Global – Earth First!

UK: 4 new releases from green anarchist zine Return Fire (PDFs)

Just now we’ve sent out the PDF versions of our recent releases, for downloading and printing (for past issues, see 325).

https://en-contrainfo.espiv.net/2016/06/05/uk-4-new-releases-from-green-anarchist-zine-return-fire-pdfs/ for links to the PDFs

Just now we’ve sent out the PDF versions of our recent releases, for downloading and printing (for past issues, see 325). To summarise, there’s the full length edition of Return Fire vol.3 (Winter 2015-2016), full of news, theory, poetry and antagonism (download in low-res here); a companion piece consisting of our ‘glossary’ entry for the issue, on Colonisation; an imposed and print-ready version of ‘Smarter Prison?’ as a supplement to vol.3, which we received from ‘Radical Interference’ and released for December of 2015; and lastly, we’ve uploaded one of the feature texts from vol.3, ‘The Veil Drops’, to theanarchistlibrary.org as a separate file for reading and reproduction. Also, there is both colour and black-and-white versions of the cover included, in case some comrades want to do their own printing.

Return Fire vol.3

A continuation of our project to bring incisive anarchic content from around to world to an anglophone readership. New editorial content, reprints of things we’ve found useful, artwork, action listings, foraging information, the usual.

There’s a few previously-untranslated articles in this issue. For example, one is an extract from the latest cover story of Italy’s eco-insurrectionary periodical Terra Selvaggia, on ‘The Advance of Urbanisation’ and, simultaneously, cracks opening in the concrete which we could utilise… Annie Archet meanwhile tells a life-story of evading identity, in Portrait of the Invisible Woman in Front of Her Mirror. To name some out of the texts we’ve assembled from selections of pre-existing ones, David King looks at the reductionist and patriarchal implications of modern reproductive technologies in ‘Into Her Inner Chambers’, and Nicola Gai speaks to acting within ‘The Maximum That Our Abilities Allow’ (from his contribution to the founding issue of the Croce Nera Anarchica).

The content we have harvested whole includes The Intensification of Independence in Wallmapu, John Severino’s poignant reflections on a project within an indigenous Mapuche community; The ‘Wild’ as Will and Representation, about commodified and alienated approaches in the urgent need for land reconnection, simply signed M.; and Sean Dunohoe’s harrowing (if limited) polemic against the Close Supervision Centres within the British prison system. (We note that this year the organising collective for the June 11 project of solidarity with long-term anarchist prisoners has called for a focus on such units wherever they are in the world; hence we’d like to dedicate this version in that direction.)

As for our usual columns… We take a retrospective look at some Global Flash-Points of insurgent activity in the months following our last volume. Rebels Behinds Bars covers the State’s aggressions against our comrades, and the latter’s thoughts on topics from surviving incarceration or repression to (anti-)organisation for the attack on authority. ‘To Create & Maintain Their Wealth’ and ‘Sensuality, Magic & Anarchist Violence’ address gendered and speciesist domination through reviews of Silvia Federici, Arthur Evans and Jason Hribal.

The Poems for Love, Loss & War are from Rydra Cosmo, Henry Zegarrundo, Natasha Alvarez and other appreciators of all things feral. For our Memory as a Weapon segment, we’ve used Unsettling America’s spellbinding telling of civilisation’s spread through Europe from the south and beyond, and subsequent trajectory, in The Witch’s Child.

And of course, much more! (All prisoner addresses and also some court-case news is now up to date in the PDF version.)

Colonisation

This time, we ended up printing the ‘glossary’ separately to the main body of the zine. This sizeable essay could be a stand-alone on the subject (one which we feel to be both key and misunderstood by anarchists in much of the world) and distributed as such, but is also relevant to several items in contents of vol.3.

‘Smarter Prison?’

Newly laid out in A5 imposed format, this exploration of the ‘Internet of Things’ and the technological ideology which it advances was first submitted to us during the Black December mobilisation. (We’re happy that since then, Silvia, Billy and Costa, who are referenced in ‘Smarter Prison?’, have been told they will not face trial again for their thwarted attack on the IBM facility.) The struggle against the nano-world continues…

‘The Veil Drops’

This is a reader on counter-insurgency through the lens of ‘crisis’, the social and de-civilising. It’s the longest editorial piece from vol.3, and up on The Anarchist Library for wider accessibility.

Until next time,
R.F.

