Category: Unnecessary Developments

Ongoing Blockade Of Fracking Site In Sussex

Entance Of Fracking Site Blocked

Frack­ing com­pa­ny Cuadrilla Resources are try­ing to start drilling in Bal­combe, West Sus­sex and the com­mu­ni­ty is try­ing to stop them.

Entance Of Fracking Site Blocked

Frack­ing com­pa­ny Cuadrilla Resources are try­ing to start drilling in Bal­combe, West Sus­sex and the com­mu­ni­ty is try­ing to stop them.

Update (2:45pm): Begin­ning to look like Bal­combe 1 – Cuadrilla 0. Thoughts are turn­ing to Day 2 of block­ade!

Update (12:45pm): Now over 250 peo­ple at site. Come down and join the par­ty!

Update (10:45am): Large crowd. Truck isn’t going any­where. Come on down!

Update (9:45am): Gaze­bos are up. Gala set­tling in for long haul. Come on down!

Update (9:00am): Great Gas Gala going strong. Trucks now backed up all through the vil­lage.

Update (8:30am): Great Gas Gala is well under­way. A truck tring to deliv­er equip­ment is being blocked from enter­ing the frack­ing site. Num­bers are grow­ing.

Pho­tos of evolv­ing block­ade at Cuadrilla Resources frack­ing site in Bal­combe, Sus­sex. Around 250 peo­ple, truck immo­bilised out­side site, seems to have mys­te­ri­ous­ly devel­oped fault with brakes. Gaze­bos up, legal brief­ing for locals, anoth­er truck stopped in vil­lage. Anoth­er 15 more trucks were due today. Now seems unlike­ly any will get on. Cuadrilla had want­ed to be up and drilling by week­end.

 

Large Number Of People Blockng Entrance
Large Num­ber Of Peo­ple Block­ng Entrance

Atmosphere Relaxed At Present
Atmos­phere Relaxed At Present

Camp Being Set Up
Camp Being Set Up

Faulty Brakes On Truck
Faulty Brakes On Truck

Police Hanging Back For Now
Police Hang­ing Back For Now


Cuadrilla have tem­po­rary plan­ning per­mis­sion to drill at site in Bal­combe. Per­mis­sion expires in Sep­tem­ber and drilling will take at least 6 weeks so any sig­nif­i­cant delays could scup­per their plans. They are explor­ing for tight (shale) oil, and the Kim­mer­age Clay shale lay­er they are tar­get­ing is sim­i­lar to the Bakken Shale in North Dako­ta. Full scale pro­duc­tion would involve thou­sands of wells, pipelines and com­pres­sor sta­tions coat­ing the Sus­sex coun­try­side. This is before you get to water con­t­a­m­i­na­tion, air pol­lu­tion and accel­er­at­ing cli­mate change. See  http://frack-off.org.uk/latest-news-from-the-great-gas-gala/ for updates

Indian tribe blocks Pan-American Highway to protest land invasion

23 July 2013 Cross post­ed from Sur­vival

 

23 July 2013 Cross post­ed from Sur­vival

 

A key South Amer­i­can high­way con­nect­ing Paraguay and Bolivia is being blocked by an Indi­an tribe angry at the destruc­tion of their rapid­ly-shrink­ing island of for­est.

Ayoreo Indi­ans today blocked the Trans-Cha­co High­way, which forms part of the Pan-Amer­i­can High­way, and have vowed to main­tain their protest until out­siders who have occu­pied their land are removed.

The Indi­ans are angry about the ille­gal inva­sion of their land by two Paraguayan farm­ers, in an area to which the Ayoreo secured offi­cial land title 16 years ago.

The farm­ers and their work­ers have erect­ed cat­tle fences and bull­dozed wide tracks, and claim that the land belongs to them. They were guard­ed by police, to pre­vent any attempt on the Ayore­os’ part to stop the work.

The land is titled to the Ayoreo, but the farmers have erected cattle fences and bulldozed wide tracks.
The land is titled to the Ayoreo, but the farm­ers have erect­ed cat­tle fences and bull­dozed wide tracks.
© Sur­vival

Although most mem­bers of the Ayoreo tribe are con­tact­ed, some groups are known to remain uncon­tact­ed in the for­est in the area now under threat.

The Ayoreo have said to Sur­vival Inter­na­tion­al, ‘We don’t want any out­siders in our ter­ri­to­ry – it’s dan­ger­ous for us, and dan­ger­ous for our rel­a­tives in the for­est. We’ll stay here [on the road] until all the out­siders leave our land.’

