Category: Wilderness Defence

Wilder­ness defence

Bardon Hit Again

Inspired by an action ear­li­er this year we decid­ed to hit Bar­dons quar­ry in Bur­to-on-trent. Bar­don are part of a group respon­si­ble for the destru­tion of moun­tains at the Glen­san­da Quar­ry in Scot­land. This is one of the largest quar­rys in Europe and exports stone for road con­struc­tion.

Inspired by an action ear­li­er this year we decid­ed to hit Bar­dons quar­ry in Bur­to-on-trent. Bar­don are part of a group respon­si­ble for the destru­tion of moun­tains at the Glen­san­da Quar­ry in Scot­land. This is one of the largest quar­rys in Europe and exports stone for road con­struc­tion.

This can not be allowed. As the secu­ri­ty watched TV we slashed tyres, stripped paint jobs, Glued locks and trashed con­va­y­or belts. All the earth movers were hit and many of the cement and agr­re­gate trucks. This action cost us very lit­tle but should cost bar­don thou­sands.

We all know lob­by­ing gets us lit­tle, we all know that once a moun­tain is gone it is gone for­ev­er, we all know time for the earth is run­ning out. We all have fear that stops us act­ing but we must act.

Update Australia Action — woodchip arson, Tasmania

anony­mous com­mu­nique:

“On the morn­ing of Thurs­day the 31th of July, the Earth Lib­er­a­tion Front attacked the Vic­to­ri­an office of Gunns Ltd with molo­tov cock­tails, caus­ing exten­sive fire dam­age. This was an act of eco­nom­ic sab­o­tage and resis­tance against the pro­posed Tamar Val­ley Pulp Mill, an eco-cidal project which would cause dis­as­trous and irre­versible dam­age to the ancient and pre­cious eco-sys­tem of Tas­ma­nia.

anony­mous com­mu­nique:

“On the morn­ing of Thurs­day the 31th of July, the Earth Lib­er­a­tion Front attacked the Vic­to­ri­an office of Gunns Ltd with molo­tov cock­tails, caus­ing exten­sive fire dam­age. This was an act of eco­nom­ic sab­o­tage and resis­tance against the pro­posed Tamar Val­ley Pulp Mill, an eco-cidal project which would cause dis­as­trous and irre­versible dam­age to the ancient and pre­cious eco-sys­tem of Tas­ma­nia.

This mill’s hunger for wood­chips would mean a dou­bling of the already immense cur­rent rate of wood-chipping[1], rav­aging the native forests of the North-East of the state. It would bring the Tas­man­ian Wedge-tailed eagle, the Spot­ted Tail Quoll and the Giant Fresh-Water Cray­fish to the brink of extinction[2]. It would spew 30 bil­lion litres of diox­in and furan laced efflu­ent into the Bass Straight every year[3], con­sume up to 40 bil­lion litres of fresh water[4], and con­tribute great­ly to cli­mate change[5].

We will not accept Gunns’s con­tin­u­al assault on Tasmania’s old growth forests, wildlife, water sup­plies and car­bon sinks. More extreme forms of eco-cide call for more extreme forms of protest.

We will not cease until Gunns aban­dons its con­tro­ver­sial Tamar Val­ley Pulp Mill.

In defense of our Earth,

Earth Lib­er­a­tion Front.

[1] Gunns Ltd. Bell Bay Pulp Mill, Draft Inte­grat­ed Impact State­ment.
[2] Gunns’s refer­ral under the EPBC Act, April 2007.
[3] Uni­ver­si­ty of Mel­bourne and Forestry Tas­ma­nia 2003: Bekessy tran­scripts, Wielang­ta court case 2006.
[4] Gunns Ltd. Bell Bay Pulp Mill, Draft Inte­grat­ed Impact State­ment.
[5] Trees- The for­got­ten solu­tion to cli­mate change; The Wilder­ness Soci­ety, 2006.”

Spirit of Freedom (August 2008)

Pro­duced by EARTH LIBERATION PRISONERS SUPPORT NETWORK

“The whole expe­ri­ence has been tough, but all the kind and strength­en­ing words
and wise thoughts from strangers made it much eas­i­er!” (For­mer Swedish Ani­mal Rights Pris­on­er)

Pro­duced by EARTH LIBERATION PRISONERS SUPPORT NETWORK

“The whole expe­ri­ence has been tough, but all the kind and strength­en­ing words
and wise thoughts from strangers made it much eas­i­er!” (For­mer Swedish Ani­mal Rights Pris­on­er)

Wel­come to the August 2008 edi­tion of Spir­it of Free­dom. As peo­ple will soon see, ELP’s pris­on­er lists have grown yet again. If we exclude the Geek anar­chist, Vagge­lis Botzatzis, and the two Amer­i­cans Richard Sills and Michael Sykes (all of whom are list­ed by ELP as ‘Oth­er Pris­on­ers’), there are now 40 list­ed ani­mal & earth lib­er­a­tion pris­on­ers in Europe & Amer­i­ca.
There are also a num­ber of non-list­ed pris­on­ers, who are not list­ed either by their own choice, or because they betrayed their fel­low activists and became infor­mants. And remem­ber these num­bers do not include those peo­ple who are either under House Arrest or on Bail pend­ing Tri­al. Nor do they include the activists whose loca­tions are cur­rent­ly unknown and who are described by the police as “on the run”. See­ing so many good peo­ple removed from their fam­i­lies & loved ones for mere­ly act­ing out of com­pas­sion and a desire to stop envi­ron­men­tal destruc­tion and ani­mal abuse is heart­break­ing.
Some of the pris­on­ers ELP lists are very well known, oth­ers are less well known. How­ev­er ALL of them deserve our love and sup­port. ALL of the list­ed pris­on­ers wel­come let­ters of sup­port. Even if it’s just a card say­ing “Hi. I’m think­ing of you”. So please, no mat­ter where you are in the world, sup­port the eco-pris­on­ers. And no com­pro­mise in defence of Moth­er Earth.

ECO-DEFENCE PRISONERS

Tre Arrow, SWIS #640393, Mult­nom­ah Coun­ty Deten­tion Cen­ter, 1120 S.W. 3rd Avenue, Port­land, Ore­gon 97206, USA. Await­ing sen­tenc­ing of six and a half years impris­on­ment hav­ing reached a non-coop­er­a­tion plea-bar­gain with the author­i­ties who accuse him of involve­ment in two arsons. 1) an arson on log­ging trucks 2) an arson on vehi­cles owned by a sand & grav­el com­pa­ny. (Tre is a raw ener­gy veg­an — He has asked that his let­ters of sup­port are writ­ten on scrap paper or tree-free paper).

Grant Barnes #137563, San Car­los Cor­rec­tion­al Facil­i­ty, PO Box 3, Pueblo, CO 81002, USA. Serv­ing 12 years for set­ting fire to a num­ber of SUV vehi­cles. The let­ters ELF were spray paint­ed onto all of the vehi­cles. (Grant is a veg­an).

Nathan Block, #36359–086, FCI Lom­poc, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, 3600 Guard Road, Lom­poc, CA 93436, USA. Serv­ing 7 years & 8 months for an ELF arson against a Poplar Tree Farm and an ELF arson against an SUV deal­er­ship. Also admit­ted his role in an ELF/ALF con­spir­a­cy. (Diet unknown).

