Category: Squatting / Free Spaces / Protest Sites

Update in tunnel boring machine saga — community resistance strong

4.8.12 update: 150 Gar­dai to move TBM 5km; Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil begin cov­er-up

4.8.12 update: 150 Gar­dai to move TBM 5km; Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil begin cov­er-up

As those fol­low­ing the sto­ry may have heard by now, the TBM was moved yes­ter­day.

Aware that some­thing was going to hap­pen, cam­paign­ers spent the night at Gle­n­amoy sleep­ing in cars and vans, aware that some­thing was going to hap­pen. Two slept under the bridge. Local res­i­dents near­by told us how the road had sunk 4 inch­es in the last few days, while oth­er parts were ruined from the excep­tion­al traf­fic. We’re sure the Coun­cil will not be so quick to do those repairs…

At 4am, gar­dai began to swarm into the area. 150 IRMS secu­ri­ty also marched up the road. We ran up, but the sheer weight of num­bers kept us back. Ten man­aged to get into the field on the side where the truck was list­ing. Sud­den­ly, 40 IRMS came in and set up a fence. Dig­gers and trucks of stone came in and for the next ten hours, Shell filled in ditch­es and built up a road around the col­lapsed bank. The crane plan had been aban­doned and its seemed the field own­er had giv­en per­mis­sion. Thus, with­out warn­ing the cross­roads were closed to all traf­fic, caus­ing chaos yet again. Shell only lat­er offered its usu­al bland, ‘sor­ry for the incon­ve­nience’ shite.

Rumour is it that the crane stopped the pre­vi­ous day sim­ply turned around and went home after being stopped. And that Shell were des­per­ate­ly try­ing to find a replace­ment – offer­ing 15K for a crane dri­ver alone to do the job, and anoth­er 50K for a crane itself.

Those in the field, hav­ing been giv­en direc­tions to go there when the road was being cleared were told they were being detained there and phys­i­cal­ly pre­vent­ed from leav­ing by gar­dai. After watch­ing the spec­ta­cle close up for a cou­ple of hours, they made their way through oth­er fields to get out.

Mau­ra Har­ring­ton’s van was stopped at Bel­linaboy by Gar­dai and had its back win­dow delib­er­ate­ly smashed by Sgt Der­mot But­ler, the well known bul­ly of the pub­lic order unit – his for­mer part­ner now has a restrain­ing order against them, but in the dubi­ous ranks of May­o’s police, that prob­a­bly puts him in line for a pro­mo­tion. Mau­ra was arrest­ed and charged, though sub­se­quent­ly released and the van returned in what was a bla­tant occa­sion of pre­ven­ta­tive deten­tion.

Anoth­er cam­paign­er also had their car impound­ed; while a third per­son was told their van could only leave the area if a gar­da drove it back to camp. There was quite a pat­tern were known pro­test­ers were being denied right of pas­sage along the road, while oth­er were stopped out­right or repeat­ed­ly harassed and searched. Those walk­ing had their own per­son­al gar­da escort, and every fifty meters from Gle­n­amoy to Bel­linaboy there was at least one gar­da stand­ing – some­one count­ed them and the total there alone came to 80. We heard of check­points set up as far as Ban­gor Erris.

But­ler con­tin­ued his cus­tom­ary inci­vil­i­ty when a local res­i­dent went to Bel­mul­let gar­da sta­tion to have his tax return signed – But­ler opened the hatch and said I’m not sign­ing that for the likes of you, before slam­ming the hatch shut.

Bet­ty Schults, a well known local cam­paign­er, and oth­ers were fol­low­ing the trail of who had giv­en per­mis­sion for the TBM trucks to go up to Gle­n­amoy in the first place. Hav­ing been told that doc­u­men­ta­tion was at the Castle­bar head­quar­ters of Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil, she made the 100km round trip only to receive a phonecall telling her that it was miss­ing from the file just as she arrived.

At 2pm we had news the TBM was mov­ing so we head­ed down to Ballyscel­ly junc­tion to wit­ness it. Vehi­cles were backed up all along it, one local res­i­dent unable to get to her elder­ly moth­er who was at home alone. As usu­al, gar­dai were hap­py to block the road entire­ly for Shell, caus­ing mas­sive dis­rup­tion as even the back­roads were closed off this time.

The twitch­i­ness of An Gar­dai Síochá­na was appar­ent. They were des­per­ate to see this go off with­out any hitch­es. As the tun­nel bor­ing machine came up the road, 38 gar­dai walk­ing in front of the truck alone. IRMS secu­ri­ty were also float­ing around. With such num­bers there was lit­tle that could be done. Punc­tu­at­ing all this was a thun­der­storm right over­head.

The sub­ject of such mas­sive oper­a­tion, which under­lines its impor­tance, it was clear that the TBM would be deliv­ered back to Bel­linaboy. Yet for five days it was stuck at Gle­n­amoy, a nation­al news sto­ry and galviniz­ing the sur­round­ing com­mu­ni­ties. Shell was at the cen­tre of the embar­rass­ment; An Gar­dai Síochá­na left red-faced, their abil­i­ty to respond reduced to sim­ple thug­gery; and the bla­tant crim­i­nal col­lu­sion of Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil becom­ing appar­ent once more. Iron­ic, as Fri­day was elven years to the very day that Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil signed their first agree­ment with Shell.

As we sat in a local pub, swap­ping sto­ries of the week, it was clear that there is hard­ly a local who does not believe Mayo coun­ty man­ag­er, Peter Hynes, has not sold his soul to Shell. The ques­tion is for how much. Cer­tain­ly he does not have the trust or respect of any­one up here.

The bat­tle is not over yet. The TBM has not got to where it is meant to, Aghoos. Before that can hap­pen, the road at Ballyscel­ly junc­tion has to be built up so it can turn. More pieces of it have still to arrive. Aghoos is not yet ready for it either, being plagued by flood­ing, while the weight of the TBM is not going to do the frac­tur­ing ground at Bel­linaboy refin­ery any good either.

Shell have shot them­selves in the foot sev­er­al times; not only a huge embar­rass­ment that made nation­al head­lines, it showed the ongo­ing strength of resis­tance com­ing from the com­mu­ni­ty here. As we sat in the pub last night we could hear the buzz of a peo­ple fight­ing back.

As ever the camp is open to all who want to come and sup­port, though you might have to mind the moat and draw­bridge…

Car­toon in Irish News on the sto­ry — http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v247/notanumber/irishnews030812-p16.jpg

———

2nd August 2012

Day three and things are still look­ing bad for Shell. Pro­test­ers and the Irish bog have the upper hand, with Shell receiv­ing flack and Gar­dai hum­bled as crane sent pack­ing.

Day Three in the TBM House
Some­where in Erris idiots at are work…

Most of the day was qui­et around the TBM itself. Fenc­ing was put up and IMRS formed a cor­don around it. We are able to walk up and around the TBM — in places you can reach out and touch the Fion­nu­ala. The turn­ing wheels have caused the tar­mac to scrunch up in quite a few places. The front of the truck has pushed the ditch out two foot, the back axles sit­ting in a pool of water and looks like one of them has buck­led. The road is pret­ty bad­ly dam­aged and it is easy to see why the dri­ver was not going any fur­ther. The load on the back is also push­ing the frame of the trail­er down onto the tires.

