Southeast Climate Convergence march visits Richmond climate criminals. Two lockdown at Bank of America

August 11th, 2008

No nukes no coal bannerAugust 11th, 2008

Despite a mas­sive police pres­ence through­out the city and our major action plan derailed by law enforce­ment harass­ment, 50 activists snaked their way through Rich­mond today in an un-per­mit­ted march, pay­ing vis­its to sev­er­al cli­mate crim­i­nals. Car­ry­ing ban­ners read­ing, “No Nukes, No Coal, No Kid­ding” and “Social Change not Cli­mate Change,” peo­ple marched to the head­quar­ters of Massey Ener­gy, Domin­ion, Vir­ginia Depart­ment of Envi­ron­men­tal Qual­i­ty, and Bank of Amer­i­ca.

At Massey Ener­gy, a noto­ri­ous coal com­pa­ny involved in moun­tain­top removal coal min­ing, activists sur­round­ed the entrance and yelled, “Hands off our moun­tains!.” The group then moved on to the Depart­ment of Envi­ron­men­tal Qual­i­ty which recent­ly rub­ber stamped Dominion’s dirty coal plant in Wise Coun­ty, VA. Next the group brought the par­ty to Domin­ion, who is build­ing the afore­men­tioned coal plant as well as propos­ing a new nuke plant in Louisa Coun­ty, VA. Chant­i­ng “No coal, no nukes, we won’t stop until you do!” the activists attempt­ed to take over Dominion’s plaza but were repelled by police on hors­es. In a show of inter­species sol­i­dar­i­ty one horse bucked a cop off its back.

To wrap things up for the day, the crowd moved on to the the tow­er­ing Bank of Amer­i­ca build­ing, one of the largest fun­ders of the coal indus­try. In impres­sive feat of stealth two activists man­age to infil­trate the beefed up secu­ri­ty at the build­ing and locked to a sign out­side of the cus­tomer entrance. Marchers sup­port­ed the lock­down with a die in on the side­walk. Police even­tu­al­ly cut free the two that were locked down and charged them with tres­pass­ing.

All in all it was a great day. While the police may have foiled our orig­i­nal plans they couldn’t stop us alto­geth­er. Pret­ty much every build­ing in Rich­mond con­nect­ed to a cli­mate crim­i­nal had cops staked out at it and sev­er­al activists cars were fol­lowed any­where they went. Despite this we had a suc­cess­ful march and lock­down. Lets con­tin­ue the strug­gle for cli­mate jus­tice in the south­east!

Billionaire’s for Coal strike in Bank of America’s home state, 4 protests in 3 days

July 11th 2008

Bank of America, Asheville protestJuly 11th 2008
Today Asheville Ris­ing Tide’s bil­lion­aire bloc descend­ed on Bank of America’s region­al head­quar­ters to demand that BoA con­tin­ue to invest their mon­ey in coal. The Bil­lion­aires for Coal car­ried signs read­ing “More Prof­it, Less Moun­tains” and sipped on dirty (coal) mar­ti­nis to applaud BoA for its fund­ing of moun­tain­top removal coal min­ing as well as the new gen­er­a­tion of dirty coal plants. The Asheville Police Depart­ment did an excel­lent job of block­ing access to the bank entrance and the ATM sure­ly scar­ing off a num­ber of bank cus­tomers.

Two days before, activists with Croatan Earth First! vis­it­ed three Bank of Amer­i­ca branch­es in Raleigh and Chapel Hill. The activist entered the banks rais­ing a ruckus and hand­ing out fliers to cus­tomers until being forced to leave. The mot­ley crew of bil­lion­aires then pro­ceed­ed to demon­strate out­side and inform­ing the pub­lic of BoA’s dirty deeds. A few weeks before sev­er­al activists were detained by police in Char­lotte, NC (BoA’s home­town) for hang­ing anti-coal poster’s in the neigh­bor­hoods of sev­er­al BoA exec­u­tives homes. After inten­sive inter­ro­ga­tion, they were let go with­out charge (remem­ber kids, nev­er talk to cops).

Bank of Amer­i­ca is guilty of fund­ing such noto­ri­ous human rights abusers and eco­log­i­cal destroy­ers as Massey Ener­gy, Arch Coal, and Peabody Ener­gy. They have recent­ly hand­ed over heaps of cash to com­pa­nies such as Duke Ener­gy that is cur­rent­ly build­ing the 800 MW Cliff­side coal plant in Cliff­side, NC.

