Category: Squatting / Free Spaces / Protest Sites

Brazil: Kayapo blockade heads into second month

May 23, 2010

It’s been exact­ly one month to the day since a group of Kayapo set up a fer­ry block­ade across the Xin­gu Riv­er in an ongo­ing protest against the con­tro­ver­sial Belo Monte hydro dam.

Kayapo blockadeMay 23, 2010

It’s been exact­ly one month to the day since a group of Kayapo set up a fer­ry block­ade across the Xin­gu Riv­er in an ongo­ing protest against the con­tro­ver­sial Belo Monte hydro dam.

The Kayapo were dis­patched to the site on April 22, the same day Brazil’s gov­ern­ment grant­ed out rights to build the dam

Sad­ly, the effort has received lit­tle media cov­er­age since then, even with a con­stant ref­er­ence to celebri­ty activists Sting and James Cameron.

Nev­er­the­less, as the front line effort heads into its sec­ond month, the Kayapo warn that they have no inten­tion of back­ing down unless the gov­ern­ment can­cels the project.

The Kayapo Continue Blockades in Protest of the Belo Monte Dam

by Inter­na­tion­al Rivers and Ama­zon Watch

For Imme­di­ate Release
May 21, 2010

The Kayapo Continue Blockades of Amazon Highway for the 28th Straight Day in Protest of the Belo Monte Dam
Brazil’s Indigenous Peoples Vow to Block Dam Construction or “Die Fighting for our Rights”

Piaraçu, Xin­gu Nation­al Park, Brazil — A group of Kayapo indige­nous peo­ple led by Chief Megaron Txukar­ramãe have been blockad­ing the Xin­gu Riv­er cross­ing of the BR-80 — a major Ama­zon high­way in Mato Grosso State — since April 23 in protest of the gov­ern­men­t’s plans to build the mas­sive Belo Monte Dam. Dozens of Kayapo war­riors have been block­ing the fer­ry cross­ing over the Xin­gu Riv­er for four weeks and are deter­mined to remain there. Their actions have dis­rupt­ed a major trans­porta­tion artery for com­mer­cial goods in the region.

In a state­ment issued from the block­ade, Chief Megaron referred to Pres­i­dent Lula as “ene­my num­ber one” to Brazil’s indige­nous peo­ples, and vowed to main­tain the block­ade until Belo Monte is can­celed or “die fight­ing for our rights.”

Chief Megaron has been joined in these protests by Kayapo Chief Raoni Metuk­tire, an emblem­at­ic leader for over 20 years of indige­nous resis­tance to the Brazil­ian gov­ern­men­t’s plans to dam the Xin­gu Riv­er. In a May 1st inter­view with the French chan­nel TF1, Chief Raoni said “I have asked my war­riors to pre­pare for war and I have spo­ken of this with oth­er tribes from the Upper Xin­gu. We will not let them [build this dam].”

Lead­ers of the Arara, Xipa­ia and Juruna indige­nous peo­ples of the Low­er Xin­gu echo the vocif­er­ous oppo­si­tion of the Kayapo to the Belo Monte Dam, and have also vowed to lay down their lives to stop the project, which would destroy their com­mu­ni­ties and liveli­hoods. “We are firm in this strug­gle, and con­tin­ue more strong and deter­mined than ever to stop Belo Monte,” said the leader Shey­la Juruna. Attempts to stop the Belo Monte Dam became known around the world last month when film­mak­er James Cameron and mem­bers of the cast of Avatar joined protests in Brasil­ia and vis­it­ed vil­lages on the Xin­gu Riv­er and its trib­u­taries to hear about the plight of the region’s indige­nous peo­ple.

Slat­ed to be the 3rd largest hydro­elec­tric project in the world, Belo Monte would divert over 80 per­cent of the Xin­gu River’s flow through arti­fi­cial canals, flood­ing over 500 sq km of rain­for­est while dry­ing out a 100 km stretch of the riv­er known as the “Big Bend,” which is home to hun­dreds of indige­nous and river­ine fam­i­lies. Though sold to the pub­lic as “clean ener­gy,” Belo Monte would gen­er­ate an enor­mous amount of methane, a green­house gas 20 times more potent than car­bon diox­ide.