Uncon­tact­ed Cha­coA spe­cial report from the Paraguayan Cha­co. Recent­ly con­tact­ed Ayoreo Indi­ans are wor­ried for the future of their uncon­tact­ed rel­a­tives.

Survival’s Direc­tor Stephen Cor­ry said today, ‘The Ayoreo are extreme­ly angry that one of the few parts of their ter­ri­to­ry that they had man­aged to secure is now being invad­ed by out­siders, with the con­nivance of the local police. It seems like the author­i­ties in Paraguay favor the rich and pow­er­ful over peo­ple like the Ayoreo, who sim­ply try to live in peace on their own land.’

Michigan Activists Locking Down to Halt Tar Sands Pipeline Construction

Brooklyn & Barb locked down

From MI-CATS Press Release:

Mon­day, July 22nd, 2013

Brooklyn & Barb locked down

From MI-CATS Press Release:

Mon­day, July 22nd, 2013

This morn­ing Michi­gan Coali­tion Against Tar Sands (MI-CATS) is tak­ing direct action near Stock­bridge ‘to halt con­struc­tion of the Tar Sands pipeline 6B expan­sion project of Cana­di­an cor­po­ra­tion Enbridge. Over 40 Michi­gan­ders have come to oppose the infa­mous corporation’s fla­grant expan­sion of the very same pipeline that spilled out into the Kala­ma­zoo Riv­er only three years ago. Enbridge claims they have restored the riv­er after a spill is no excuse to expand the pipeline, expand­ing the pipeline increas­es the risk for every­one.

Res­i­dents are cur­rent­ly halt­ing Enbridge’s con­struc­tion plans by putting their bod­ies on the line in an act of non vio­lent civ­il dis­obe­di­ence against Enbridge’s plans. At least 6 peo­ple have been arrest­ed so far as police attempt to shut down the protest. 4 peo­ple are cur­rent­ly locked down to con­struc­tion equip­ment and refus­ing to move. Police have arrest­ed their med­ical sup­port team and threat­en to arrest any­one who tries to approach them.

 

These mea­sures come after the exhaus­tion of every method with­in the law, as it has has become appar­ent from our expe­ri­ences all through­out the state. Our state gov­ern­ment is ready to set aside its own laws and legal process­es to accom­mo­date this for­eign cor­po­ra­tion.

Enbridge itself has con­sis­tent­ly demon­strat­ed that their sole pri­or­i­ty is their own bot­tom line, not the health and safe­ty of the peo­ple of Michi­gan, our ecosys­tem, and even their own work­ers.

Michi­gan Coali­tion Against Tar Sands seeks to unite the peo­ple of Michi­gan toward the com­mon goal of stop­ping all trans­porta­tion of tar sands oil in the state and advo­cat­ing against the pro­duc­tion and trans­porta­tion of tar sands every­where. We work in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the glob­al move­ment against harsh fos­sil fuel extrac­tive prac­tices.

Accord­ing to one per­son who is par­tic­i­pat­ing in this action “This pipeline is a dis­as­ter for Michigan’s water and the glob­al cli­mate. I’m blockad­ing this pipeline to  pre­vent the next spill because I care about Michigan’s air and water. Peo­ple all over the world are tak­ing action in their own com­mu­ni­ty this Fear­less Sum­mer. We need to leave all fos­sil fuels in the ground.” – William Lawrence of East Lans­ing

We will not allow Cana­di­an tar sands to pass through our back­yards. We will no longer allow the same Cana­di­an cor­po­ra­tion respon­si­ble for the tar sands which still lie at the bot­tom of our Kala­ma­zoo Riv­er to place all of us at risk. We are tak­ing this action to pro­tect from anoth­er spill and to ensure a liv­able plan­et for gen­er­a­tions to come.

Loca­tion of the action is the Enbridge 6B ease­ment off of Grimes west of M‑52 near Stock­bridge, MI. Look for the orange con­struc­tion signs and the police pres­ence. ‪#‎micat­s­act‬. Updates on the action will con­tin­ue, as events unfold.

This is MI-CATS’ sec­ond action at the Enbridge 6B pipeline this sum­mer; in the first an activist climbed inside the Enbridge 6B pipe. Fol­low @MichiganCats and @efjournal on twit­ter for updates

Flotilla Protests Development in Manatee County

Res­i­dents opposed to the pro­posed Long Bar Pointe devel­op­ment project gath­ered in boats on Sara­so­ta Bay to protest los­ing the last piece of unde­vel­oped shore­line in Man­a­tee Coun­ty.