Spirit of Freedom (July 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)

Prisoner Solidarity 8Pro­duced 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 July 2008 edi­tion of Spir­it of Free­dom. As a num­ber of ELP sup­port­ers will be aware, ELP has tra­di­tion­al­ly ded­i­cat­ed our newslet­ters to fall­en friends, who have either been killed or seri­ous­ly injured as a result of their protest activ­i­ties. For the past few months ELP has­n’t car­ried any ded­i­ca­tion and we hoped that we would not have to ded­i­cate anoth­er newslet­ter to a fall­en friend again. How­ev­er last month, ELP received the heart­break­ing news about the death of Marie Vesco. Marie was a French activist liv­ing in Eng­land. She was involved with a num­ber of groups includ­ing ‘Food Not Bombs’. On Wednes­day the 4th of June 2008 Marie was cycling to the Car­ni­val Against the Arms Trade when a Four Wheel Dri­ve
vehi­cle (an SUV if your Amer­i­can) swerved across two lanes hit­ting Marie. A sec­ond vehi­cle then also hit Marie. Marie died instant­ly: she was just a few days away from her 20th birth­day. Marie is remem­bered as a warm, loud, fun, viva­cious fig­ure with an infec­tious laugh that was always ready to help oth­ers. ELP under­stands that at least two Crit­i­cal Mass cycle rides have already been ded­i­cat­ed to Marie. Like­wise in mem­o­ry of Marie ELP is ded­i­cat­ing this newslet­ter to her mem­o­ry. The loss of Marie is a blow for the move­ment and our thoughts are with her fam­i­ly and friends.

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).

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, Colum­bia Coun­ty Jail, 403 Jack­son Street, Portage, Wis­con­sin 53901, 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. (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).

Gregg Avery TA7450, HMP Win­ches­ter, Rom­sey Road, Win­ches­ter, SO22 5DF, Eng­land. On remand accused of con­spir­a­cy to black­mail, in rela­tion to his involve­ment with the SHAC cam­paign. (Gregg is a veg­an).

Natasha Avery NR8987, HMP Bronze­field, Woodthor­pe Road, Ash­ford, Mid­dx. TW15 3JZ, Eng­land. Jailed for breach­ing her parole con­di­tions imposed on her for telling a fox hunt­ing mur­der­ing scum what she thought of them. Also await­ing tri­al accused of con­spir­a­cy to black­mail, in rela­tion to her involve­ment with the SHAC cam­paign. (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, Anti­rep 2008, Post­fach 101, 1070, Vien­na, 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.

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).

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).

Sarah Gis­borne, LT5393, HMP Down­view, Sut­ton Lane, Sut­ton, Sur­rey, SM2 5PD, Eng­land. Serv­ing 5½ years for con­spir­a­cy to cause crim­i­nal dam­age fol­low­ing the dam­ag­ing of 8 vehi­cles owned by peo­ple linked to Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ence. Due for release at the end of July (Sarah 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).

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.

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)

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.

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.

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).

Daniel McGowan — See details in Eco Defence Pris­on­ers List.

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).

Andrew Stepan­ian #26399–050, FCI But­ner Medi­um II Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, PO Box 1500, But­ner, NC 27509 USA. Serv­ing 36 months for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign. (Andrew 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).

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).

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

AMP-Ohio Utility Headquarters Overtaken by Earth First! — No More Business as Usual for Environmentally Destructive Profiteers

Earth First! activists demand can­cel­la­tion of pro­posed coal-fired pow­er plant in Meigs Coun­ty, Ohio

AMP-Ohio occupation

Earth First! activists demand can­cel­la­tion of pro­posed coal-fired pow­er plant in Meigs Coun­ty, Ohio

Colum­bus, OH — At 11:30am Mon­day morn­ing (8/7/2008), about 100 Earth First! activists occu­pied the head­quar­ters of Amer­i­can Munic­i­pal Pow­er, an elec­tric util­i­ty that pro­vides statewide ser­vice to mem­ber com­mu­ni­ties.

As part of an ongo­ing series of direct actions, activists con­front­ed CEO Marc Gerken and demand­ed that AMP-Ohio can­cel its plans for con­struc­tion of a new and wide­ly opposed coal-fired pow­er plant in south­east Ohio.

Dozens of activists charged the build­ing and occu­pied the lob­by, dis­abled video cam­eras with sil­ly string, danced on fur­ni­ture, banged on pots and pans, and deliv­ered anti-coal mes­sages to employ­ees with chants and songs. Five activists locked them­selves down in the lob­by and two activists climbed the flag­poles in front of the build­ing, hoist­ing signs that read “no new coal!” and “we won’t stop until you do.”