Most work was on fin­ish­ing bypass­es around the TBM so vehi­cles could get in and out of Ross­port. Cars are able to get to Ross­port, but the direct route is still not pos­si­ble, mean­ing the road through Gle­n­amoy vil­lage is still being used, caus­ing dam­age to locals gar­dens and the road sur­face is being destroyed by turn­ing lor­ries from Bar­retts & Lennons. Local coun­cil­lors moaned about it and asked for reports from Shel­l’s pet Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil.

How­ev­er, one of the Ross­port 5 and Gold­man Prize win­ner Willie Cor­duff did some­thing about the haulage trucks com­ing through the vil­lage, stand­ing in front of one truck com­ing through. Unfor­tu­nate­ly arrest­ed, but released with­out charge two hours lat­er.

Locals and campers mon­i­tored the sit­u­a­tion all day, every­one in good spir­its enjoy­ing the sight. Even though it under­lines Shel­l’s idio­cy in attempt­ing the whole project in the first place, it is awe­some to see the unbe­lie­ve­able.

Else­where, the two arrest­ed for the Cross­moli­na lock-on plead­ed guilty in Bal­li­na court. One was fined 200 euros on the spot and the oth­er had their pun­ish­ment deferred to the Sep­tem­ber hear­ing in Bel­mul­let, when many oth­ers arrest­ed on pre­vi­ous protests are also hav­ing their cas­es heard.

Gar­dai were around all day, but in small num­bers. Amaz­ing giv­en how much was spent on escort­ing it a day or so ago that they’ve pret­ty much aban­doned it now. Def­i­nite­ly a ques­tion or two to be asked there about a colos­sal waste of mon­ey. Maybe they were get­ting the bol­lock­ing they tru­ely deserved as the trucks could only have been on that road with their per­mis­sion.

Some peo­ple did a bit of dig­ging and it turns out that not only was there a major fail­ure of judge­ment among expe­ri­enced peo­ple who should have known bet­ter about tak­ing a heavy load up a rur­al road through bog­land, but it may also been ille­gal. Accord­ing to the road traf­fic man­ag­ment plan, the approved haulage route ends at the Ballyscal­ly junc­tion to Aghoos. Peter Hynes, the Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil Direc­tor of Ser­vices / Coun­ty Man­ag­er who always bends over back­wards to help Shell, has said that Shell had all the nec­es­sary per­mis­sions, which, to put it polite­ly is dis­as­sem­bling some­what. Did he real­ly give per­mis­sion for Shell to go up to Gle­n­amoy? Maybe peo­ple should ring his office ((094) 90 24444) and ask to see the doc­u­ments. Heads need to roll on this one.

In answer to some­one’s ques­tion, the trucks came the des­ig­nat­ed route, on the main route past Bal­linaboy to the Aghoos com­pound. They failed to make the turn­ing at the Ballyscal­ly turn­ing where the ani­mal labs are, so con­tin­ued up to Gle­n­amoy / Ross­port junc­tion — to turn around and try from the oth­er direc­tion.

But back to the direct action bit. In the evening reports start­ed com­ing in (and this is the beau­ty of a com­mu­ni­ty wide cam­paign — eyes and ears every­where) that a crane was on its way. Shell were say­ing that the TBM was going to be moved. Mmmh, a lot of peo­ple thought oth­er­wise. Infact, some turned thought into action. Mau­ra was there with her car across the road at Bel­linaboy bridge, hold­ing it up. More sped down there to give sup­port, and before you could blink anoth­er pro­test­er was up on the crane.

The whole road was blocked. Shell work­ers from the refin­ery had to go the long way around, grid­lock­ing the road out from Pul­lath­omas — and, we are told, made to wait by some local res­i­dents none too hap­py at the sight of them.

Mau­ra’s car was pulled out of the way, but the gar­dai end­ed up crash­ing it into the side of the bridge, caus­ing them to aban­don the effort. After a while it was back in place, mak­ing sure the cher­ryp­ick­er to take down the per­son on the crane could not reach them.

Sev­er­al hours lat­er some­where between six­ty and hun­dred peo­ple came to enjoy the sight of the the crane stuck in the mid­dle of the road. While some might moan about the block­age or emer­gency ser­vices, the fact remains that these are the roads of the local com­mu­ni­ty and it is they who are mak­ing the deci­sions that Shell needs to be kicked out — and tak­ing action. This was not a local com­mu­ni­ty annoyed by the road being blocked, but hap­py to see Shell tak­ing anoth­er poke in the eye.

Gar­dai arrived — then called for back­up as they realised they were strug­gling to con­tain the sit­u­a­tion. You could see they were loos­ing it, drag­ging out var­i­ous old faces includ­ing Brett and oth­er faces famil­iar from baton charges sev­er­al years ago; some even thought push­ing young girls around with their heavy hands was appro­pri­ate. They were met with fury.

There was a stand-off, with the gar­dai iso­lat­ing Mau­ra and the crane. More scuf­fles. The cher­ryp­ick­er was tem­porar­i­ly occu­pied with the Gar­dai assault­ing a num­ber of peo­ple to get it back, includ­ing pres­sure-point­ing — the usu­al over-reac­tion from the likes of But­ler and Gill from the Pub­lic Order Cut­ting Team. At least one gar­dai had his pep­per spray out and Brett was try­ing to use his torch as a baton.

For pic­tures, see here http://shelltosea.com/content/pictures-last-night-blocking-tbm-crane

Mau­ra’s car was toed out of the way once more and the per­son from the crane arrest­ed — and giv­en a cheer. The cher­ryp­ick­er itself start­ed list­ing dan­ger­ous­ly as one of its tires deflat­ed.

Then as we read­ied our­selves for the crane to come through, it reversed and dis­ap­peared into the night, last seen some­where beyond Ban­gor… They gar­dai had lost the stom­ach for the fight, it seems. You could hear the hap­pi­ness in the voic­es of the peo­ple all around us. Eleven years on in this long fight, vic­to­ries were still pos­si­ble in the face of Shel­l’s inva­sion. This part of Erris remains free in the hearts of the peo­ple there.

After­wards, peo­ple went back up to Gle­n­amoy to keep vig­il there. Peo­ple con­tin­ue to arrive at camp. This is not over yet.

For a good video of some of the resis­tance of pre­vi­ous nights see http://shelltosea.com/content/youtube-videos-shell-sea-resists-shells-attempt-move-tunnel-boring-machine-rossport-31–7‑201

Some oth­er reports
http://shelltosea.com/content/councillor-appalled-over-shell-truck-blockage-glenamoy
http://shelltosea.com/content/rossport-farmer-arrested-jack-knifed-lorry

Shell humbled as protestors disrupt arrival of the Tunnel Boring Machine

31st July 2012

31st July 2012

The last twelve plus hours saw pro­test­ers in Erris take on one of the largest Gar­dai oper­a­tions Ire­land has seen in some time – and ran rings around it. The mam­moth oper­a­tion saw hun­dreds of Gar­dai and IRMS secu­ri­ty try­ing to escort the tun­nel bor­ing machine [TBM] to Aghoos. Yet Shell to Sea cam­paign­ers man­aged, in sep­a­rate inci­dents, two lock-ons and used a car to block­ade a bridge on the route of the TBM.