Res­i­dents opposed to the pro­posed Long Bar Pointe devel­op­ment project gath­ered in boats on Sara­so­ta Bay to protest los­ing the last piece of unde­vel­oped shore­line in Man­a­tee Coun­ty.

Dozens of pro­tes­tors gath­ered on a flotil­la of boats, kayaks, pad­dle boards and jet skis in Sara­so­ta Bay Sat­ur­day after­noon.

“This is tip­ping point for Man­a­tee Coun­ty, we got to make a deci­sion which way we go,” pro­tes­tor Jaime Can­field said. “Do we want to fol­low the rest of Flori­da and devel­op the coast or do we pre­serve it.”

Can­field is opposed to an ambi­tious project that threat­ens to remove man­groves and sea grass in Sara­so­ta Bay to make way for a mari­na and five-star resort-style devel­op­ment. The project is pro­posed for an area that par­al­lels El Con­quis­ta­dor Park­way where 75th Street West inter­sects with 53rd Avenue West that has long been agri­cul­tur­al.

Cur­rent­ly a project includ­ing con­dos and sin­gle fam­i­ly homes with docks is already approved but devel­op­ers want to expand.

Devel­op­ers behind the project — Car­los Beruff of Medal­lion Home and Lar­ry Lieber­man from the Bar­ring­ton Group — how­ev­er believe the project will be a wel­come and much need­ed addi­tion to Man­a­tee Coun­ty.

The new plans call for a mixed-use devel­op­ment — sin­gle- and mul­ti-fam­i­ly units, hotel, mari­na, office and com­mer­cial space, and a con­fer­ence cen­ter — on the 463.2 acres.

How­ev­er near­ly 295 acres is with­in the Coastal High Haz­ard zone, an area prone to flood­ing dur­ing storms. Because the land is vul­ner­a­ble in a storm, devel­op­ers must get the coun­ty to amend the com­pre­hen­sive plan to allow for the more intense devel­op­ment.

Ter­ri Won­der, one of the orga­niz­ers of the protest thinks an amend­ment to the com­pre­hen­sive plan is a ter­ri­ble idea.

“We hope Car­los changes his mind now or before Aug. 6,” Won­der said. “If not, that the Man­a­tee Coun­ty Com­mis­sion will not rat­i­fy his project.”

Won­der, a Bayshore, res­i­dent said she grew up on Sies­ta Key and saw how devel­op­ment changed the island. She moved to Bayshore Gar­dens to get back some of what she had lost and because Sies­ta Key became to pricey.

Many of the pro­tes­tors includ­ing Won­der are con­cerned about the effects the pro­posed devel­op­ment will have on the bay, a breed­ing and feed­ing ground for dol­phins and man­a­tees.

The boaters gath­ered in a flotil­la and shared ban­ners and signs read­ing “Pro­tect the bay” and “Save our Shore.” They even tar­get­ed the project’s financ­ing, which is from Bain Cap­i­tal.

“We want to pre­serve what is pre­cious,” Won­der said. “Home­own­ers want to retire here and their chil­dren and grand­chil­dren want to come here.”

Won­der fears that if the project is approved, devel­op­ment will reach a point of no return and that Man­a­tee Coun­ty will no longer rep­re­sent the best of Flori­da.

“Well it’s inter­est­ing because last night we held a meet­ing at the El Con­quis­ta­dor Coun­try Club and we received a tremen­dous­ly pos­i­tive reac­tion from peo­ple that would be thrilled that there would be some place to go, eat and enjoy the water,” Lieber­man said. “They were thrilled that there would be a revi­tal­iza­tion of Man­a­tee Coun­ty.”

Liber­man says one of the project’s envi­ron­men­tal experts was at meet­ing to explain how the project intends to have zero neg­a­tive impact to the envi­ron­ment.

“I know there are a lot of peo­ple that are protest­ing, but these peo­ple have not seen the plan. They have not talked to the expert envi­ron­men­tal­ist who have guar­an­teed us that this would have a pos­i­tive envi­ron­men­tal impact on the envi­ron­ment and Sara­so­ta Bay,” Lieber­man said. “They are out there protest­ing and they don’t know the facts and that is dan­ger­ous.”

Long­time Bayshore res­i­dent Richard Nel­son looked to the Sara­so­ta side of the bay Sat­ur­day after­noon and then around him, fear­ful of the changes that could come.