Busi­ness as usu­al was dis­rupt­ed for sev­er­al hours while police forcibly removed demon­stra­tors from the prop­er­ty, arrest­ing eight. Bail mon­ey is still need­ed for sev­er­al activists. Please help out by donat­ing to the legal fund at http://earthfirstjournal.org/

Mor­gan Kipler, an Earth First!er from Colum­bus, said that the pro­posed plant “is cur­rent­ly the great­est threat to Ohio’s health, safe­ty, and wel­fare, and must be can­celled imme­di­ate­ly.”

Earth First! oppos­es the pow­er plant for a num­ber of rea­sons. The pro­posed plant would be a major cli­mate change con­trib­u­tor, emit­ting 7.3 mil­lion tons of CO2 into the air every year. The local impact is just as dra­mat­ic: Meigs Coun­ty ranks num­ber one in the state for lung can­cer inci­dence, and num­ber two for relat­ed mor­tal­i­ties.

A study released by the Clean Air Task Force shows Meigs Coun­ty to be in the cen­ter of a tri-state hot zone for pre­ma­ture death rates direct­ly attrib­ut­able to PM 2.5 expo­sures. PM 2.5 is the par­tic­u­late mat­ter released by pow­er plants respon­si­ble for a mul­ti­plic­i­ty of life-short­en­ing ill­ness­es includ­ing can­cer and car­dio­vas­cu­lar and res­pi­ra­to­ry dis­eases.

If the pro­posed AMP-OH plant is built, it will become one of five coal plants with­in a ten-mile radius to the south­ern tip of Meigs Coun­ty. Addi­tion­al­ly, four more coal-fired plants have been pro­posed for con­struc­tion in the area by oth­er elec­tric util­i­ty providers. This is an obvi­ous injus­tice as it forms the back­bone of the high­est con­cen­tra­tion of coal-fired pow­er plants in the coun­try.

The pow­er plant is also a bad deal for elec­tric cus­tomers. Costs of con­struc­tion have esca­lat­ed from $1.2 to $2.9 bil­lion since Octo­ber of 2005, an increase of about $1.7 mil­lion per day over the last 3 years! At a time of cost hikes, nation­wide pow­er plant can­cel­la­tions and rejec­tions, and pend­ing fed­er­al leg­is­la­tion on glob­al warm­ing emis­sions, AMP-Ohio is mak­ing a bad deci­sion for its mem­ber com­mu­ni­ties, the peo­ple of Meigs Coun­ty, and future gen­er­a­tions in Ohio and beyond.

Earth First! said it will con­tin­ue to resist the con­struc­tion of the AMP-Ohio plant with a diver­si­ty of tac­tics.

—–

Earth First! is an inter­na­tion­al move­ment root­ed in bio-cen­trism and direct action. This action con­cludes the Earth First! 2008 nation­al gath­er­ing, which took place in South­ern Ohio from June 30-July 7.

I was for­tu­nate enough to be at the AMP-Ohio head­quar­ters in March, when activists occu­pied AMP’s lob­by and demand­ed that AMP CEO Marc Gerken sched­ule a meet­ing with impact­ed com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers to dis­cuss their con­cerns about the Meigs Coun­ty coal plant. Gerken promised to sched­ule the meet­ing, then broke his promise sev­er­al months lat­er.

AMP-Ohio are part of a small army of coal indus­try envi­ron­men­tal crim­i­nals, who are try­ing their hard­est to pol­lute our com­mu­ni­ties and cause cli­mate chaos in order to increase their prof­its. But in order to do that, they’re going to have to get past a small army of envi­ron­men­tal war­riors — like the activists who shut down AMP’s head­quar­ters on Mon­day — who are will­ing to put their per­son­al safe­ty on the line in order to con­front and shut down these cli­mate crim­i­nals.

ELF target Coca-Cola twice and wild boar freed

In sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Aus­tri­an activists, impris­oned ille­gal­ly by the state, the Earth Lib­er­a­tion Front (ELF) twice this month tar­get­ed Coca-Cola in Mex­i­co for their crimes against the earth and its inhab­i­tants, whilst in Spain, ELF and Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Front activists report­ed that they freed a boar that was await­ing death.

In sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Aus­tri­an activists, impris­oned ille­gal­ly by the state, the Earth Lib­er­a­tion Front (ELF) twice this month tar­get­ed Coca-Cola in Mex­i­co for their crimes against the earth and its inhab­i­tants, whilst in Spain, ELF and Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Front activists report­ed that they freed a boar that was await­ing death.