Mar­co Camenisch, Post­fach 3143, CH-8105 Regens­dorf, Switzer­land. Serv­ing 18 years. 1) Ten years for using explo­sives to destroy elec­tric­i­ty pylons lead­ing from nuclear pow­er sta­tions. 2) Eight years for the mur­der of a Swiss Board­er Guard whilst on the run. In ’02 Mar­co com­plet­ed a 12-year sen­tence in Italy for destroy­ing elec­tric­i­ty pylons in Italy. (Mar­co is a meat eater who encour­ages organ­ic liv­ing).

Daniele Casali­ni, Casa Cir­con­dar­i­ale, Via Burla 59, 43100 Par­ma, Italy. Il Sil­vestre activist await­ing tri­al accused of using explo­sives to dam­age an elec­tric­i­ty pylon in protest at nuclear ener­gy. (Daniele is a veg­an).

Rod Coro­n­a­do — See details in Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Pris­on­ers List.

Francesco Gioia, C.C. Sol­lic­ciano, Via Giro­lamo Min­ervi­ni 2/R, 50142 Firen­ze Sol­lic­ciano (FI), Italy. Il Sil­vestre activist await­ing tri­al accused of using explo­sives to dam­age an elec­tric­i­ty pylon in protest at nuclear ener­gy. (Francesco is a veg­e­tar­i­an and Straight Edge).

Pao­la Gori, Via delle Mac­chie 9, 57124 Livorno, Italy. Il Sil­vestre activist await­ing tri­al accused of allow­ing her house to be used to plan ille­gal activ­i­ty. (Pao­la is a veg­an).

Bryan Lefey #38664–086, FDC SeaT­ac, Fed­er­al Deten­tion Cen­ter, P.O. Box 13900, Seat­tle, WA 98198, USA. On remand accused of an ELF action that saw the dam­ag­ing of GM trees and the dam­ag­ing of US Forestry Ser­vice vehi­cles. (Diet unknown).

Jef­frey Luers, # 13797671, CRCI, 9111 NE Sun­der­land Ave, Port­land, OR 97211–1708, USA. Serv­ing 10 years for arson on a SUV deal­er­ship & the attempt­ed arson of an oil truck. The orig­i­nal sen­tence was 22 years & 8 months, but was reduced on appeal. (Diet unknown).

Eric McDavid, 16209–097. FCI Vic­torville Medi­um II, PO BOX 5700, Ade­lan­to, CA 92301, USA. Serv­ing 19 years & 7 months for plan­ning to destroy the prop­er­ty of the U.S. Forestry Ser­vice, mobile phone masts and pow­er plants. At the point of his arrest no crim­i­nal dam­age has actu­al­ly occurred. (Eric is a veg­an).

Daniel McGowan, #63794–053, FCI Terre Haute, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, P.O. Box 33, Terre Haute, IN 47808, USA. Serv­ing 7 years for an ELF arson against a Poplar Tree Farm and an ELF arson against an old growth log­ging cor­po­ra­tion. Also admit­ted his role in an ELF/ALF con­spir­a­cy. At the moment Daniel is in tran­sit as he has been ordered to appear before some Grand Juries. Daniel is refus­ing to answer the Grand Jury ques­tions and is gain­ing addi­tion­al prison time because of this (Daniel is a veg­e­tar­i­an).

Jonathan Paul — See details in Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Pris­on­ers List.

Bri­ana Waters, 36432–086, FDC — Seat­ac, Fed­er­al Deten­tion Cen­ter, P.O. Box 13900, Seat­tle, WA 98198, USA. Serv­ing six years for involve­ment in an ELF arson on a Uni­ver­si­ty. (Diet unknown).

Joy­an­na Zach­er, #36360–086, FCI Dublin, 5700 8th St.- Camp Parks- Unit F, Dublin, CA 94568, USA. Serv­ing 7 years & 8 months for an ELF arson against a Poplar Tree Farm and an ELF arson against an SUV deal­er­ship. Also admit­ted her role in an ELF/ALF con­spir­a­cy. (Diet unknown).

ANIMAL LIBERATION PRISONERS
(All Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Pris­on­ers fol­low a min­i­mum veg­e­tar­i­an diet and most are veg­an).

Jon Able­white TB4885, HMP Lowd­ham Grange, Lowd­ham, Not­ting­ham, NG14 7DA, Eng­land. Serv­ing 12 years for attempt­ing to black­mail a farmer who sup­plied guinea pigs for vivi­sec­tion. (Jon is a veg­an).

Dan Amos VN7818, HMP Exeter, 30 New North Road, Exeter, Devon, EX4 4EX, Eng­land. On remand hav­ing plead­ed guilty to con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Dan is a veg­an)

Gregg Avery TA7450, HMP Win­ches­ter, Rom­sey Road, Win­ches­ter, SO22 5DF, Eng­land. On remand hav­ing plead­ed guilty to con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Gregg is a veg­an).

Natasha Avery NR8987, HMP Bronze­field, Woodthor­pe Road, Ash­ford, Mid­dx. TW15 3JZ, Eng­land. On remand hav­ing plead­ed guilty to con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Nat is a veg­an).

Mel Broughton TN9138, HMP Wood­hill, Tat­ten­hoe Street, Mil­ton Keynes, Bucks MK4 4DA, Eng­land. On remand accused of involve­ment with an arson and black­mail cam­paign against an Oxford Uni­ver­si­ty vivi­sec­tion estab­lish­ment.
(Mel is a veg­an).

Mar­tin Bal­luch, (JA Josef­s­tadt), Jus­ti­zanstalt Wr. Neustadt, Max­i­m­il­iang. 3, 2700 Wr. Neustadt, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. (Mar­tin is a veg­an)

Christoph, Anti­rep 2008, Post­fach 101, 1070, Vien­na, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. At the moment Christo­pher does not wish to have his full name pub­lished. (Christoph is a veg­an).

Jacob Con­roy #93501–011, FCI Vic­torville Medi­um I Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, P.O. Box 5300, Ade­lan­to, CA 92301, USA. Serv­ing 48 months impris­on­ment for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign. (Jake is a veg­an).

Rod­ney Coro­n­a­do #03895–000, FCI El Reno, PO Box 1500, El Reno, OK 73036, USA. Serv­ing one-year impris­on­ment after he informed peo­ple how to make an incen­di­ary device dur­ing a speech at an ani­mal rights gath­er­ing. (Rod is a veg­e­tar­i­an).

Don­ald Cur­rie A3660AA, HMP Parkhurst, New­port, Isle of Wight, PO30 5NX, Eng­land. Serv­ing an Inde­ter­mi­nate Sen­tence, of not less than six actu­al years, for car­ry­ing out arsons against tar­gets asso­ci­at­ed the vivi­sec­tion indus­try includ­ing HLS. (Don is a veg­an).

Jür­gen Faul­mann, Jus­ti­zanstalt Wr. Neustadt, Max­i­m­il­iang. 3, 2700 Wr. Neustadt, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. (Jur­gen is a veg­an).

Lau­ren Gaz­zo­la #93497–011, FCI Dan­bury, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, Route #37Danbury, CT 06811, USA. Serv­ing 54 months impris­on­ment for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign. (Lau­ren is a veg­an).