“Look at this, they all want it to look like that,” Nel­son said. “That actu­al­ly looks more like the Bronx.”

Nel­son moved to Flori­da from New York City near­ly 23 years ago, and he says he hasn’t regret­ted it for a day.

“We have to try and pre­serve every­thing we got,” Nel­son said. “You have to fight for it or else they are just going to try and do what­ev­er they want.”

Protest call out! Vedanta AGM, 1st August, London.

1st August, 2pm. The London Marriott Hotel, Grosvenor Square, W1K 6JP.

Please spread the word and join us for this year’s Vedan­ta AGM demo (fly­er attached). Affin­i­ty group actions/street theatre/banners etc encour­aged.

1st August, 2pm. The London Marriott Hotel, Grosvenor Square, W1K 6JP.

Please spread the word and join us for this year’s Vedan­ta AGM demo (fly­er attached). Affin­i­ty group actions/street theatre/banners etc encour­aged. This will be an inter­na­tion­al day of action and is usu­al­ly well cov­ered in Indi­an and UK news­pa­pers.

We will bring the defiant energy of the Dongria Kond tribe to London, as they fight the final stages of their 10 years battle for survival against Vedanta’s planned mega mine.

Parallel demonstrations are already planned in Odisha and Delhi in India on this international day of action.

Bring drums, placards, banners and lots of energy!

JOIN OUR GRASSROOTS SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT TO STOP THIS KILLER CORPORATE!

Vedan­ta Resources is a FTSE 100 British-Indi­an min­ing com­pa­ny guilty of thou­sands of deaths, envi­ron­men­tal dev­as­ta­tion, anti union action, cor­rup­tion and dis­dain for life on earth. They have become one of the most hat­ed and con­tentious com­pa­nies in the world.

In Odisha, India they are try­ing to mine a moun­tain inhab­it­ed by an ancient tribe – the Don­gria Kond – who have suc­cess­ful­ly fought them off for more than 10 years. Their fight is in its final stages, and we need to mobilise all our ener­gy to ensure Vedan­ta is kicked out of the Niyam­giri moun­tains for­ev­er.

Vedan­ta is now diver­si­fy­ing into oil and gas, and expand­ing into Africa, Sri Lan­ka and pos­si­bly even the Arc­tic. They cur­rent­ly oper­ate in Zam­bia, South Africa, Liberia, Namib­ia, Aus­tralia, Sri Lan­ka, and across India.

Cov­er­age of last year’s AGM demo in the Guardian news­pa­per

Since last year’s AGM Vedan­ta are guilty of a major tox­ic gas leak affect­ing thou­sands of peo­ple at their Ster­lite sub­sidiary cop­per smelter in Tuti­corin, Tamil Nadu. At their Jhar­sug­u­da Alu­mini­um com­plex they released fly ash over farm­land pol­lut­ing rivers and vil­lages. In Zam­bia they tried to fire 2000 work­ers from their Konko­la Cop­per mines and smelter before being stopped by the Zam­bian Gov­ern­ment. One Zam­bian employ­ee was shot dead at the plant.

At Niyam­giri, Odisha, Vedan­ta with it’s cronies in the Odisha state gov­ern­ment are try­ing to force their mega baux­ite mine through at any cost. They are using police harass­ment, manip­u­la­tion, threats and dis­tor­tion of the legal sys­tem to pre­vent the Don­gria Kond from vot­ing against the project in the com­ing weeks. Forces have even opened fire on women and chil­dren threat­en­ing them not to oppose the mine. But the Don­gria are stronger than ever and pre­pared to fight tooth and nail to save their moun­tain in these final stages.

Vedan­ta are sup­port­ed by the British gov­ern­ment, as well as our banks, pen­sion funds and finan­cial insti­tu­tions. Vedan­ta is 64.9% owned by CEO Anil Agar­w­al and his fam­i­ly via var­i­ous tax havens. Top share­hold­ers include Stan­dard Life, Black­rock inc. and JP Mor­gan – the same financiers of South African min­er Lon­min who shot and killed 34 protest­ing mine work­ers in August 2012.

 

Last year’s AGM demo

Foil Vedan­ta is a sol­i­dar­i­ty move­ment work­ing direct­ly with those affect­ed by Vedan­ta in India and else­where. We are cur­rent­ly try­ing to get Vedan­ta de-list­ed from the Lon­don Stock Exchange.

Please join activists who will be ral­ly­ing in Odisha, Goa and Del­hi on 1st August as part of an inter­na­tion­al day of action to stop this killer cor­po­rate and it’s sup­port­ers.