Despite legal injunc­tions against the pro­jec­t’s auc­tion, the Brazil­ian gov­ern­ment announced that the auc­tion’s win­ning con­sor­tium, “Norte Ener­gia,” would pro­ceed with plans to dam the Xin­gu Riv­er. Pres­i­dent Lula’s insis­tence that the project move for­ward at all costs — in spite of seri­ous social, envi­ron­men­tal and finan­cial con­cerns, as well as a mas­sive local and inter­na­tion­al out­cry — con­tin­ues to be met with fierce denounce­ments from indige­nous peo­ple of the Xin­gu Basin.

“The destruc­tion that would be caused by the mas­sive Belo Monte Dam in the glob­al­ly essen­tial Ama­zon Basin would have world­wide ram­i­fi­ca­tions that can’t yet be ful­ly com­pre­hend­ed. Indige­nous peo­ple are deter­mined to dis­rupt the ‘busi­ness as usu­al’ mod­el of destruc­tive devel­op­ment projects that ruin the envi­ron­ment and their tra­di­tion­al ways of life,” said Atossa Soltani of Ama­zon Watch. “Indige­nous groups from the Xin­gu Basin have sent the Brazil­ian gov­ern­ment a clear and resound­ing mes­sage that they will not allow the Belo Monte Dam to move for­ward. A Brazil­ian and inter­na­tion­al coali­tion of orga­ni­za­tions and social move­ments stands in sol­i­dar­i­ty with these groups, and is mobi­liz­ing fur­ther social and legal actions.”

International bike ride links communities in resistance: Merthyr to Mayo cyclist

22.5.2010
Today, a 50-strong inter­na­tion­al bike ride begins the 400 mile jour­ney from a com­mu­ni­ty resist­ing Britain’s largest open cast coal mine in Merthyr Tyd­fil, Wales to Coun­ty Mayo, Ire­land, where local peo­ple have spent the last ten years fight­ing a Shell-led gas devel­op­ment. We aim to offer direct sup­port to these two local cam­paigns resist­ing the fos­sil fuel indus­try.

22.5.2010
Today, a 50-strong inter­na­tion­al bike ride begins the 400 mile jour­ney from a com­mu­ni­ty resist­ing Britain’s largest open cast coal mine in Merthyr Tyd­fil, Wales to Coun­ty Mayo, Ire­land, where local peo­ple have spent the last ten years fight­ing a Shell-led gas devel­op­ment. We aim to offer direct sup­port to these two local cam­paigns resist­ing the fos­sil fuel indus­try.

30 cyclists from the UK will join the “Madrid to Mayo” cycle ride in Cork, and many oth­ers from Ire­land are expect­ed to join on route. We will spend ten days trav­el­ing up the west coast of Ire­land, dis­trib­ut­ing a spe­cial­ly pro­duced news­pa­per, “Chang­ing Times”. Events are being held along the way, each night we’re being host­ed by dif­fer­ent com­mu­ni­ty organ­i­sa­tions, and we’ll arrive in Mayo for the Ross­port Sol­i­dar­i­ty Camp June Bank Hol­i­day Week­end Gath­er­ing at Glen­gad.

It’s gonna be a good laugh, but hope­ful­ly more than that — the line we are draw­ing from Merthyr to Mayo is a reminder that none of us can afford to see these places in iso­la­tion.

The ride begins today with an event in Merthyr Tyd­fil where local res­i­dents and the sol­i­dar­i­ty cyclists are shar­ing sto­ries, ideas, music and food.

“Our com­mu­ni­ties’ sto­ries are repeat­ed across the globe in the places where fos­sil fuels are sourced. Large cor­po­ra­tions move into areas regard­less of the wish­es of the affect­ed pop­u­la­tion; resources are extract­ed and, whilst the cor­po­ra­tions reap vast prof­its, the local peo­ple have to suf­fer the health and envi­ron­men­tal con­se­quences. And, as the fos­sil fuels are burnt they con­tribute to cli­mate change, affect­ing every­one.” — Merthyr res­i­dent, Alyson Austin.