Fol­low­ing on from Sun­day night’s dis­cov­ery of the arrival of the TBM into Dublin Port (see http://www.indymedia.ie/article/102198 & http://www.wsm.ie/c/garda-deployed-protect-shells-machine-people-ireland ), pro­test­ers from Sli­go met it at its overnight rest­ing place, while oth­ers mobilised with peo­ple com­ing from across the coun­try. We were told that there would be an armed response unit and oth­er pieces would be join­ing the con­vey, hav­ing come in from Killy­begs and Belfast.

Despite short notice a call out for a protest at Bal­li­na 9pm, Mon­day night, was quick­ly picked up and spread. Local radio sta­tions spread the word, and the six­ty or so pro­test­ers were joined by many from Bal­li­na and sur­round­ing areas – some to see the TBM itself, but often offer­ing sup­port as well.

Ban­ners were held call­ing for an end to Shel­l’s occu­py­ing army, point­ing out that not only were Shell col­o­niz­ing Erris for its own needs, not and they were doing it with the con­nivance of the Irish state – who had sup­plied armed Gar­dai to add to their many insults. There were many plain-clothes cops cir­cling around, some of them dis­play­ing remark­able faith­ful­ness to 1970s stereo­types…

Just after mid­night the first of the lock-ons went into place out­side of Cross­moli­na. Despite a strong Gar­dai pres­ence in this town, it caught them com­plete­ly on the hop. The con­voy was halt­ed on the out­skirts of Bal­li­na, with the Sli­go road being blocked by Gar­dai, while the pub­lic order team raced to deal with the lock-on. Pro­test­ers and oth­ers from Bal­li­na attempt­ed to reach the con­voy but were turned back.

The lock-on last­ed a lit­tle under an hour with two arrest­ed. Reac­tion from the Gar­dai, nev­er the most pleas­ant from the pub­lic order unit’s cut­ting team of But­ler and Gill was sour­er than usu­al.

Pro­test­ers, unde­terred, left Bal­li­na and regrouped at Bel­la­cor­rick. After a few hours wait, top­ping our­selves up with refresh­ments, the con­voy came into sight (4.30am). One well known local cam­paign­er prompt­ly blocked the bridge with her van, park­ing it diag­o­nal­ly across a nar­row spot bring­ing things once again to a halt. Yet again despite there being sev­er­al van loads of Gar­dai with us.

A trac­tor from Carey’s Tool and Plant Hire of Ban­gor (097–83018 / 086–8236018) was brought up to haul it out – the com­pa­ny are well known for doing this for Shell over the years. Resis­tance was put up by the 30 or so pro­test­ers there, lead­ing to a bat­tle for the bridge. Though over­whelmed sev­er­al times over by Gar­dai num­bers, it took them time to clear us out of the way, ket­tling us next to the old pub. It was easy to see that it was start­ing to affect them.

Just as that was fin­ish­ing and the con­voy was on its way again, lat­er than ever, news came through that a sec­ond lock-on was in place on the Ban­gor road (6am). Cue enraged Gar­dai as the care­ful­ly planned oper­a­tion to move the TBM became far­ci­cal. Anoth­er hours worth of delay with anoth­er two arrests.

The whole of the sur­round­ing area was sealed off, though some pro­test­er vehi­cles man­aged to get back to camp to the great irri­ta­tion of local Gar­dai. To top it off, the TBM, now many hours lat­er than it should have been, was unable to make the turn­ing at Aghoos which would take it down to its final rest­ing place. Thus forc­ing it to go to Gle­n­amoy in order to turn and try again.

Where it prompt­ly got stuck at 8am. One local cou­ple were told to park their van up in a spe­cif­ic place by Gar­dai. Who then said they that was wrong and dragged it away to a new place. Where the turn­ing truck crashed into it… adding insult to all of this, the l van dri­ver was assault­ed by Gar­dai. Then got stuck as the road began to cave in under the weight of the 162 ton seg­ment; the dri­ver refused to get back into the truck in case it top­pled down the side of the embank­ment.

Mean­while the tail­backs grew. Dri­vers, under­stand­ably irate irate dri­vers were threat­ened with arrest­ed; an indi­vid­ual on McGrath’s truck on their way to dial­y­sis was sent home.

As it stands, the trucks are still there, one tied to the oth­er to stop it slip­ping more. For a good image see http://www.shelltosea.com/sites/default/files/images/TBM_truck_stuck_at_Glenamoy.jpg Thhe main road to Ross­port is cut off and might be for the fore­see­able future as they try to find solu­tions. Word is that cranes might be brought in, but they come with their own sets of prob­lems. The rain has final­ly start­ed. We will wait and see, and prob­a­bly have a few good laughs. The TBM, offen­sive­ly, has been named Fion­nu­ala from the Chil­dren of Lir, and like that leg­end may it be stuck there for 300 years…

It is fair to say peo­ple here are pleased. At short notice as great response was organ­ised and the mul­ti-mil­lion euro oper­a­tion made a mock­ery off. Shell and the Irish state thought they were going to sneak the TBM in under every­one’s noses. Instead they got a rapid­ly mobilised set of protests that used it to bring the cam­paign mes­sage to peo­ple who had not encoun­tered it before. The farce it became was giv­en the air­time it deserved, Shel­l’s dirty secret­ly received a pub­lic wash­ing. It was real­ly spir­it­ing to learn that a group of young lads had come down from Sli­go to oppose it, hav­ing only just heard about it on the radio.

We thought that at best it would be high­ly sym­bol­ic, we nev­er thought that we could make such a laugh­ing stock of a mul­ti-mil­lion euro oper­a­tion. The icing on the cake though, came from Shell. The farce at Gle­n­amoy shows them up for what they were. If they cant, with all that plan­ning, get the TBM in, how can there be any trust that they can run the pipeline safe­ly. As one sleep-deprived but cheer­ful camper said, if they cant even get the tun­nel bor­ing machine turned on the road, how the hell are they going to get it up the estu­ary…

Update: Right, a quick update from camp. The Tun­nel Bor­ing Machine is still stuck. Shel­l’s con­trac­tors Road­bridge have been try­ing sev­er­al dif­fer­ent meth­ods, but none work­ing. Cur­rent­ly, it is believed the plan is to build up the road so local res­i­dents can get past, then use the main road to bring in cranes that can lift the truck in sec­tions. How­ev­er, there is resis­tance in the air…

Fol­low­ing on from pre­vi­ous sto­ries…

Ini­tial­ly the Gar­dai closed off the entire road, mak­ing local res­i­dents and tourists sit in their cars with­out infor­ma­tion — reach­ing us many tales of out­right lies being told to peo­ple by Gar­dai who refuse to acknowl­edge it was any­thing to do with Shell. The peo­ple of Erris are not stu­pid.

