existing initiatives. This is why we choose not to be a homogeneous group, but to open up to the diversity of actors fighting the capitalist food production model. We address the issues of access to land, collective farming, seed rights and seed exchange. We strengthen the impact of our work through cooperation with activists who focus on different tasks but who share the same vision.
Nevertheless, our openness has some limits. We are determined to take back control over our lives and refuse any form of authoritarianism and hierarchy. We respect nature and living beings, but will neither accept nor tolerate any form of discrimination, be it based on race, religion, gender, nationality, sexual orientation or social status. We refuse and will actively oppose every form of exploitation of other people. With the same force and energy, we act with kindness and conviviality, making solidarity a concrete practice of our daily life.
We support the struggles and visions of la Via Campesina, and work to strengthen them. We wish to share the knowledge and the experience from years of struggle and peasant life and enrich it with the perspectives and strength of those of us who are not peasants, or not yet peasants. We all suffer the consequences of the same policies, and are all part of the same fight.