Both com­mu­ni­ties have a long his­to­ry of resis­tance, and their efforts have result­ed in amaz­ing suc­cess­es. In Erris, Mayo, the cam­paign won a size­able vic­to­ry in Novem­ber last year, when Shell’s appli­ca­tion for their onshore gas pipeline was effec­tive­ly refused by the plan­ning author­i­ties; it is unclear when (or if) per­mis­sion will be grant­ed in the future. In Merthyr Tyd­fil, cam­paign­ers are cur­rent­ly tak­ing out a Group Pri­vate Nui­sance case against the min­ing com­pa­ny, Miller Argent. Sig­nif­i­cant num­bers of local peo­ple are par­tic­i­pat­ing in the legal action which aims to lim­it the mine’s impact on res­i­dents. Cli­mate activists recent­ly did a sol­i­dar­i­ty action by blockad­ing coal trains head­ed from the mine to Aberthaw Pow­er Sta­tion. In recent months, Mayo has seen string of actions local­ly, nation­al­ly and inter­na­tion­al­ly in sol­i­dar­i­ty with polit­i­cal pris­on­ers Pat O’Don­nell and Niall Har­nett (more infor­ma­tion on the pris­on­ers and how to write to them, and the cam­paign in gen­er­al, on the shell to sea web­site.)

Please join us on the ride, for the gath­er­ing, and in con­tin­ued resis­tance against patri­ar­chal white-suprema­cist cap­i­tal­ist impe­ri­al­ism, and the fight for social and eco­log­i­cal jus­tice!

http://www.merthyrtomayo.org.uk

The new Action Update — full of of action news and analysis

In the new sum­mer edi­tion of the EF! Action Update, read about coal trains block­ad­ed, peat bogs defend­ed, and gas ter­mi­nals shut down. Find out about the dan­gers of nan­otech, cur­rent state of nuclear GM tri­als in the UK, Tesco upris­ings, golf course trash­ing, tar sands action and much more.

Newcastle flotilla blockadeIn the new sum­mer edi­tion of the EF! Action Update, read about coal trains block­ad­ed, peat bogs defend­ed, and gas ter­mi­nals shut down. Find out about the dan­gers of nan­otech, cur­rent state of nuclear GM tri­als in the UK, Tesco upris­ings, golf course trash­ing, tar sands action and much more.

Be inspired by our protest camp fea­ture and the recent Tit­nore vic­to­ry. And from across the seas, read about our broth­ers and sis­ters strug­gling against whal­ing ship sab­o­tage, coal port pirates, riots in Zagreb, min­ing firm occu­pa­tions in Bolivia, dam resis­tance in Brazil and much more.

“We are going to inher­it the earth . There is not the slight­est doubt about that. We Are not afraid of ruins. We car­ry a new world, here in our hearts. That world is grow­ing this minute.” — Dur­ru­ti

To down­load the lat­est EF!AU for print­ing, go to http://www.earthfirst.org.uk/efau/actionupdate_summer10print.pdf

To read the lat­est EF!AU online, go to http://www.earthfirst.org.uk/efau/actionupdate_summer10.pdf

Eviction Threat to Kew Bridge Eco Village

Kew Bridge Eco Vil­lage faces an evic­tion threat, start­ing from this Fri­day, 21st of May, 2010. It is like­ly that they will evict on the fri­day, or the mon­day after or at some oth­er date that suits their pur­pos­es.

Kew Eco VillageKew Bridge Eco Vil­lage faces an evic­tion threat, start­ing from this Fri­day, 21st of May, 2010. It is like­ly that they will evict on the fri­day, or the mon­day after or at some oth­er date that suits their pur­pos­es. If you want to help pro­tect the eco vil­lage, then come down and lend a hand.

The eco vil­lage is pri­mar­i­ly a place for beings of dif­fer­ent per­spec­tives, expe­ri­ences, ideals and aims to come togeth­er to cre­ate sus­tain­able com­mu­ni­ties, wher­ev­er they might exist. The site is set to be turned into a mon­strous devel­op­ment of expen­sive flats and more pubs and shops, in an area with two near­by shop­ping cen­ters, and with 3 pubs in the imme­di­ate area, and copi­ous amounts of dis­used prop­er­ties stand­ing emp­ty as the num­bers of home­less con­tin­ue to rise. Kew Bridge Eco Vil­lage stands in the way of this redicu­lous devel­op­ment and against all unsus­tain­able prac­tices every­where.

