Category: Wilderness Defence

Wilder­ness defence

Protest camp evicted & restarted

7th Feb 2013: Mov­ing Camp and Climb­ing Trees

We are in the process of mov­ing the camp to anoth­er loca­tion in the park.

There is a pro­test­er up in the trees which have ari­al walk ways to them.

7th Feb 2013: Mov­ing Camp and Climb­ing Trees

We are in the process of mov­ing the camp to anoth­er loca­tion in the park.

There is a pro­test­er up in the trees which have ari­al walk ways to them.

If you are will­ing and able to active­ly pro­tect oth­er trees by var­i­ous means, we do have food sup­plies and a lim­it­ed amount climb­ing gear for use. 

The police have sur­round­ed anoth­er area of trees which are about to be felled.

6/2/13, noon: URGENT: An evic­tion notice has been served to us on the camp which will be enforced in 45 min­utes at 12.00 We need peo­ple to come down to the camp as soon as pos­si­ble!
To show how many peo­ple in our com­mu­ni­ty object to what MCC are doing…
To make the evic­tion dif­fi­cult which will give us more time….
To help move things out of camp so res­i­dents won’t loose all of there grear they have kind­ly donat­ed, as the police can hold equip­ment ‘as evi­dence’.

http://savealexandraparkstrees.wordpress.com

Decoy Pond camp evicted but the campaign continues! (31 Jan)

Decoy Pond camp – the third of three camps that had been erect­ed on the path of the planned Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) – was final­ly evict­ed yes­ter­day (Wednes­day 30 Jan).

Decoy Pond camp – the third of three camps that had been erect­ed on the path of the planned Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) – was final­ly evict­ed yes­ter­day (Wednes­day 30 Jan).

In the end it took scores of secu­ri­ty, bailiffs and police three days to evict all of the climbers – not to men­tion tun­nel­ers, peo­ple in tripods and folk locked-on on the ground! Denied food, water and med­i­cine by East Sus­sex Coun­ty Coun­cil, the activists in the trees also had to con­tend with tor­ren­tial rain and gusts of wind of up to 54mph (Met Office fig­ure for near­by Bat­tle)! See below for pho­tos and films from yes­ter­day (30 Jan). In total, 9 peo­ple were arrest­ed, and the CHD is now help­ing to assist those charged, as they go through the court process.

After 48 days of con­tin­u­ous protest (with 28 arrests) some of those involved will prob­a­bly now be tak­ing a short but much need­ed rest. Nonethe­less, the Cam­paign con­tin­ues, with four activists in Court this morn­ing (Thurs­day 31 Jan), more news expect­ed from the High Court on Fri­day, the “Grannies’ Dinghy” action in the Val­ley this Sat­ur­day (2 Feb­ru­ary), and an oppor­tu­ni­ty for oppo­nents of the Road to get togeth­er to form groups and plan future activ­i­ties, this Sun­day (3 Feb­ru­ary: 4–6pm, The Roomz, 33–35 West­ern Road, St Leonards on Sea, TN37 6DJ).

Many more activ­i­ties and projects are also in the pipeline, so please sign the Pledge / like us on Face­book / fol­low us on Twit­ter (@combe_haven) / send a dona­tion (use the Pay­Pal but­tons on this site or send a cheque) and stay post­ed for more news on Phase 2. A luta con­tin­ua!

Day 48 (30 Jan): Decoy Pond Camp eviction continues!

[Update, 10.43am: First arrest of the day report­ed as cam­paign­er removed from tree.]

[Update, 10.43am: First arrest of the day report­ed as cam­paign­er removed from tree.]

30 Jan: Day 48 of the cur­rent phase of Combe Haven protests has begun with activists still in the trees at Decoy Pond Camp (see here for maps and direc­tions). The evic­tion con­tin­ues! East Sus­sex Coun­ty Coun­cil are still insist­ing that no food, water, blan­kets or med­i­cines be allowed up to the peo­ple high-up in the trees, who faced gusts of wind of up to 54mph last night.

Mean­while, local grand­moth­ers are mobil­is­ing to bring inflat­able dinghies to the flood­ed val­ley ths Sat­ur­day (2 Feb­ru­ary) for an aquat­ic demon­stra­tion of their sup­port for the peace­ful protests.

Five peo­ple were arrest­ed yes­ter­day, bring­ing the total num­ber of arrests so far to 26. All have now been released: one was cau­tioned, and the remain­ing four have been charged.

As we not­ed at the time of the evic­tion of “Base Camp”: This is only the end of the begin­ning for the protests against the Bex­hill Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR)!

If you can’t make it down to the Val­ley this week then please sign the Pledge / like us on Face­book / fol­low us on Twit­ter (@combe_haven) / send a dona­tion (use the Pay­Pal but­tons on this site or send a cheque) and stay post­ed for news on Phase 2!