The vast Gar­dai num­bers which had been escort­ing the TBM van­ished entire­ly from the area, pre­sum­ably utter­ly exhaust­ed from a whole night of being giv­en the run around. They left four of their num­ber to try and man­age the traf­fic, which was by the after­noon slow and backed up, most­ly as lor­ries from Lennon and Bar­retts quar­ries had start­ed turn­ing up with stone for the road build­ing. Locals res­i­dents, already furi­ous at the dis­rup­tion and gar­dai rude­ness towards them, came out of their hous­es and stopped the trucks, say­ing the TBM was sim­ply not want­ed.

The four Gar­dai were not up to the job, and most­ly did what Road­bridge told them to — so when Road­bridge’s fore­man demand­ed the lor­ries come through side by side, grid­lock ensued. Res­i­dents had to sort the Gar­dai’s mess, redi­rect­ing traf­fic and lor­ries to clear the block­age.

More and more peo­ple start­ed com­ing as radio and word of mouth car­ried the sto­ry, with peo­ple com­ing from across Mayo to stand in sol­i­dar­i­ty with friends and fam­i­ly. Doors were opened by the peo­ple of Gle­n­amoy to those who came to stand in the rain against Shell.

Mean­while, Mayo coun­ty coun­cil is bend­ing over back­wards to help Shell clear up their mess — all those grants seem to be com­ing use­ful after all. Coun­ty man­ag­er Peter Hynes is not going to hold Shell respon­si­ble, so yet again the peo­ple are pick­ing up Shel­l’s bill. How­ev­er, Shell did have to eat hum­ble pie as the sto­ry spread, with the head of Shell Ire­land hav­ing to issue an apol­o­gy, or rather regret­ting the incon­ve­nience. Not as much as the res­i­dents do.

Shel­l’s secu­ri­ty IRMS are now con­trol­ling a pub­lic road and decid­ing where res­i­dents can walk. This was chal­lenged lead­ing to some peo­ple being put in the ditch. Of course the Gar­dai stood in line with IRMS — real­ly was impos­si­ble to tell them apart, but res­i­dents made it very clear that the road did not belong to Shell or its lack­eys.

As ever, with these things, it is great to be in the midst of such com­mu­ni­ty spir­it and resis­tance.

It appears that Road­bridge are going to resume work after mid­night, with the aim of shift­ing the list­ing truck tomor­row and tak­ing it to Bel­linaboy refin­ery (a change from going direct to the Aghoos com­pound), until more work can be done to strenght­en the roads. We think the mighty Irish bog may be a bit trick­er than that…

Camp is tak­ing a rest — its been a long 36 hours for many peo­ple, though some are going to main­tain a pres­ence at the site of the fias­co. Oth­er good news is that the two peo­ple arrest­ed for the sec­ond lock-on have been released with­out charge. The first two are up in court in Bal­li­na tomor­row.

One twit­ter cap­tured it:  http://pic.twitter.com/55lYSNpB

For images see  http://www.shelltosea.com/content/pictures-tunnelling-machine-stuck-glenamoy and http://photos.independent.ie/gallery/Shell_to_Sea_protest/slideshow/Shell_to_Sea_activists_protest/05mI7xq7Oxakf

Mainshill Open Cast Coal Site shut down for the day!

July 14th, 2012

July 14th, 2012

At 10:00 this morn­ing a group of 45 activists invad­ed Scot­tish Coal’s Main­shill Open Cast Coal Site near Dou­glas, South Lanark­shire, and occu­pied machin­ery and pre­vent­ed coal­ing oper­a­tions on the site and shut it down for the day. Machines includ­ing a “prime mover” were occu­pied and all work was stopped com­plete­ly. This is the first action at Take Back the Land! - the action camp in the Dou­glas Val­ley will be up and run­ning until the 18th July. Updates and pho­tos to fol­low

 

Take Back the Land: site taken, Glentaggart East occupied!

11/7/2012

Yes­ter­day evening we occu­pied Scot­tish Coal’s new open­cast mine site in the Dou­glas Val­ley, South Lanark­shire, for Take Back the Land! – a week of action against the destruc­tion of open­cast min­ing.

11/7/2012

Yes­ter­day evening we occu­pied Scot­tish Coal’s new open­cast mine site in the Dou­glas Val­ley, South Lanark­shire, for Take Back the Land! – a week of action against the destruc­tion of open­cast min­ing.

The camp will run until the 18th July and there will be a mass action on Sat­ur­day 14th July. There’s detailed direc­tions to the camp here  http://takebacktheland.org.uk/?page_id=6 and the web­site here  http://takebacktheland.org.uk/ has all the infor­ma­tion you’ll need to par­tic­i­pate. Come and get involved – take action against cor­po­rate greed, fat-cat land­lords and cor­rupt local gov­ern­ment!

Action round-up from Faslane anti-nuke action month

Four Olympic Gold Medal Winners arrested at Faslane Naval Base on Monday 11th June!

The  four women from Glas­gow and Edin­burgh are mem­bers of the Gare­loch Hor­tis peace group which was tak­ing part in thir­ty days of actions to mark thir­ty years of Faslane Peace Camp’s protest against Tri­dent nuclear weapons. The group staged the Peace Olympics with events as var­ied as syn­chro­nised swim­ming and putting the Hag­gis.

The medal­lists were arrest­ed dur­ing the Tug of Peace across the North Gate of the base.

The event drew atten­tion to the con­tin­ued pres­ence of the ille­gal and dead­ly weapons in Scot­land, and all eight oth­er nuclear nations. The win­ners’ podi­um high­light­ed that the only way to win the Race for Peace is to lay down the weapons of mass destruc­tion.

 

Activists blockade Faslane Naval Base

19.6.2012

Today at 7 o’ clock in the morn­ing activists of the Faslane Peace­camp block­ad­ed the Tri­dent Naval Base. Three peo­ple locked on in front of the South Gate. From the orig­i­nal five peo­ple at the North Gate two were arrest­ed imme­di­ate­ly while the rest were able to block­ade one lane of the road. The block­ade last­ed about 90 min­utes.


A spokesper­son said on behalf of the Peace Camp: ” We are hav­ing this block­ade today because we want to show our oppo­si­tion against nuclear weapons. We express our fear and our anger in a non­vi­o­lent way. We ask the British gov­ern­ment to lis­ten to the opin­ion of the major­i­ty of Scot­tish peo­ple and MSP’s. The Peo­ple do not want Tri­dent! They do not want this base with it’s nuclear weapons in Scot­land. Due to the fact that in the next few years Scot­tish inde­pen­dence may be achieved now is the time to put pres­sure upon the British gov­ern­ment. Instead of start­ing to put mon­ey into a Tri­dent replace­ment we want them to shut down the Faslane Naval Base and stop their nuclear weapons pro­gram.”

An inter­na­tion­al activist added: “This block­ade was a very inter­na­tion­al one. Peo­ple from all parts of Britain and activists from Spain and Swe­den were involved. I think that it is my right and my duty as a glob­al cit­i­zen to do non­vi­o­lent direct actions against nuclear weapons as long as our gov­ern­ments do not ful­fill their duty and stop fight­ing wars. Nuclear weapons are ille­gal by inter­na­tion­al human­i­tar­i­an law and I want all coun­tries to respect this and make a step to a more peace­ful world.”

