Category: Squatting / Free Spaces / Protest Sites

Rampart — police break down door

28 Octo­ber 2008
A small num­ber of police broke down the front door and entered the Ram­part today. They searched peo­ple for drugs and pho­tographed them as well as the bar­ri­cades and the build­ing itself. They explained their actions say­ing that it is because the area is a high-risk drugs area. This is unfor­tu­nate­ly true of the street but we are con­cerned that this may be relat­ed to our evic­tion as well. They entered the Ram­part with­out a war­rant and then left after they had pho­tographed. This was NOT an evic­tion attempt.

28 Octo­ber 2008
A small num­ber of police broke down the front door and entered the Ram­part today. They searched peo­ple for drugs and pho­tographed them as well as the bar­ri­cades and the build­ing itself. They explained their actions say­ing that it is because the area is a high-risk drugs area. This is unfor­tu­nate­ly true of the street but we are con­cerned that this may be relat­ed to our evic­tion as well. They entered the Ram­part with­out a war­rant and then left after they had pho­tographed. This was NOT an evic­tion attempt.

Dif­fi­cult right now to say what it means in rela­tion to an evic­tion, but on the side of cau­tion, we are ask­ing peo­ple to come to the Ram­part tonight (Tues 28th) to stay over to defend the build­ing and help with bar­ri­cades for what might be an ear­ly morn­ing evic­tion. We will also need peo­ple to assist out­side if the time comes so send us your mobile num­ber to be informed. There will be a hearty break­fast for the brave.

–

28th octo­ber 2008, lon­don, whitechapel, lunchtime:

the police unex­pect­ed­ly intrud­ed the ram­pART social cen­tre in their lunchtime. they must have been starv­ing, because they felt like break­ing the doors. we won­der if it was appetite, that made them force their way in, or curios­i­ty, to see the progress of our efforts to bar­ri­cade the ram­pART. still, we art not amused of offi­cers on the scrounge…

… although we are gen­er­al­ly open for peo­ple to come by to wine and dine with us, but we’d like to invite peo­ple to knock on the doors, rather than knock­ing them down. and we don’t sup­port glut­tony of greedy devel­op­pers, grop­ing hous­es to con­vert them to lux­u­ry flats, because they want to bite more than they can chew…

… as you might know, the ram­pART is under threat of imma­nent evic­tion, so these three cop­pers might have been the van­guard of the 80 riot cops that are expect­ed to come by with the high court bailiffs to evict the space. so we are think­ing how many peo­ple we will have to cater for break­fast. need­less to say, we’d pre­fer to pam­per our friends and sup­port­ers. so feel wel­come to join the feast & fight the beast and defend your favourite social cen­tre…

please con­tact us via email: rampart@mutualaid.org or phone: 07852657501

Paraguan resistance to GM soya plantings — evictions & violence

28 Octo­ber 2008
Peas­ant organ­i­sa­tions are resist­ing against the begin­ning of the GM soya sea­son all over the coun­try of Paraguay. They demand access to land, land reform and the stop of the pes­ti­cide spray­ing which impacts on their com­mu­ni­ties. Despite the new gov­ern­ment, many camps have been evict­ed and vio­lence has tak­en place: 2 lead­ers have been mur­dered and hun­dreds of peas­ants have been arrest­ed. Please sign the let­ter below to put pres­sure on the gov­ern­ment and put a stop to vio­lence!

San Marco eviction28 Octo­ber 2008
Peas­ant organ­i­sa­tions are resist­ing against the begin­ning of the GM soya sea­son all over the coun­try of Paraguay. They demand access to land, land reform and the stop of the pes­ti­cide spray­ing which impacts on their com­mu­ni­ties. Despite the new gov­ern­ment, many camps have been evict­ed and vio­lence has tak­en place: 2 lead­ers have been mur­dered and hun­dreds of peas­ants have been arrest­ed. Please sign the let­ter below to put pres­sure on the gov­ern­ment and put a stop to vio­lence!

San Mar­co evic­tion & video­clip show­ing what hap­pened when a large group of campesinos halt­ed fumi­ga­tion trac­tors of Brazil­ian soy pro­duc­ers. Paraguay, com­mu­ni­ty of Yvypé all at http://www.lasojamata.org/en/node/230

In Paraguay, GM soya mono­cul­tures are today the main cause of defor­esta­tion, the destruc­tion and pol­lu­tion of oth­er ecosys­tems, of vio­lence and the evic­tion of small farm­ers and indige­nous peo­ples. Paraguay has near­ly 2,6 mil­lion hectares of soy plan­ta­tions for ani­mal feed exports and, more recent­ly, for agro­fu­el. A jour­nal­ist who vis­it­ed the coun­try in 2007 described the impact of soya mono­cul­tures as fol­lows:
“Rur­al east­ern Paraguay used to be full of jun­gle, small farms, schools and wildlife. Now it is a green sea of soy­beans. The fam­i­lies, trees and birds are gone. The schools are emp­ty. The air is filled with the tox­ic stench of the pes­ti­cides like paraquat and 2,4‑D used to pro­tect the soy crops” [http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3093].

The rem­nants of Paraguay’s Atlantic For­est and of the Alto Parana for­est, as well as wet­lands, grass­lands and rivers are being destroyed and pol­lut­ed by the expan­sion of immense RR soya fields. Defor­esta­tion is wors­en­ing glob­al warm­ing and also caus­ing severe region­al warm­ing and droughts. It has con­tributed to the worst fire sea­son ever record­ed in Paraguay last year, and prob­a­bly to the severe drought which is cur­rent­ly affect­ing the south of the coun­try. More than 100,000 small peas­ant fam­i­lies have been evict­ed for soya plan­ta­tions and over 100 peas­ant lead­ers have been mur­dered since the late 1990s in con­flicts over access to land. Agro-chem­i­cal (glyphosate, 2,4D, and oth­ers) spray­ing of soya plan­ta­tions severe­ly affects the health of peo­ple liv­ing in soy region, in some cas­es lead­ing even to deaths, and also destroys people´s food crops. Hunger and mal­nu­tri­tion are increas­ing as less and less land is avail­able to farm­ers for grow­ing food.

In August this year, a new gov­ern­ment took office and the new pres­i­dent, Fer­nan­do Lugo, promised to sup­port small farm­ers against pes­ti­cide poi­son­ing and soya expan­sion. How­ev­er, the gov­ern­ment has giv­en con­flict­ing sig­nals by also sup­port­ing increased soya exports at the same time. Also, the police and juridi­cal forces have been sup­port­ing soya busi­ness­es in sup­press­ing the peas­ant move­ment in their fight against pes­ti­cide spray­ing and the expan­sion of soy mono­cul­tures.

This month, at the start of the new soya plant­i­ng sea­son, small farm­ers’ organ­i­sa­tions have mobilised to stop pes­ti­cide spray­ing and to pro­tect peas­ant agri­cul­ture and the envi­ron­ment against fur­ther destruc­tion. They have set up around 130 law­ful camps at the mar­gins of soya ‘lat­i­fun­dios’ (large estates). In recent weeks, they have been increas­ing­ly sub­ject­ed to vio­lence, with two mur­ders of peas­ant lead­ers, unlaw­ful arrests and deten­tions. Also, var­i­ous camps have been vio­lent­ly evict­ed, with use of increas­ing num­bers of para­mil­i­taries. Many peas­ant lead­ers are receiv­ing death threats. The civ­il secu­ri­ty guards that for­mer gov­ern­ment organ­ised ‘Comi­sion Gar­rote’ are the main actors behind this threats.