Two short films from yesterday’s evic­tion:

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Press Infor­ma­tion Note
Combe Haven Defend­ers [1]
30 Jan­u­ary 2013

EVICTION OF HASTINGS ANTI-ROAD CAMP ENTERS THIRD DAY
Local grand­moth­ers to show sup­port with “Grannies’ Dinghy” action this Sat­ur­day (2 Feb)

30 Jan­u­ary, 8.15am: At least four activists are still in the tree­tops of the third [2] anti-road camp along the route of the pro­posed Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) this morn­ing, as local grand­moth­ers mobilise to bring inflat­able dinghies to the flood­ed val­ley ths Sat­ur­day (2 Feb­ru­ary) for an aquat­ic demon­stra­tion of their sup­port for the peace­ful protests.

Cam­paign­ers are cur­rent­ly peace­ful­ly resist­ing the evic­tion of the Camp, which is locat­ed just west of Upper Wilt­ing Farm in Crowhurst (TN38 8EG) [3]. East Sus­sex Coun­cil have denied food and water to the pro­test­ers – who have faced heavy rain and gusts of up to 54mph, fifty-feet up in the trees – since Mon­day morn­ing [4].

Local grand­moth­ers will be assem­bling with inflat­able dinghies at 12.45pm this Sat­ur­day (2 Feb­ru­ary) at the Plough Inn in Crowhurst (TN33 9AW), from where they plan to mount an aquat­ic demon­stra­tion against the Road in the near­by flood­ed fields – fields through which the Road is sup­posed to pass [5]. An ear­li­er action (“Grannies’ Tree”) was repro­duced in both the Dai­ly Mail and Dai­ly Tele­graph.

The £100m Road project is one of over forty “zom­bie roads” that were declared dead years ago but have now been resus­ci­tat­ed as part of as part of Britain’s largest road-build­ing pro­gramme in 25 years [6,7].

Sev­en peo­ple have been arrest­ed since Mon­day, includ­ing Natal­ie Hyn­de, daugh­ter of pop singer Chrissie Hyn­de [4]. The peace­ful protests against the Road– which have now been run­ning con­tin­u­ous­ly for 48 days, with 26 arrests – have seized nation­al atten­tion over the past sev­en weeks [8].

Adri­an Hop­kins of the Combe Haven Defend­ers said: “Resis­tance has been grow­ing to this awful scheme as each day pass­es and more peo­ple become inspired by the action so far tak­en to pro­tect the beau­ti­ful Combe Haven val­ley. This is only the begin­ning of a sus­tained cam­paign of peace­ful resis­tance to this envi­ron­men­tal­ly dis­as­trous white-ele­phant project.”

NOTES
[1] http://www.combehavendefenders.org.uk
[2] The first camp was estab­lished on 21 Decem­ber. Two oth­er camps along the route, ‘Three Oaks’ and ‘Adams Farm’, have already been evict­ed, on 14 Jan and 16–17 Jan respec­tive­ly, result­ing in sev­en arrests.
[3] For maps and direc­tions see http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/camp-groundrules-directions/
[4] http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/2013/01/29/29-jan-escc-still-denying-food-blankets-to-activists-facing-44mph-gusts/
[5] http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/2013/01/26/sat-19-jan-grannies-photoshoot‑2/
[6] See ‘Con­tro­ver­sial ‘zom­bie roads’ scheme to be resus­ci­tat­ed’, Guardian, 10 Octo­ber 2012, http://tinyurl.com/zombieroads
[7] http://bettertransport.org.uk/media/26-Oct-roads-report
[8] http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/recent-media-coverage/

Tar Sands Blockade Activists Forced to Settle Lawsuit But Will Continue to Fight

TransCanada Claimed $5 Million in Damages

On Fri­day, Jan­u­ary 25th, a group of activists agreed to a se

TransCanada Claimed $5 Million in Damages

On Fri­day, Jan­u­ary 25th, a group of activists agreed to a set­tle­ment in TransCanada’s law­suit against Tar Sands Block­ade, Ris­ing Tide North Texas, Ris­ing Tide North Amer­i­ca, and nine­teen indi­vid­u­als. The SLAPP suit (Strate­gic Law­suit Against Pub­lic Par­tic­i­pa­tion) alleged that direct action against Key­stone XL has cost Tran­sCana­da $5 mil­lion. This con­tra­dicts fre­quent pub­lic state­ments by TransCanada’s spokes­peo­ple that block­aders were not imped­ing con­struc­tion in any mean­ing­ful way.