First conference of the Mesopotamian Ecology Movement (MEM)

Final Declaration of the 1st Conference hold on April 23-24, 2016, in Wan – North Kurdistan

On April 23 and 24, 2016, in the city of Wan (Van) the first conference of the Mesopotamian Ecology Movement (MEM) has been held with the participation of 100 delegates from the provinces Amed (Diyarbakir), Dîlok (Gaziantep), Riha (Sanliurfa), Merdîn, Muş, Wan, Elih (Batman), Siirt, Dersîm and Bedlîs (Bitlis), from Turkey with activists from the following movements and groups Gaya magazine, Anti Nuclear Platform, Green Resistance, Green Newspaper, Green and Left Party, Black Sea in Rebellion, Defense of North Forests, Water Right Campaign, Dersîm-Ovacik Municipality and with of the German ICOR and the East-Kurdistan group Green Chiya. Including representatives of the DTK, KJA, HDK and HDP there were in total 170 people joining the first big gathering of the MEM since its buildup.

The conference in Wan has been organized in a period of intensive political struggles by people in Kurdistan for freedom and self-governance which may change significantly the future of a region, but demands many victims.

Based on the trinity city-class-state and the method of dominance-capital accumulation, the capitalist modernity creates a breathless and unproductive life for the society as well as it faces the nature with every kind of destruction. On behalf of the existing hegemonical system the nation-state und its governments disperse the social-solidary character of the society and imposes unemployment, poverty, unhealthy nourishment via industrial and GMO’s and the cultural-social devastation on the people. Huge destructive projects like the GAP (Southeastern Anatolia Project), Ilisu Dam, Munzur dams, Green Way, Cerattepe Mining and Kanal Istanbul are developed and realized with the aim to enable the forests for construction, to commercialise the waters, commodification of the land, to control nature and people and promote the consumption of fossil fuels which is nothing else than the move away and alienation of people to their original nature and life.

Currently, the ruling regime in Turkey carries out a brutality which is incomparable in the recent history of Kurdistan and the Middle East and has a new perfidious dimension. Hundreds of thousands of people from Sur, Nusaybin, Hezex, Kerboran, Farqin, Şırnak, Gever, Silopi and Cizre are displaced forcely from their cities which are under a systematic destruction. While doing so, the world public keeps silent on the destruction of nature and cities and all massacres.

The denying and monist mentality of the nation-state and the unlimited profit-competition and domination seeking character of the capitalist modernity has brought the world into the current grave state. Thats why social disasters turn into ecological disasters and vice versa. The society and the humanity has to say stop to this development. If this situation continues then we will pass over a point from where a turnabout would be not possible any more. In this sense also the raise of an ecological resistance is very important.

Despite of the destructive mentality and practice a return is possible. It is necessary to raise the ecological struggle both against the wars and the elimination of life areas and our cultural and social values through destructive and exploitative numerous projects like dams, coal plants, mining. In this line the ecological struggle has to be done and spread under the maxim “Lets communalize our land, waters and energy and setup the democratic free life”. It is the right time to defend the democratic nation against the nation-state, the communal economy based on anti-caputalism and anti-monopolism against capitalist fast profit seeking logic and large industrialism, the organic agriculture, ecological villages and cities, ecological industry, energy and technology against agriculture and energy policies imposed by capitalist modernity.

With the consciousness that the ecological struggle is the touchstone for the liberation of the whole humanity we are aware that every action may bring us closer to a free individual and free society. We understand that our struggle towards reaching our nature and societal truth, which are the fundamentals of our existence justification, is an important contribution for the liberation of people and nature in our world. With a big exitement, which we feel deeply, we take our position in this struggle.

Our paradigm, the herald of bright ages of the 21st century’s and coming milleniums, is the one of a radical democratic, communal, ecological, women libertarian society. In this sense the ecology struggle is beyond being any struggle but the vital essence of the free life paradigm. Without ecology the society and without human and nature the ecology can not exist. Ecology, as the essence and self to milleniums old universal dialectic of formation, dialectically weaves all processes of entities connected to each other and like the rings of a chain.

In this sense the struggle against capitalist modernity; is the struggle to develop democratical, social and liberatarian mindset, the struggle to become a social subject against the statist – sovereignist mindset. This can only develop with social entity, with a struggle of freedom, with a stand against to the system that puts up the nature-society-individual for the interests of capital-rent and hegemony.

In the Middle East, the history of ecology hasn’t been written like the history of woman. Like for free woman it is necessary to know the history of woman, for a ecological society it is necessary to know the history of ecology. In this sense, by opening up ecology academies, it is necesseary to include ecological consciousness to the programs of all social spheres and academic educations as an essential extent. Like organizing our own assemblies, the responsibility to ensure the organization of social sphere and institutional studies with ecological consciousness and sensibility is vital. In relation to democratic and ecologic society’s construction, important things been agreed upon in our conference. At the same time with the decisions, that have been taken in our conference, an intellectual, organisational and operational contribution has been aimed for the global ecological movements. Some ofthe decisions that have been taken are:

– To establish a strategic intellectual, organizational and operational
coordination with national and international ecology movements in order
to enhance common discussions and actions against ecological destruction and exploitation.
– To struggle against the mental, physical and ideological destructions
in vital things for life such as energy, water, forests, soil,
urbanisation, agriculture-seed, technology; based on the approved
policies of the Mesopotamian Ecology Movement at the conference to rise
the struggle within the aimed construction of a new life
– To fight against the system that demolishes the urban settlements, that burns the forests in Kurdistan; to treat publically the ecological devastation experienced in Kurdistan and to map the devastations within the war.
– To plan actions with other ecology movements against the destruction of cities in Kurdistan; to ensure active participation in solidarity platforms that have been established in these cities.
– To maintain the struggles protecting the cultural and natural sites/values that faces extinction such as Hasankeyf, Diyarbakır-Sur, Munzur Valley, “Gele Goderne” due to energy and security policies in Kurdistan.
– To develop a Kurdistanesque ecological model.
– To be more and regular present in printed and digital media organs and
to establish ecology academies.
– To carry out the legal struggles in parallel to ongoing actions and campaigns.
– To expand the own organizational structures in all Kurdistan and Middle-East.

RWE Stockholders Meeting in ESSEN Germany Disrupted

RWE Energy (Rheinisch-Westfälisches Elektrizitätswerk AG Rhine-Westfalia) Stockholders meetings was met with outside protest and constant inside disruptions by over 70 activists from groups ranging from Fossil Free and Greenpeace to groups and projects engaging in anticoal blockades and direct actions such as Hambacher Forest, Robin Wood and Indigenous Groups from Siberia resisting the eviction of their villages by coal mining projects linked to RWE. The protests and actions started a day before and during the night with stencils on the pavement and walls around the headquarters of RWE and the convention center. During the morning tables, banners and inflatables were settup outside of the entrance to the convention hall that was being guarded by both local police on the outside and private security firms inside. Approximately 40 activists got inside as part of the Critical Shareholders action to be at first met with pat down and metal detector searches followed by a large dose of green washing displays and presentations. All the computer stations containing RWE propaganda were promptly changed to the home page of Hambacher Forest occupation http://hambachforest.blogsport.de/information-about-the-forest/ and remained showing an eco/defense response to coal mining info attentively read throughout the meeting by stockholders next to RWE employees happily handing out corporate schwag. Before the actual meeting begun the setting was rather surreal with activist connecting and taking Virtual Reality tours of RWE coal Mines and its diggers as waiters served drinks to an older and more conservative demographic all around.

From the very begging of the meeting and commencement speeches the disruptions begun with several protesters jumping on the stage and unfolding banners, followed by others unfolding larger banners and chanting antiCoal and Climate Justice and pro Hambacher Forest Slogans. One protesters lacked himself with soft lockons to the railing close to the podium and was slightly injured when the security tried to forcefully dislodge him, another protester was also injured by sustaining bruises on her leg. Some of the stockholders also attempted to assault the protesters by pulling their glasses and cameras and yelling insults while others insisted that thez be alowed to protest. With over 25 protesters being taken to a holding room under the stage, the atmosphere turned more festive as confetti flew, and no one watched the official livefeed of the speeches provided on a monitor showing close ups of the faces of the speakers only, yet still punctuated with many additional pauses full of consternation as other protests and disruptions raged on and the ranks in the the holding facility continued to swell. All detained in the convention center were eventually released. Another group which succeeded with a climb of, on this day heavily guarded, RWE Tower and a banner drop was detained for several hours and then also released.

This year meeting had very little to celebrate as RWE for the first time in over 60 years suspended its dividend payments to ordinary shareholders, announced its plan to cut 2,000 jobs over the next two years and predicted that its rating will be lowered even further due to their nuclear waste storage remaining from shut down atomic power plants. NO dividend this year will especially affect many cash-strapped local municipalities in north-west Germany with combined stake of around 24 percent in the RWE group which have remained immune to the message of the vibrant DeInvest movement and the global irreversible effects of the coal mining industry on the climate, and general health and welbeing of the global population and the horrendous effects its horrendous effects on biodiversity.

The sinister overtone of the convention were numerous statements by the member of the board that the turmoil facing conventional energy companies could have devastating effects as it leaves to back up capacity to balance rather “shallow and unreliable” renewable energy. Calling it a “horror scenario” a term rather descriptive of climate change and chaos on the brink of which the world finds itself to to action of climate criminals such as RWE, topic obviously missing from the speeches but not the protests, this above mentioned corporate energy apparatus induced paranoia and verbal gymnastics could hint to the possibility of government financed bailout and even more intensive pro fossil fuel subsidies. It remains more important for the Climate Justice Struggle to keep up the pressure through diversity of tactics and protests such as this one.

System Change Not Climate Change!!!