The ten­den­cy seems to be that the vio­lence and repres­sion against the peas­ant move­ment will inten­si­fy. For many in the move­ment, this year is their last chance to stop soya expan­sion and to pro­tect what remains of Paraguays’ forests and wet­lands, sus­tain­able peas­ant agri­cul­ture, and small farm­ers and indige­nous people?s future.

Please write to the author­i­ties in Paraguay and urge them to ful­ly sup­port small farm­ers and their demands for pro­tec­tion from pes­ti­cide spray­ing, from evic­tions, envi­ron­men­tal destruc­tion and pol­lu­tion, for food sov­er­eign­ty and land reform.

See last action report — farms occu­pied — at http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/21753/

See also:
Video about the 2 evic­tions in Alto Parana:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYEBsk0jtG4
Video about the camp against the pes­ti­cide spray­ing in Caaguazú
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4xnXaZGjS8
Peas­ant com­mu­ni­ty in San Pedro against the pes­ti­cide spray­ing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfLEXvipkJw

Arti­cles about the cur­rent sit­u­a­tion in Paraguay:
http://www.lasojamata.org/

LETTER (send the Span­ish ver­sion that is below)

Dear Sir/Madam,

Re: Please pro­tect Paraguay’s com­mu­ni­ties and envi­ron­ment against soya
mono­cul­tures

I was very pleased to hear about Pres­i­den­t’s Lugo’s stat­ed com­mit­ment to
pro­tect small farm­ers against soya plan­ta­tions, includ­ing against
pes­ti­cide spray­ing and to stop defor­esta­tion. How­ev­er, I am deeply
con­cerned to hear about the increas­ing vio­lence against peas­ant
organ­i­sa­tions that are mobil­is­ing against pes­ti­cide spray­ing in the soya
mono­cul­tures, while argu­ing for a new agri­cul­tur­al pol­i­cy that pro­tects
small farm­ers and food sov­er­eign­ty as well as the envi­ron­ment.

Two peas­ant lead­ers ? Sin­dul­fo­Martínez mem­ber of the organ­i­sa­tion MCP and
Bien­venido Mel­gar­e­jo of the organ­i­sa­tion ASAGRAPA have recent­ly been
mur­dered. There are reports of a ‘hit list’ with the names of fifty
peas­ant lead­ers who fear that they could be mur­dered next. In the past
weeks, the courts and the police have been involved in the evic­tion of
peas­ant camps which have been law­ful­ly set up on the mar­gins of, not on,
soya plan­ta­tions, resort­ing to laws which exist to pre­vent crim­i­nal
offences. Peo­ple have been unlaw­ful­ly evict­ed, detained, crim­i­nalised and
tor­tured.

With this let­ter, I want to show my strong sup­port to the main demands of
peas­ant move­ments and civ­il soci­ety organ­i­sa­tions in Paraguay: that
pes­ti­cide spray­ing of soy mono­cul­tures must be banned and effec­tive­ly
stopped. The lands ille­gal­ly sold to agribusi­ness com­pa­nies must be
returned to the land­less Paraguayan peas­ants.

I urge you to stop the evic­tion orders and repres­sion against peas­ant
mobil­i­sa­tion. The two recent mur­ders and all reports of police vio­lence
and tor­ture must be ful­ly inves­ti­gat­ed and those respon­si­ble must be held
to account. The fam­i­lies of those who have been mur­dered must receive
finan­cial com­pen­sa­tion.

The gov­ern­ment must take imme­di­ate action and inves­ti­gate the death
threats against peas­ant lead­ers. The first step for this is to dis­solve
the so called ?Cit­i­zen Secu­ri­ty Com­mis­sions?, com­mon­ly called ?Gar­rote
Com­mis­sions?. These groups are the main actors of the para-police vio­lence
against social organ­i­sa­tions in the rur­al areas.

In front of the urgent sit­u­a­tion of pover­ty and envi­ron­men­tal dev­as­ta­tion
in Paraguay, the gov­ern­ment must ini­ti­ate a pro­gramme to sup­port peas­ant
farm­ing and food sov­er­eign­ty, rather than fur­ther sac­ri­fic­ing Paraguay’s
com­mu­ni­ties and envi­ron­ment to pro­duce ani­mal feed and agro­fu­els for
export.

Please let me know what your plans are for address­ing this urgent
sit­u­a­tion, in order to avoid more vio­lence and human rights vio­la­tions,
includ­ing more killings of peas­ants, and to pro­tect com­mu­ni­ties and the
envi­ron­ment from soya mono­cul­tures.

Thank you,

Yours faith­ful­ly,
Asun­to: Por favor, pro­te­ja a las comu­nidades paraguayas y al medio
ambi­ente de los monocul­tivos de soja

Esti­ma­da Sra., Esti­ma­do Sr.,

Ha sido muy sat­is­fac­to­rio para mí, saber acer­ca del com­pro­miso del
Pres­i­dente Lugo para pro­te­ger a los pequeños campesinos en con­tra de las
planta­ciones de soja, así como de las fumi­ga­ciones con pes­ti­ci­das y la
defor­estación. Sin embar­go, me pre­ocu­pa seri­amente cuan­do escu­cho acer­ca
de la escal­a­da de vio­len­cia dirigi­da hacia las orga­ni­za­ciones campesinas
que se mov­i­lizan en con­tra de las fumi­ga­ciones de pes­ti­ci­das sobre las
pobla­ciones y a favor de una nue­va políti­ca agraria que pro­te­ja a los
pequeños campesinos, la sober­anía ali­men­ta­ria y el medio ambi­ente.

Dos líderes campesinos ‑Sin­dul­fo­Martínez de la orga­ni­zación, Movimien­to
Campesino Paraguayo- MCP (Vía Campesina-PY) y Bien­venido Mel­gar­e­jo de la
orga­ni­zación Aso­ciación de Agricul­tores de Alto Paraná- ASAGRAPA han
sido recien­te­mente asesina­dos. Hemos tenido noti­cias acer­ca de una ?lista
negra? con nom­bres de unos cin­cuen­ta líderes campesinos que temen ser los
próx­i­mos asesina­dos. Jue­ces y la policía han esta­do en estas últi­mas
sem­anas impli­ca­dos en el des­man­te­lamien­to de cam­pa­men­tos campesinos
estable­ci­dos legal­mente en las már­genes, y no den­tro, de las planta­ciones
de soja, amparán­dose en leyes de pre­ven­ción del crimen. Los campesinos han
sido ile­gal­mente expul­sa­dos, detenidos, crim­i­nal­iza­dos y tor­tu­ra­dos.