The eight Tex­ans who came to court to defend them­selves on Fri­day, some of whom had not been active­ly involved with Tar Sands Block­ade since protests in August, were threat­ened with los­ing their homes and life’s sav­ings if the law­suit went for­ward. In order to pro­tect the liveli­hoods and depen­dents of brave activists like Tam­mie Car­son, who locked her­self to a truck car­ry­ing Key­stone XL pipe, the activists agreed to set­tle the law­suit. The cor­po­ra­tion will not seek the $5 mil­lion in finan­cial dam­ages, and the named defen­dants and orga­ni­za­tions agreed to not tres­pass on Key­stone XL prop­er­ty in Texas and Okla­homa or face addi­tion­al charges.

Despite this legal set­back, mem­bers of Tar Sands Block­ade are as deter­mined as ever to stop Key­stone XL. The sus­tained direct action cam­paign will con­tin­ue. Here’s a chronol­o­gy of all the direct actions tak­en since August 2012.

Defen­dants made the fol­low­ing state­ments in response to the set­tle­ment:

Tam­mie Car­son, a life­long Tex­an, grand­moth­er, and defen­dant from Arling­ton, TX, said:

“I took action for my grand­kids’ future. I couldn’t sit idly by and watch as a multi­na­tion­al cor­po­rate bul­ly abused emi­nent domain to build a dirty and dan­ger­ous tar sands pipeline right through Tex­ans’ back­yards. I had no choice but to set­tle or lose my home and every­thing I’ve worked for my entire life.”

 

Ram­sey Sprague, Tar Sands Block­ade spokesper­son, and defen­dant from Fort Worth, TX, said:

“Tran­sCana­da is dead wrong if they think a civ­il law­suit against a hand­ful of Tex­ans is going to stop a grass­roots civ­il dis­obe­di­ence move­ment. This is noth­ing more than anoth­er exam­ple of Tran­sCana­da repress­ing dis­sent and bul­ly­ing Tex­ans who are defend­ing their homes and futures from tox­ic tar sands.”

Lau­ren Regan, an attor­ney with the Civ­il Lib­er­ties Defense Cen­ter and one of the legal coor­di­na­tors for the Tar Sands Block­ade made the fol­low­ing state­ment:

“The SLAPP suit (Strate­gic Law­suit Against Pub­lic Par­tic­i­pa­tion) filed against the peo­ple and orga­ni­za­tions that are fight­ing against TransCanada’s uneth­i­cal and envi­ron­men­tal­ly destruc­tive pipeline will nev­er stop the people’s resis­tance to the XL Pipeline. Tran­sCana­da has repeat­ed­ly attempt­ed to vio­late the law and bul­ly the peo­ple of Texas: through cor­po­rate cor­rup­tion and lies, they obtained “com­mon car­ri­er” sta­tus in Texas in order to steal pri­vate prop­er­ty from low income and hard work­ing Tex­ans; they have attempt­ed to bring the full weight of the police state upon non­vi­o­lent activists in an attempt to crush their peace­ful resistance–using mace, tasers, and phys­i­cal bru­tal­i­ty.

Despite phys­i­cal harm, lengthy incar­cer­a­tions, felony charges, and now civ­il law­suits to restrict their right to protest, the peo­ple have not been deterred and have only been embold­ened in the face of Transcanada’s attempt at repres­sion and bul­ly­ing. At each attempt by Tran­sCana­da to chill the cit­i­zens’ rights to protest the XL Pipeline, the people’s lawyers will stand up to defend them in the Court’s. For every pro­tes­tor that is jailed or beat­en, ten more arrive to take that person’s place. For every home­own­er who has had their land stolen, and dan­ger­ous tar sands oil now threat­ens their health and envi­ron­ment, peo­ple from around the coun­try will band togeth­er to pro­tect the next threat­ened com­mu­ni­ty through a vari­ety of non­vi­o­lent tools. Resis­tance is Fer­tile. The sur­vival of the plan­et in the face of glob­al cli­mate change deserves noth­ing less.”

Treesit in California Against CalTrans Bypass

A coali­tion of envi­ron­men­tal groups staged a protest Mon­day morn­ing along High­way 101 to protest the con­struc­tion of the high­way bypass around Willits.

Dozens of pro­tes­tors from Earth First! joined with a new­ly formed Willits group called Save our Lit­tle Lake Val­ley in an effort to stop the planned tree cut­ting along the bypass foot­print. In addi­tion to pick­et signs, a local woman is now liv­ing on a plat­form nes­tled in top of one of the trees slat­ed for removal. Pick­eters on the ground vowed to sup­port her tree sit­ting protest for as long as it takes.

“Cal­Trans did not cut today, it was def­i­nite­ly a vic­to­ry,” says orga­niz­er Sarah Grusky of Save our Lit­tle Lake Val­ley. “We plan to hold vig­ils as often as pos­si­ble to keep a look­out.”