This block­ade is part of the 30 days of action from the 9th June to the 9th July. To find out more about what has hap­pened and will hap­pen in the future vis­it our blog.

http://faslanepeacecamp.wordpress.com/

Faslane Peace Campers Trespass at Coulport Nuclear Weapons Depot

15/06/2012

Angus Chalmers and Leon­na O’Neill of Faslane Peace Camp entered RNAD Coul­port in the ear­ly hours of Wednes­day morn­ing.

They left the camp on foot at approx­i­mate­ly 10pm with the inten­tions of see­ing how close they could get to Coul­port under the cov­er of dark­ness. By the time they were approach­ing the out­er fence perime­ter the two still had­n’t been appre­hend­ed or detect­ed by secu­ri­ty or any of the night vision cctv cam­eras, and so decid­ed to con­tin­ue to see how far luck (or the inep­ti­tudes of the secu­ri­ty sys­tem on what should be the most heav­i­ly guard­ed naval depot in the UK) would get them.

They decid­ed to approach the Explo­sives Han­dling Jet­ty via the shore line and entered by wad­ing water and climb­ing a razor wire fence. At this point they decid­ed to walk vis­i­bly and announce them­selves to the first police they saw. To their sur­prise they were met with zero secu­ri­ty per­son­nel and were able to access a jet­ty a mat­ter of feet from the Explo­sives Han­dling Jet­ty where the Tri­dent nuclear war­heads are loaded to the Van­gau­rd sub­marines.

Angus climbed a fur­ther fence into the estab­lish­ment set­ting off the ban­dit alarm and alert­ing the MOD secu­ri­ty and cctv cam­era oper­a­tors. Both were soon appre­hend­ed by MOD police and arrest­ed and charged with miil­i­tary by-laws and the Seri­ous Organ­ised Crime and Police Act 2005 (SOCPA). Both were held in cus­tody until court on Thurs­day after­noon where the SOCPA charges were dropped and they plead­ed not guilty to the by-laws charges.

Leon­na and Angus said “This is evi­dence that the Couport Nuclear Weapons Depot is unsafe. The capac­i­ty for this tech­nol­o­gy to irreper­a­bly destroy life and the envi­ron­ment should be rea­son enough to ensure that it is safe guard­ed and pro­tect­ed in a way that does not allow for human error or com­pla­cen­cy. The rel­a­tive ease at which we were able to approach and enter Coul­port on foot and the close prox­i­matey we were able to get to the Explo­sives Han­dling Jet­ty is sur­pris­ing and dis­turb­ing”.

 

Faslane Peace Camp and Trident Ploughshares Trespass at Faslane Naval Base

2/07/2012

 
Sev­en activists from Faslane Peace Camp and Tri­dent Ploughshares entered Faslane naval base this morn­ing with four mem­bers of the group slip­ping past guards and reach­ing points up to 100 yards inside the base. A fur­ther two were arrest­ed in the attempt.

At 7am this morn­ing Faslane Peace Camp and Tri­dent Ploughshares activists attend­ed the North gate of the Faslane Naval Base to ser­e­nade the approach­ing morn­ing shift staff with peace and nuclear dis­ar­ma­ment songs. The act dou­bled as a ruse to enable fif­teen of the group to attempt enter­ing the base. One TP activist, Bri­an Larkin, suc­ceed­ed in gain­ing entry to the base whilst the rest were pre­vent­ed from doing so by Minit­sry of Defence and Strath­clyde police.

Bri­an was charged with breach of SOCPA, the Seri­ous Organ­ised Crime and Police Act, and mil­i­a­try by-laws and lat­er released on an under­tak­ing. Upon being released Larkin said “the seri­ous organ­ised crime hap­pens inside the base and not in these actions for peace and dis­ar­ma­ment. It is the ongo­ing deploy­ment of Tri­dent sub­marines – each car­ry­ing 48 war­heads, eight times more destruc­tive than the bomb dropped on Hiroshi­ma which killed 200,000 peo­ple – that con­sti­tutes seri­ous organ­ised crime and vio­lates every prin­ci­ple of human­i­ty in inter­na­tion­al law.”

In a show of the same relent­less per­sis­tence that has kept the Peace Camp and the anti-nuclear move­ment going over the years, the group lat­er returned to make a sec­ond attempt at breach­ing the North Gate. Two were arrest­ed dur­ing the attempt whilst six gained entry, four of which reach­ing up to 100 yards inside the base.

The ban­dit alarm was acti­vat­ed and the Naval Base was locked down, pre­vent­ing traf­fic from enter­ing the base and nor­mal oper­a­tions to con­tin­ue with­in the base for 45 min­utes. The action was part of the Peace Camp’s 30 Days of Action mark­ing 30 years of con­tin­u­ous resis­tance to nuclear weapons at Faslane. Thir­ty peo­ple have been arrest­ed in the cam­paign which began on 9 June. Nine peo­ple were arrest­ed today.

It is not yet clear what the oth­er eight will be charged with but a breach of SOCPA charge is like­ly in addi­tion to breach­ing mil­i­tary by-laws. Angus Chalmers of the Fasland Peace Camp said “This land has been fenced and des­ig­nat­ed as a SOCPA area in order to make pos­si­ble the seri­ous crime of deploy­ing Tri­dent.” Mar­garet Brem­n­er of the Tri­dent Ploughshares Gare­loch Hor­ti­cul­tur­al­ists affin­i­ty group added “We cross this line today to demon­strate that this land, this earth, does not belong to a state which is using it to threat­en the destruc­tion of the earth and all its peo­ples. We enter this gate in order to reclaim land for life not death.”

Each of those tres­pass­ing were car­ry­ing let­ters explain­ing the inter­na­tion­al ille­gal­i­ty of nuclear weapons to present to work­ers inside the base. In 1996, the Inter­na­tion­al Court of Jus­tice wrote the advi­so­ry opin­ion that not only would the use of nuclear weapons be ille­gal but the very threat of use through deploy­ment, main­te­nance and upgrade of nuclear weapons sys­tems is in con­tra­ven­tion to the Nuclear Non-Pro­lif­er­a­tion Treaty.

Under the terms of the NPT which entered into force over forty years ago, the UK gov­ern­ment is oblig­at­ed to bring nuclear dis­ar­ma­ment to com­ple­tion. Instead the UK gov­ern­ment has con­tin­ued to main­tain and is now upgrad­ing its nuclear weapons sys­tem. The recent news that the MoD has award­ed lucra­tive con­tracts to arms com­pa­nies for the ini­tial stages of a Tri­dent replace­ment pro­gramme fur­thers this ongo­ing mock­ery of our inter­na­tion­al legal oblig­a­tions.

As long as our gov­ern­ment con­tin­ues to fail in it’s oblig­a­tion to make seri­ous moves toward com­plete nuclear dis­ar­ma­ment, mem­bers of Tri­dent Plougshares and Faslane Peace Camp are com­mit­ted to non-vio­lent direct action to dis­rupt the deploy­ment of these ille­gal and immoral weapons.