Con esta car­ta quiero demostrar mi enér­gi­co apoyo a las dos prin­ci­pales
deman­das de los campesinos y las orga­ni­za­ciones de la sociedad civ­il de
Paraguay: Las fumi­ga­ciones con agrotóx­i­cos de los monocul­tivos de soja
deben ser pro­hibidas y detenidas de man­era efec­ti­va. Las tier­ras ven­di­das
irreg­u­lar­mente a los agroem­pre­sar­ios deben ser devueltas a los campesinos
sin­tier­ras paraguayos.

Exi­jo fre­nar la actu­al ola de desa­lo­jos y repre­sión a las mov­i­liza­ciones
campesinas. El desa­lo­jo por recur­sos de amparo pre­ven­ti­vo es una medi­da
jurídi­ca irreg­u­lar. Los dos recientes asesinatos y todos los reportes de
vio­len­cia poli­cial y tor­tu­ra deben ser inves­ti­ga­dos a fon­do, y sus
respon­s­ables deben ser penal­iza­dos. Las famil­ias de los asesina­dos deben
ser com­pen­sadas económi­ca­mente.

Así tam­bién el gob­ier­no debe actu­ar de for­ma inmedi­a­ta y fre­nar las
ame­nazas de muerte que pen­den sobre los diri­gentes campesinos. El primer
paso para ello es aten­der a las deman­das de las orga­ni­za­ciones de
desar­tic­u­lación de las ?Comi­siones de Seguri­dad Ciu­dadana?, común­mente
denom­i­nadas ?Comisión gar­rote?. Estos gru­pos son los prin­ci­pales
pro­tag­o­nistas de vio­len­cia para­poli­cial con­tra las orga­ni­za­ciones sociales
en el cam­po.

Frente la urgente situación de pobreza y dev­astación ambi­en­tal del cam­po
paraguayo, el gob­ier­no debe ini­ciar inmedi­ata­mente un pro­gra­ma de apoyo a
la agri­cul­tura campesina y la sober­anía ali­men­ta­ria. Bas­ta ya del
sac­ri­fi­cio de las comu­nidades campesinas e indí­ge­nas del Paraguay y del
medio ambi­ente para man­ten­er un mod­e­lo agroex­por­ta­dor sojero que sólo
pro­duce ali­men­to para ani­males y agro­com­bustibles.

Por favor, deme a cono­cer sus planes para con­tener esta urgente situación
y para evi­tar más vio­len­cia y vio­la­ciones de dere­chos humanos, incluyen­do
más asesinatos de campesinos en su país, y para pro­te­ger a las comu­nidades
y al medio ambi­ente de los monocul­tivos de la soja.

Muchas gra­cias por ade­lan­ta­do y un aten­to salu­do.

ADDRESSES / DIRECCIONES

1. Pres­i­den­cia de la Repúbli­ca del Paraguay
Exce­len­tísi­mo Don Fer­nan­do Lugo Mén­dez, Pres­i­dente de la Repúbli­ca del
Paraguay
Pala­cio de Gob­ier­no
El Paraguayo Inde­pen­di­ente e/Ayolas y O´leary
Cen­tral tele­fóni­ca 4140000 (RA)
web­site: www.presidencia.gov.py
e‑mail: presidente@presidencia.gov.py
webmaster@presidencia.gov.py

Sec­re­taria Gen­er­al
S. E. Miguel Angel López Per­i­to
Min­istro, Sec­re­tario Gen­er­al y Jefe del Gabi­nete Civ­il de la Pres­i­den­cia
de la Repúbli­ca
Tel 4140288, fax 4140310

2. Sec­re­taria del Ambi­ente (SEAM)
S. E. José Luís Casac­cia , Min­istro, Sec­re­tario Ejec­u­ti­vo
Avda. Madan Lynch 3500 y Reservista de la Guer­ra del Cha­co.
Tel + 595 21 615803/4, fax + 595 21 615807
casac­cia jcasaccia@hotmail.com

3. SENAVE, Ser­vi­cio Nacional de Cal­i­dad y Sanidad Veg­e­tal y de Semi­l­las
Ing. Agr. Luis Llano Imas , pres­i­dente
Ofic­i­na cen­tral del SENAVE: Edif. PLANETA I. Humaitá Nº 145 c/ Ntra. Sra.
de la Asun­ción. Tele­fax: + 595 21 445 769 /+ 595 21 441 549, Asun­ción -
Paraguay
presidencia@senave.gov.py
secretaria_general@senave.gov.py

S. E. Rafael Fil­iz­zo­la, Min­istro
Chile y Man­du­virá
Tel + 595 21 493 661, fax: + 595 21 450.027
ministro@mdi.gov.py
vmseguridad@mdi.gov.py
sgeneral@mdi.gov.py
5. Min­is­te­rio de Jus­ti­cia y Tra­ba­jo
S. E. Blas Llano, Min­istro
Gas­par Rodríguez de Fran­cia y Esta­dos Unidos
Tel + 595 21 447010, + 595 21 493209, fax + 595 21 208469
mjt@mjt.gov.py

6. Min­is­te­rio de Agri­cul­tura y Ganade­ria
S. E. Can­di­do Vera Bejara­no, Min­istro
Pres­i­dente Fran­co 479
Tel + 595 21 441036, cen­tral + 595 21 451316/ 447304
Vicem­i­nis­te­rio de Agri­cul­tura: vagricultura@mag.gov.py
Sec­re­taría Gen­er­al: secretariagral@mag.gov.py

7. Fis­calía Gral. del Esta­do
Dr. Rubén Can­dia Amar­il­la
fiscaliageneral@ministeriopublico.gov.py

Tasmanian Forest Activists Twice Violently Attacked by Loggers — solution to whole conflict proposed by activists

For­est activists attacked in the Upper Flo­ren­tine Val­ley, Tassie
22 Octo­ber 2008
On Mon­day morn­ing a for­est activist was repeat­ed­ly kicked in the head by vio­lent, out of con­trol log­gers in the Flo­ren­tine Val­ley, the site of a protest against old-growth log­ging.

Still Wild tree sit & banner blockadeFor­est activists attacked in the Upper Flo­ren­tine Val­ley, Tassie
22 Octo­ber 2008
On Mon­day morn­ing a for­est activist was repeat­ed­ly kicked in the head by vio­lent, out of con­trol log­gers in the Flo­ren­tine Val­ley, the site of a protest against old-growth log­ging.

A peace­ful action by con­ser­va­tion­ists in the Upper Flo­ren­tine was tar­get­ed by vio­lent log­ging con­trac­tors, with one activist kicked in the head and block­ade infra­struc­ture attacked with a sledge­ham­mer, seri­ous­ly endan­ger­ing two activists. This occurred while a Forestry Tas­ma­nia employ­ee watched on.

The group blocked the road for three hours until about 9.30am (AEDT) when a con­trac­tor attacked the vehi­cle with a sledge­ham­mer, she said.

“The con­trac­tor set upon the car with a sledge­ham­mer and then dragged the activist out from the car and kicked him in the head while he was lying on the ground,” Ms Majew­s­ki said.

She said the vic­tim, who escaped seri­ous injury, was a 22-year-old male activist who unlocked his arm from the road dur­ing the sledge­ham­mer attack.