Cal­Trans has been work­ing for the past few weeks, plac­ing mark­ers along the project right of way prepar­ing for the con­trac­tor to begin work. The first sig­nif­i­cant work sched­uled for the con­trac­tor is to cut the trees along the bypass route to pre­vent migra­to­ry birds from nest­ing in them. Tree cut­ting is expect­ed to start with­in two to three weeks accord­ing to Cal­Trans spokesman Phil Fris­bie.

Cal­Trans award­ed the $108 mil­lion con­struc­tion project to the part­ner­ship of DeSil­va Gates Con­struc­tion and Flat­iron West Incor­po­rat­ed late last year with the expec­ta­tion most of the heavy con­struc­tion work would not start until 2013 after the sea­son­al rains sub­sided.

A law­suit filed by The Cen­ter for Bio­log­i­cal Diver­si­ty, Sier­ra Club, Willits Envi­ron­men­tal Cen­ter and the Envi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Infor­ma­tion Cen­ter in May 2012 is seek­ing to delay the project until a more thor­ough exam­i­na­tion of alter­na­tives is con­duct­ed. The Cal­i­for­nia Farm Bureau joined the law­suit in August 2012. In Novem­ber a fed­er­al judge denied the groups’ request for an injunc­tion aimed at stop­ping con­struc­tion until the law­suit issues were set­tled. The tri­al date is sched­uled for June 7.

While the courts set­tle the over­all legal­i­ty of Cal­Trans bypass design, some area activists are con­cerned about the dam­age being done in the mean­time. Pro­tes­tors brought infor­ma­tion­al signs and held them up to wave at trav­el­ers along the east side of High­way 101 south of Walk­er Road aimed at stop­ping any con­struc­tion through peace­ful protest.

“Cal­trans has not con­sid­ered the many oth­er viable and sen­si­ble solu­tions to Will­lits’ traf­fic prob­lems devel­oped by the peo­ple,” said War­bler, a Lit­tle Lake Val­ley farmer occu­py­ing the tree. “This Bypass will not improve local traf­fic and will cre­ate no per­ma­nent jobs, but it will per­ma­nent­ly scar the Lit­tle Lake Val­ley. The Army Corp of Engi­neers is man­dat­ed to choose the least harm­ful alter­na­tive and the Bypass as planned isn’t it.”

War­bler is 24-years-old and has been liv­ing and work­ing in the Willits val­ley for the past four years. This is her first tree sit. She vol­un­teered for this role when plan­ning for the protests began last year. She received tree climb­ing instruc­tions from Cas­ca­dia For­est Defend­ers who also helped her get set­tled into the tree locat­ed at the south end of the new planned bypass not far from the cur­rent High­way 101. She has tarps to pro­tect her­self from rain and two sleep­ing bags to keep warm.

When asked how long she planned to stay in the tree she said, “that depends on Cal­Trans and local author­i­ties.”

Updates from the trees: Hastings Link Road protests

 

 

An activist high in the tress at Decoy Pond camp. 28-01-2013. Photo: Adrian Arbib. www.arbib.org

 

 

An activist high in the tress at Decoy Pond camp. 28-01-2013. Photo: Adrian Arbib. www.arbib.org

Day 47 (Jan 29): Decoy Pond Camp evic­tion con­tin­ues

[Update, 10am, Tues 29 Jan: A con­cert­ed move is report­ed­ly being made on all of the tree­hous­es, with lots of climb­ing spe­cial­ists in the trees.]

The evic­tion of the third camp (Decoy Pond Camp – see here for maps and direc­tions) along the route of the Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) con­tin­ues today (Tues 29 Jan – the 47th day of con­tin­u­ous protests in the val­ley) with activists still locked-on up trees, after spend­ing a night in cold & wet con­di­tions, fac­ing gusts of up to 44mph (which are no joke when you’re 50 foot up a tree!).

Of the two peo­ple arrest­ed yes­ter­day: one has been cau­tioned and released, and the oth­er is appear­ing in court this morn­ing.

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Update, 6.30pm Mon 28 Jan: Climb­ing team & bailiffs have now left Decoy Pond camp for the day, leav­ing secu­ri­ty guards & fenc­ing behind. Two arrests have been report­ed. No-one yet removed from the trees. Hot food and more tar­pau­lins need­ed this evening (Mon 28 Jan). Evic­tion to con­tin­ue tomor­row (Tues 29 Jan).