Fur­ther demon­stra­tions are planned for the remain­der of the thir­ty days of action which will fin­ish on July 9th. Amongst oth­er actions, there will be an aca­d­e­m­ic sem­i­nar block­ade on Fri­day and a Rebel Clown Army insur­gence on Sat­ur­day. For more infor­ma­tion on the 30Days Action Cam­paign con­tact the camp via  faslane30@gmail.com.

Faslane Peace Camp: 01436 820901 or 07511793227
Tri­dent Ploughshares: Bri­an Larkin 07768 312676

For More infor­ma­tion on
Tri­dent Ploughshares see: www.tridentploughshares.org.uk
Faslane Peace Camp and 30 Days of Action see: http://faslanepeacecamp.wordpress.com/

 

Squat Milada brutally evicted after an attempt to make a one-off commemorative gig

The Prague’s renowned squat Vila Mila­da, which was evict­ed three years ago after being one of the most impor­tant places for Czech autonomous under­ground scene, had been occu­pied by approx­i­mate­ly 30 peo­ple on Sat­ur­day July 30th to com­mem­o­rate the bleak anniver­sary by an impro­vised hard­core punk gig.

The Prague’s renowned squat Vila Mila­da, which was evict­ed three years ago after being one of the most impor­tant places for Czech autonomous under­ground scene, had been occu­pied by approx­i­mate­ly 30 peo­ple on Sat­ur­day July 30th to com­mem­o­rate the bleak anniver­sary by an impro­vised hard­core punk gig. Even though the author­i­ties were informed that this is a one-off event which is not an attempt to reocup­py the squat for good but a sym­bol­ic point­ing out of a pas­sive approach of a Czech state to take care of unused build­ings and of the oppres­sion against alter­na­tive cul­ture, the police react­ed with a mas­sive police oper­a­tion includ­ing an aggres­sive attack against the non-vio­lent con­cert-goers, which result­ed in many bloody injuries and in a tem­po­rary arrest of tens of peo­ple. At least 20 peo­ple were bru­tal­ly beat­en up and psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly humil­i­at­ed inside the build­ing out of reach of cam­eras and wit­ness­es and the remain­ing 7 activists hid behind the chim­neys on the roof of the build­ing, fear­ing for their health and risk­ing their lives over a 4‑storey gap direct­ing to ground. After a day-long nego­ti­a­tions and a cou­ple of stu­pid attempts of the Czech police to harass tens of sup­port­ers in front of the build­ing, the squat­ters decid­ed to climb down if the Police lets them to gath­er their belong­ings from the low­er parts of the house. In the ear­ly evening of Sun­day July 1st, they real­ized all of their equip­ment, includ­ing lap­tops, loud­speak­ers, gui­tar com­bos and elec­tric gui­tars, were smashed up by the inter­ven­ing Police riot squad. The own­er of the house is going to bring a law­suit against the activists and more seri­ous offens­es are actu­al­ly threat­en­ing them.

Earth First! Summer Gathering Update — programme, directions, website and more

It’s only weeks until the Earth First! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing begins.
Five days of work­shops, info shar­ing and learn­ing new skills, 1–5 August.

It’s only weeks until the Earth First! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing begins.
Five days of work­shops, info shar­ing and learn­ing new skills, 1–5 August.

The Earth First Sum­mer Gath­er­ing takes place each year to pro­vide a space in which the rad­i­cal ecol­o­gy move­ment can share skills and plan for future cam­paigns and actions.

Dis­cus­sions around the impor­tance of com­mu­ni­ty build­ing in inner cities, the state of the anar­chist move­ment and patri­archy in activism.

Skill shares includ­ing wom­en’s self-defence, research­ing cor­po­ra­tions and nav­i­ga­tion.

Cam­paign round ups from Frack Off! Smash Edo and Lud­dites 2000 amongst oth­ers.

If you have work­shops you like to run or dis­cus­sions you’d like to facil­i­tate then email us at earthfirstsummergathering@riseup.net

Full pro­gramme.

Camp­ing is on a slid­ing scale of £30 to £15, pay what is gen­uine­ly appro­pri­ate.

Food will be from Anar­chist Teapot and meal tick­ets will be £5 a day.

Kids can have sep­a­rate meals if they want for £3 a day.

There will be a cou­ple of kids spaces, and spe­cial work­shops being ran for kids. If you’d like to run any kids work­shops get in touch at earthfirstsummergathering@riseup.net.

If you want you dog to come along then you’re going to have to email us at earthfirstsummergathering@riseup.net

And of course there will be enter­tain­ment and a bar open in the evenings.

The camp is ½ mile from the Berring­ton vil­lage, and 1 mile from the larg­er vil­lage of Cross Hous­es.

We encour­age non-cycling campers to use pub­lic trans­port if pos­si­ble as Cross Hous­es is on a bus route.

BY TRAIN
The near­est train sta­tion is Shrews­bury. You can then get the bus to Cross Hous­es (see below). If com­ing from a long dis­tance it can some­times be cheap­er to get a tick­et to a large sta­tion such as Birm­ing­ham, Wolver­hamp­ton, Man­ches­ter or Crewe and then a sep­a­rate tick­et on to Shrews­bury. Check nation­al rail for train times and prices. If com­ing from the Lon­don direc­tion, it’s gen­er­al­ly cheap­er to buy a Super Off­peak Return, spec­i­fy­ing “Lon­don Mid­land & Arri­va only”.

BY BIKE
See here for direc­tions and a map to the camp from Shrews­bury for cyclists and dri­vers.

BY BUS
When you arrive at Shrews­bury train sta­tion, ask some­one to point you to the bus sta­tion. It’s only a few min­utes walk from the train sta­tion. The bus ser­vice that runs from town to with­in a mile of Crabap­ple is the 436 towards Bridg­north. It runs every hour from 7.40am to 5.40pm with a “late” one at 7.40pm. The jour­ney to Cross Hous­es is approx 15 mins. You will need to press the stop but­ton when you see the sign for Cross Hous­es. Some of the ser­vices on this route are low-floor acces­si­ble bus­es. Please note that the last bus leaves Shrews­bury at 7.40pm, Mon­day to Sat­ur­day and there are no Sun­day bus ser­vices. For the bus timetable see here http://shropshire.gov.uk/bustimes/timetable.jsc?timetable=436mfi0412.
The camp itself is about 1 mile from the bus stop. From the bus stop at Cross Hous­es, walk back towards Shrews­bury past the petrol sta­tion (on your right) and take the first left turn signed “Berring­ton”. After about ½ mile, the road forks at the edge of the vil­lage. Take the right turn sign­post­ed “Bet­ton Abbots” and we’re about ¼ mile up the road on the right.
If you intend to come by bus but need help get­ting to and from the bus stop, you can arrange a pick up with us: details will be avail­able near­er the time.