“Mem­bers of the Tas­man­ian com­mu­ni­ty engaged in legit­i­mate peace­ful protest in defence of ancient forests should not be sub­ject­ed to this kind of vio­lence, nor should it be con­doned by Forestry Tas­ma­nia employ­ees” said Still Wild Still Threat­ened spokeper­son Ula Majew­s­ki.

“Due to the car­bon-stor­age val­ue of this for­est, the con­tentious nature of this log­ging oper­a­tion and today’s vio­lence, Still Wild Still Threat­ened requests an imme­di­ate ces­sa­tion of log­ging in coupe FO042E” Ula Majew­s­ki said.

“Vio­lence of this kind is per­pe­trat­ed by a small minor­i­ty of log­ging con­trac­tors. Con­trac­tors such as Howell’s Log­ging should focus their anger on those who are endan­ger­ing their liveli­hoods, such as Forestry Tas­ma­nia and Gunns Lim­it­ed, who con­tin­ue to dam­age Tas­man­ian com­mu­ni­ties and forests with an unsus­tain­able, wood­chip based indus­try” Ula Majew­s­ki said.

“Activists will be pur­su­ing this mat­ter with the police” said Miss Majew­s­ki.

On Sat­ur­day the camp will cel­e­brate their sec­ond year try­ing to halt log­ging of old-growth forests in the Upper Flo­ren­tine val­ley, about 120 kilo­me­tres west of Hobart.

The rain­for­est val­ley is sur­round­ed on three sides by the Tas­man­ian Wilder­ness World Her­itage Area. The Inter­na­tion­al Union for Con­ser­va­tion of Nature has iden­ti­fied the Upper Flo­ren­tine as hav­ing poten­tial World Her­itage val­ue.

Ula Majew­s­ki, a spokes­woman for the group Still Wild, Still Threat­ened, said attempts to save the for­est were reach­ing a crit­i­cal point, with plans to dri­ve a 10-kilo­me­tre log­ging road into the val­ley this sum­mer.

“That would open the entire area up for log­ging,” Ms Majew­s­ki said.

Video (same video also here)

—
Camp­site fire­bombed by log­gers

24 Octo­ber 2008
Three car loads of men arrived at the group’s camp­site late last night, Still Wild Still Threat­ened mem­ber Ula Majew­s­ki said. “A num­ber of unknown indi­vid­u­als arrived at Camp Flo­ren­tine around 11.30pm and used jer­ry cans of petrol to set the two vehi­cles on fire,” Ms Majew­s­ki said today. “A for­est activist who was sleep­ing in the vicin­i­ty of the vehi­cles was wok­en by shout­ing and loud smash­ing.

“A for­est infor­ma­tion booth pro­vid­ed for tourists was also set on fire and a gas cook­er inside explod­ed,” she said.

The inci­dent was report­ed to police after some of the activists had to walk out of the for­est because their cars had been destroyed in the attack. Still Wild Still Threat­ened spokes­woman Ula Majew­s­ki said her group had used a “drag­on” to block a road used by log truck dri­vers and forestry work­ers. With a “drag­on” a car is dri­ven over a device dug into the road and an activist, using a hole in the floor of the vehi­cle, locks an arm onto the device, she said.

The attack in the Flo­ren­tine Val­ley, 120km west of Hobart, fol­lows a vio­lent clash between forestry work­ers and activists at a road block in the same area on Tues­day. Activists had dis­rupt­ed log­ging in the area for a day last week using a tree-sit­ter, alleged­ly cost­ing con­trac­tors an esti­mat­ed $10,000 in lost rev­enue.

The camp has swelled with sup­port­ers to the Strath­gor­don Rd site in sol­i­dar­i­ty the pro­test­ers. The camp­site, where five peo­ple were sleep­ing, blocks a for­est road to an area marked for log­ging.

http://www.myspace.com/stillwildstillthreatened

———–

Tas­man­ian for­est activists pro­pose a solu­tion

Still Wild Still Threat­ened and the Huon Val­ley Envi­ron­ment Cen­tre are propos­ing a solu­tion to the pro­tract­ed debate over con­tentious forestry oper­a­tions in old growth and high con­ser­va­tion val­ue areas of the South­ern Forests.

“Still Wild Still Threat­ened and the Huon Val­ley Envi­ron­ment Cen­tre are propos­ing a Tas­man­ian and Aus­tralian Gov­ern­ment dri­ven solu­tion to con­tentious log­ging and road­ing oper­a­tions in the South­ern Forests. We are call­ing on all stake­hold­ers to adopt a con­sid­ered and ratio­nal approach to bring­ing this pro­longed for­est debate to a fair and envi­ron­men­tal­ly respon­si­ble con­clu­sion,” said Still Wild Still Threat­ened Spokesper­son Ula Majew­s­ki.

“Our organ­i­sa­tions are pre­pared to cease all in-for­est peace­ful direct action that restricts log­ging and road­ing oper­a­tions, con­tin­gent on a mora­to­ri­um on all forestry oper­a­tions in old growth and high con­ser­va­tion val­ue areas of the South­ern Forests, and the cre­ation of an inde­pen­dent­ly medi­at­ed dia­logue that aims to resolve the for­est issue,” said Huon Val­ley Envi­ron­ment Cen­tre Spokesper­son Adam Burl­ing.

The con­di­tions of this pro­posed solu­tion are:

1. SWST and the HVEC will com­mit to a ces­sa­tion of all in-for­est peace­ful direct action that restricts

log­ging and road­ing oper­a­tions in the South­ern Forests

2. The Tas­man­ian and Aus­tralian Gov­ern­ments will com­mit to a mora­to­ri­um on all forestry, log­ging and road­ing oper­a­tions in old growth and high con­ser­va­tion val­ue areas of the South­ern Forests;^1

3. An inde­pen­dent­ly medi­at­ed dia­logue will be under­tak­en, dri­ven by rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Depart­ment of Pre­mier and Cab­i­net and the Office of the Prime Min­is­ter, and attend­ed by rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the rel­e­vant min­istries, includ­ing cli­mate change, and rel­e­vant con­ser­va­tion groups and indus­try stake­hold­ers. This dia­logue will aim to resolve the long run­ning for­est debate in Tas­ma­nia in an envi­ron­men­tal­ly and eco­nom­i­cal­ly sus­tain­able man­ner;

4. That the above com­mit­ments remain in force for a peri­od of six months, with exten­sions grant­ed if dia­logue is ongo­ing;

5. That com­mu­ni­ty events con­tin­ue unhin­dered in the South­ern Forests, and for­est activists are able to main­tain a pres­ence in areas such as the site of Camp Flo­ren­tine.

“The Tas­man­ian com­mu­ni­ty deserves bet­ter than to see the con­tin­ued log­ging of our pre­cious remain­ing car­bon dense ancient forests, such as the Styx, Weld, and Upper Flo­ren­tine. And it deserves bet­ter than to see a for­est indus­try that exists on gov­ern­ment hand­outs and mar­gin­alis­es local oper­a­tors. We urge pol­i­cy mak­ers to con­sid­er this unique pro­pos­al,” Adam Burl­ing said.

“We will be for­mal­ly con­tact­ing Pre­mier Bartlett and Prime Min­is­ter Rudd about this today and are seek­ing a response by Tues­day 11^th Novem­ber,” said Ula Majew­s­ki.