So if you want to pro­tect the eco vil­lage, whether you con­sid­er your­self to be class­war, eco, fem­i­nist, hip­py, hard­core, non-vio­lent, sur­vival­ist, what­ev­er: come on down and sup­port the vil­lage! There are plen­ty of sleep­ing spaces, and you even have the option of set­ting up a tent.

See you at the bar­ri­cades!!!!

See a map?

Note: click­ing the map link will load data from Open­streetmap’s exter­nal serv­er.

Hounslow squatted community land project

New land project occu­pied

New land project occu­pied

Come and get stuck in at squat­ted Houn­slow Com­mu­ni­ty Land Project, on the Han­worth rd nxt to Gur­d­wara tem­ple, ideas so far are allot­ments, sus­tain­able liv­ing, cre­ative work­shops, recy­cled sculp­ture gar­den, spir­i­tu­al space, sports pitch­es, adven­ture play­ground and nature trail! Come and be part of this! site phone kat on 07812 774110 or just turn up betwn 12 and dusk any day.

Coal Action Network website relaunched!

Check out http://coalaction.org.uk/ for the updat­ed and re-vamped Coal Action Net­work web­site and detailed coal maps of the UK. It is hoped that this web­site will be a use­ful resource to any­one tak­ing action – or think­ing of tak­ing action – to pro­tect com­mu­ni­ties, envi­ron­ments and the cli­mate sys­tem from coal projects.

Check out http://coalaction.org.uk/ for the updat­ed and re-vamped Coal Action Net­work web­site and detailed coal maps of the UK. It is hoped that this web­site will be a use­ful resource to any­one tak­ing action – or think­ing of tak­ing action – to pro­tect com­mu­ni­ties, envi­ron­ments and the cli­mate sys­tem from coal projects.

The CAN web­site will be kept up-to-date with recent news from cam­paigns and the indus­try. Have a look at The Coal Maps – map­ping coal across the UK, con­tacts page for cam­paigns and groups active on coal, use­ful resources for cam­paign groups, argu­ments against new coal, upcom­ing events and links to infor­ma­tion and oth­er issues. You can get in touch to con­tribute updates and infor­ma­tion and sign up to the CAN email list.

Through this web­site we aim to help link com­mu­ni­ty strug­gles and arm our­selves with the infor­ma­tion we need to resist new open cast coal mines and coal-fired pow­er sta­tions.

European Squatting Meeting

Next 17, 18, 19, and 20 of June, a Euro­pean Squat­ting Meet­ing will be held in the “CSO La For­sa” (Aveni­da de la Fama, 41, Cor­nel­la de Llo­bre­gat — Barcelona), so we are con­tact­ing groups across Europe who are inter­est­ed in par­tic­i­pate.

To join the meet­ing and / or sub­mit­ting infor­ma­tion, you can get in con­tact with us at: jornadaskny010@riseup.net

Pro­gram

Wednes­day 16 June

Next 17, 18, 19, and 20 of June, a Euro­pean Squat­ting Meet­ing will be held in the “CSO La For­sa” (Aveni­da de la Fama, 41, Cor­nel­la de Llo­bre­gat — Barcelona), so we are con­tact­ing groups across Europe who are inter­est­ed in par­tic­i­pate.

To join the meet­ing and / or sub­mit­ting infor­ma­tion, you can get in con­tact with us at: jornadaskny010@riseup.net

Pro­gram

Wednes­day 16 June

Arrival & Wel­come: Food, Drinks & Live Music (Txaranga)

Thurs­day 17 June

Morn­ing Pro­gram

Open­ing: Pre­sen­ta­tion of the dif­fer­ent squats presents
• His­tor­i­cal Con­text: Begin­ning of the squat move­ment in Europe
• Polit­i­cal Con­text: Legal frame­work, repres­sion and response strate­gies (Con­tacts and agree­ments with the state, response on the street, assim­i­la­tion of evic­tions … )
• Present and Future
• Con­nex­ions with oth­er strug­gles

We´d like that every col­lec­tive could make a lit­tle scheme of this to tack­le it bet­ter.