Report­ed: 28th June

received anony­mous­ly:

“On June 1 the bot­tler and dis­trib­u­tor of the multi­na­tion­al coca cola was attacked in Mex­i­co state; its walls were cov­ered in paint and a large paint­ing at the entrance read, ‘Multi­na­tion­al mur­der­ers;’ the attacks do not stop and will go on increas­ing.

Sol­i­dar­i­ty with pris­on­ers of Aus­tria!
For ani­mal lib­er­a­tion!
For the lib­er­a­tion of the land!
For human lib­er­a­tion!
Sab­o­tage and direct action!

FLT/ELF”

Report­ed: 24th June

trans­la­tion from www.accionvegana.org:

“On thurs­day 12 of june we freed a wild boar in Cac­eres. We opened the fence that kept him encaged. This easy action has giv­en back free­dom to an ani­mal that was wait­ing to be mur­dered by hunters.

We want to show our sol­i­dar­i­ty with our Aus­tri­an com­rades repressed and to every ani­mal lib­er­a­tion activist in jail.

ALF/ELF”

Report­ed: 7th June

anony­mous com­mu­nique (trans­la­tion):

“Coca-Cola, one of the Amer­i­can multi­na­tion­als respon­si­ble for the destruc­tion of our plan­et, com­plic­it in the exploita­tion and theft of water from indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties (Chi­a­pas), gen­er­at­ing human exploita­tion by forc­ing chil­dren to work more than 10 hours a day in their sug­ar­cane crops (El Sal­vador), mas­sive pol­lu­tion of rivers with tox­ic prod­ucts (India), con­trac­tor of para­mil­i­tary groups that killed union work­ers (Colom­bia), financer of death by vol­un­tar­i­ly giv­ing a por­tion of their prof­its to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, racist since the days of Nazi Ger­many, part­ner­ing with large mag­nates and multi­na­tion­als such as Nes­tle, McDon­alds, Chrysler, Tex­a­co, (like­wise) respon­si­ble for glob­al warm­ing, the bru­tal exploita­tion of the land and the food cri­sis afflict­ing the world today, should be a pri­ma­ry objec­tive for all those com­bat­ants who are fight­ing against the many aber­ra­tions and for the lib­er­a­tion of the land, ani­mals and humans, because this glob­al com­pa­ny alone is an exam­ple of the influ­ence of the cap­i­tal­ist sys­tem on its own­ers, the extreme abuse of pow­er and the advanc­ing of its glob­al con­trol over many inno­cents.
Hence the Frente de Lib­eración de la Tier­ra has tak­en firm action against this scourge; in the evening of June 5 the walls of the com­pa­ny were splashed with paint with a spe­cial stench, the vehi­cles of the admin­is­tra­tors were like­wise vic­tims of our first but not last attack.
We will return but with even more force.

Ded­i­cat­ed to the fight­ers of Aus­tria = recent­ly impris­oned by the fas­cist state of that coun­try.
For­ward!

..:FLT:.. – Esta­do de Méx­i­co”

See also the pre­vi­ous Mex­i­can ALF/ELF action, click here

coal power station actions in Australia

Yes­ter­day (Fri­day June 27) CIA (Con­cerned, Inde­pen­dent Activists) locked on to and shut down a con­vey­or trans­port­ing coal into Muja pow­er sta­tion in Col­lie. Two activists were arrest­ed.

Muja power station actionYes­ter­day (Fri­day June 27) CIA (Con­cerned, Inde­pen­dent Activists) locked on to and shut down a con­vey­or trans­port­ing coal into Muja pow­er sta­tion in Col­lie. Two activists were arrest­ed.

In the ear­ly hours of this morn­ing a group of cli­mate cam­paign­ers entered the perime­ter of the Muja coal-fired pow­er sta­tion near Col­lie. West­ern Aus­tralia and shut down the con­vey­or belt sup­ply­ing coal into the sta­tion. This is a peace­ful protest against the con­tin­ued use and expan­sion of pol­lut­ing and unsus­tain­able pow­er gen­er­a­tion in West­ern Aus­tralia. One per­son has locked onto the con­vey­or belt used to trans­port coal into the pow­er sta­tion, pre­vent­ing its oper­a­tion and stop­ping the con­vey­or belt sup­ply of coal into the plant. Ben­jamin Cody, a thir­ty year old father of four from Bun­bury said that he was shut­ting down the plant to high­light and protest against gov­ern­ment approval of two new coal-fired pow­er sta­tions and plans for the con­struc­tion of two more. “Each of these will have a life­time of at least thir­ty years, com­mit­ting our­selves and future gen­er­a­tions of West Aus­tralians to dirty, pol­lut­ing and unre­li­able ener­gy until around 2040. The Car­pen­ter and Rudd Gov­ern­ments need to be held account­able, and the tran­si­tion to WA’s dean ener­gy future has to start now,” Mr Cody said. “Gen­er­at­ing elec­tric­i­ty from coal-fired pow­er sta­tions is the dirt­i­est way to pro­duce pow­er on the plan­et Col­lie could be the ‘Sil­i­con Val­ley’ of renew­able ener­gies if the gov­ern­ment were to direct invest­ment into renew­able tech­nol­o­gy. Instead this mon­ey is all being direct­ed towards the coal indus­try”.