UNITED ENVIRONMENT GROUPS TAKE TASMANIAN FOREST SOLUTION TO THE FEDERAL CABINET

Envi­ron­ment groups work­ing towards an end to the con­flict over for­est man­age­ment in Tas­ma­nia took a unit­ed posi­tion to meet­ings with four Fed­er­al Cab­i­net min­is­ters last night in Launce­s­ton.
Meet­ings were pos­i­tive and envi­ron­men­tal cam­paign­ers are con­fi­dent this will mark the start of a con­struc­tive work­ing rela­tion­ship that could see the long-over­due deliv­ery of envi­ron­men­tal, social and eco­nom­ic via­bil­i­ty to the strug­gling Tas­man­ian tim­ber indus­try.
“We are hope­ful requests to the Fed­er­al Cab­i­net and Tas­man­ian Pre­mier Bartlett to engage in mean­ing­ful dia­logue and par­tic­i­pate in the solu­tion to this long-run­ning dis­pute will bear fruit” said Dr Phill Pullinger, Direc­tor of Envi­ron­ment Tas­ma­nia.
“Col­lec­tive­ly, we call on Tas­man­ian Min­is­ter David Llewellyn to take a more open and con­struc­tive approach than that so far dis­played, and help bring the Pre­mier to the table and start talk­ing about a pos­i­tive way for­ward,” said Vica Bay­ley, spokesper­son for The Wilder­ness Soci­ety.

Recent rev­e­la­tions that for­est con­trac­tors want assis­tance to exit the indus­try, and that sawlogs are in over-sup­ply, show that now is the time for a res­o­lu­tion to this con­flict.
The Aus­tralian (4/11/08) reports, “In Tas­ma­nia, hard-hit for­est con­trac­tors are seek­ing a fed­er­al­ly fund­ed exit pack­age to allow them to leave the indus­try “with dig­ni­ty”.

“Forestry Tas­ma­nia is not the appro­pri­ate body to nego­ti­ate this con­flict. Only Pre­mier Bartlett can, by join­ing with fed­er­al lead­ers and help­ing to steer for­est con­flict to an ami­ca­ble clo­sure” said Jen­ny Weber, spokesper­son for the Huon Val­ley Envi­ron­ment Cen­tre.

“Envi­ron­ment groups sup­port a respon­si­ble for­est indus­try in Tas­ma­nia and are unit­ed in the belief that there can be a res­o­lu­tion to the debate that could deliv­er win-win out­comes for our forests and for­est-depen­dent com­mu­ni­ties,” said Ula Majew­s­ki, spokesper­son for Still Wild Still Threat­ened.

UK free-spaces news — Rampart & Worcester possible evictions

New social cen­tre under threat of ille­gal & pos­si­bly vio­lent evic­tion tomor­row
21.10.2008
This is to inform every­one as well as a call-out for sup­port — new­ly occu­pied com­mu­ni­ty and arts cen­tre in Worces­ter threat­ened with ille­gal and pos­si­bly vio­lent evic­tion tomor­row.

New social cen­tre under threat of ille­gal & pos­si­bly vio­lent evic­tion tomor­row
21.10.2008
This is to inform every­one as well as a call-out for sup­port — new­ly occu­pied com­mu­ni­ty and arts cen­tre in Worces­ter threat­ened with ille­gal and pos­si­bly vio­lent evic­tion tomor­row.

This is a call-out for sup­port — if you can get here before mid­night tonight and want to stay here, and eat with us and have a mer­ry night then please do. After mid­night, the last door will be ful­ly bar­ri­cad­ed. Any­one wish­ing to show sup­port for this ille­gal evic­tion after this point please turn up at 13–17 Car­den Street (off City Walls Road), Worces­ter WR1 around 11.30 tomor­row (WEDNESDAY), bring ban­ners, cam­eras and cam­era-phones and pro­vide pos­i­tive pub­lic rela­tions, because if they are forc­ing their way into our home IT IS ILLEGAL and we will not be scared by this bull­shit.

So what hap­pened…?
At about 15:30 today a bailiff arrived at the door with a let­ter on behalf of Keather Prop­er­ties Ltd. THE LETTER IS TRANSCRIBED AT THE BOTTOM FOR ANYONE WHO WANTS TO READ THE BOLLOCKS NOTICE

We’ve been on the phone to the Advi­so­ry Ser­vice for Squat­ters, and they have con­firmed that this is a total­ly ille­gal evic­tion. They have dealt with mat­ters like this on a day to day basis for 30 years and under­stand the law a lot bet­ter than most com­mer­cial lawyers. They assure us any attempt to evict tomor­row will be crim­i­nal and we should defend our­selves with num­bers and phys­i­cal bar­ri­cades. The ‘exer­cis­ing their rights’ part applies to land, and not build­ings. And see­ing as a tent can apply as a build­ing, an 8000 square ft com­mer­cial build­ing cer­tain­ly counts!

This would be a dif­fer­ent sto­ry if we only lived here.. but for two sol­id weeks we have been putting all our love and ener­gy into this place. We have had dreams become real­i­ty in cre­at­ing a space where any­one is wel­come and can come and cre­ate any­thing, any­time they want.

Com­mu­nal cook­ing, cir­cuit bend­ing and sewing work­shops, music prac­tice, paint­ing, and much much more was on the agen­da — our gallery cov­ered with work from many dif­fer­ent local artists, and now we have been dis­cov­ered we are being pre­sent­ed with ille­gal and vio­lent threats.

This whole thing is new to us.. but the bar­ri­cades are being strength­ened and peo­ple are get­ting ready for a poten­tial­ly long day of defend­ing the Wet Paint build­ing.

This is a call-out for sup­port — if you can get here before mid­night tonight and want to stay here, and eat with us and have a mer­ry night then please do. After mid­night, the last door will be ful­ly bar­ri­cad­ed. Any­one wish­ing to show sup­port for this ille­gal evic­tion after this point please turn up at 13–17 Car­den Street (off City Walls Road), Worces­ter WR1 around 11.30 tomor­row (WEDNESDAY), bring ban­ners, cam­eras and cam­era-phones and pro­vide pos­i­tive pub­lic rela­tions because if they are forc­ing their way into our home IT IS A CRIMINAL OFFENCE and we will not be scared by this bull­shit.

call us on 07965710354

Your friends at WET PAINT 🙂

.….….….blah blah blah

TAKE NOTICE

KEATHER PROPERTIES LTD (LANDOWNER) are the own­ers of the land on which you are tres­pass­ing and require you to leave. You are here with­out con­sent and are there­fore tres­pass­ing and have no right to remain. You should there­fore leave togeth­er with all your vehi­cles and goods by 1200 hours on the 22 day of Octo­ber 2008.

If you fail to do so, KEATHER PROPERTIES LTD (LANDOWNER) will exer­cise its rights to self-help to remove you from the land and have instruct­ed Bailiffs from Swift Cred­it Ser­vices Lim­it­ed to do so on its behalf. This right, under Com­mon Law, is set out on Hals­burys law of Eng­land. The police will attend if nec­es­sary to ensure that there is no breach of the peace.