Join Us At:

https://www.ende-gelaende.org/en/
http://hambachforest.blogsport.de/
http://lautonomia.blogsport.eu/

and at all other local and regional Climate Justice and Extreme Energy Struggles.

—
The Hambacher Forest a millenarian forest on the age of the largest open cast lignite mine in Europe is being defended with tree occupations, barricades towers and tunnels. We call upon all of you to join us under a banner of Eco-justice and Biocentrism.

In Solidarity,
Hambach Forest Defenders

The reality of the UK’s coal industry exposed

Map

A new report from the Coal Action Network exposes the untold human and environmental stories of the coal supply chain. Ditch Coal calls on the government to phase out coal faster than its suggested end of 2025. The extreme situations surrounding mines in Russia, Colombia, the USA and the UK which supply the UK’s power stations show that coal energy is an extreme energy. 24% of electricity generated in 2015 came from coal.

Grass roots group the Coal Action Network has worked with communities and environmental activists from the four major countries supplying the UK’s coal. The report details the ignored social justice issues caused by our addiction to coal.

Mining Impacts Abroad

Russia supplies 42% of the coal imported to the UK. In Russia’s main coal producing region, the Kuzbass area of Siberia, mining is devastating indigenous communities and their cultures. Shor and Teleut peoples are being forced off their ancestral lands, breaking the connection with their spiritual homes, their culture is being attacked and their language is fading from use.

Companies exporting coal from Colombia have been implicated in financing paramilitary mass murders, executions, and disappearances. Whole villages have been forcibly evicted to make way for mines, with insufficient relocation plans. Colombia produces a third of the coal imported here.

In the USA, where 19% of the coal imported to the UK is from, extremely destructive mining operations are destroying huge swathes of land and ecosystems, and poisoning local people. Mountaintop removal and damaging deep mining processes are used by companies exporting coal to the UK.

Although the UK government has announced an intention to phase out coal by 2025 Coal Action Network do not see this as something to celebrate. This time-frame and the phase out’s many caveats show that the government continues to prioritise our high electricity demands over others basic rights such as the safety of ones home, the ability to grow food, rights to health, freedoms of religion and spirituality, and biodiversity.

Mining in the UK

Since the government’s coal phase out announcement Durham based mining company Hargreaves have been granted permission to mine at Field House County Durham. Miller Argent who run the UK’s biggest mine Ffos-y-Fran are appealing a decision against a new mine adjacent to it. Five other coal mine applications are still waiting a decision. We need to stop coal mining in this country.

Communities in the UK are fighting for their areas and against coal power. As environmental activists we should follow their example and stand up to the companies involved and stand in solidarity with front-line communities. We cannot simply wait for the government to sort this out. The coal industry is spread wide across our island. Ditch Coal highlights where the ports importing coal are, where power stations are situated and which companies are mining in the UK. There are nine power stations burning coal without a closure plan.

Coal power used to be a main focus of the UK environmental movement, it still is in Germany and remains an issue here. The Coal Action Network will be touring the UK with a Russian activist in the spring, you can catch a preview at the Earth First Winter Moot. The Coal industry’s currently in a position of change, where new technology needs to be implemented or power stations closed. Join the Coal Action Network in fighting the individual power stations and working with communities, let’s not rely on the government to take these important actions.

The whole report can be viewed at www.coalaction.org.uk/ditchcoal as can the two page summary and infographics. Check out the website to see what we are up to or follow us on facebook.

actions in Paris at #COP21 & around the world

For all the latests updates on climate direct actions taken around the world, including in Paris parallel to the UN climate negotiations, see our twitter feed

Peruvian Land Defender Killed After 48-Hour Anti-Mining Strike

October 29th, 2015

Seven rural communities organized a general strike that immobilized completely the activities in Puquio, capital of Lucana province, and resulted in the unfortunate death of a young member of the Cccollana community: Erick Mendonza Tumaylle, age 22. The conflict occurred at the site of one informal mining project where toxic run-offs lead directly into fields used by the community for agriculture.

Leaders of the community have reported Juan Pariona of Ccollao injured as a result of being held hostage by the informal mining company in the San Andrés zone.

This theme of conflict is a recurring one throughout the entire southern territories of Ayacucho, Ica, and parts of Arequipa. Some community members are suing Laytauma Corporation for being the main storage facility for explosives, for being the main source of income for informal transient workers, and for being the sole purchaser of feed produced in Sancos district.

People are worried about how thousands of informal workers are affecting the Yuariviri lagoon, the many springs and water sources. It has been made apparent that the center storm of this conflict has moved to this zone of the country.

by Observatorio de Conflictos Mineros en el Perú / Conflictos Mineros

translated by Earth First! Newswire

Anti-Dam Activists Celebrate Two Years of Blockades in Malaysia

On October 23rd 2015, indigenous communities from around the world gathered on the banks of the Baram River in Sarawak, Malaysia in the context of the second year anniversary of the indigenous-led blockades against the proposed Baram Dam. Two years ago indigenous communities set up two blockades and chased workers and researchers from the site. The works on the dam have come to a standstill and last month the government of Sarawak announced a moratorium.