Con­cerned Inde­pen­dent Activists (CIA) spokesper­son, Nicholas Mor­gan said, “It is dis­ap­point­ing and frus­trat­ing that short sight­ed politi­cians and vest­ed inter­ests are pre­vent­ing WA from mov­ing for­ward into the renew­able ener­gy indus­try. This is not about tak­ing away jobs, it’s about cre­at­ing more jobs in ener­gy indus­tries that are sus­tain­able and reli­able, such as wind, solar, wave, and geot­her­mal. Cur­rent­ly in Ger­many, there are rough­ly 250,000 jobs in the renew­able ener­gy indus­try which is grow­ing every year,” Mr Mor­gan said,“The world­wide renew­able indus­try is worth over $100 bil­lion and is dou­bling in size every 20 months. Aus­tralia has real inno­v­a­tive strength and could play a big part, with envi­ron­men­tal, employ­ment and oth­er eco­nom­ic ben­e­fits to fol­low. Aus­tralia risks being left behind in the dark ages”.

The action is also tak­ing place in the shad­ow of WA’s gas and ener­gy cri­sis. “It is absolute­ly unac­cept­able that in this day and age the West Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment is still rely­ing on fos­sil fuels for the state’s ener­gy needs” said Mr Mor­gan. “West­ern Aus­trali­a’s ener­gy emer­gency high­lights the need to invest in a range of clean and reli­able resources such as solar and wind. It is a sad joke that the gov­ern­ment is respond­ing to the lack of gas by reopen­ing the states dirt­i­est pow­er sta­tion which was decom­mis­sioned because it used old, pol­lut­ing tech­nol­o­gy”.

This action is part of a grow­ing trend around Aus­tralia of com­mu­ni­ties who are frus­trat­ed with the lack of action being tak­en by gov­ern­ments on cli­mate change. “All over the world peo­ple are reclaim­ing their pow­er and assert­ed their right to live in a world free from dan­ger­ous cli­mate change”.

———-

3rd July 2008 — Cli­mate Camp hails Green­peace action: promis­es more to come…

Organ­is­ers of the Camp for Cli­mate Action have applaud­ed Green­peace for this morn­ing shut­ting down the coun­try’s biggest sin­gle source of car­bon diox­ide, Erar­ing Pow­er Sta­tion, south of New­cas­tle…

Erar­ing pow­er sta­tion is equal first in the dubi­ous hon­our of biggest CO2 emit­ter in Aus­tralia with anoth­er Hunter pow­er sta­tion, Bayswa­ter in Muswell­brook.

Camp spokesper­son, Hol­ly Creenaune, said that direct action against the caus­es of cli­mate change was a rea­son­able response to the inac­tion of Gov­ern­ment on reduc­ing coal depen­dence.

“The longer the Gov­ern­ment pre­var­i­cates on this issue, the more peo­ple will take action them­selves against coal pow­er and exports.”

“Green­peace have tak­en action that any rea­son­able per­son would take in the face of the urgent need to stop emit­ting green­house gas­es and the hes­i­tan­cy of Gov­ern­ment to take lead­er­ship.

“Next week hun­dreds of peo­ple will fol­low their bold lead and take part in the largest sin­gle direct action against the caus­es of cli­mate change that Aus­tralia has ever seen.”

The Camp for Cli­mate Action will cul­mi­nate in a peace­ful direct action on 13th July at the Car­ring­ton coal ter­mi­nal, where hun­dreds of peo­ple will walk onto the coal rail line and stop coal exports in their tracks.

“This is the real­i­ty of the sit­u­a­tion: hav­ing wast­ed the last decade doing noth­ing about cli­mate change but car­ry­ing on increas­ing our green­house pol­lu­tion, we are now faced with the need to begin decom­mis­sion­ing pow­er sta­tions and wind­ing back coal exports.”