We will be ral­ly­ing out­side Vedanta’s Annu­al Gen­er­al Meet­ing in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Don­gria Kond tribe of Odisha.

New Blockades in Guangdong, Third Major Protest This Week

Blockade via dumptruck17 July 2013 Author­i­ties in the south­ern Chi­nese province of Guang­dong have promised to halt pro­duc­tion at two fac­to­ries near Sihui city after demon­stra­tors blocked the gates, clash­ing with work­ers in the third mass e

Blockade via dumptruck17 July 2013 Author­i­ties in the south­ern Chi­nese province of Guang­dong have promised to halt pro­duc­tion at two fac­to­ries near Sihui city after demon­stra­tors blocked the gates, clash­ing with work­ers in the third mass envi­ron­men­tal protest in the region this week, activists said on Tues­day.

Local res­i­dents said vehi­cles con­tin­ued to come in and out of the main gates of an ink-mak­ing plant and a print fac­to­ry on Tues­day, how­ev­er, rais­ing sus­pi­cions that pro­duc­tion may still be going on.

The promise from local gov­ern­ment offi­cials came after hun­dreds of res­i­dents of Sihui’s Baisha vil­lage con­verged on the Nanyue Screen Print­ing Fac­to­ry and the Pre­ci­sion Ink. Co. Ltd. plant, which they claim are pol­lut­ing the local envi­ron­ment.

“We blocked up their gates using cement,” one pro­test­er sur­named Lu said on Tuesday.”We demand­ed that the work­ers on the pro­duc­tion floor stop work, but they closed the door on us and wouldn’t let us in.”

“A group of peo­ple got overex­cit­ed and forced their way onto the shop floor, and got into a fight with some of the work­ers there,” Lu said. ”A num­ber of vil­lagers were injured in the fight, and had to be tak­en to hos­pi­tal.”

Mount­ing anger

A sec­ond Baisha res­i­dent sur­named Liang said anger had been mount­ing over alleged pol­lu­tion from both fac­to­ries among local peo­ple for a num­ber of years.

“In recent years, peo­ple have been get­ting sick, and it’s get­ting worse and worse,” Liang said. “A lot of vil­lagers have devel­oped res­pi­ra­to­ry dis­eases like asth­ma and pneu­mo­nia.”
“A lot of peo­ple have con­stant sore throats and inflam­ma­tion, too, while some of the old­er peo­ple in the vil­lage have lung can­cer,” he said.

“The kids all have upper res­pi­ra­to­ry tract inflam­ma­tion, asth­ma and even pneu­mo­nia.”
Lu said vil­lagers were still sus­pi­cious that the promise to halt pro­duc­tion hadn’t been car­ried out, because both fac­to­ries pro­vid­ed high lev­els of income to local gov­ern­ment through tax­a­tion

“These two fac­to­ries are class A tax­pay­ers to the Sihui munic­i­pal gov­er­ment,” he said. “They are very large, and they pay huge amounts in tax­es.”

“They are big cus­tomers around these parts, and they hire a lot of work­ers, so of course the gov­ern­ment is going to be on their side.”

‘Run­ning nor­mal­ly’

An employ­ee who answered the phone at the neigh­bor­hood com­mit­tee of the rul­ing Chi­nese Com­mu­nist Par­ty in Sihui’s Chengzhong dis­trict declined to com­ment. “I don’t know about this,” the employ­ee said.

Repeat­ed calls to the dis­trict envi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion depart­ment went unan­swered dur­ing office hours on Tues­day.

An employ­ee who answered the phone at the Nanyue Screen Print­ing Co. said admin­is­tra­tive staff were oper­at­ing nor­mal­ly on Tues­day, but declined to com­ment on the protest, or on the report­ed halt in pro­duc­tion.

“We are all at work, and things are run­ning nor­mal­ly,” the employ­ee said, in ref­er­ence to the office staff. “I don’t real­ly know about it, because the top-lev­el lead­er­ship is deal­ing with it.”

Third protest

The Sihui con­fronta­tion on Mon­day marks the third mass envi­ron­men­tal protest in Guang­dong this week.

On the same day, thou­sands of peo­ple marched in Huadu dis­trict of the provin­cial cap­i­tal Guangzhou in protest over plans to build a waste incin­er­a­tor plant on their doorstep.
And the Huadu protest came just one day after res­i­dents of Jiang­men won an appar­ent con­ces­sion from local offi­cials, who said they would can­cel plans to build a nuclear fuel pro­cess­ing plant near the city after three days of demon­stra­tions.