Joshua Harp­er #29429–086, FCI Sheri­dan Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, P.O. Box 5000, Sheri­dan, OR 97378 USA. Serv­ing 36 months impris­on­ment for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign. (Josh is a veg­an).

Felix Hnat (JA Eisen­stadt), Jus­ti­zanstalt Wr. Neustadt, Max­i­m­il­iang. 3, 2700 Wr. Neustadt, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. (Felix is a veg­an).

Jan, Anti­rep 2008, Post­fach 101, 1070, Vien­na, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. At the moment Jan does not wish to have his full name pub­lished. (Jan is a veg­an).

Kevin Kroem­mer, Anti­rep 2008, Post­fach 101, 1070, Vien­na, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. (Kevin is a veg­an)

Sean Kirt­ley WC 6977, HM Prison Blak­en­hurst, Hewell Lane, Red­ditch, B97 6QS, Eng­land. Serv­ing four and a half years for run­ning an anti-vivi­sec­tion cam­paign web­site. (Sean is a veg­an).

Kevin Kjon­aas #93502–011, FCI Sand­stone, PO Box 1000, Sand­stone, MN 55072 USA. Serv­ing 72 months impris­on­ment for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign. (Kevin is a veg­an).

Leo, Anti­rep 2008, Post­fach 101, 1070, Vien­na, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. At the moment Leo does not wish to have his full name pub­lished. (Leo is a veg­an).

Daniel McGowan — See details in Eco Defence Pris­on­ers List.

Chris­t­ian Moser, Jus­ti­zanstalt Wr. Neustadt, Max­i­m­il­iang. 3, 2700 Wr. Neustadt, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. (Chris­t­ian is a veg­an).

Heather Nichol­son VM4859, HMP Bronze­field, Woodthor­pe Road, Ash­ford, Mid­dx. TW15 3JZ, Eng­land. On remand accused of con­spir­a­cy to black­mail, in rela­tion to her involve­ment with the SHAC cam­paign. (Heather is a veg­an).

Jonathan Paul, #07167–085, FCI Phoenix, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, 37910 N 45th Ave., Phoenix, AZ 85086, USA. Sen­tenced to 51 months for an ALF arson on a horse meat plant. Also admit­ted his role in an ELF/ALF con­spir­a­cy. (Jonathan is a veg­an).

Sabine, Anti­rep 2008, Post­fach 101, 1070, Vien­na, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. At the moment Sabine does not wish to have their full name pub­lished. (Sabine is a veg­an).

Andrew Stepan­ian #26399–050, USP Mar­i­on, P.O. Box 1000 Mar­i­on, IL 62959, USA. Serv­ing 36 months for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign. (Andrew is a veg­an).

Elmar Völkl (JA Eisen­stadt), Jus­ti­zanstalt Wr. Neustadt, Max­i­m­il­iang. 3, 2700 Wr. Neustadt, Aus­tria. One of ten Aus­tri­an’s held on remand accused of var­i­ous ani­mal rights actions. (Elmar is a veg­an).

Ker­ry Whit­burn TB4886, HMP Lowd­ham Grange, Lowd­ham, Not­ting­ham, NG14 7DA, Eng­land. Serv­ing 12 years for attempt­ing to black­mail a farmer who sup­plied guinea pigs for vivi­sec­tion. (Ker­ry is a veg­an).

Sarah White­head, VM7684, HMP Bronze­field, Woodthor­pe Road, Ash­ford, Mid­dx, TW15 3JZ, Eng­land. Serv­ing two years for: 1) res­cu­ing a pup­py from hor­rif­ic con­di­tions. 2) res­cu­ing over 100 ani­mals from a pet breed­er who was lat­er pros­e­cut­ed for ani­mal abuse. Also await­ing tri­al for SHAC activ­i­ty. (Sarah is a veg­an)

PLOUGHSHARES PRISONERS

Helen Wood­son, 03231–045, FMC Car­swell — Admin. Max. Unit, POB 27137, Ft. Worth, TX 76127, USA. Serv­ing 8 years 10 months for actions that focused on the inter­re­la­tion­ship of war & the destruc­tion of the nat­ur­al world. The actions includ­ed pour­ing red paint over the secu­ri­ty desk of a fed­er­al court and mak­ing threat­en­ing com­mu­ni­ca­tions. Pre­vi­ous­ly Helen had served 20½ years for: 1) Using a ham­mer to dis­arm a nuclear mis­sile silo. 2) Burn­ing $25,000 on the floor of a bank whilst denounc­ing war, envi­ron­men­tal destruc­tion & eco­nom­ic injus­tice. 3) Mail­ing warn­ing let­ters with bul­lets attached to Gov­ern­ment & cor­po­rate offi­cials. (Diet unknown).

THE LECCE FIVE
The Lec­ce Five have been charged with “sub­ver­sive asso­ci­a­tion” accused of dam­ag­ing Esso petrol pumps to oppose the War on Iraq; sab­o­tag­ing the cash machines of a bank which funds an immi­gra­tion cen­tre; and tar­get­ing the multi­na­tion­al com­pa­ny Benet­ton in sup­port of Mapuche land rights activists in Chile. All of the defen­dants are cur­rent­ly either under house arrest or released on bail.

ANTIFA PRISONERS

Vah­tang Devitlidze, ul. Libbedo­va 42, UO 68/2, otryad 14, briga­da 142, g. Hagyshen­sk, Krasnodarskiy Kray, 352680 Rus­sia. Serv­ing 2½ years for stab­bing a neo-nazi in the leg whilst defend­ing him­self from attack. (Diet unknown).

Augustin Kraus, Vazeb­ni veznice, PP‑1, Lit­o­merice, 41 201, Czech Repub­lic.
Serv­ing 14 months for his par­tic­i­pa­tion in attacks against local neo-nazis. His charge was “bod­i­ly harm”. He speaks Czech, Slo­vak and Pol­ish. You can also write him short post­cards in Eng­lish. (Diet unknown).

Fabio Milan, C.C. via Pianez­za 300, 10151 Tori­no, Italy. On remand accused of fight­ing with the police after an anti-fas­cist protest. (Diet unknown).

Andrea Neff, Bnr: 746/07/2, Jus­tizvol­lzugsanstalt fur Frauen in Berlin, Arkonas­trasse 56, 13189 Berlin, Ger­many. Serv­ing 14 months for anti-fas­cist activ­i­ty. (Diet unknown).

Chris­t­ian Süm­mer­mann, Bnr: 441/08/5, JVA Plötzensee, Lehrter­str. 61, 10557 Berlin, Ger­many. Serv­ing 40 months for breach­ing the peace whilst serv­ing a sus­pend­ed sen­tence issued for anti-fas­cist activ­i­ties. (Diet unknown).

Tomasz Wiloszews­ki, Zak­lad Karny, Orze­chowa 5, 98–200 Sier­adz, Poland.
Serv­ing 15 years for acci­den­tal­ly killing a neo-nazi whilst defend­ing him­self. (Tomasz is a veg­e­tar­i­an).

Yuri Yure­vich Milevskiy, SIZO #7 kam­era 38, g. Brest, ul. Kar­la Mark­sa 86, 224000 Belarus. On remand for fight­ing with neo-nazis. (Diet unknown).