For fur­ther infor­ma­tion

Hol­ly Creenaune 0417 682 541
Georgina Woods 0438 223 771

Issue Two of the ‘Roadblock Report’ Now Out!

3/7/2008
Issue two of the inde­pen­dent newslet­ter of the I‑69 cam­paign is now out for your down­load­ing, print­ing and dis­trib­ut­ing plea­sure.
You can find both the first and the sec­ond issue on the web­site of Road­block Earth First! http://stopi69.wordpress.com/resources or on the media archive sec­tion of the I‑69 Media Office’s web­site http://i69mediaoffice.wordpress.com/media-archive

3/7/2008
Issue two of the inde­pen­dent newslet­ter of the I‑69 cam­paign is now out for your down­load­ing, print­ing and dis­trib­ut­ing plea­sure.
You can find both the first and the sec­ond issue on the web­site of Road­block Earth First! http://stopi69.wordpress.com/resources or on the media archive sec­tion of the I‑69 Media Office’s web­site http://i69mediaoffice.wordpress.com/media-archive
In this issue:

- let­ter from the edi­tors about media/independent media
‑break­ing news sto­ries about
• the tree sit evic­tion,
• Bloom­ing­ton torch march,
• retal­ia­to­ry actions across Indi­ana,
‑action reports on:
• home demos,
• sol­i­dar­i­ty demos,
‑updates on
• the nature walks on the route,
• the com­mu­ni­ty bar­bq,
‑opin­ion pieces about
• the flood­ing in Indi­ana,
• a response to alle­ga­tions of vio­lence in office demos.
‑I-69 Lis­ten­ing project inter­view
‑Crit­i­cal thought piece on the future of the ‘anti-glob­al­iza­tion move­ment.

The sec­ond issue is for­mat­ted in 8.5”X11”, to be dou­ble sided. Email road­block­re­port (at) yahoo.com if you would like a dif­fer­ent for­mat.

As well, the I‑69 Media Office is announc­ing the launch of its new web­site, i69mediaoffice.wordpress.com . The I‑69 Media Office is an inde­pen­dent clear­ing­house for anti-I-69 infor­ma­tion and action report­ing. Please explore our ‘under con­struc­tion’ web­site for more infor­ma­tion on what we do.

Arrests As International Whaling Commission Fails To Protect Whales

Fif­teen peo­ple were arrest­ed by police at a meet­ing of the Inter­na­tion­al Whal­ing Com­mis­sion (IWC), held this year in San­ti­a­go, Chile.

IWC protest

Fif­teen peo­ple were arrest­ed by police at a meet­ing of the Inter­na­tion­al Whal­ing Com­mis­sion (IWC), held this year in San­ti­a­go, Chile. The pro­test­ers were sup­pos­ed­ly try­ing to ‘storm’ the meet­ing but oth­er reports state that the mere pres­ence of peo­ple in front of the meet­ing’s venue was seen as a ‘secu­ri­ty threat’.

The IWC meets annu­al­ly to reg­u­late the whal­ing indus­try and make deci­sions on con­ser­va­tion of whale pop­u­la­tions. So far the meet­ing has­n’t reached any agree­ments and the com­mis­sion con­tin­ues to be strong­ly dev­id­ed between the pro- and anti-whal­ing nations. Skye Bor­toli, an activist from Teens Against Whal­ing described the meet­ing this year as ‘pathet­ic’, say­ing “this body will be known in the future as a small group of eco­log­i­cal­ly arro­gant peo­ple who are con­demn­ing the world’s whales to agony and obliv­ion for pet­ty pol­i­tics and a few lousy bucks.”

Relat­ed Audio: Sea Shep­herd Cap­tain Paul Wat­son Talks in Lon­don | Inter­view With Not­ting­ham Activist On Return From Whale Sav­ing Mis­sion

Relat­ed Newswire: Ice­land Defies Mora­to­ri­um On Com­mer­cial Whal­ing — Whale Hunt Start­ed | Nor­way Starts Whale Hunt­ing Sea­son

Pre­vi­ous Fea­tures: Armed Cana­di­an Coast Guard Storms Con­ser­va­tion Ves­sel | Not­ting­ham Activist Returns From Whale Sav­ing Mis­sion In Antar­ti­ca | Injured Among Sea Shep­herd Crew As Japan­ese Mil­i­tary Open Fire | Activists Held Hostage By Japan­ese Whalers In South­ern Ocean