Can you come tonight to climb into site and help defend the trees tomor­row? Trans­port from Brighton, Lewes, Bex­hill & Hast­ings. Details 07766 335506
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The evic­tion of the third camp (Decoy Pond Camp – see here for maps and direc­tions) along the route of the Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) began around 8.40am this morn­ing. As at t 12.30pm there were some 70+ secu­ri­ty per­sonnnel on the site, as well as a con­sid­er­able num­ber of activists lock-on up the trees – includ­ing at least one at the top of a fifty-foot tree. The first arrest was report­ed around 12.20pm.

As we not­ed at the time of the evic­tion of “Base Camp”: This is only the end of the begin­ning for the protests against the Bex­hill Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR)!
If you can’t make it down to the Val­ley this week then please sign the Pledge / like us on Face­book / fol­low us on Twit­ter (@combe_haven) / send a dona­tion (use the Pay­Pal but­tons on this site or send a cheque) and stay post­ed for news on Phase 2!

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Press Infor­ma­tion Note
Combe Haven Defend­ers [1]
28 Jan­u­ary 2013

EVICTION OF 3RD HASTINGS ANTI-ROAD CAMP BEGINS
Cam­paign­ers peace­ful­ly resist­ing £100m project in tun­nels and trees

28 Jan­u­ary, 9.45am: The evic­tion of the third [2] anti-road camp along the route of the pro­posed Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) has begun this morn­ing, Mon­day 28 Jan­u­ary. Cam­paign­ers are  cur­rent­ly peace­ful­ly resist­ing the evic­tion of the Camp, which is locat­ed just west of Upper Wilt­ing Farm in Crowhurst (TN38 8EG), locked-on up trees and down tun­nels [3].

The peace­ful protests against the Road– which have been run­ning since 14 Decem­ber, with 19 arrests – have seized nation­al atten­tion over the past month [4].

Yes­ter­day, direc­tors and senior cam­paign­ers from six major envi­ron­men­tal and trans­port NGOs, includ­ing the RSPB, Green­peace and the Cam­paign to Pro­tect Rur­al Eng­land, vis­it­ed the Camp, con­demn­ing the £100m Road project [5], one of over forty “zom­bie roads” that were declared dead years ago but have now been resus­ci­tat­ed as part of as part of Britain’s largest road-build­ing pro­gramme in 25 years [6, 7].

Andy Atkins, Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, Friends of the Earth, said “’This road shouldn’’t have been approved. It will lead to more pol­lu­tion, dam­age the envi­ron­ment and do lit­tle to boost the local econ­o­my. Reviv­ing dis­cred­it­ed road schemes like this won’t solve our eco­nom­ic and trans­port prob­lems, it will sim­ply shift traf­fic else­where. Trans­port pol­i­cy must change direc­tion. We need clean­er cars and safe, effi­cient and afford­able alter­na­tives.’” [5]

Adri­an Hop­kins of the Combe Haven Defend­ers said: “Resis­tance has been grow­ing to this awful scheme as each day pass­es and more peo­ple become inspired by the action so far tak­en to pro­tect the beau­ti­ful Combe Haven val­ley. This is only the begin­ning of a sus­tained cam­paign of peace­ful resis­tance to this envi­ron­men­tal­ly dis­as­trous white-ele­phant project.”

NOTES
[1] www.combehavendefenders.org.uk
[2] The first camp was estab­lished on 21 Decem­ber. Two oth­er camps along the route, ‘Three Oaks’ and ‘Adams Farm’, have already been evict­ed, on 14 Jan and 16–17 Jan respec­tive­ly, result­ing in sev­en arrests that will all go to court lat­er this week.
[3] For maps and direc­tions see http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/camp-groundrules-directions/
[4] See http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/recent-media-coverage/
[5] See http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/2013/01/27/green-and-conservation-groups-ceos-visit-camp-condemn-link-road-plans/
[6] See ‘Con­tro­ver­sial ‘zom­bie roads’ scheme to be resus­ci­tat­ed’, Guardian, 10 Octo­ber 2012, http://tinyurl.com/zombieroads
[7] http://bettertransport.org.uk/media/26-Oct-roads-report

URGENT APPEAL – Defend Combe Haven, Resist the Eviction!

Camp Decoy, the last of three camps stand­ing in the way of the pro­posed Bex­hill – Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR), faces evic­tion next Mon­day (28 Jan). If you have ever thought you might come and take a stand against this hor­ri­fy­ing scheme, now’s the time.

Camp Decoy, the last of three camps stand­ing in the way of the pro­posed Bex­hill – Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR), faces evic­tion next Mon­day (28 Jan). If you have ever thought you might come and take a stand against this hor­ri­fy­ing scheme, now’s the time.