OTHER PRISONERS

Olga Alek­san­drov­na Nevskaya, UU163/5, 7 Otryad, pos. Dzerzhin­skiy, Mozhaysk 140090 Moskovskaya oblast, Rus­sia. Eco-activist serv­ing 6 years for arson, crim­i­nal dam­age and caus­ing explo­sions in protest at the war in Chech­nya. Due for release in 2009. (Diet unknown).

Vagge­lis Botzatzis, Komo­ti­ni Juridi­cal Prison (“Dikastikes Fylakes Komo­ti­nis”), T.K. 69100, Greece. On remand accused of set­ting fire to two com­pa­ny cars owned by a energy/power com­pa­ny. It is believed that the per­son or per­sons unknown who car­ried out the arson did so in protest at the destruc­tion of the nat­ur­al envi­ron­ment and in sup­port of two work­ers who died at the pow­er plant. Vagge­lis is also accused of set­ting fire to a bank and start­ing a fire inside a car yard. (Meat Eater).

Richard Sills (Address Unknown, USA). Serv­ing 15 months for bomb hoax­ing a Uni­ver­si­ty say­ing they would be tar­get­ed by the ALF if they did­n’t stop their ani­mal exper­i­ments. (Diet unknown).

Michael W. Sykes, 100 East 2nd St, Mon­roe, Michi­gan 48161, USA. Youth held on remand accused of anti-sprawl arsons, crim­i­nal dam­age, spray-paint­ing an anar­chist sign and burn­ing the Amer­i­can flag. (Diet unknown)

Fran Thomp­son, #1090915 HU 1C, WERDCC, PO Box 300, Van­dalia, MO 63382, USA.
Serv­ing Life for killing, in self-defence, a stalk­er who had bro­ken into her home. Before her impris­on­ment Fran was an eco, ani­mal & anti-nuke cam­paign­er. (Fran is a veg­an).

MOVE
MOVE is an eco-rev­o­lu­tion­ary group who car­ried out protests in defence of all life. All move pris­on­ers describe them­selves as veg­e­tar­i­ans. There are cur­rent­ly eight MOVE activists in prison each serv­ing 100 years after been framed for the mur­der of a cop in 1979. 9th defen­dant, Mer­le Africa, died in prison in 1998.

Deb­bie Simms Africa (006307), Janet Hol­loway Africa (006308) and Janine Philips Africa (006309) all at: SCI Cam­bridge Springs, 451 Fuller­ton Ave, Cam­bridge Springs, PA 16403–1238, USA.

Michael Davis Africa (AM4973) and Charles Simms Africa (AM4975) both at SCI Grater­ford, PO Box 244, Grater­ford, PA 19426–0244, USA.

Edward Good­man Africa (AM4974), SCI Mahanoy, 301 Morea Rd, Frackville, PA 17932, USA.

William Philips Africa (AM4984) and Del­bert Orr Africa (AM4985) both at SCI Dal­las Draw­er K, Dal­las, PA 18612, USA.

Mumia Abu Jamal, (AM8335), SCI Greene, 175 Progress Dri­ve, Way­nes­burg PA 15370, USA. In 1981 Mumia, for­mer Black Pan­ther and vocal sup­port­er of MOVE, was framed for the mur­der of a cop. He was orig­i­nal­ly sen­tenced to death but is cur­rent­ly await­ing re-sen­tenc­ing fol­low­ing a court hear­ing in 2001.

STATEMENT ON VIOLENCE
Some peo­ple list­ed in this newslet­ter have car­ried out vio­lent actions. ‘Spir­it of Free­dom’ does not con­done vio­lence. But we are also against cen­sor­ship & believe peo­ple can decide for them­selves who they wish to sup­port.

ABOUT E.L.P. SUPPORT NETWORK
ELP is an inter­na­tion­al eco-pris­on­er sup­port net­work found­ed, in Britain, in 1993 to sup­port jailed eco-activists. We sup­port the pris­on­ers by pro­duc­ing var­i­ous reg­u­lar pris­on­er lists:

Spir­it of Free­dom is ELP’s inter­na­tion­al month­ly pris­on­er list­ing which is cir­cu­lat­ed by e‑mail.

Urgent ELP! Bul­letin is an e‑mail ser­vice that dis­trib­utes the names of any new eco-pris­on­er as soon as ELP gets their details. For more info e‑mail ELP4321@hotmail.com

On-Line Newslet­ters — ELP has a num­ber of web­sites that pro­vide news, pris­on­er lists and addi­tion­al info about ELP & the pris­on­ers.

Eng­lish lan­guage ELP Web­site
www.spiritoffreedom.org.uk

Greek lan­guage ELP Web­site
http://greekelp.blogspot.com

North Amer­i­can ELP Web­site
www.ecoprisoners.org

Turk­ish lan­guage ELP Web­site
www.geocities.com/yesilanarsi/elp.htm

ELP Extra is an e‑mail group that cir­cu­lates the details of polit­i­cal pris­on­ers, ELP learns about, who do not fall with­in the remit for sup­port by ELP. To sub­scribe to the list e‑mail ELP4321@Hotmail.com

Aus­tralian ELP.SN is our Aus­tralian con­tact. For more info e‑mail elp4321@hotmail.com

Bel­gium ELP.SN is our Bel­gium con­tact. For more info e‑mail elp_bel@hotmail.com

Ger­man ELP.SN is a pris­on­er led ini­tia­tive run by eco-pris­on­er Mar­co Camenisch. For more info con­tact Mar­co Camenisch, Post­fach 3143, CH-8105 Regens­dorf, Switzer­land.

Greek ELP.SN is our Greek con­tact. For more info e‑mail greekelp@yahoo.gr

North Amer­i­can ELP is our North Amer­i­can con­tact. For more infor­ma­tion e‑mail naelpsn@mutualaid.org

Turkey ELP.SN is our Turk­ish con­tact. For more info e‑mail yesilanarsi@yahoo.com

SAVING ICELAND BLOCKADES RIO TINTO-ALCAN’S SMELTER IN ICELAND

Aug 01 2008
“STOP THE DESTRUCTION OF ÞJÓRSÁ FOR ARMS PRODUCTION!”

Rio-Tinto/Alcan blockadeAug 01 2008
“STOP THE DESTRUCTION OF ÞJÓRSÁ FOR ARMS PRODUCTION!”

HAFNARFJORDUR, ICELAND — Activists from Sav­ing Ice­land have today begun stop­ping traf­fic to and from Rio Tinto-Alcan’s alu­mini­um smelter in Straumsvík, Haf­nar­fjor­dur, by chain­ing them­selves to the gates of the plant. Sav­ing Ice­land is protest­ing against Rio Tinto-Alcan’s plans to increase their alu­mini­um pro­duc­tion capac­i­ty on the island, the con­se­quences of which would would be that sig­nif­i­cant parts of Iceland’s unique envi­ron­ment would have to be destroyed for ener­gy gen­er­a­tion. The activists are also protest­ing against the worlds largest alu­mini­um producer’s involve­ment with the arms indus­try.

Rio Tin­to-Alcan wants to increase its pro­duc­tion in Straumsvík by 40 thou­sand tons per year with­out enlarg­ing the smelter build­ing itself. At the same time the com­pa­ny is plan­ning to build a sec­ond alu­mini­um smelter in the towns of Keil­isnes or Þor­lák­shöfn (1).