Links: IWC offi­cial web­site | Wikipedia on IWC | Teens Against Whal­ing | Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety | Green­peace | San­ti­a­go Indy­media | Indy­media Ocean Defence

This year, like many a year before, the IWC fails to make progress in their pro­tec­tion of whales. Japan and oth­er pro-whal­ing nations push for a par­tial lift­ing of the ban on com­mer­cial whal­ing. Also, the US (which has been involved with Japan’s whal­ing indus­try) has been push­ing for the reg­u­la­tion of ‘sci­en­tif­ic whal­ing’, some­thing which con­ser­va­tions argue would only legit­imize an already ille­gal activ­i­ty. Japan uses the ‘sci­en­tif­ic research’ as a smoke­screen for their ille­gal com­mer­cial whal­ing prac­tices.

There has been a debate about whether Green­land should be allowed a big­ger quo­ta of whales for their hunt and dis­cus­sions are ongo­ing about Japan’s hunt in the South­ern Ocean. It has been report­ed that the ear­li­est the IWC might come to some kind of agree­ment is by next year’s meet­ing, which is to be held in Madeira, Por­tu­gal. The com­mis­sion con­tin­ues to be strong­ly divid­ed between pro-whal­ing (Japan, Den­mark, Nor­way, Ice­land) and anti-whal­ing (Aus­tralia, Unit­ed King­dom, New Zealand, South Africa) nations.

Cap­tain Paul Wat­son, from the Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety, did man­age to get into the hotel this year. He nor­mal­ly nev­er makes it inside as the Sea Shep­herd is the only organ­i­sa­tion offi­cial­ly banned from attend­ing IWC meet­ings. Paul, like Skye Bor­toli, isn’t impressed with the state of affairs at this year’s meet­ing: “There were many things that could come out of this meet­ing. Japan could with­draw from the IWC and become a rene­gade whal­ing nation along with their part­ners in con­ser­va­tion crime Nor­way and Ice­land. Or a com­pro­mise may be bro­kered that will allow the Japan­ese to with­draw from the South­ern Ocean with­out los­ing face or third­ly, and most like­ly, noth­ing will come out of this meet­ing at all. From the way things are going so far it looks like Sea Shep­herd will be return­ing to the South­ern Ocean to once again enforce the reg­u­la­tions that the IWC and the nations of the world refuse to uphold. Oh well, I come to these meet­ings with no expec­ta­tions hop­ing to be pleas­ant­ly sur­prised. After more than three decades I am still wait­ing.

Green­peace was also present in Chile, with a dom­i­nant pres­ence among the var­i­ous anti-whal­ing NGO’s and con­ser­va­tion­ists. Dave writes on the Green­peace blog: “We hope some­thing good comes out of these meet­ings, and that the com­mis­sion trans­forms itself into a body that pro­tects the whales and not the whalers. While com­mis­sion­ers sit in rooms talk­ing, whales are still dying in the South­ern Ocean and around the world from com­mer­cial whal­ing, ship strikes, sonar-relat­ed deaths, net­ting and pol­lu­tion, amongst oth­er human-induced haz­ards.”

On a pos­i­tive note, Chile, the host of this year’s meet­ing has declared a per­ma­nent ban on whal­ing in its waters. Speak­ing at a for­mer whale pro­cess­ing plant that Chile closed in 1967, Pres­i­dent Michelle Bachelet said she sent a bill to Con­gress propos­ing a whale sanc­tu­ary along Chile’s coast­line and declared the whale a nation­al mon­u­ment.

imc-uk-fea­tures

Road resistance round-up from the Midwest US

Indi­ana June 24- Resis­tance to I‑69 has been rapid­ly heat­ing up in the past month. While the first protest camp set up was qui­et­ly evict­ed in ear­ly May, a tree-sit and occu­pa­tion cre­at­ed in the path of a pro­posed onramp lat­er that month last­ed five weeks.

B-rad Camp - against I-69Indi­ana June 24- Resis­tance to I‑69 has been rapid­ly heat­ing up in the past month. While the first protest camp set up was qui­et­ly evict­ed in ear­ly May, a tree-sit and occu­pa­tion cre­at­ed in the path of a pro­posed onramp lat­er that month last­ed five weeks.

Dur­ing that time, par­tic­i­pants also built an elab­o­rate ground camp, while simul­ta­ne­ous­ly car­ry­ing on inten­sive orga­niz­ing with local fam­i­lies threat­ed by the road, cul­mi­nat­ing in a com­mu­ni­ty pic­nic in Oak­land City attend­ed joint­ly by landown­ers and eco-activists. Excit­ing demon­stra­tions and sol­i­dar­i­ty actions hap­pened through­out the month — in Bloom­ing­ton, Louisville, Mary­land, and beyond.