Should this enforce­ment action by nec­es­sary , you will be held respon­si­ble for all costs of your removal and trans­porta­tion and KEATHER PROPERTIES LTD (LANDOWNER) may take pro­ceed­ings against you for the recov­ery of these costs.

KEATHER PROPERTIES LTD (LANDOWNER) will be enti­tled to take such action because you failed to respond to a request to leave the land on which you are cur­rent­ly tres­pass­ing.

DATED THIS 21 DAY OF OCTOBER 2008
SIGNED
LANDOWNER KEATHER PROPERTIES LTD
ADDRESS C/O ROBERT DAVIES PARTNERSHIP LTD.

wetpaint@riseup.net

—

SAVE the Ram­pART

21 Octo­ber 2008
Ram­pART Lon­don’s longest last­ing lib­er­at­ed space is fac­ing evic­tion.

yes­ter­day a mem­ber of the Ram­pART col­lec­tive talked to a guy out­side Ram­pART, who intro­duced him­self as Stu­art who was also present at court on the 20th of Decem­ber. he said that the coun­cil build­ing con­trol depart­ment had been has­sling them and he’d nar­row­ly avoid­ed them slap­ping a court order on them last week in rela­tion to dan­ger­ous parts of the build­ing such as slates hang­ing off etc.

they have been try­ing to get us evict­ed since March and got there­fore a war­rant from the high court, which means they are using the high court bailiffs, the police say they need 80 offi­cers and demand­ed £25,000 for the costs. so the own­er took the police to court and the police backed down. the hold up is still the police who have not giv­en a date yet…

so.…

basi­cal­ly the Ram­pART could be evict­ed any time and it’s just the police being the ones that has held it up. we will not get notice of the date of the
evic­tion and we will find it dif­fi­cult to hold off 80 cops and bailiffs on a sur­prise 5am evic­tion. we do need to pro-active­ly find anoth­er build­ing as a back­up. we won’t give in with­out resist­ing the evic­tion to make a state­ment against gen­tri­fi­ca­tion and the evic­tion of free spaces in east Lon­don.

we invite you to come and get cre­ative in its defence. this Thurs­day we are launch­ing an ongo­ing time of action.

we’ll start build­ing and cook­ing @ 3 pm, then Dan­ish activists will share expe­ri­ences from the youth house @ 6 pm, din­ner around 7.30 and build­ing and direct action skill-shar­ing after that. we need tools for mak­ing the bar­ri­cades effi­cient and beau­ti­ful, so if you have access to tools or mate­ri­als please bring them along.

when we fight for Ram­part we are not just fight­ing to defend the space. we are part of a world wide strug­gle against the cap­i­tal­ist world order.

we are fight­ing for every­one’s rights to learn and edu­cate, share, live and love with­out author­i­ties.

we are fight­ing for our dreams.

now is the time to show Lon­don and the rest of the world that the strug­gle con­tin­ues…

rampart@mutualaid.org
http://www.rampart.co.nr

Guerrilla Gardening Comes To Chester

A group of Chester res­i­dents, hav­ing noticed that there is neglect­ed and orphaned land all over the city, decid­ed to form a guer­ril­la gar­den­ing troop. The term ‘guer­ril­la gar­den­ing’ is used loose­ly to describe dif­fer­ent forms of rad­i­cal gar­den­ing. Some­times this is gar­den­ing with polit­i­cal aims — per­haps high­light­ing land use issues — or some­times it is about grow­ing food.

A group of Chester res­i­dents, hav­ing noticed that there is neglect­ed and orphaned land all over the city, decid­ed to form a guer­ril­la gar­den­ing troop. The term ‘guer­ril­la gar­den­ing’ is used loose­ly to describe dif­fer­ent forms of rad­i­cal gar­den­ing. Some­times this is gar­den­ing with polit­i­cal aims — per­haps high­light­ing land use issues — or some­times it is about grow­ing food.

The troop of Guer­ril­la Gar­den­ers have been out and about in Chester. Their first project inv­oled trans­form­ing three lit­ter strewn planters on Christle­ton Road, one of the main gate­ways to the city. Lit­ter and weeds were removed and replaced with win­ter pan­sies, daf­fodils, for­get-me-nots and hon­ey­suck­le.

The troop wants to reclaim land from per­ceived neglect and mis­use. Armed with trow­els, bulbs and vision, their idea is to gar­den every­where, any­where.

One Guer­ril­la Gar­den­er stat­ed:

’ I was fed up of see­ing these planters filled with rub­bish and weeds every time I walked into the City Cen­tre. I want­ed to reclaim this resource for us all to enjoy’

The Guer­ril­la Gar­den­ers want to make Chester a more appeal­ing place to live, beau­ti­fy­ing the neigh­bour­hood and giv­ing it back to the com­mu­ni­ty.

To get involved or donate plants/saplings/ shrubs

con­tact chesterguerrillagardeners@hotmail.co.uk

The latest EF! Action Update is out, bringing you reports of eco-resistance for the darkening days…

Bring­ing light & inspi­ra­tion to the dark­er evenings are the action sto­ries in the lat­est Earth First! Action Update.

Block­ades of nuclear pow­er, roads & rivers around the world were joined “with this Shell-blockad­ing D‑lock I thee wed”.

Adjustable spanner photoBring­ing light & inspi­ra­tion to the dark­er evenings are the action sto­ries in the lat­est Earth First! Action Update.

Block­ades of nuclear pow­er, roads & rivers around the world were joined “with this Shell-blockad­ing D‑lock I thee wed”.

And if anti-fas­cist action, quar­ry sab­o­tage, squats, tree plat­forms, wrekin’ open­casts, scal­ing lux­u­ry hotels & the lat­est protest camp news was­n’t enough for you, chuck in some glue, arm tubes, a pool of oil, stink bombs, air­borne rape alarms and a Lego-sized occu­pa­tion, then there’s full reports from this sum­mer’s antics at the Camp for Cli­mate Action, Ross­port sol­i­dar­i­ty camp, EF! sum­mer gath­er­ing and Sav­ing Ice­land camp, plus a crop of glob­al cli­mate camps & news of protest & resis­tance from all 5 con­ti­nents.

“No nukes, no coal, no kid­ding” — with peo­ple dying (both lit­er­al­ly & sym­bol­i­cal­ly) from the activ­i­ties of the Earth-destroy­ers, peo­ple have been shout­ing to just “Leave it in the Ground”, drag­on boats have clashed with navy gun­boats in Ire­land, an oil war was declared in Nige­ria, and ‘moles’ spent a week under­ground dig­ging fur­ther and fur­ther away from the forces of dark­ness at an open-cast coal site.

Details of the new Coal Action Net­work, upcom­ing dates & a full con­tact list should help launch (or boost) you into the orbit of eco-resis­tance.

Sub­scribe and get it sent direct to a let­ter­box near you — you’d also be sup­port­ing the EF!AU to get print­ed and sent out to pris­on­ers & protest camps. If you want some to dis­trib­ute, con­tact us at: actionup­date (AT) earthfirst.org.uk

Down­load the lat­est issue or past issues here.