Reyk­javík Ener­gy (Orku­vei­ta Reyk­javíkur) pulled out from an ener­gy deal with Rio Tin­to-Alcan because of strong pub­lic oppo­si­tion to their expan­sion, result­ing in the geot­her­mal­ly active Bitra moun­tain being saved.(2)

At the same time, Landsvirkjun (the nation­al ener­gy com­pa­ny) is plan­ning to go ahead with the con­struc­tion of three dams in the Thjórsá riv­er, south Ice­land, as well as one in the adjoin­ing Tung­naá riv­er. They have already signed an ener­gy expan­sion con­tract with Rio Tin­to-Alcan (4). In Decem­ber 2006, the two com­pa­nies signed a con­tract which stat­ed that Rio Tin­to-Alcan would share the cost of the three dams in Thjórsá (5).

Cor­rup­tion in Haf­nar­fjörður
In the end of March 2007, a pub­lic ref­er­en­dum took place in Haf­nar­fjör­dur, where a major­i­ty in the city vot­ed against the enlarge­ment of their Rio Tinto-Alcan’s smelter. Lúd­vík Geirs­son, may­or of Haf­nar­fjör­dur, said that the ref­er­en­dum was a “vic­to­ry for democ­ra­cy” and added that he would fol­low the con­clu­sion (6). Rio Tin­to-Alcan announced that they were then con­sid­er­ing to move their pro­duc­tion facil­i­ty to to Thor­lák­shöfn.

Only three months lat­er, Lúd­vík sat at a meet­ing with Ran­nveig Rist, direc­tor of Alcan in Ice­land, and Michael Jacques, direc­tor of Alcan Pri­ma­ry Met­al Group, where they dis­cussed the future of Alcan in Ice­land. One idea dis­cussed was to increase the Straumsvik smelter’s capac­i­ty into the sea, on top of a land­fill mound, rather than onto a lava rock area cleared by Alcan in antic­i­pa­tion of a pos­i­tive result from the ref­er­en­dum (7). Many see this as a betray­al of the ref­er­en­dum spir­it, which was not in regards to the speci­fici­ties of Alcan’s expan­sion but their expan­sion alto­geth­er.

“Is this real­ly what Geirs­son calls the ‘vic­to­ry of democ­ra­cy’? Bro­ken promis­es?” says Snor­ri Páll Jóns­son Úlfhildar­son, from Sav­ing Ice­land. “His behav­iour show clear­ly how much pow­er the alu­mini­um cor­po­ra­tions have here in Ice­land. The author­i­ties seem to not dare to speak or act against these cor­po­ra­tions will.”

Alcan’s links with the arms indus­try
August 30th, 2006, Alcan signed a long-term con­tract for their involve­ment with the pro­duc­tion of the F‑35 Join­t­er Strike Fight­er, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the arms pro­duc­ers Lock­heed Mar­tin, Nothrop-Grum­man and BAE Sys­tems (8).

“This is not a respectable com­pa­ny” says Sofie Larsen from Sav­ing Ice­land. “Until now, Alcoa has got the most atten­tion here in Ice­land when it comes to the links between alu­mini­um pro­duc­tion and the arms indus­try. Yet, Alcan is no bet­ter at all, since the com­pa­ny is con­tract­ed to sev­er­al dif­fer­ent weapon pro­duc­ers.”

Alcan pro­duces alu­minum for EADS (Euro­pean Aero­space and Defense and Space) (9), whose line of mil­i­tary heli­copters and fight­er jets includes the Eurofight­er Tycoon, Mirage F1 and EF18 Hor­net. EADS is also a lead in the pro­duc­tion of mis­siles (10).

“On it’s web­site, EADS claims that the company’s prod­uct is only sold to coun­tries who ´guar­an­tee a respon­si­ble approach to high-tech mil­i­tary air sys­tems´” says Sofie, ”but on the same site, one can find videos which glo­ri­fy Nazi Germany’s air­force (11). What kind of ethics is that?”

The damming of Thjórsá riv­er
Despite strong local resis­tance from farm­ers unwill­ing to give up their land for Rio Tinto-Alcan’s expan­sion, Landsvirkjun have been work­ing full time to push through the four dam project. Landsvirkjun has again and again gone up to the riv­er, try­ing to get farm­ers to agree with the con­struc­tion. When they received a let­ter signed by nine of the ten farm­ers affect­ed by the Urridafoss water­fall Thjórsá dam, stat­ing that they refused to par­tic­i­pate in any fur­ther dis­cus­sions with the ener­gy agency, Landsvirkjun threat­ened to force­ful­ly expro­pri­ate their land.

Recent­ly the dis­trict coun­cil of Flóahrep­pur made an agree­ment with Landsvirkjun to include the Urridafoss dam into their dis­trict plan. Jón Árni Vig­nis­son, a farmer who lives by Thjórsá, said that they had done so after Landsvirkjun had promised to pump funds into a vari­ety of their minor infra­struc­ture projects: road, water sup­ply and mobile phone recep­tion improve­ments (12). Essen­tial­ly, the local gov­ern­ment had been bribed.

The enlarge­ment of Rio Tinto-Alcan’s capac­i­ties in Ice­land and the damming of the Thjórsá riv­er are high­ly cor­rupt projects which Sav­ing Ice­land demands the imme­di­ate halt­ing of.

Ref­er­ences:

(1) Mbl.is, Álfram­leiðs­la hjá Alcan aukin um 22 prósent, http://www.mbl.is/mm/frettir/innlent/200…
(2) Mbl.is, Fyrirhugaðar framkvæmdir og orkusala hal­dast í hen­dur, http://www.mbl.is/mm/frettir/innlent/200…
(3) Mbl.is, 200 mw orkusala úr sögun­ni, http://www.mbl.is/mm/frettir/innlent/200…
(4) Vísir.is, Alcan kep­pir áfram um orku Þjórsár, http://visir.is/article/20070909/FRETTIR…
(5) Heimasíða Rio Tin­to-Alcan á Íslan­di, http://www.riotintoalcan.is/?PageID=12&a…
(6 )Mbl.is, Sig­ur fyrir lýðræðið, http://www.mbl.is/mm/frettir/innlent/200…
(7) Mbl.is, Álver á land­fyllingu, http://mbl.is/mm/frettir/innlent/2007/06…
(8) Vef­síða Alcan, http://www.alcan.com/web/publishing.nsf/…(JSF
(9) Vef­síða ABC Mon­ey, http://www.abcmoney.co.uk/news/132007869…
(10) Vef­síða EADS, http://www.eads.com/1024/en/businet/defe…
(11) Myn­d­band sem segir sögu EADS, http://www.eads.com/xml/content/OF000000…
(12) Sunnlen­s­ka Frét­tablaðið, 30. tölublað, Eigum mar­ga aðra valkosti, bls. 8–9, 24. Júlí 2008

Office Attacked in Protest of Pulp Mill

“On the morn­ing of Thurs­day the 31th of July, the Earth Lib­er­a­tion Front attacked the Vic­to­ri­an office of Gunns Ltd. This was an act of eco­nom­ic sab­o­tage and resis­tance against the pro­posed Tamar Val­ley Pulp Mill, an eco-cidal project which would cause dis­as­trous and irre­versible dam­age to the ancient and pre­cious eco-sys­tem of Tas­ma­nia.