Indigenous anti-dam activists from Indonesia, the Philippines, Cambodia, Brazil, the US, Honduras, and from around Malaysia united at the blockades to stand in solidarity with the resistance against the Baram Dam and to strengthen ties between their communities. The week-long event is called the World Indigenous Summit on Environment and Rivers, WISER Baram 2015, and was hosted by the grassroots network SAVE Rivers.

During celebrations at the two blockades, the proposed dam site, as well as at a conference in the town of Miri, the participants were united by the similarities between their struggles. “I have gained a lot of experience from all of the delegates. And with such information, I am confident enough such experiences will be fundamental to us – the Baram People – and our strategies to continue to fight and stop the proposed Baram Dam,” said James Nyurang, who hosted the delegates at his village.

According to Berta Cáceres, 2015 Goldman Prize winner from Honduras, “this summit on indigenous peoples and rivers has a special value in that its actions give strength to the historic resistance of our peoples and makes visible the grave aggression and conflict generated by the privatization of rivers and the construction of dams within Indigenous communities and regions.”

The declaration also calls on governments and institutions to stop presenting dams as climate neutral, and recognize that dams emit large amounts of greenhouse gases, including methane.

Participants in the summit collectively produced a declaration that acknowledges the widespread suffering and destruction caused by dams, and stresses the importance of obtaining Free, Prior, and Informed Consent from communities impacted by dam building. It urges all stakeholders to act in full accountability, transparency, and compliance of all human rights principals and values.

The indigenous defense of the Baram river stands united with other communities’ struggles for land, livelihood, spirituality, identity, and community cohesion.

protest against British Columbia Hydro Dawson Creek dam – unconnected person wearing anonymous mask gets shot dead

Anonymous member in Guy Fawkes Mask Shot Dead by RCMP; “#OpAnonDown” Anons Vow Revenge

Sept 23, 2015

Terry Hadland, a Peace River farmer, says he should have got the police bullet that killed a man wearing a Guy Fawkes mask outside a Site C open house this summer.

“He created a diversion so I could get away,” Mr. Hadland told The Globe and Mail in an interview. “He stepped up and took that shot for me, that’s for sure.”

RCMP were called to the open house in Dawson Creek on July 16 after getting calls about a man causing a disturbance at the British Columbia Hydro public information session.

One day after the hacker group Anonymous vowed to “avenge one of our own” following the shooting, the group is claiming to have crashed parts of the RCMP website on Sunday morning.

A Twitter account associated with the global activist group has posted photos showing the Dawson Creek RCMP website server status listed as “down.”

– See more at: http://www.alaskahighwaynews.ca/dawson-creek/police-mum-on-link-between-police-shooting-anonymous-group-1.2005056#sthash.SbEOrEJA.dpuf

Mr. Hadland said he was the man causing trouble, but he left before police arrived, and officers confronted another man, who was reportedly carrying a knife and wearing the trademark mask of the hacktivist group Anonymous. Moments later, shots were fired, and James McIntyre, a dishwasher at Le’s Family Restaurant, was dead outside the Stonebridge Hotel’s Fixx Urban Grill.

In response to the shooting, Anonymous promised retribution, subsequently posting a 2014 Treasury Board memo about Canadian Security Intelligence Service funding, and threatening to leak more material.

One day after the hacker group Anonymous vowed to “avenge one of our own” following the shooting, the group is claiming to have crashed parts of the RCMP website on Sunday morning.

A Twitter account associated with the global activist group has posted photos showing the Dawson Creek RCMP website server status listed as “down.”

– See more at: http://www.alaskahighwaynews.ca/dawson-creek/police-mum-on-link-between-police-shooting-anonymous-group-1.2005056#sthash.SbEOrEJA.dpuf

One day after the hacker group Anonymous vowed to “avenge one of our own” following the shooting, the group is claiming to have crashed parts of the RCMP website on Sunday morning.

A Twitter account associated with the global activist group has posted photos showing the Dawson Creek RCMP website server status listed as “down.”

– See more at: http://www.alaskahighwaynews.ca/dawson-creek/police-mum-on-link-between-police-shooting-anonymous-group-1.2005056#sthash.hTyGNWmh.dpuf

Anonymous has already begun its retaliation campaign, knocking the main RCMP websites offline for several hours on Sunday (19 July).

This is part of the group’s campaign to “remove the RCMP cyber infrastructure from the Internet” as it calls on members to “march, create and sign petitions, hack, dox [until] all demand and justice is met”.