BY TAXI
There is also a taxi rank just out­side Shrews­bury train sta­tion. Acces­si­ble taxis can be got from here.- but it is MUCH cheap­er to book a cab from a local com­pa­ny – Comet Cabs 01743 344444, or Vin­cent Cabs 01743 367777. Vin­cents also have a book­ing office just across the road from the sta­tion, which is handy if you don’t have a phone to book a cab in advance.

USEFUL LINKS
See here direc­tions and a map to the camp from Shrews­bury for cyclists and dri­vers.
See a map of where the site is here
See the bus timetable
Direc­tions from places oth­er than Shrews­bury

Earth First! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing Col­lec­tive
earthfirstsummergathering@riseup.net

http://earthfirstgathering.weebly.com

Eco village occupation in Windsor this June


On Sat­ur­day 09th June, we will be walk­ing from Syon Lane Com­mu­ni­ty Allot­ment in West Lon­don to Wind­sor.  We will be camp­ing for one night on the route. Our aim is to start a com­mu­ni­ty on a piece of dis­used land on the Crown Estate.
We plan to grow our own food, make shel­ters and live sus­tain­ably: to show an alter­na­tive to our sys­tem of cri­sis. We call for the right for every­one to be able to use the dis­used land to live on, free the yoke of debt and rent.
If you share our vision, and you are will­ing to work to achieve it, we wel­come you to join us.
Meet­up Details
Meet at Syon Lane Com­mu­ni­ty Allot­ment on Sat 09th
June from 11 a.m. We will be depart­ing at 1 p.m sharp.
 
Bring camp­ing equip­ment, warm  cloth­ing, mug, bowl, spoon and a torch. Also please bring seeds and any use­ful equip­ment if you can.
Should you wish to meet us in Wind­sor, or at some oth­er point along the jour­ney, please call the num­bers below on the day.
If  you would like to know more about this  project, please vis­it: www.diggers2012.wordpress.com or email  diggers2012@yahoo.co.uk
Alter­na­tive­ly you can call or text the fol­low­ing num­bers: 07963 475 195 / 07905 283 114 to find  out more.
Syon Lane Com­mu­ni­ty Allot­ment Direc­tions and map.
Street Address: The lane adja­cent to Plat­form 1, Syon Lane Sta­tion, Roth­bury Gar­dens, Isle­worth, Mid­dle­sex, TW7 5JG
Get­ting to the site: We are sit­u­at­ed on the long strip of land adja­cent to Plat­form 1 of Syon Lane Sta­tion, which is on the south­ern rail­way line com­ing from Lon­don Water­loo via Kew Bridge and Houn­slow.
Near­est Tube: Oster­ley – Turn left out of the sta­tion, fol­low the Great West Road until you reach Syon Lane, then turn right. Then turn right down a foot­path before you cross the rail­way bridge, it will lead you through to Roth­bury Gar­dens, and you will see our site entrance oppo­site.
Near­est bus stop:Lon­don Road – Busch Cor­ner (237/267/235) – Come up either Spur Road or Syon Lane until you reach the rail­way bridge. Then go onto Plat­form 1 and fol­low the foot­path between two met­al fences, you will see our entrance on your left.
Map link: http://g.co/maps/ga6mn

http://diggers2012.wordpress.com/
https://www.facebook.com/events/388997621152693/
http://london.indymedia.org/events/12282
https://twitter.com/#!/freetheland

FASLANE 30 DAYS OF ACTION: UPDATE AND FINAL CALL OUT

As of June 12th this year, the Peace Camp will have been in exis­tence for 30  years. Whilst it is great that there has been such ded­i­ca­tion from thou­sands over the years, the radioac­tive beast still has­n’t been chased from it’s lair! A 30 Day cam­paign of anti-nuclear insub­or­di­na­tion, from June 9th to July 9th, has thus been planned.

As of June 12th this year, the Peace Camp will have been in exis­tence for 30  years. Whilst it is great that there has been such ded­i­ca­tion from thou­sands over the years, the radioac­tive beast still has­n’t been chased from it’s lair! A 30 Day cam­paign of anti-nuclear insub­or­di­na­tion, from June 9th to July 9th, has thus been planned.

You can find details of some of the pub­lic events list­ed chrono­log­i­cal­ly below, but for the most part, there will be art­ful insur­gency through­out of a nature we would pre­fer not to dis­close to “the pow­ers that be”… Ener­gies and cus­to­di­al time will­ing, we hope to take non-vio­lent direct action at least once a day! And not just at Faslane, oh no!

So do come along when­ev­er you can and you will find actions wait­ing to hap­pen via autonomous, inclu­sive, con­sen­sus based plan­ning and par­tic­i­pa­tion. Every­one is wel­come (except for under­cov­er police offi­cers… We have trained a dog to sniff you out. You have been warned.) Fun, frol­ics, veg­an feasts and brush­es with the law are all guar­an­teed!

With a vote on Scot­tish Inde­pen­dence and Tri­dent replace­ment in wait­ing this is the time for a renewed cam­paign of resis­tance!

There are scenic camp­ing spots and veg­an food will be pro­vid­ed for all meals (dona­tions for which will be grate­ful­ly received from those who can afford it). Car­a­vans will be allo­cat­ed on a needs basis first so do let us know in advance. We can answer ques­tions and queries by email or phone us on 01436 820901 or 07511793227.

Please pro­lif­er­ate this in any way that you can.
We love you and need your help to be very naughty through­out our 30 Day cam­paign,
Faslane Peace Camp

P.S. THIS IS NOT A PARTY. The sole inten­tion of this cam­paign is to res­ur­rect an anti nuclear cam­paign at Faslane that has long been wan­ing at a time when it is most essen­tial in con­nec­tion to the Scot­tish Inde­pen­dence debate, Tri­dent replace­ment and a poten­tial for actu­al nuclear decom­mis­sion­ing in the UK. Repeat, THIS IS NOT A PARTY. Do come if you wish to be part of a big team of love­li­ness, direct action and action sup­port. Do not come if you just want a par­ty.

EVENTS THAT WE CAN ANNOUNCE:

PEACE PICNIC JUNE 17TH: Helens­burgh CND would like to invite all local groups to a peace pic­nic at Faslane North Gate on Sun­day June 17th from noon to 4pm. Jeely Peace cafe from Stir­ling CND will pro­vide cater­ing. Please bring ban­ners, musi­cal instru­ments and your friends. The Peace Camp will be pleased to wel­come you before or after the pic­nic, or any time, ever.

PEACE MARCH FROM GLASGOW TO FASLANE 21ST-23RD JUNE: A group of enthu­si­as­tic walk­ers and con­cerned cit­i­zens will meet at George Square, Glas­gow at mid­day on Thurs 21 June to walk to Faslane in the name of peace and no nukes! They will be stop­ping to camp en route overnight. The pace will be relaxed. Every­one is wel­come, bring ban­ners and prac­ti­cal shoes!

RISE UP SINGING 1ST AND 2ND JULY: *Come and sing Tri­dent out of Faslane and out of Scot­land! *To re-invig­o­rate the diverse cre­ativ­i­ty of Faslane 365 and to keep the issue of nuclear weapons firm­ly in the pub­lic eye and on the polit­i­cal agen­da, Rise Up Singing (a Tri­dent Ploughshares affin­i­ty group) has organ­ised a two-day gath­er­ing to cel­e­brate the 30th birth­day of Faslane Peace Camp. Every­one wel­come! No singing expe­ri­ence nec­es­sary. Bring a song to share, a ban­ner and some cake, and we’ll pro­vide the tea.