The EF!AU is there to inspire peo­ple to take eco­log­i­cal direct action, to pro­vide info to help you just get out and do it. Don’t feel shy, put your best foot for­ward.

The EF!AU is the quar­ter­ly newslet­ter of peo­ple tak­ing eco­log­i­cal direct action — send us news of your action or cam­paigns, and come along to the Win­ter Moot if you want to get involved in any of the cam­paigns you’ve read about.

What is Earth First!?

Shell Pulling Out of Glengad till early Spring

Impor­tant Update from Erris.
The word is – Shell are pulling out of Glen­gad and sus­pend­ing work till ear­ly Spring. Shell ‘con­sul­tants’ are inform­ing local res­i­dents that the beach is being ‘rein­stat­ed’ and the work will take a num­ber of weeks.

The Soli­taire has moved on and is ‘off hire’ to Shell.

Impor­tant Update from Erris.
The word is – Shell are pulling out of Glen­gad and sus­pend­ing work till ear­ly Spring. Shell ‘con­sul­tants’ are inform­ing local res­i­dents that the beach is being ‘rein­stat­ed’ and the work will take a num­ber of weeks.

The Soli­taire has moved on and is ‘off hire’ to Shell.

No press release has issued from Shell and they are behind in their week­ly ‘progress’ reports to the PAD (Petro­le­um Affairs Divi­son) of Min­is­ter Eamon Ryan’s Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion, Ener­gy and Nat­ur­al Resources, which can nor­mal­ly be read here: http://www.dcenr.gov.ie/Natural/Petroleum+Affairs+Division/Corrib+Gas+Field+Development/SEPIL+Weekly+Progress+Reports+to+PAD.htm

It appears that Shell are wrap­ping up oper­a­tions at the pro­posed land­fall site in Glen­gad. The trench exca­vat­ed through the cliffs into the pro­tect­ed areas is being back­filled, and the cause­way built out into Broad­haven Bay is being removed. Also one side of the site fenc­ing on the beach has been removed. And the cable drum has been removed from the winch.

Unfor­tu­nate­ly the com­mence­ment of remov­ing the cause­way will not be able to remove the hun­dreds of tonnes of fine mate­r­i­al, which has been washed away, pol­lut­ing the local sea area for miles. Fish­er­men have said they can see the dis­coloura­tion in the water 5 or 6 miles away from the Shell beach com­pound.

Var­i­ous mate­ri­als which Shell were sup­posed to have kept stored and sep­a­rate in the com­pound, have in fact been mixed and stored on the beach and much of this, as well as unsuit­able cause­way mate­ri­als, has been wash­ing away for months now, through high tides and rain.

Bro­ken con­crete and steel have also been added to these mate­r­i­al heaps, which I would assume will be dumped or buried on site, whether on the beach or inside the com­pound in the SAC/SPA. It appears that this ‘for­eign rub­ble’ is now being used to fill the trench which was dug through the cliff to take the pipe.

The Soli­taire has left Scot­land for the Span­ish port of Algee­rias, near Gibral­tar, a main bunker port, sev­er­al days ago.

For unknown rea­sons Shell con­tin­ue to employ boats to sit in the bay a few hun­dred metres from the land­fall site, with 3 boats there this morn­ing, includ­ing a small tug / winch boat. Its not clear what if any­thing they are doing.

The road widen­ing and upgrades to facil­i­tate Shell have con­tin­ued, with Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil clos­ing or block­ing the road for long peri­ods despite vehe­ment local objec­tions to these upgrade works, with peo­ple liv­ing along the route being forced to block the sides of the road at their prop­er­ties to pre­vent the Coun­cil steal­ing their mar­gins to widen the road for Shell.

I would remind peo­ple who are inter­est­ed that AFRI are hold­ing a Hedge School, which looks to be even bet­ter than last year’s with a week­end of talks from some very rel­e­vant peo­ple, http://www.corribsos.com/index.php?id=515&event=1 or http://www.afri.ie for details. That’s the 24th, 25th & 26th Oct.

Protest halts logging in upper Florentine Valley-Monday 13 October 2008 & campaign update newsletter

MEDIA RELEASE
Mon­day, 13th Octo­ber 2008
Tas­man­ian for­est defend­ers take a stand against cli­mate crimes in the Upper Flo­ren­tine Val­ley

MEDIA RELEASE
Mon­day, 13th Octo­ber 2008
Tas­man­ian for­est defend­ers take a stand against cli­mate crimes in the Upper Flo­ren­tine Val­ley

This morn­ing, for­est activists from Still Wild Still Threat­ened con­duct­ed a peace­ful action in the Upper Flo­ren­tine Val­ley, halt­ing log­ging oper­a­tions in coupe FO42E. A for­est defend­er is perched high on a tree-sit to protest against the con­tin­ued dec­i­ma­tion of Tas­ma­ni­a’s car­bon dense old growth forests.

“We are speak­ing out against the cli­mate crimes which con­tin­ue to be per­pet­u­at­ed by Forestry Tas­ma­nia and Gunns Lim­it­ed, and are call­ing on Kevin Rudd to take imme­di­ate action and put a stop to the ram­pant wood-chip­ping of some of our most sig­nif­i­cant car­bon sinks” said Still Wild Still Threat­ened spokesper­son Chris­to Mills.

“A recent ANU study has clear­ly shown that Tas­ma­ni­a’s ancient forests can play a key role in com­bat­ing dan­ger­ous cli­mate change. [1]However, these glob­al­ly renowned forests con­tin­ue to be sub­ject­ed to destruc­tive road­ing, log­ging and burn­ing oper­a­tions” said Mr Mills.

“The car­bon rich forests of the Upper Flo­ren­tine Val­ley are being sys­tem­at­i­cal­ly destroyed to feed the rapa­cious appetite of an envi­ron­men­tal­ly unsus­tain­able wood-chip­ping industry.The dev­as­ta­tion of these car­bon rich forests is an inter­na­tion­al dis­grace and for­est defend­ers will con­tin­ue to take peace­ful action against these rep­re­hen­si­ble cli­mate crimes” said Mr Mills.

“Pro­tect­ing Tas­ma­ni­a’s ancient forests is a sim­ple and high­ly effec­tive cli­mate change solu­tion” said Mr Mills.

For com­ment, con­tact: Chris­to Mills 0447 631 735

—–

The lat­est cam­paign update newslet­ter, Spring 2008 — upcom­ing dates (Note: South­ern hemi­sphere spring is our North­ern autumn) — not that you’d think of fly­ing there in any case, boys & girls 😉

Halloween land squat, Birmingham — housing crisis

POSSIBLE DEVELOPMENT OF GREEN FIELD SITES FOR HOUSING

The issue of a lack of good qual­i­ty, well main­tained homes for social rent has long been an issue in Birm­ing­ham

Poor qual­i­ty and bad­ly main­tained rent­ed homes cause a vari­ety of prob­lems for their occu­pants includ­ing poor health.

POSSIBLE DEVELOPMENT OF GREEN FIELD SITES FOR HOUSING

The issue of a lack of good qual­i­ty, well main­tained homes for social rent has long been an issue in Birm­ing­ham

Poor qual­i­ty and bad­ly main­tained rent­ed homes cause a vari­ety of prob­lems for their occu­pants includ­ing poor health.