The hackitivst collective has also offered to raise funds for the victim’s burial.

Doxxing

The group leading the campaign – Operation Anon Down – also tweeted on Monday (20 July) that it had accessed documents marked “secret” inside the Canadian government, warning: “It’s not just a DDoS op anymore kiddos.”

#AnonDown has accessed docs marked “secret” inside Canadian government. It’s not just a DDoS op anymore kiddos. More tomorrow. Night all.
— Operation Anon Down (@OpAnonDown) July 20, 2015

In an emailed statement released over the weekend, Anonymous vowed to “identify the RCMP officer involved, thoroughly dox him – and release that dox on the Internet. Because the world has a right to know every detail about killer cops.”

Anonymous has a patchy history with “doxxing” police officers accused of shooting members of the public however, with one member of Anonymous having incorrectly identified the officer accused of shooting Michael Brown in Ferguson last year.

Mr. Hadland, 66, said he did not know Mr. McIntyre, 48, and regrets that his actions inadvertently brought police into conflict with him. “It’s tragic, that’s for damn sure,” he said. “They were trying to get me.”

Mr. Hadland said if police had found him instead of Mr. McIntyre, the incident would have ended peacefully. “I would have obeyed them,” he said.

Mr. Hadland, who lives off the grid on a farm in the Peace River district, said he went to the open house to protest against the controversial Site C dam.

“I’d been planning it for a couple of weeks,” he said. “I walked into the room … I thought, ‘I’m just going to push them a bit.’”

Mr. Hadland said BC Hydro officials were talking to members of the public at information tables covered with pamphlets, maps and posters.

“I flipped a couple [of tables],” he said. “I ripped up the rest of the maps …. They had placards. … I started breaking up those.”

Mr. Hadland said he was quickly surrounded by BC Hydro staff, but the confrontation did not become violent.

“They didn’t try to push me,” he said. “I made my statement and I walked out.”

Mr. Hadland said he assumes 911 calls were made during his protest, but added that if anyone reported a violent incident, then the police were misinformed and may have arrived expecting serious trouble.

“It was all very peaceful,” he said. “The police could have showed up and been amicable.”

When it was suggested that tipping over tables and tearing up posters might seem threatening to some, Mr. Hadland agreed.

“Oh, it could have been,” he acknowledged.

Mr. Hadland said he passed within metres of Mr. McIntyre in the parking lot but did not see a knife or a mask.

“I thought he was a BC Hydro person [because] he kept turning away and trying to hide his face,” he said.

Mr. Hadland was worried police were coming, so he jumped in his vehicle and drove away without looking back. He said he went to the RCMP the next day, identified himself as the man who disrupted the meeting, and told police he was concerned someone had made a 911 call “that wasn’t valid” because his protest was not violent.

Arthur Hadland, a former director of Peace River Regional District, confirmed his cousin was the man who disrupted the Site C open house.

The Independent Investigations Office (IIO) of B.C. is investigating the police shooting of Mr. McIntyre.

“It is not our practice to provide specific details about an investigation while it is still active – what I can say is that while we obtain all accessible and available information we believe is relevant to the IIO investigation, our focus is on the actions of the police officers,” Kellie Kilpatrick, an IIO spokesperson said in an e-mail.

“Since our investigation of the initial disturbance is a parallel investigation to that of the IIO’s investigation which is still ongoing, it would be inappropriate for me to comment at this time,” Corporal Dave Tyreman of the RCMP’s North District said in a separate e-mail.

BC Hydro spokesman Dave Conway declined to comment on Mr. Hadland’s version of events.

—

July 2015:

B.C. Hydro Site C protest in Vancouver cancelled due to concerns about violence

Rally organizers say they’re concerned about reaction to the recent death of a man in Dawson Creek

—

Further info

Indigenous activists celebrate bitter victory over rainforest dam moratorium

22nd October 2015

As indigenous activists opposing hydropower dams on their territories gather this weekend in the rainforests of Sarawak, Malaysia, they have good news to celebrate: a giant dam on the Baram river has been put on hold. But the forests are still being logged, local people have been stripped of land rights, and a programme of 12 giant dams is still official policy.

Indigenous anti-dam campaigners from Brazil, India, Honduras, and across Southeast Asia are gathering on the island of Borneo to coordinate campaigns on the impact of large hydroelectric dams.

The World Indigenous Summit on Environment and Rivers is now under way in the town of Miri on Baram River in the Malaysian state of Sarawak – where rainforest dams have already drowned thousands of square kilometres of forest.

Local indigenous people belonging to Penan, Kenyah, Kayan and other groups have led a two-year blockade against the proposed Baram hydropower dam sited on the upper reaches of the Baram River, staging encampments at the dam site itself and at a site along its access road.