“On the morn­ing of Thurs­day the 31th of July, the Earth Lib­er­a­tion Front attacked the Vic­to­ri­an office of Gunns Ltd. This was an act of eco­nom­ic sab­o­tage and resis­tance against the pro­posed Tamar Val­ley Pulp Mill, an eco-cidal project which would cause dis­as­trous and irre­versible dam­age to the ancient and pre­cious eco-sys­tem of Tas­ma­nia.

This mill’s hunger for wood­chips would mean a dou­bling of the already immense cur­rent rate of wood-chipping[1], rav­aging the native forests of the North-East of the state. It would bring the Tas­man­ian Wedge-tailed eagle, the Spot­ted Tail Quoll and the Giant Fresh-Water Cray­fish to the brink of extinction[2]. It would spew 30 bil­lion litres of diox­in and furan laced efflu­ent into the Bass Straight every year[3], con­sume up to 40 bil­lion litres of fresh water[4], and con­tribute great­ly to cli­mate change[5].

We will not accept Gunns’s con­tin­u­al assault on Tasmania’s old growth forests, wildlife, water sup­plies and car­bon sinks. More extreme forms of eco-cide call for more extreme forms of protest.

We will not cease until Gunns aban­dons its con­tro­ver­sial Tamar Val­ley Pulp Mill.

In defense of our Earth,

Earth Lib­er­a­tion Front.

[1] Gunns Ltd. Bell Bay Pulp Mill, Draft Inte­grat­ed Impact State­ment.
[2] Gunns’s refer­ral under the EPBC Act, April 2007.
[3] Uni­ver­si­ty of Mel­bourne and Forestry Tas­ma­nia 2003: Bekessy tran­scripts, Wielang­ta court case 2006.
[4] Gunns Ltd. Bell Bay Pulp Mill, Draft Inte­grat­ed Impact State­ment.
[5] Trees- The for­got­ten solu­tion to cli­mate change; The Wilder­ness Soci­ety, 2006.”

Report­ed anony­mous­ly by Bite Back

DC Students for a Democratic Society & Potomac Earth First! Funk I‑69

July 31, 2008

Smash I-69 bannerJuly 31, 2008
Resis­tance to the con­struc­tion of Inter­state 69 con­tin­ued nation­al­ly on Mon­day as near­ly 100 peo­ple took over K Street in Wash­ing­ton, D.C. to demon­strate their oppo­si­tion to NAFTA & I‑69. SDSers, Potomac EF!ers, and oth­ers danced in the streets, hand­ed out hun­dreds of fliers and stick­ers about I‑69, and held cor­po­ra­tions pub­licly account­able for their com­plic­i­ty in I‑69 and the Plan Puebla Pana­ma. Dis­tract­ing the police with their funky dance moves, the crowd was able to storm the Cato Insti­tute, a right-wing think tank respon­si­ble for forc­ing neolib­er­al ide­ol­o­gy down the throats of com­mu­ni­ties across the world, and left their pris­tine glass doors plas­tered with anti-I-69 stick­ers.

The row­dy crowd con­tin­ued to the offices of HNTB, a plan­ning firm respon­si­ble for I‑69, but were lim­it­ed to block­ing traf­fic and chant­i­ng by the line of riot police pro­tect­ing their cor­po­rate boss­es. The group final­ly danced its way down to the Wash­ing­ton Post, hold­ing the cor­po­rate apol­o­gist respon­si­ble for uncrit­i­cal­ly sup­port­ing neolib­er­al poli­cies and free trade agree­ments through­out the Amer­i­c­as. Once again, the crowd was almost obtained entrance to the offices, dis­tract­ing those inside and dis­rupt­ing work, but were forced down the stairs by a line of riot police.

The action forced hun­dreds of peo­ple to stop in their tracks (lit­er­al­ly, as traf­fic was stopped by a danc­ing recla­ma­tion of the streets), open their eyes, and learn about Inter­state 69. It also served as a reminder to those respon­si­ble for Inter­state 69: we know where you are, we will con­tin­ue to vis­it you wher­ev­er you hide, and all that pro­tects you are thin glass doors and a line of riot police. Cap­i­tal­ism may be glob­al­ized, but so is resis­tance.

Sitting on piles of coal, revolting peasants, trashing things & fixing other things together, it’s the latest EF! Action Update

Smelters smelt­ed and wood­chip­pers chipped, pro­tes­tors around the world have been busy again tak­ing action against the plan­et-trash­ers — read all about it in the lat­est quar­ter­ly EF! Action Update.

This EF!AU is jam packed with excit­ing actions, plus fea­tures on inter­na­tion­al resis­tance against coal in time for this year’s Camp for Cli­mate Action, a resur­gence of anti-genet­ics cam­paign­ing, and pro­pos­als for a rolling block­ade next year of Kingsnorth. You’ll be inspired to Taste the Waste, Leave it in the Ground and who knows what else!

EF! mine rest planets later logoSmelters smelt­ed and wood­chip­pers chipped, pro­tes­tors around the world have been busy again tak­ing action against the plan­et-trash­ers — read all about it in the lat­est quar­ter­ly EF! Action Update.

This EF!AU is jam packed with excit­ing actions, plus fea­tures on inter­na­tion­al resis­tance against coal in time for this year’s Camp for Cli­mate Action, a resur­gence of anti-genet­ics cam­paign­ing, and pro­pos­als for a rolling block­ade next year of Kingsnorth. You’ll be inspired to Taste the Waste, Leave it in the Ground and who knows what else!

With sto­ries of green­wash laid bare, guer­ril­la-gar­den­ing, revolt­ing peas­ants, protest camps against coal mines and air­ports, build­ings burnt down, con­vey­ors and trains stopped, tires deflat­ed, GM fields lib­er­at­ed & ‘tri­als’ decon­t­a­m­i­nat­ed, despite tear-gas, jail threats, and fortress-like field pro­tec­tion, con­tin­u­ing resis­tance in Mayo & Ice­land, and cam­paign suc­cess­es, the diverse uses of super­glue just become mun­dane. Got a bro­ken tea cup or an incin­er­a­tor to shut down? You know what to use!

And if smash­ing green­hous­es or hang­ing about 60 metres up seems wierd, read on…

Also includes full lists of eco­log­i­cal direct action groups, protest camps & sup­port groups. Bat­ter­ies not includ­ed.

Pick up your copy at the Camp for Cli­mate Action or at your near­est social cen­tre. Or drop us a line at actionup­date AT earthfirst.org.uk and we’ll post you as many as you like for dis­trib­ut­ing around town and at events.

Down­load the lat­est EF!AU to share with oth­ers, sub­scribe or check out some past issues. The next issue will come out at the begin­ning of Novem­ber.

And of course, this year’s EF! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing (click here for lat­est news) is from Wednes­day 27th August to Mon­day 1st Sep­tem­ber 2008, if you want to plot & plan, and laugh & chat with old friends & new.