Evening Pro­gram

Dis­cus­sion:
We would like to expose dif­fer­ent strate­gies against repres­sion fol­lowed in dif­fer­ent spaces and places and their long-term effects: legal­iza­tions, agree­ments, dif­fer­ent kinds of direct response against evic­tions and its effects of the activ­i­ties of the spaces (such as the recep­tion of chil­dren, sup­port groups out­lawed …)

Fri­day 18 June

Morn­ing Pro­gram

Speak­ings:
Exhi­bi­tion of dif­fer­ent par­tic­u­lar cas­es of ways of act­ing against evic­tions try­ing to accom­mo­date the exist­ing diver­si­ty.
(To Be spec­i­fied but we want cas­es suf­fi­cient­ly rep­re­sen­ta­tive into the direct action)

Evening Pro­gram

Dis­cus­sion:
Con­se­quences of dif­fer­ent types of reac­tion to evic­tions: Legal, per­son­al and move­ments long-term effects?…

Sat­ur­day 19 June

Morn­ing Pro­gram

Open Air: Food & The­ater

Demon­stra­tion

Evening Pro­gram

Speak­ings:
Exhi­bi­tion of dif­fer­ent strug­gles with the squat move­ment as a cat­a­lyst or as a sup­port for their devel­op­ment.

Sun­day 20 June

Morn­ing Pro­gram

Dis­cus­sion:
Police repres­sion and dif­fer­ent meth­ods of repres­sion, see if there is an under­ly­ing polit­i­cal pur­pose at the Euro­pean lev­el and seek to form a gen­er­al pic­ture of it for a Euro­pean legal per­spec­tive of the map and the nation­al and local nuances (Com­mon­al­i­ties and dif­fer­ences between coun­tries and areas …) Any trends in com­mon? Are they using the same meth­ods of repres­sion? (Increased penal­ties, penal­ties of areas not pre­vi­ous­ly leg­is­lat­ed sen­tences, fines penal­ties, tight­en­ing of the evic­tions, more or less aggres­sive or spec­tac­u­lar of these, pro­pos­als for legal­iza­tion and recov­ery of the spaces …)

Evening Pro­gram

Speak­ing-Dis­cus­sion:
Police and Euro­pean police net­works, how they affect us, devel­op­ment and effec­tive action (DNA, data­bas­es, files police activists, agreed the clo­sure of bor­ders …)

Con­clu­sions and future pro­pos­als

Clos­ing Event: Drinks and Live Music

Both ses­sions in the morn­ing as the after­noon will be divid­ed into two blocks with a break in the mid­dle. We pro­vide simul­ta­ne­ous inter­pre­ta­tion.

http://www.faunanocturna.net/press/jornadeseuropeesdokupacio

Black Cat Centre (Bath) Illegally Evicted

7.05.2010
The Black Cat, Bath, has sad­ly been evict­ed this morn­ing from the Porter Butt build­ing on Lon­don Road.

We lost in court this morn­ing, and rather than wait for an evic­tion order to come through, the land­lords came right round the house and barged in with the full sup­port of local police.

7.05.2010
The Black Cat, Bath, has sad­ly been evict­ed this morn­ing from the Porter Butt build­ing on Lon­don Road.

We lost in court this morn­ing, and rather than wait for an evic­tion order to come through, the land­lords came right round the house and barged in with the full sup­port of local police.

We’re cur­rent­ly nego­ti­at­ing for the release of our pos­ses­sions from the build­ing, and are intend­ing to keep fair­ly qui­et until those nego­ti­a­tions are con­clud­ed in our favour. Once that’s done, thought — or if it does­n’t hap­pen — then we’re going to raise some mer­ry hell!

Sat­ur­day’s Open Mic may find a new home, so keep your eyes peeled for that.

Thanks to all our sup­port­ers, and apolo­gies to those of you who should have got emails about this, rather than hav­ing to see it on indy — the only per­son who can spell our email pass­word is off play­ing D&D…

Sol­i­dar­i­ty and Strug­gle,
The Black Cat Col­lec­tive

Bristol Eco Villager hospitalised after tripod demolition

5th May 2010

5th May 2010
After enter­ing the Eco Vil­lage site this morn­ing, bailiffs per­sist­ed through the day in their attempts to evict all Eco Vil­lagers from the St Wer­bergh’s site. Local res­i­dents joined vil­lagers in an increas­ing­ly des­per­ate attempt to pre­vent this. Although a cher­ry pick­er was turned away, a dig­ger was final­ly brought on site. Attempts had been made to pre­vent this by climb­ing onto it, but the dig­ger oper­a­tor evad­ed this by aggres­sive dri­ving, throw­ing at least one per­son to the floor.