“We are maintaining the blockade and we are going to celebrate the anniversary on the 23-24 October”, said Peter Kallang, conference organizer and coordinator of SAVE Rivers Sarawak, a network of groups opposing dams.

Baram dam on hold – but the logging rages on

Activists have reason to celebrate. In a television address in July Sarawak’s Chief Minister Tan Sri Adenan Satem declared a moratorium on the Baram Dam project. The 400-square-kilometer (154-square-mile) reservoir of the 1,200-megawatt Baram Dam would displace up to 20,000 people and submerge their lands.

So good news, certainly. But despite the moratorium, clearance of the vast Baram Dam site is proceeding quickly. The government has already extinguished local land rights and issued logging permits to large Malaysian logging companies, and logging has begun, as Kallang explains:

“The loggers are going all out to take this opportunity to cut everything in the way. This license for logging is a legal license given by the government under what they call the salvage logging … under salvage logging they cut anything and everything, even the small trees about six inches in diameter.”

Meanwhile it appears that the moratorium decision may have been forced by simple economics: an inability to raise the billions of dollars needed for its construction.

In the case of the 2,400-megawatt Bakun Dam, which became operational in 2011 private financing fell short and British-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto backed out of a proposed aluminium smelter. The state resorted to loaning most of the $2.3 billion construction cost from state pension funds.

The controversial dam, Asia’s second largest outside China, displaced 10,000 people and submerged 700 square kilometres (270 square miles) of rainforest and farmland. But now it is running at well under half of its capacity three years after it came online: it is actually generating just 900MW due to lack of domestic energy demand.

A plan to export Bakun’s energy to the Malaysian mainland via undersea transmission lines has been shelved. Activists are also keen to highlight the poor record of electricity generation by Sarawak’s Batang Ai dam.

But there’s plenty more dams planned for Sarawak’s rivers

The Baram Dam is only the fourth proposed development of twelve large dams slated to be constructed by 2030 as part of a broader hydropower-development plan called the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (SCORE). And there’s no sign that the project is to be abandoned.

Next in line for construction is the 1,295 megawatt, 204-meter (669-foot) high Baleh Dam, which so far has attracted less opposition because it is not scheduled to displace communities. Over the long term, 50 dams will be required to realize the Malaysian government’s target of 20 gigawatts of hydropower capacity in Sarawak.

“The essence of SCORE is to industrialise the state by leveraging on Sarawak’s competitive advantage in bulk hydropower”, Sarawak’s Public Utilities Minister Datuk Amar Haji Awang Tengah Ali Hasan said in a speech at the International Hydropower Association’s (IHA) conference in China last July.

Hasan argued that the plan would bring jobs and economic development to Sarawak, particularly it’s remote areas, according to the Borneo Post. Mongabay contacted the IHA for its views on SCORE and the Baram moratorium but it declined to comment.

SCORE, born in 2006 out of the Ninth Malaysia Plan, a government roadmap for development by 2020, represents a formidable scheme to replace indigenous lands and tropical rainforests with heavy industry like steel, glass, aluminium, and agri-business plantations.

However, the aim to industrialize might not be going according to plan. “It is all talking nonsense”, said Kallang, explaining that Sarawak Energy, the nationalized state energy supplier that manages all of Sarawak’s electricity, has repeatedly failed to disclose a list of companies that have signed on to purchase electricity from the 12 planned dams. Kallang suspects this is because no such list exists.

Meanwhile Sarawak’s 944-megawatt Murum Dam is complete but has yet to become operational. Kallang explained that controversy still surrounds the project, with displaced Penan hunter-gatherer indigenous communities claiming they have not been paid the compensation that the Sarawak government promised them. But another problem, surely, is that there is no demand for its power.

Still no final decision on Baram dam

Activists remain cautious about the Baram moratorium and have decided to maintain their blockade pending further confirmation. Kallang thinks the state elections next year might have influenced the decision to put the dam on hold. “When politicians talk we have to know whether they are really genuine or they are fishing for votes”, he said.

Sarawak Energy spokesperson Ahadiah Zamhari told Mongabay that a final decision on the dam’s construction has yet to be made. “The Chief Minister of Sarawak has imposed a moratorium to all parties on matters related to Baram hydropower project pending the government’s final decision on the project”, he stated in an email, while declining to be interviewed.

But Rebekah Shirley, a researcher with the Energy and Resources Group at University of California, Berkeley, is cautiously optimistic: “I see this recent moratorium on works in Baram as progressive. It is hopefully a signal of new leadership that is keen on listening to the concerns of stakeholders – albeit stakeholders that should already be a legitimate part of the decision making process.”

Shirley’s work with her Berkeley colleague Daniel Kammen showing the potential of small-scale energy options such as solar and micro-hydro to meet Sarawak’s energy needs without building dams has influenced the government.