Saving Iceland Shuts Down Geothermal Drilling Work in Hengill

HELLISHEIDI (ICELAND) – This morn­ing the direct action cam­paign Sav­ing Ice­land has occu­pied one of the main geot­her­mal drill sites in Hengill where the Hell­ishei­di pow­er plant is being expand­ed by Reyk­javik Ener­gy. 20 activists have chained them­selves to machin­ery and have climbed the drill to hang up a ban­ner say­ing “Reyk­javik Ener­gy out of Hell­ishei­di and Yemen”.

HELLISHEIDI (ICELAND) – This morn­ing the direct action cam­paign Sav­ing Ice­land has occu­pied one of the main geot­her­mal drill sites in Hengill where the Hell­ishei­di pow­er plant is being expand­ed by Reyk­javik Ener­gy. 20 activists have chained them­selves to machin­ery and have climbed the drill to hang up a ban­ner say­ing “Reyk­javik Ener­gy out of Hell­ishei­di and Yemen”. They have also occu­pied the pow­er con­trol room of the drill site. The pow­er to the drill was shut off and drilling was stopped for the rest of the day. Sev­en peo­ple got arrest­ed. The protest was aimed at Reyk­javik Ener­gy sup­ply­ing elec­tric­i­ty to alu­mini­um smelters in Ice­land, destruc­tion and pol­lu­tion of the Hengill area and RE’s spon­sor­ing of severe human rights abuse in Yemen.

In the last week, Sav­ing Ice­land took action at the Glen­core and ALCOA head­quar­ters in Switzer­land as well as all Swiss Ice­landic con­sulates, the Ice­landic embassy in Rome, Ice­landic con­sulate in Milan and also the head­quar­ters of Impregi­lo. In Ice­land Cen­tu­ry Alu­minum and Landsvirkjun both saw two actions against them and now Reyk­javik Ener­gy was tar­get­ed.

“We have been camp­ing at Hell­ishei­di for two weeks now and we are wit­ness­ing the scale of destruc­tion, most of which is not very vis­i­ble to the pub­lic. Peo­ple should real­ly come and have a look what is hap­pen­ing here. What used to be a beau­ti­ful nat­ur­al area is now full of tar­mac and pol­lu­tion. It used to be full of tourists. Now the hik­er huts are aban­doned while moun­tains are being blown up to pow­er the Cen­tu­ry smelters,” says Sav­ing Iceland’s Jaap Krater.

Most of the work is being done by East­ern Euro­peans who are liv­ing in a work camp, in sim­i­lar con­di­tions to the Karah­n­jukar con­struc­tion.

Reyk­javik Ener­gy Invest in Yemen
Sav­ing Ice­land also crit­i­cis­es Reyk­javik Ener­gy for it’s invest­ments in Yemen (1,2), a coun­try with a Shari’a regime, where there is no free press and secu­ri­ty ser­vices are rou­tine­ly involved in tor­ture and even extra­ju­di­cial exe­cu­tions (3,4).

“RE say that geot­her­mal invest­ments will ben­e­fit the poor in the coun­try. The real­i­ty is that the ener­gy will not go to the poor. The regime is very cor­rupt and Yemen is even adver­tis­ing for alu­mini­um smelters to come there. If some­one would have said ten years ago: I’m mak­ing a deal with Sadam Hus­sein to help the poor, would you believe them?”
“RE should not make deals with any­one involved in seri­ous human rights vio­la­tions, whether it’s a fun­da­men­tal­ist state or heavy indus­try cor­po­ra­tions,” says Krater.

Impact of Hell­ishei­di exten­sion
The envi­ron­men­tal impact asess­ment for Hell­ishei­darvrikjun says explic­it­ly that the only pur­pose is to sup­ply ener­gy for the Cen­tu­ry expan­sion at Grun­dar­tan­gi and pos­si­ble new ALCAN and Cen­tu­ry plants at Straumsvik and Hel­gu­vik (5). At the same time, farm­ers pay twice as much for elec­tric­i­ty as these cor­po­ra­tions (6).
Sav­ing Ice­land has pub­lished reports doc­u­ment­ing a long list of human rights vio­la­tions of these com­pa­nies (7, 8).

Sav­ing Ice­land spokes­peo­ple Miri­am Rose and Jaap Krater have doc­u­ment­ed the effects of the geot­her­mal pow­er in Hengill in the jour­nal the Ecol­o­gist (9):

“Laced with var­i­ous and some­times tox­ic com­pounds from deep with­in the bedrock, the [geot­her­mal bore­hole] water is either pumped back into the bore­hole – which can lead to geo­log­i­cal insta­bil­i­ty – or is pumped untreat­ed into streams and lakes. This par­tic­u­lar tech­nique has already cre­at­ed a huge dead zone in lake Thing­vallavatn.”

Pic­tures of the phys­i­cal impact of the drilling can be seen on the Sav­ing Ice­land web­site (10 / see below)

About Sav­ing Ice­land
In the last two weeks, Sav­ing Ice­land stopped work at the con­struc­tion site of Cen­tu­ry Aluminum’s planned new smelter in Hel­gu­vík, they block­ad­ed the exist­ing Cen­tu­ry smelter on Hvalfjor­dur, and took a num­ber of actions against Landsvirkjun, Iceland’s nation­al pow­er com­pa­ny. This is part of their fourth sum­mer of direct action against heavy indus­try in Ice­land.
Sav­ing Ice­land was start­ed by Ice­landic envi­ron­men­tal­ists ask­ing for help to protest the Ice­landic wilder­ness, the largest remain­ing in Europe, from heavy indus­try. Alu­mini­um cor­po­ra­tions Alcoa, Cen­tu­ry Alu­minum and Rio Tin­to-Alcan want to con­struct new smelters. This would require exploita­tion of all the geot­her­mal areas in the coun­try, as well as damming all major glacial rivers (see http://www.savingiceland.org/sos).
This year, the fourth action camp to pro­tect Ice­landic nature has been set up near the Hell­ishei­di geot­her­mal plant.

More infor­ma­tion
http://www.savingiceland.org
saving­ice­land at riseup.net

Ref­er­ences

1. Yemen News Agency (2008). Yemen, Ice­landic REI sign doc­u­ment to invest in gen­er­at­ing elec­tric­i­ty by geot­her­mal. http://www.sabanews.net/en/news151190.ht… [Accessed July 27th, 2008]
I2. ceNews (208). Elec­tric­i­ty agree­ment signed between Yemen and Ice­land. http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2008/04/… [Accessed July 27th, 2008]
3. BBC News (2008). Coun­try Pro­file: Yemen. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_… [Accessed July 17th, 2008]
4. Embassy of Yemen in the US (2008). http://www.yemenembassy.org/economic/ind…. [Accessed July 17th, 2008]
5. VGK (2006). Envi­ron­men­tal Impact Ass­es­ment fot Hel­ishei­darvirkjun. VGK, Reyk­javik.
6. Ice­land Review (2007). Cen­tu­ry Smelter to Pay Less for Ener­gy than Farm­ers. June 7th 2007. Also avail­able at http://savingiceland.puscii.nl/?p=821. [Accessed July 27th, 2008]
7. Sav­ing Ice­land (2007). Alcan’s Links to the Arms Indus­try. http://savingiceland.puscii.nl/?p=882 [Accessed July 27th, 2008]
8. Sav­ing Ice­land Press Release (2007). Sav­ing Ice­land Block­ades Cen­tu­ry and ELKEM. http://savingiceland.puscii.nl/?p=841 [Accessed July 27th, 2008]
9. Krater, J., Rose, M., Anslow, M. (2007). Alu­mini­um Tyrants. The Ecol­o­gist 2007 (10). Also avail­able at http://savingiceland.puscii.nl/?p=1021 [Accessed July 27th, 2008]
10. Sav­ing Ice­land (2008). Destruc­tion of Hengill. http://savingiceland.puscii.nl/?page_id=… [Accessed July 27th, 2008]