Wors­en­ing lev­els of air and water pol­lu­tion, as well as dis­putes over the effects of heavy met­als from min­ing and indus­try, have forced ordi­nary Chi­nese to become increas­ing­ly involved in envi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion and protest.

Honduran Army Kills Indigenous Leader of COPINH Who Resisted Dam in Rio Blanco

16 July 2013 On Mon­day July 15th, while the Lenca com­mu­ni­ty of Rio Blan­co, in Hon­duras, marked 106 days of resis­tance to the build­ing of Agua Zarca hydro­elec­tric dam, the Army indis­crim­i­nate­ly shot at the demon­stra­tors killing one of the l

16 July 2013 On Mon­day July 15th, while the Lenca com­mu­ni­ty of Rio Blan­co, in Hon­duras, marked 106 days of resis­tance to the build­ing of Agua Zarca hydro­elec­tric dam, the Army indis­crim­i­nate­ly shot at the demon­stra­tors killing one of the lead­ers of the resis­tance, Tomas Gar­cia, and seri­ous­ly injur­ing his son (pho­to).

Tomas was a Lenca indige­nous leader who was part of his community’s Indige­nous and Aux­il­iary Coun­cil and of the Nation­al Coun­cil of the Civic Coun­cil of Pop­u­lar and Indige­nous Orga­ni­za­tions of Hon­duras (COPINH).

The Hon­duran activist was shot dead while he was walk­ing with oth­er com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers to the project’s facil­i­ties owned by Desa and Sino­hy­dro com­pa­nies, while his son, who was seri­ous­ly injured by a high-cal­i­bre bul­let, is in hos­pi­tal and his life is in dan­ger, Berta Cac­eres, leader of COPINH, told Real World Radio.

Berta described the act as “a des­per­ate and crim­i­nal reac­tion” by the com­pa­nies that want to build a dam on Riv­er Gual­caeque, seri­ous­ly affect­ing the com­mu­ni­ties liv­ing there. The Hon­duran army sup­ports the com­pa­nies, said Berta, and they even pay for the trans­porta­tion and main­te­nance of troops deployed by the Hon­duran gov­ern­ment in Tegu­ci­gal­pa in Rio Blan­co.

On Mon­day night, COPINH report­ed of more mil­i­tary troops being deployed in Zaca­pa, San­ta Bar­bara, and there were fears of new shoot­ings against civil­ians dur­ing the wake of the mur­dered indige­nous leader.

“The com­mu­ni­ty is out­raged. We are in great sor­row, also because we believe we have to con­tin­ue our strug­gle”, said Berta dur­ing a phone inter­view. “As the elec­tions approach (in Novem­ber) they want to teach COPINH a les­son”, she explained and said the com­mu­ni­ty decid­ed to con­tin­ue occu­py­ing the access to the dam.

A few hours after the inci­dents, COPINH had report­ed that since Fri­day 12, top exec­u­tives of the com­pa­ny Desar­rol­lo Energéti­co Sociedad Anón­i­ma (DESA)- which is in charge of the project togeth­er with the orig­i­nal group Sino­hy­dro – trav­elled to meet with local hit­men, who are respon­si­ble for direct threats against sev­er­al mem­bers of the indige­nous coun­cil, includ­ing Tomas Gar­cia.

Before they start­ed shoot­ing at civil­ians, the mil­i­tary made no attempt to talk with the activists, said Berta.

The leader of COPINH was ille­gal­ly arrest­ed in May and sub­mit­ted to a tri­al for pur­port­ed­ly hav­ing an ille­gal weapon, some­thing that the court could not prove and the case was final­ly dis­missed.

The leader high­light­ed that in the new cas­es of repres­sion against res­i­dents of the com­mu­ni­ty of Rio Blan­co, we urgent­ly need inter­na­tion­al sol­i­dar­i­ty to report the civic and mil­i­tary author­i­ties and both com­pa­nies for mur­der.

“We are aware that we are con­front­ed with an impuni­ty strat­e­gy in a con­text that seems to be wors­en­ing”, said Berta. She said the com­mu­ni­ties’ deter­mi­na­tion to defend their ter­ri­to­ry is strength­ened in these sit­u­a­tions of state and pri­vate vio­lence.

In fact, riv­er Gual­car­que is con­sid­ered an essen­tial part of the Lenca spir­i­tu­al­i­ty and the com­mu­ni­ties are con­fronting the busi­ness projects as a trib­ute to their culture’s sym­bol­ic fig­ure: Lem­pi­ra.