Dur­ing cold­er months the issue of insu­la­tion is a major prob­lem with those on low wages or ben­e­fits not being able to heat their home prop­er­ly. AND IT IS YET ANOTHER SOURCE OF CLIMATE CHANGE caused by a lack of insu­la­tion

On Sep­tem­ber 1st 2008 JUSTICE NOT CRISIS action group scaled the Town Hall in Birm­ing­ham to protest at the coun­cil’s social hous­ing pol­i­cy.

On Thurs­day 30th Octo­ber JUSTICE NOT CRISIS are squat­ting a piece of vacant coun­cil hous­ing land and set­ting up the JOHN LINES HOMELESS VILLAGE. We intend to cel­e­brate Hal­loween on the Fri­day and stay for as long as pos­si­ble.

For full up to date info please vis­it the web site at www.justicenotcrisis.wordpress.com
email us at justice.not.crisis@googlemail.com

We are cam­paign­ing for:

1. That the coun­cil release some of their hous­ing land to hous­ing asso­ci­a­tions so that they can use £100m worth of gov­ern­ment grants to build 2,000 new homes for social rent.
2. We oppose the build­ing of 1,000s of new homes on green field sites in and around Birm­ing­ham as part of the coun­cils aspi­ra­tion to build up to 60,000 new homes.
3. We want to see the coun­cil improve their homes to a much bet­ter stan­dard than the laugh­able “decent homes stan­dard”.

SWOMP — A freestate in Amsterdam, the Netherlands

Intro­duc­tion

It is the fourth time activists have squat­ted a piece of land in the Pijp (an area of Ams­ter­dam) and by far the most suc­ces­ful action. They are protest­ing against unnec­es­sary demo­li­tion and spec­u­la­tion as well as tak­ing action in sup­port of local neigh­bour­hoods for a sus­tain­able future.

Intro­duc­tion

It is the fourth time activists have squat­ted a piece of land in the Pijp (an area of Ams­ter­dam) and by far the most suc­ces­ful action. They are protest­ing against unnec­es­sary demo­li­tion and spec­u­la­tion as well as tak­ing action in sup­port of local neigh­bour­hoods for a sus­tain­able future.

swomp solar

Some his­to­ry

On July 11, 2008, a group of peo­ple from the Pijp squat­ting group and Groen­front! Ams­ter­dam squat­ted a vacant lot at Rusten­berg­er­straat 438–440. A school had pre­vi­ous­ly stood on the land and was demol­ished against the wish­es of the neigh­bour­hood, prob­a­bly to pre­vent it being squat­ted. There are cur­rent­ly no plans for the site, which has a tree which is pro­tect­ed by per­mits. Pre­vi­ous land squats had been evict­ed quite bru­tal­ly by police so this time the activists were pre­pared — they were in large num­bers, had the sup­port of local res­i­dents and made sure their car­a­vans were well secured in the ground!

After one month, the project declared itself a free state and the res­i­dents pledged to live in a car­bon neu­tral fash­ion on the site. Instead of wait­ing for local gov­ern­ment to decide what to do with the land they decid­ed to take action them­selves! Per­ma­cul­ture gar­dens were set up and solar pan­els were installed. Local squat cafes are doing ben­e­fits in sup­port of the project. In Sep­tem­ber an open day was held with a tour speak­ers and dis­cus­sions

swomp soil

Liv­ing at SWOMP (in the words of one res­i­dent)

The whole thing has grown into a cli­mate friend­ly exper­i­men­tal gar­den. Every day we are learn­ing more about the prob­lems you encounter when hav­ing to pro­vide for your­self (doing it in a way which means in the future you can keep pro­vid­ing your­self). These are the same prob­lems soci­ety / the com­mu­ni­ty will faces soon. We are exper­i­ment­ing with per­ma­cul­tures, we have a ground­wa­ter­pump and a solar­cell and are plan­ning to build our own eco toi­let.

Being busy with this I’m meet­ing a lot of oth­er peo­ple being busy with sim­i­lar stuff, and sud­den­ly the feel­ing of being an activist call­ing out in the land of the deaf is chang­ing. More and more peo­ple seem to be real­is­ing some­thing has to be done, and most impor­tant­ly, we can do it (we are going to win)!

We stum­bled across the con­cept of tran­si­tion towns. Appar­ent­ly oth­ers are doing the same as us. Oth­ers, not activists just com­mu­ni­ties. Com­mu­ni­ties that stop and think: how are we going to deal with the upcom­ing (unavoid­able) oil-cri­sis and cli­mate change? What hap­pens when the trucks stop dri­ving and bring­ing us food and pro­duce from all over the world? Loot­ing, only the fittest will sur­vive? Or can we as a com­mu­ni­ty pre­pare our­selves and equip our­selves with work­able solu­tions. We should start prepar­ing: Where do we get food? Who heals the sick, how do we trans­port? How do make tools with­out our cur­rent tech­nol­o­gy? And most impor­tant of all how do we pre­vent future cri­sis? How can we find a bal­anced way of liv­ing with­out wear­ing out our own sur­round­ings?

New ethics will have to be devel­oped. This all might seem a dis­tant dream or fan­ta­sy but it is already hap­pen­ing all over the world. With 33 tran­si­tion towns in Eng­land and 77 world­wide. And four times more being set up world­wide. It is actu­al­ly a very acces­si­ble way of chang­ing, it’s real­is­ing that we our­selves need to do it and nobody else. It starts with cre­at­ing con­scious­ness. Not about the upcom­ing cri­sis, every­body knows about that by now and activists all over the world feel frus­trat­ed about every­body know­ing but nobody act­ing on it.

We need to grow con­sciousnes about self-deter­mi­na­tion, and about the pos­si­bil­ties that you have as an indi­vid­ual and a com­mu­ni­ty. Of course the gov­ern­ment and cor­po­ra­tions won’t change by them­selves. We don’t need to wait for them, we should even exclude them. The steps seem so big but are actu­al­ly small and achiev­able. It starts with grow­ing con­scious­ness, its almost like a sect man! Wher­ev­er some peo­ple start being busy with tran­si­tion towns, all the peo­ple around them get infect­ed and enthu­si­asm soon grows a net­work. A net­work starts hav­ing meet­ings, and in the meet­ing real­is­tic goals will be set. “In how­ev­er many years we should be able to get at least 50% of our food from our own lands, by then we need to have reduced our oil-depen­dence, at least by the year of XXXX, we shall be total­ly inde­pen­dent”.

Stuff like that, read it, it’s inspir­ing. In Eng­land ther are some towns, vil­lages, dwellings, but also neigh­bour­hoods that start­ed think­ing about the future. These towns or dwellings will be the pio­neers in the time of tran­si­tion which pret­ty soon every­body is going to expe­ri­ence. We can wait till our wal­lets force us to change, or we can be the ones who will lat­er have the advan­tages of hav­ing start­ed off ear­ly. It’s just a log­i­cal step to take in a time like this.

Links

http://swomp.wordpress.com/>Home web­site
http://www.steenbreek.org/img/pers/DeMorgen_20080906.pdf>In the Bel­gian press