We need to do absolute­ly every­thing we can to peace­ful­ly resist this evic­tion. We have been tru­ly hum­bled over the last few weeks by the lev­el of sup­port from the local com­mu­ni­ty, and from well-wish­ers far and wide.  But now we need peo­ple, lots of peo­ple, to stand togeth­er and say: “Enough is enough, it’s time to pro­tect the coun­try­side”.

See here for maps and direc­tions from the near­est train sta­tion (Crowhurst).

Combe Haven is the first of 190 sites at risk of new road devel­op­ment.  If we allow this one, the oth­ers will fol­low and pre­cious habi­tats all over the coun­try will be lost for­ev­er.

Here’s how you can help resist the evic­tion of Camp Decoy:

1. Share this far and wide.  Face­book, Twit­ter, Email.  Phone your friends.  Phone your local radio sta­tion!  Tell every­one at work, at school, at col­lege, and down the pub.

2.Donate! Use the donate but­ton on the Combe Haven Defend­ers web-site, or send them a cheque. Every lit­tle helps: just £6 buys enough rope to secure a plat­form; £12 buys a lock to secure some­one to it.

3.Most impor­tant­ly – Come to Combe Haven and help to peace­ful­ly defend Camp Decoy!

CATCH THE COMBE HAVEN BUS!

Decoy Wood is the last remain­ing piece of wood­land in the way of the BHLR.  Wait a week or two and it may be gone. If live in Eng­land, Wales or Scot­land and you can get 20 peo­ple from your com­mu­ni­ty to come, we will pro­vide you with your very own Combe Haven Bus, for free!

These bus­es will bring peo­ple to Camp Decoy on Sat­ur­day, and on Sun­day we hope to pro­vide train­ing in tree-climb­ing, lock­ing-on, and a legal brief­ing.

We need every­one, whether it’s for peace­ful resis­tance, legal obser­va­tion or gen­er­al sup­port.  Whether you are will­ing to risk arrest or not – there’s a job for you!

The bus will return to your com­mu­ni­ty after a few days of action, depend­ing on the sit­u­a­tion on the ground.

For more infor­ma­tion about the Combe Haven Bus, please phone or text 07766 335506

Activists Disrupt Arch Coal Corporate HQ In St. Louis

  22nd Jan.  CREVE COEUR, MO —  Sev­en pro­test­ers affil­i­at­ed with the RAMPS cam­paign (Rad­i­cal Action for Moun­tain Peo­ples’ Sur­vival), MORE (Mis­souri­ans Orga­nizi

  22nd Jan.  CREVE COEUR, MO —  Sev­en pro­test­ers affil­i­at­ed with the RAMPS cam­paign (Rad­i­cal Action for Moun­tain Peo­ples’ Sur­vival), MORE (Mis­souri­ans Orga­niz­ing for Reform and Empow­er­ment) and Moun­tain Jus­tice are locked down to a 500-pound small pot­ted tree in Arch Coal’s third-floor head­quar­ters while a larg­er group is in the lob­by per­form­ing a song and dance.  Addi­tion­al­ly, a heli­um bal­loon ban­ner with the mes­sage “John Eaves Your Coal Com­pa­ny Kills”, direct­ed at the Arch Coal CEO was released in the Arch Coal head­quar­ters.

“We’re here to halt Arch’s oper­a­tions for as long as we can. These coal cor­po­ra­tions do not answer to com­mu­ni­ties, they only con­sume them.  We’re here to resist their unchecked pow­er,” explained Mar­garet Fet­zer, one of the pro­tes­tors.

Arch Coal, the sec­ond largest coal com­pa­ny in the U.S., oper­ates strip mines in Appalachia and in oth­er U.S. coal basins. Strip min­ing is an acute­ly destruc­tive and tox­ic method of min­ing coal, and resource extrac­tion dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly impacts mar­gin­al­ized com­mu­ni­ties.

“From the Bat­tle of Blair Moun­tain to the cur­rent fight with the Patri­ot pen­sions, the peo­ple of cen­tral Appalachia have been fight­ing against the coal com­pa­nies for the past 125 years. The strug­gle con­tin­ues today as we take action to hold Arch Coal and oth­er coal com­pa­nies account­able for the dam­age that they do to peo­ple and com­mu­ni­ties in Appalachia and around the world. Coal min­ing dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly impacts indige­nous peo­ples, and we stand in sol­i­dar­i­ty with dis­en­fran­chised peo­ple every­where,”  Dustin Steele of Min­go Coun­ty, W.Va. said.  Steele was one of the peo­ple locked in Arch’s office.