“We con­tin­ue fight­ing, we are not afraid, we will not be prey to fear and we will con­tin­ue this peace­ful but strong bat­tle for life”, she con­clud­ed.

Residents raise sinkhole warning signs over Shell tunnel

sinkhole_1.jpgYes­ter­day (14th July), local res­i­dents and sup­port­ers raised signs on Sruwad­da­con estu­ary, warn­ing of the sink­holes that con­tin­ue to appear over Shel­l’s tun­nel.

sinkhole_1.jpgYes­ter­day (14th July), local res­i­dents and sup­port­ers raised signs on Sruwad­da­con estu­ary, warn­ing of the sink­holes that con­tin­ue to appear over Shel­l’s tun­nel. Res­i­dents first noticed the sink­holes begin­ning to appear in the spe­cial area of con­ser­va­tion on the 20th May and numer­ous sink­holes have appeared along the tun­nel route since then.

The warn­ing signs which read “Dan­ger Sink­holes: Keep Back” were erect­ed in order to warn users of the estu­ary of pres­ence of the sink­hole, which have been up to 8 foot deep. Res­i­dents were forced to put up the warn­ing signs after both Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil and the Depart­ment of Ener­gy & Nat­ur­al Resources, despite being con­tact­ed, have failed to take any action.

The Nation­al Parks & Wildlife Ser­vice are also believed not to have inves­ti­gat­ed thus far the pos­si­ble dam­age that may be occur­ring to the ben­th­ic life in the estu­ary, despite the area being both a Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion and a Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Area.

Shell to Sea spokesper­son Ter­ence Con­way stat­ed “When Shell experts were giv­ing evi­dence in the oral hear­ing, there was­n’t a word about sink­holes and the bub­bling up of pos­si­ble con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed mate­r­i­al to the sur­face of the spe­cial area of conservation”.[1]

Shell have pre­vi­ous­ly sent up to 10 work­ers with shov­els out on the estu­ary in a failed attempt to fill in the sink­holes.

Mr Con­way con­tin­ued “We can cur­rent­ly fol­low the path of the tun­nel by the trail of sink­holes that have appeared on the strand. Fail­ure to reg­u­late has caused alot of suf­fer­ing in Ire­land, yet the Gov­ern­ment are still allow­ing Shell to do what­ev­er they want. The sink­holes are fur­ther proof that the Gov­ern­ment con­tin­ues to aban­don their respon­si­bil­i­ty to reg­u­late Shell.”

Links

[1] YouTube Video: What’s hap­pen­ing in Shel­l’s Tun­nel? — http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hvz2l27Ooc

[2] Reports of sink­holes above Cor­rib tun­nel inves­ti­gat­ed
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/reports-of-sinkholes-abo…54717

[3] Mid­west Radio Clip about third sink-hole in Sruwad­da­con estu­ary
http://www.shelltosea.com/content/midwest-radio-clip-ab…tuary

 

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Bubbling in the water in the foreground while people raise warning signs in the background of photo
Bub­bling in the water in the fore­ground while peo­ple raise warn­ing signs in the back­ground of pho­to

sinkhole_4.jpg

sinkhole_5.jpg

Police Fire Water Cannons to Quell Protest as Baton-Wielding Shop Owners Threaten Reporters in Istanbul

15 July 2013 Police have fired water can­nons and tear gas to the sev­er­al thou­sand pro­test­ers gath­ered on Istanbul’s İstikl­al Avenue to protest a mid­night bill adopt­ed this week by the Par­lia­ment which curbed the super­vi­sion of the Cham­ber of Archi­tects and Engi­neers (TMMOB) i

15 July 2013 Police have fired water can­nons and tear gas to the sev­er­al thou­sand pro­test­ers gath­ered on Istanbul’s İstikl­al Avenue to protest a mid­night bill adopt­ed this week by the Par­lia­ment which curbed the super­vi­sion of the Cham­ber of Archi­tects and Engi­neers (TMMOB) in all urban projects, giv­ing full author­i­ty to the Envi­ron­ment and Urban Plan­ning Min­istry. Some shop own­ers also threat­en­ing­ly attacked with batons reporters an pro­test­ers chased the pro­test­ers into the side streets by the police.