Dubbed B‑Rad Camp (after Brad Will, an Earth First!er and Indy­media jour­nal­ist mur­dered by the Mex­i­can state), the occu­pa­tion was evict­ed last Fri­day, June 20. Five peo­ple were arrest­ed around the camp, with the two treesit­ters being exposed to extreme dan­ger and bru­tal­i­ty by the state climbers. Three addi­tion­al pro­test­ers were arrest­ed at a police check­point on their way to sup­port those fac­ing evic­tion.

Sol­i­dar­i­ty actions were launched almost imme­di­ate­ly, and one per­son was arrest­ed that after­noon at an I‑69 plan­ning office in Bloom­ing­ton. Since then, demos have been called across Indi­ana, at offices belong­ing to the Indi­ana Depart­ment of Trans­porta­tion, con­trac­tors, and the Depart­ment of Nat­ur­al Resources, who were respon­si­ble for lend­ing climbers to INDOT. Near­ly 100 peo­ple joined a torch march in Bloom­ing­ton the fol­low­ing night, lead­ing police to scram­ble to pro­tect the down­town plan­ning office while peo­ple chant­ed, drummed and shot off fire­works.

A few chants from this demo and oth­ers: “They wreck dreams — we wreck roads” “I‑69 Shut it down, dri­ve INDOT out of town” “No more roads, no more jails” and “Sol­i­dar­i­ty means attack — against the road we will fight back” and at the end of the torch march “We will win!”

Since then, local orga­niz­ers have worked to put togeth­er legal sup­port for those now fac­ing charges (none extreme­ly seri­ous), while oth­ers have con­tin­ued to act in response to the evic­tion. A mil­i­tant office inva­sion against Bernardin Lochmueller and Asso­ciates (a deeply com­plic­it con­trac­tor) in Evans­ville today end­ed in con­fronta­tions with man­agers and bro­ken win­dows.

This account is only a brief sum­ma­ry of some of the more vis­i­ble actions that have occurred in the past weeks against I‑69. Mean­while, many peo­ple have con­tin­ued with oth­er kinds of excit­ing oppo­si­tion efforts, includ­ing the Road­block Report (avail­able on the web­site), the I‑69 Lis­ten­ing Project (a push to cre­ate more space to dia­logue and share sto­ries across the spec­trum of farm­ers and oth­ers resist­ing), and gar­den­ing with landown­ers along the route, among oth­er exper­i­ments to spread and deep­en the strug­gle.

More details and pic­tures can be found at
www.stopi69.wordpress.com . Pic­tures at http://stopi69.wordpress.com/photos/

BAA’s par­ent com­pa­ny, Fer­rovial, is respon­si­ble for pro­vid­ing much of the fund­ing being used to cur­rent­ly build I‑69, through its pur­chase of the Indi­ana Toll Road.

Anti-Sprawl Direct Action in Montana

Flat­head Val­ley, Mon­tana, U.S. — A group call­ing itself Amer­i­cans Stop­ping Sprawl­ing Devel­op­ment (ASSD) has tak­en cred­it for a rash of inci­dents involv­ing the removal of sur­vey­or stakes and graf­fi­ti that is esti­mat­ed to have cost devel­op­ers as much as $20,000 so far.

Stop Sprawl!Flat­head Val­ley, Mon­tana, U.S. — A group call­ing itself Amer­i­cans Stop­ping Sprawl­ing Devel­op­ment (ASSD) has tak­en cred­it for a rash of inci­dents involv­ing the removal of sur­vey­or stakes and graf­fi­ti that is esti­mat­ed to have cost devel­op­ers as much as $20,000 so far.

A three page anti-cap­i­tal­ist man­i­festo was left behind by the van­dals after the first inci­dent which took place on May 17th. The doc­u­ment call urban sprawl “one of the great­est issues fac­ing our soci­ety” and promised more actions against it.

The non-prof­it envi­ron­men­tal group Cit­i­zens for a Bet­ter Flat­head has joined devel­op­ers and their allies and offered a cash reward for infor­ma­tion lead­ing to the arrest and con­vic­tion of indi­vid­u­als respon­si­ble for a cam­paign anti-sprawl van­dal­ism.

Cit­i­zens for a Bet­ter Flat­head pledged $100 towards the reward fund. A rep­re­sen­ta­tive at the Sier­ra Club’s Mis­soula office also dis­avowed the action.