Min­go Coun­ty is rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the pub­lic health cri­sis faced by com­mu­ni­ties over­bur­dened by strip min­ing.  A recent study of life expectan­cies placed Min­go Coun­ty in the bot­tom 1 per­cent out of 3,147 coun­ties nationwide.(1)

Arch’s strip mines not only poi­son com­mu­ni­ties, but also seek to erase the lega­cy of resis­tance to the coal com­pa­nies in Appalachia. Arch’s Adkins Fork Sur­face Mine is threat­en­ing to blast away Blair Mountain—the site of the sec­ond largest upris­ing in U.S. his­to­ry and a mile­stone in the long-stand­ing strug­gle between Appalachi­ans and the coal companies.(2)

The dev­as­ta­tion of Arch’s strip mines plague regions beyond Appalachia.  Arch’s oper­a­tion in the Pow­der Riv­er Basin is the “sin­gle largest coal min­ing com­plex in the world.(3)”  Pro­duc­ing 15 per­cent of the U.S. coal sup­ply, Arch is a major cul­prit of the cli­mate cri­sis.

NASA sci­en­tist James Hansen describes the burn­ing of coal as a lead­ing cause glob­al cli­mate change.(4)  The Mid­west region faces seri­ous pub­lic health impacts from cli­mate change due to “increased heat wave inten­si­ty and fre­quen­cy, degrad­ed air qual­i­ty, and reduced water quality(5),” accord­ing to recent­ly pub­lished data from the Nation­al Cli­mate Assess­ment.

Armed indigenous community forces Petroamazonas to abandon oil project in Ecuador

An indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty in the Ecuado­ri­an Ama­zon has won a reprieve after build­ing up an arse­nal of spears, blow­pipes, machetes and guns to fend off an expect­ed intru­sion by the army and a state-run oil com­pa­ny.

An indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty in the Ecuado­ri­an Ama­zon has won a reprieve after build­ing up an arse­nal of spears, blow­pipes, machetes and guns to fend off an expect­ed intru­sion by the army and a state-run oil com­pa­ny.

The res­i­dents of Sani Isla expressed relief that a con­fronta­tion with Petroa­ma­zonas did not take place on Tues­day as antic­i­pat­ed, but said the firm is still try­ing to secure explo­ration rights in their area of pris­tine rain­for­est.

“We have won a vic­to­ry in our com­mu­ni­ty. We’re unit­ed,” said the com­mu­ni­ty pres­i­dent, Leonar­do Tapuy. “But the gov­ern­ment and the oil com­pa­ny won’t leave us alone. “

The Kich­wa tribe on Sani Isla, had said they were ready to fight to the death to pro­tect their ter­ri­to­ry, which cov­ers 70,000 hectares. More than a quar­ter of their land is in Yasuni nation­al park, the most bio­di­verse place on earth.

Petroa­ma­zonas had ear­li­er told them it would begin prospect­ing on their land on 15 Jan­u­ary, backed by pub­lic secu­ri­ty forces.

Before the expect­ed confrontation,the shaman, Patri­cio Jipa said peo­ple were mak­ing blow­pipes and spears, try­ing to bor­row guns and prepar­ing to use sticks stones and any oth­er weapons they could lay their hands on.

“Our inten­tion was not to hurt or kill any­one, but to stop them from enter­ing our land,” he said.

It is unclear why Petroa­ma­zonas hes­i­tat­ed. The com­pa­ny has yet to respond to the Guardian’s request for a com­ment.

Locals spec­u­lat­ed that it was due to a reaf­fir­ma­tion of oppo­si­tion to the oil com­pa­ny at a marathon com­mu­ni­ty meet­ing on Sun­day.

“They’ve heard that we are unit­ed against the explo­ration so they have backed off,” said Fredy Gualin­ga, man­ag­er of the Sani Lodge. “We’re hap­py they haven’t come. Life is going on as nor­mal.”

The relief may not last for long giv­en the huge fos­sil fuel resources that are thought to lie below the for­est.

“It was a close thing, but we’re not out of the water. The oil com­pa­ny has not giv­en up. They will con­tin­ue to hound us and to try to divide the com­mu­ni­ty. But at least we have a few days respite,” said Mari Muench, a British woman who is mar­ried to the vil­lage shaman.

The elect­ed lead­ers of Sani Isla have pledged to resist offers from Petroa­ma­zonas for the dura­tion of their term.

“This pol­i­cy will remain in place dur­ing our peri­od in office. We’re com­mit­ted to that and we will do what we can to make it more per­ma­nent,” said Abdon Gre­fa, the speak­er of the com­mu­ni­ty.

The bat­tle has now moved to the judi­cial sys­tem and the court of pub­lic opin­ion. Their appeal for an injunc­tion went before a judge on Wednes­day and they are call­ing on sup­port­ers to help them build a long-term eco­nom­ic alter­na­tive to fos­sil fuels.