Mem­bers of TMMOB, of whom many were among the most active lead­ers of the Tak­sim Sol­i­dar­i­ty Plat­form that ini­ti­at­ed the protests over the demo­li­tion of Gezi Park in Istan­bul, as well as many pro­test­ers, had joined the demon­stra­tion in Galatasaray Square that start­ed at 5:30 p.m.

How­ev­er, police did not allow the group to walk to Tak­sim Square after the Governor’s Office refused to grant per­mis­sion. Police demand­ed the pro­test­ers to end the demon­stra­tion after the state­ment, warn­ing them that a dis­per­sion by force would be car­ried out against them if they failed to do so. Most of the pro­test­ers dis­persed while the police chased them into the side streets, cut­ting off some of the pedes­tri­an entrances to the İstikl­al Avenue.

Shop own­ers with batons attack pro­test­ers, reporters

After scat­ter­ing, some of the pro­test­ers start­ed to regroup on the İstikl­al Avenue. Water can­non trucks and panz­ers were also dis­patched to the area. Live footage showed riot police using tear gas in the side streets, while reports said that they also fired rub­ber bul­lets to pro­test­ers.

Mean­while, a group of baton-wield­ing shop own­ers attacked pro­test­ers run­ning from the police. They also threat­ened reporters, try­ing to pre­vent them in vain from film­ing and tak­ing their pic­tures.

Police also detained pro­test­ers, includ­ing art schol­ar Osman Erden. Erden was seen bleed­ing from the mouth while he was tak­en into cus­tody.

‘No to crazy projects’

Ear­li­er, a spokesper­son for the group slammed the mid­night bill, say­ing the gov­ern­ment want­ed to “silence” archi­tects and engi­neers to pre­vent hur­dles in grandiose urban projects. “They don’t want us because we are against [Istanbul’s] third bridge, because we said no to Canal Istan­bul,” he said, refer­ring to the mas­sive-scale con­struc­tion works brand­ed as “crazy projects” by Prime Min­is­ter Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Dur­ing his speech, the crowd also chant­ed “no to the third bridge, no to canal Istan­bul, no to crazy projects,” hint­ing that the demands of the pro­test­ers could widen.

The spokesper­son also recalled that many mem­bers of the Tak­sim Sol­i­dar­i­ty Plat­form and oth­er civ­il groups were harassed and ill-treat­ed while in cus­tody, includ­ing Mücel­la Yapıcı, the gen­er­al sec­re­tary of TMMOB’s Istan­bul office.

“We won’t sur­ren­der,” he said.

Pro­test­ers were also seen hold­ing pic­tures of Ali İsm­ail Kork­mez, the fifth Gezi pro­test­er to have died, who passed away this week after suc­cumb­ing to his injuries, inflict­ed by assailants who beat him with sticks.

Ear­li­er, moth­ers whose chil­dren had been detained orga­nized a sit-in in GalatasaraySquare, call­ing for the end of arbi­trary deten­tions.

Gezi Park was opened on July 8 after being in police lock­down for more than three weeks. The open­ing of the park had caused inci­dents as police inter­vened once again against pro­test­ers, tak­ing into cus­tody 50 peo­ple, includ­ing a num­ber of NGO mem­bers.

Activists Form Human Pipeline on Flatbush Avenue to Protest Natural Gas Pipeline

Activists say they’re con­cerned wildlife would be impact­ed if some­thing went wrong with the pipeline being built in Brook­lyn. (July 14, 2013)

Activists say they’re con­cerned wildlife would be impact­ed if some­thing went wrong with the pipeline being built in Brook­lyn. (July 14, 2013)

Dozens of activists formed a human pipeline on Flat­bush Avenue today in protest of a nat­ur­al gas pipeline that’s being built through parts of Brook­lyn.

Parts of the pipeline are already under con­struc­tion to con­nect Brook­lyn with a pipeline that goes up and down the East Coast. Activists say they’re con­cerned about the impact the under­ground flow­ing gas could have on the bor­ough, wildlife and the envi­ron­ment.

A rep­re­sen­ta­tive from Transco, the com­pa­ny behind the project, argued that oppo­nents are over­look­ing the fact that the envi­ron­men­tal ben­e­fits of nat­ur­al gas are exact­ly what is dri­ving the project. It is also the pri­ma­ry rea­son why the may­or specif­i­cal­ly cit­ed this project as key to help­ing the city achieve its clean air goals, Transco says.

The spokesper­son added that Transco has been safe­ly pro­vid­ing nat­ur­al gas to New York City for more than 50 years with­out inci­dent.

A pub­lic com­ment peri­od will be held to dis­cuss the project fur­ther.