A mound of earth was then pushed against the build­ing giv­ing bailiffs access to non-tri­pod sit­ting vil­lagers. The bailiffs then pro­ced­ed to low­er the tripods whilst the sit­ters were still in them, with no regard for their well being and safe­ty, As a result of this treat­ment one tri­pod sit­ter was sun­se­quent­ly tak­en to hos­pi­tal with poten­tial­ly seri­ous injuries to his legs.

Dur­ing all of this police ignored cries of pain and calls for help, they did, how­ev­er, act to pre­vent vil­lagers attempt­ing to re-enter the site over the fence.

The bailiffs then pro­ced­ed to demol­ish the on site build­ing, ignor­ing requests to damp­en the earth to pro­tect the native endan­gered newt pop­u­la­tion.

The site own­er has since con­tact­ed local res­i­dents to talk about non indus­tri­al use of the land.

The bailiffs firm act­ing on behalf of the High Court were Con­stant & Co.

Con­stant & co. are respon­si­ble for the some of the most vio­lent and hor­rif­ic evic­tions across the coun­try, spe­cial­iz­ing in bru­tal­iz­ing Gyp­sy, Roma, and Trav­eller com­mu­ni­ties. (one quick exam­ple, but there are loads more out there: http://www.wombles.org.uk/article2009075558.php)
One could inform them in a vari­ety of for­mats that their activ­i­ties are oth­er than desir­able mak­ing use of the details below:

Con­stant & Com­pa­ny
66 Harpur Street,
Bed­ford,
MK40 2RA

(t) 01234 340091
(f) 01234 301299

bedford@constantandcompany.co.uk

–

Eco Vil­lager Hos­pi­talised: update and request for footage and wit­ness­es

Just a quick update to you all on Kevs con­di­tion and a few details about what actu­al­ly hap­pend. Six bailiffs ille­gal­ly low­ered the tri­pod he was on, crush­ing him bitweed the polls. They then pro­ceed­ed to sit on him to pre­vent peo­ple from seeing/filimng what was going on, caus­ing the polls to act like giant blunt scis­sors and bad­ly dam­ag­ing the left side of his body.

Whilst try­ing to remove him, they also yanked his left leg vio­lent­ly from side to side, caus­ing bad lig­a­ment dam­age to a pre­vi­ous knee injury. The docs at the hos­pi­tal have giv­en him some pret­ty hefty pain killers and hes com­plet­ly zonked out next to me as I type.

If any­one has any footage of what hap­pend, or would like to act as a wit­ness, could you please please please get in con­tact with us as we WILL be press­ing charges.

BRISTOL ECO VILLAGE EVICTION — BAILIFFS ON SITE NOW

5th May 2010
This morn­ing Bailiffs moved onto the site at St Webergh’s Bris­tol.

5th May 2010
This morn­ing Bailiffs moved onto the site at St Webergh’s Bris­tol. Res­i­dents are resist­ing and at present there are still four peo­ple on site plus two Tri­pod sit­ters, one on the roof of the build­ing and one on the gate. In a dis­turb­ing move how­ev­er, bailiffs sre threat­en­ing to remove the tri­pod sit­ters and and peo­ple on the roof with­out climb­ing teams and spe­cial equi­ment, claim­ing that these are not nec­es­sary.

Loca­tion BS2 9SH: http://wtp2.appspot.com/wheresthepath.htm?lat=51.46909913993294&lon=-2.5699142096996144&gz=18&oz=10>=1

–

Most­ly still a stand-off but some updates..

The own­er has now showed up appar­ent­ly to talk to res­i­dents about the site. Mean­while the vil­lagers remain up tripods over the main gate to the site and on the roof of an on-site build­ing. A cher­ry-pick­er has showed up but as I under­stand it the local res­i­dents have occu­pied the pick­er … awe­some!!

This is not over by a long shot. Please get down to the vil­lage as there is every­thing to be won today. Bailiffs are still dis­cussing the poten­tial of just tip­ping tripods with peo­ple up in them. Any video cam­eras that can be tak­en down there are VITAL to stop the bailiffs from going nuts.

Local res­i­dents have put their bod­ies on the line by join­ing with Vil­lagers to link arms and block­ade the gates to pre­vent access by machin­ery.