Their research appears to provide a cost-effective alternative to big dams with the added advantage of reduced environmental and social conflicts. After meeting with Kammen, Kallang, and others in June, Sarawak Chief Minister Adenan said in a television interview last month that he would look into these alternatives.

But in recent years a number of revelations have exposed corruption at the highest levels of Sarawak’s Government. The business affairs of the former Chief Minister and current state Governor, Taib Mahmud, have particularly been in the spotlight. Kallang explained Taib’s links to dam construction, which have been well documented by the news media:

“If the dams, especially Baram and Baleh are cancelled, it will affect Taib’s company very much because the sole supplier of cement in the whole of Sarawak is a company called CMS [Cahya Mata Sarawak] which is owned 90% by the Taib family… Also Sarawak Cable is owned by his son, so they are going to supply all the cable required for the transmission lines.”

The struggle is global

Dam-building remains widespread worldwide. The International Hydropower Association in its 2015 report said: “We publish this report at a time of significant hydropower development, with 37.4 GW of new installed capacity in 2014 bringing the global total to 1,036 GW.”

As part of the convergence this week, the international delegation of activists is due to join villagers on the blockades in solidarity, and over a hundred people are expected to stay in the camp, extended for the occasion, at kilometer 15 of the dam’s access road. “They are going to visit the dam site and from there they will visit the villages which could be flooded if the dam is built. We will stay overnight on the blockade”, Kallang said.

Annina Aeberli, who is helping to organize the events as a campaigner with the Swiss NGO Bruno Manser Fonds, explained the idea behind the initiative: “We were really thinking about what we can do to strengthen [the villagers’] spirits to fight. So then we came back to this idea to bring international dam activists to the Baram area, so that they can show solidarity and motivate the people.”

Though the Baram Dam protests appear to have been effective, on October 26 Kallang is due in court, where he faces fines and even jail-time in a suit brought by Sarawak Energy against him and 22 others for allegedly chasing the company away from the Baram worksite.

Whatever the court outcome, Kallang is committed to the struggle long-term and recognizes the global dimensions of the issue as indigenous activists battling dams abroad make the long journey to Sarawak:

“We would like to invite them to share their experience in fighting against dams. And with this we hope to build better solidarity with them.”

Videos and sources here

Ahousaht First Nation Blockade Open Net Salmon Farm

An aerial view of Clayoquot Sound, just north of Tofino, B.C., is shown in this handout photo. The Ahousaht First Nation are protesting an open-net salmon farm in the area.

September 11th, 2015

TOFINO, B.C. — Members of a Vancouver Island First Nation are vowing to risk arrest rather than allow an international fish farming company to anchor an open-net salmon farm north of Tofino.

Members of the Ahousaht First Nation say they set up a boat blockade Wednesday at the site of the new farm, owned by Norwegian-based Cermaq.

The Ahousaht say the company holds 17 salmon farm tenures in Clayoquot Sound and applied for two new tenures in the same area last year.

The First Nation believes the applications signal a new round of fish farm expansion on the West Coast, with the Ahousaht Fish Farm Committee predicting a four-fold increase in the industry over the next 15 years.

Protesters oppose any new fish farms in the area.

They fear possible diseases bred in fish within the open nets could be passed to clam beds or wild salmon travelling to and from nearby spawning grounds.

http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/first-nations-blockade-halts-anchoring-of-tofino-area-salmon-farm-1.2556934

First Nations blockade Clayoquot Sound salmon farm

This is a media release from UBCIC.

Members of Ahousaht First Nations are currently blockading the attempts of Cermaq to install a new open-net salmon farm at Yaakswiis, north of Tofino BC.

On Wednesday Ahousaht members took boats out to the site and prevented Cermaq from anchoring the controversial new farm, which was assembled off-site and towed to Yaakswiis.

“Wild salmon are in decline everywhere salmon feedlots are in operation around the world. We will stop any future activity at this location”, said Tom Paul, an Ahousaht member. “We will stay out there until we are moved—we will be arrested if need be” he added.

The Ahousaht Fish Farm Committee strongly opposed any fish farms at the Yaakswiis location, due to concerns about proximity to rich seafood resources such as clam beds and wild salmon rivers.

Cermaq is a Norwegian-based corporation recently acquired by Mitsubishi. They currently hold 17 salmon farm tenures in Clayoquot Sound, which was the site of major logging confrontations in 1993.

Cermaq applied in 2014 for two new tenures in Ahousaht First Nations territories. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans approved one application in late July this year, and one was refused.

The salmon farming industry is poised to increase four-fold on the BC coast by 2030. These new applications are the first round of this major expansion.

http://www.vancouverobserver.com/news/first-nations-blockade-clayoquot-sound-salmon-farm