“We hope peo­ple will write protest let­ters to Petroa­ma­zonas, come and vis­it our lodge, pro­mote Sani, donate mon­ey to our school and projects, vol­un­teer as teach­ers or pro­vide funds to stu­dents to trav­el over­seas so they can learn what we need to sur­vive in the future,” said the com­mu­ni­ty sec­re­tary, Klid­er Gualin­ga.

18 Jan: Unevicted! Third Road Protest Camp Still in Place

PLEASE NOTE: We’re cur­rent­ly expe­ri­enc­ing prob­lems with our (out­go­ing) text mes­sag­ing.

PLEASE NOTE: We’re cur­rent­ly expe­ri­enc­ing prob­lems with our (out­go­ing) text mes­sag­ing. Until fur­ther notice, please direct all texts and calls to 07926 423 033, and check your email (assum­ing you’ve signed-up to our email list), this web-site and the Face­book page to keep up to speed on what’s hap­pen­ing.

VIDEO: https://www.indymedia.org.uk/media/2013/01//505637.3gp

The third of three protest camps (“Decoy Pond”) against the Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) remains unevict­ed today (Fri­day 18 Jan). Sup­port­ers and vis­i­tors are wel­come! See maps above and below for loca­tion and direc­tions.

Two cam­paign­ers occu­py­ing trees at the now-evict­ed “Base Camp” were arrest­ed yes­ter­day (Thurs­day 18 Jan­u­ary), bring­ing the total num­ber of arrests since the peace­ful protests began on 14 Decem­ber to nine­teen.

Please note: “Decoy Pond” camp is a bit trick­i­er to get to than the (now evict­ed) main camp was. In par­tic­u­lar, at present you need to be fair­ly steady on your feet to nav­i­gate the rough and icy ter­rain.

Press release Combe Haven Defend­ers [1]
Fri­day 18 Jan­u­ary
Con­tact 07926 423 033

UNEVICTED! THIRD ROAD PROTEST CAMP STILL IN PLACE, AS LOCAL GRANDMOTHERS MOBILISE TO SUPPORT PROTESTS
Cam­paign­ers still in trees as total num­ber of arrests reach­es nine­teen

Fri­day 18 Jan­u­ary, Crowhurst: The third of three protest camps (“Decoy Pond”) against the Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) remains unevict­ed today (18 Jan), as local grand­moth­ers mobilise to show their oppo­si­tion to the Road and sup­port for the peace­ful protests.

Fol­low­ing their suc­cess­ful “Grannie Tree” action – pho­tos from which appeared in the Dai­ly Tele­graph among oth­er places [2] – local grand­moth­ers are organ­is­ing a sec­ond “Grannies Pho­to­shoot” against the Road this Sat­ur­day (19 Jan), meet­ing at 12.45pm by the Recre­ation Ground near The Plough pub in Crowhurst (TN33 9AW) [2].

Two cam­paign­ers occu­py­ing trees at the now-evict­ed “Base Camp” were arrest­ed yes­ter­day, bring­ing the total num­ber of arrests since the peace­ful protests began on 14 Decem­ber to nine­teen.

Like the two camps that have already been evict­ed this week, “Decoy Pond” is locat­ed on the pro­posed route of the BHLR (see foot­note [3] for maps and loca­tion).

The peace­ful protests against the road– which have now been run­ning for over a month – have seized nation­al atten­tion over the past week [4]. Tree-felling work for the road start­ed on 14 Decem­ber 2012 and rep­re­sents the first sig­nif­i­cant work on the high­ly-con­tro­ver­sial 3 mile £100m road, one of over forty “zom­bie roads” that were declared dead years ago but have now been resus­ci­tat­ed as part of as part of Britain’s largest road-build­ing pro­gramme in 25 years [5, 6].

Gabriel Car­lyle, a spokesper­son for the Combe Haven Defend­ers: “Despite the freez­ing tem­per­a­tures – and the mas­sive resources deployed against them by East Sus­sex Coun­ty Coun­cil – cam­paign­ers are still occu­py­ing the trees along the route of the BHLR. The last month of protests are only the begin­ning of a sus­tained cam­paign of peace­ful resis­tance to this envi­ron­men­tal­ly dis­as­trous £100m white-ele­phant project.”

Con­tact 07926 423 033

NOTES
[1] www.combehavendefenders.org.uk
[2] https://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/2013/01/17/sat-19-jan-grannies-photoshoot‑2/
[3] Near­by post­code TN33 9AY. See maps above.
[4] http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/recent-media-coverage/
[5] See ‘Con­tro­ver­sial ‘zom­bie roads’ scheme to be resus­ci­tat­ed’, Guardian, 10 Octo­ber 2012, http://tinyurl.com/zombieroads
[6] http://bettertransport.org.uk/media/26-Oct-roads-report