EarthFirst! gathering workshop call & travel info

LAST CALL FOR RUNNING WORKSHOPS

at the Earth First! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing
Eco­log­i­cal Direct Action with­out Com­pro­mise
27 Aug — 1 Sept 2008, Nor­folk

Get in touch if you or your campaign/group/network would like to run a work­shop or ses­sion at the gath­er­ing, espe­cial­ly if you can offer work­shops on action train­ing, direct action cam­paigns, ecol­o­gy, eco­log­i­cal restora­tion and sus­tain­able liv­ing.

Email us on sum­mer­gath­er­ing _ AT _ earthfirst.org.uk or ring 01524 383012

Dead­line 12 August!

We’ve already got lots of work­shops con­firmed. Join us for:


LAST CALL FOR RUNNING WORKSHOPS

at the Earth First! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing
Eco­log­i­cal Direct Action with­out Com­pro­mise
27 Aug — 1 Sept 2008, Nor­folk

Get in touch if you or your campaign/group/network would like to run a work­shop or ses­sion at the gath­er­ing, espe­cial­ly if you can offer work­shops on action train­ing, direct action cam­paigns, ecol­o­gy, eco­log­i­cal restora­tion and sus­tain­able liv­ing.

Email us on sum­mer­gath­er­ing _ AT _ earthfirst.org.uk or ring 01524 383012

Dead­line 12 August!

We’ve already got lots of work­shops con­firmed. Join us for:

DIRECT ACTION TRAINING
includ­ing: Blockad­ing, rec­cies for actions, secu­ri­ty for actions, how to plan actions, legal and arrest info, map read­ing for begin­ners, squat­ting, how to run legal sup­port and police liai­son

GET INVOLVED IN AND PLAN DIRECT ACTION CAMPAIGNS
Leave it in the ground — resis­tance to coal
Stop­ping GM test fields
Sav­ing Ice­land: resis­tance to heavy indus­try
Food and Cli­mate Change info and action
Oppos­ing the nuclear indus­try
Bio­fu­els
Smash Edo – what’s hap­pen­ing and inter­st­ing lessons for oth­er cam­paigns
Ris­ing Tide

ECOLOGY AND SUSTAINABLE LIVING
Learn about ecol­o­gy, eco-cen­tric ethics, sus­tain­able liv­ing and eco­log­i­cal restora­tion includ­ing field trips and hands-on work.

There’ll also be inter­na­tion­al and nation­al action round-ups, region­al get-togeth­ers, ses­sions on strat­e­gy, where next and how we com­mu­ni­cate.

———

More info about the Earth First! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing

Want to do some­thing to stop our plan­et from get­ting trashed?

EF! is about direct action to halt the destruc­tion of the Earth. It’s about doing it your­self rather than rely­ing on lead­ers, gov­ern­ments or indus­try.
Direct action is at the heart of it, whether you’re stand­ing in front of a bull­doz­er, shut­ting down an open-cast mine or rip­ping up a field of GM crops.

We’re a loose net­work of peo­ple, groups and cam­paigns com­ing togeth­er for eco­log­i­cal direct action.

Join us for 5 days of work­shops, net­work­ing and plan­ning actions, run with­out lead­ers by every­one who comes along. The gath­er­ing is also a
prac­ti­cal exam­ple of low-impact eco-liv­ing and non-hier­ar­chi­cal organ­is­ing.

WHERE IS IT?
The gath­er­ing is hap­pen­ing on love­ly fields less than 3 miles from Diss in Nor­folk, with reg­u­lar trains to Diss and bus­es from Diss to the site.
We rec­om­mend that you arrive Tue evening, as work­shops will start on Wednes­day morn­ing and run until Sun­day after­noon.

FOOD AND WHAT TO BRING
Deli­cious veg­an food will be pro­vid­ed by the Anar­chist Teapot for £4 per day, or you can cater for your­self
Bring camp­ing gear — if you want details of B&Bs in the area con­tact us.
We are ask­ing for a con­tri­bu­tion of £15-£25 accord­ing to what you can afford.
Dogs: the gath­er­ing is held at a dog free site, unfor­tu­nate­ly we will have to turn away any dogs that arrive.
Please leave your car at home, it’s real­ly easy to get to by pub­lic trans­port or come by bike. You can also check out our lift shar­ing board:
http://www.easf.org.uk/forum/viewforum.php?f=15

WHAT YOU’LL FIND ON SITE
Wel­come tent at the gate
Work­shop spaces
Anar­chist Teapot Kitchen
Veg­gies Cafe
Kids space with toys
Library with books on rad­i­cal thought and some relax­ing fic­tion
Book stall by Nat­ter­jack Press
A space for leaflets and dis­plays
Cin­e­ma show­ing political/campaigns films
Bar
Wash­ing facil­i­ties and com­post toi­lets
Sauna and hot tubs
Renew­able pow­er

(Please not that the gath­er­ing is not a fes­ti­val)

Find out more and join in!

The near­est train sta­tion is up on the web­site (for book­ing advance train or coach tick­ets), and there’s a lift-shar­ing forum too.

Email us if you can offer a work­shop, want to help out with the gath­er­ing or if you would like posters and leaflets to dis­trib­ute.

http://www.earthfirst.org.uk, sum­mer­gath­er­ing _ AT _ earthfirst.org.uk

Police try and enter Bodge House

Ear­li­er today (25 July) sev­er­al police turned up to look at a hole in the field, in actu­al fact it is a tun­nel, but hey!

Ear­li­er today (25 July) sev­er­al police turned up to look at a hole in the field, in actu­al fact it is a tun­nel, but hey!

The police then came on site after appar­ent­ly swear­ing was heard and was there excuse for enter­ing the bound­ary around the house. they tried to get up on to the roof of the house and fetched a crow bar and to lever­age there way in through one of the board­ed up win­dows but failed to get in any ware as the house has had a month of for­ti­fi­ca­tions built into it.

Details at this point are sketchy, the police claim swear­ing came from the tree house, but accord­ing to the site crew, it was from else­where so they attempt­ed to arrest the occu­pi­er to no avail, and have threat­ened to come back lat­ter with police climbers

Not con­tent at that one of the female crew at Bodge house, striped naked and jumped into the buck­et of a dig­ger work­ing at the bot­tom of the dri­ve and refused to move, this meant that the police had to go back to the house and plead with some of the female crew to come and ask her to give up the protest. There was no answer from in the house and one pro­test­er they should knock on the front door, the police man was puz­zled and said he didn’t know there was one, and was sent around the front to look for it….only to return embar­rassed for being tak­en for a fool

So are if you are around and want to join in the fun get down to Bodge house

http://leaveitintheground.wordpress.com