ACADEMIC SEMINAR ROADBLOCK 6TH JULY:
On Fri­day July 6th aca­d­e­mics and activists from all over the world will par­tic­i­pate in a sem­i­nar block­ade as part of Faslane 30. The trans-dis­ci­pli­nary sem­i­nar block­ade fol­lows sim­i­lar actions at Faslane in 2005 and at COP15 in Copen­hagen in 2009 and is part of an emerg­ing tra­di­tion of putting social the­o­ry into per­son­al prac­tice. The theme of  the sem­i­nar is ‘secu­ri­ty’ and par­tic­i­pants are invit­ed to reflect on the com­plex issue of nuclear weapons from a range of per­spec­tives ‑gov­er­nance, secu­ri­ti­sa­tion and dis­cours­es of ‘ter­ror’, ethics, as well envi­ron­men­tal and social jus­tice. Leav­ing moral­i­ty aside for just one moment, we ask how is spend­ing on nuclear weapons jus­ti­fied strate­gi­cal­ly, eco­nom­i­cal­ly and social­ly in an era when the nature of con­flict is so changed, when much of the world is in eco­nom­ic melt­down and so many peo­ple are suf­fer­ing from poli­cies of aus­ter­i­ty? The sem­i­nar block­ade will be peace­ful but will insist on claim­ing the pub­lic space for demo­c­ra­t­ic debate on what secu­ri­ty means both geopo­lit­i­cal­ly and in people’s every­day lives. Con­tri­bu­tions will engage with broad­er themes of pol­i­tics, democ­ra­cy, gov­ern­men­tal­i­ty, con­flict res­o­lu­tion, cit­i­zen­ship, glob­al
rela­tions and anti-war. The sem­i­nar will involve cre­ative pub­lic and par­tic­i­pa­to­ry schol­ar­ship, using a vari­ety of media and forms: paper pre­sen­ta­tions are envis­aged — though Pow­er­Point is logis­ti­cal­ly unfea­si­ble! — along­side work­shops for small group debate, expe­ri­ence shar­ing and oth­er kinds of learn­ing. In par­tic­u­lar, we hope that peace  cam­paign­ers at the camp will be cen­tral­ly involved in the sem­i­nar. The tim­ing and exact loca­tions of sem­i­nar events will nec­es­sar­i­ly be deter­mined on the day, but par­tic­i­pants are invit­ed to gath­er at the Peace Camp between 8 and 9.30 am.

CIRCA 7TH JULY:
The Clan­des­tine Insur­gent Rebel Clown Army (CIRCA) will NOT be march­ing on Faslane nuclear sub­ma­rine lair on Sat­ur­day 7th of July, oh no. Even though the Tri­dent mis­siles at Faslane Naval Base could kill all the Clowns on the plan­et –and all the clowns too! – we won’t be there. Even though the Tri­dent mis­siles at Faslane are going to be replaced at an astro­nom­ic cost when all Clowns are feel­ing the pinch, we will not be roused to action. Even though none of our Clown com­rades and friends in Scot­land want Tri­dent or its replace­ment, CIRCA aren’t for turn­ing (up). Most of all, even though Rebel Clowns would defend every­one for just the price of a rub­ber dingy and load of cus­tard pies, even though Tri­dent replace­ment will take our Army jobs away, we will NOT be part of Faslane 30. Aca­d­e­mics say that CIRCA has died a death in Britain, and they are right. They must be right because they are aca­d­e­mics and aca­d­e­mics know every­thing about elites, exploita­tion, mil­i­tari­sa­tion… (Fun­ny how noth­ing changes, then, eh?) How­ev­er. A new Army of Rebel Clowns from all over Britain is trained and ready to join our inter­na­tion­al com­rades and peace camp friends to PARTY on the 30th anniver­sary of resist­ing nuclear non­sense at Faslane. If Tri­dent makes us redun­dant and aca­d­e­mics pro­nounce us dead, we will come to the par­ty as the unem­ploy­able undead, as gum­my vam­pires, veg­an zom­bies and mangy were­wolves. CIRCA will NOT be march­ing on Faslane, but a ghost army of Rebels Clowns – sea­soned corpses and the fresh­ly (sic) deceased (dis­eased?) might, just might, be there! Come on, do the  Res­ur­rec­tion-Insur­rec­tion Shuf­fle!

… And the rest is top secret! 

Wicked Work Weekend in Mayo

Stop­ping Shell, mov­ing camp & drag­ging pal­lets!

Fri­day 4th May Day of Sol­i­dar­i­ty suc­cess­ful­ly stopped all Shell haulage for the day. Once folks were sat­is­fied that Shell was­n’t going to try and do any haulage, they went to the Ross­port Sol­i­dar­i­ty Camp to start tak­ing down struc­tures and move the camp.

Stop­ping Shell, mov­ing camp & drag­ging pal­lets!

Fri­day 4th May Day of Sol­i­dar­i­ty suc­cess­ful­ly stopped all Shell haulage for the day. Once folks were sat­is­fied that Shell was­n’t going to try and do any haulage, they went to the Ross­port Sol­i­dar­i­ty Camp to start tak­ing down struc­tures and move the camp.

Over the week­end all but the kitchen struc­ture was tak­en down, hun­dreds of pal­lets were moved to the new field, and the kitchen mar­quee was put up in the new field. The sum­mer camp is locat­ed two fields away from the win­ter field, next to the Augh­oose church. There is one large com­mu­nal sleep­ing space, but most peo­ple will be sleep­ing in tents for the sum­mer. If you are vis­it­ing the camp bring a tent if you have one, but don’t let it stop you com­ing if you don’t!

There were about 20 peo­ple on camp for the week­end, and aside from a bit of wind on fri­day we lucked out with the weath­er. The tunes were pumpin’, and peo­ple real­ly stepped up to get the work done! On Sat­ur­day we had a vis­it from a group of stu­dents who, with the help of a local farmer and his trac­tor, moved hun­dreds of pal­lets to the new field. Night­time was relax­ing with camp­fires and music, and every­one seemed in high spir­its. Many hands, light work! The bank hol­i­day Mon­day some pix­ies went down to Shel­l’s forestry com­pound and undid a bit of Shel­l’s work.

Now the camp is build­ing up for the annu­al June gath­er­ing, 1–4th of June. See more details here: http://shelltosea.com/content/rossport-solidarity-camp-gathering‑1–4‑june

The week fol­low­ing the gath­er­ing will be a Week of Action against Shell, so come up for work­shops and dis­cus­sions at the week­end and if you can stick around to help with the actions after­wards. There are lots of roles involved in mak­ing an action as safe and effec­tive as pos­si­ble, for exam­ple tak­ing pho­tos, legal observ­er, sup­port, as well as being in an arrestable role. You can read more here: http://www.rossportsolidaritycamp.org/?page_id=282