Category: Rest of Europe

Rest of Europe

Tarnac 9 Cleared of Terrorism Charges Over Rail Sabotage

An alleged “anar­chist cell” at the cen­tre of one of France’s most polit­i­cal­ly-charged legal sagas is final­ly to be tried for sab­o­tag­ing high-speed train lines.

August 9th, 2015


An alleged “anar­chist cell” at the cen­tre of one of France’s most polit­i­cal­ly-charged legal sagas is final­ly to be tried for sab­o­tag­ing high-speed train lines.

But in a major blow to police, who con­duct­ed a sev­en-year inves­ti­ga­tion into the group, the four will not face ter­ror charges, judi­cial sources told AFP on Sat­ur­day.

The so-called Tarnac group was round­ed up in high-pub­li­cised raids in Novem­ber 2008 accused of sab­o­tag­ing the TGV net­work around Paris, a pow­er­ful sym­bol of French nation­al pride and tech­ni­cal know-how.

Thou­sands of pas­sen­gers and more than 160 train ser­vices were delayed after steel rods were put across over­head pow­er cables on three high-speed lines between Paris and Lon­don, Brus­sels and the French regions.

Then inte­ri­or min­is­ter Michele Alliot-Marie brand­ed the group a dan­ger­ous “ultra-left anar­chist move­ment”, but the group — who lived in a rur­al com­mune in cen­tral France — and many on the French left, accused Pres­i­dent Nico­las Sarkozy’s right-wing gov­ern­ment of try­ing to frame them.

But in a major blow to the author­i­ties, anti-ter­ror­ist judge Jeanne Duye came down against their demands in her long-await­ed judge­ment Fri­day to try them for ter­ror offences.

Yil­dune Levy, sus­pect­ed of belong­ing to a ‘ter­ror­ist organ­i­sa­tion’ with her then-boyfriend

– ‘The Com­ing Insur­rec­tion’ –

She did, how­ev­er, send the group’s reclu­sive leader Julien Coupat, his wife Yil­dune Levy and two oth­ers for tri­al on con­spir­a­cy charges, sources said.

The group’s lawyers called the deci­sion a “total repu­di­a­tion” of the alle­ga­tions against the four.

“After near­ly sev­en years of try­ing to pin the blame on them, we final­ly have a coura­geous judi­cial deci­sion. It is a total repu­di­a­tion of the pros­e­cu­tion case,” Marie Dose and William Bour­don said.

“From the begin­ning, our clients were con­sid­ered and treat­ed like ter­ror­ists. Final­ly they have realised that it doesn’t stick,” they added.

“Our arrest was pure­ly polit­i­cal and was based on false tes­ti­mo­ny from the police,” said anoth­er of the accused, Math­ieu Bur­nel. “All this will fall apart at our tri­al.”

The case cen­tred on the charis­mat­ic fig­ure of Coupat, 40, a far-left intel­lec­tu­al from a wealthy fam­i­ly who had gath­ered a group of 20 fol­low­ers around him in a remote vil­lage in the Cor­reze region of cen­tral France.

Rely­ing heav­i­ly on pas­sages from a 2007 book attrib­uted to Coupat, “The Com­ing Insur­rec­tion”, inves­ti­ga­tors claimed the group — the “invis­i­ble com­mit­tee of the imag­i­nary par­ty” — had tipped over from rad­i­cal anar­chist pol­i­tics into ter­ror­ism.

The book dis­cussed sab­o­tage and oth­er ways to “finalise the fall of the state”, and men­tioned the high-speed TGV net­work as an “easy” tar­get.

But Coupat, who refused to con­firm he was its author, said it was “ris­i­ble that ter­ror­ism charges could be brought on the basis on a book on pub­lic sale.”

Coupat and Levy, 31, admit­ted being close to TGV lines east of Paris when an iron bar was placed on the track on the night of Novem­ber 7, 2008, but denied putting it there.

Coupet spent more than six months in jail as police tried to build a case against him, with Levy also locked up for more than two months.

The pros­e­cu­tion has five days to appeal the judge’s deci­sion.

from AFP

Addi­tion: their arrest was in part down to Mark Kennedy, the British under­cov­er cop embed­ded in Earth First! and the wider eco­log­i­cal direct action move­ment for over 7 years.  More info

Germany: Last Living Barricade in Hambach Forest Evicted; Freedom for Jus!

Ger­many: Last Liv­ing Bar­ri­cade in Ham­bach For­est Evict­ed

July 28th, 2015

On the 22nd of July the tow­er – to this date the only remain­ing liv­ing bar­ri­cade – got evict­ed. The tow­er blocked an impor­tant access way to the Ham­bach For­est [pre­vi­ous­ly on S!N]and its occu­pa­tion.

Dur­ing the 14 hours of the evic­tion, four activists were arrest­ed of who three have been released, while one is in deten­tion await­ing tri­al in the JVA (jail) in Köln-Ossendorf. Jus is accused of resist­ing the evic­tion. The cops are try­ing to jus­ti­fy the deten­tion by claim­ing that Jus doesn‘t have a legal address and alleged­ly “no social oblig­a­tions in Ger­many”. There­fore, they think that it’s like­ly that he will “stay away from tri­al”.

Meuse, France: Nuclear Waste Landfill Project Sabotaged

July 14th, 2015

anony­mous report / Con­tra Info

Not far from Bure, an analy­sis site of ANDRA was attacked by a few deter­mined night owls.

At Bure, in Meuse, pow­er is try­ing by all its means to have accept­ed a nuclear waste land­fill project 500 meters under­ground.

Despite that the project has not yet offi­cial­ly start­ed, that of the nuclear waste not arriv­ing before 2025, the ANDRA instal­la­tions (the Nation­al Agency for Radioac­tive Waste Man­age­ment, in charge of the land­fill project) are already swarm­ing in the area.

One night around the 25th June, a con­struc­tion site con­tain­ing mul­ti­ple elec­tri­cal instal­la­tions and a well, to analyse the con­di­tion of the rock and water table, was dev­as­tat­ed.

The well was then forcibly blocked up with con­crete, and all the cab­i­nets were frac­tured and destroyed by the rage of those who don’t want to wait for the exhaus­tion of legal resorts to attack this project.

Attack the infra­struc­ture of pow­er wher­ev­er they are, in Meuse like else­where.

Against Cigéo and its world, resis­tance and sab­o­tage!

Germany: Hambach Forest Defenders Occupy Four Bucket Wheel Excavators for July 4th Climate Games

July 14th, 2015

At the Cli­mate Games in Ams­ter­dam today count­less play­groups make their moves. Team Blue (the police) and the team of indus­tri­al com­pa­nies play their usu­al strat­e­gy: In Ams­ter­dam they want to expand the West port for coal trans­ship­ment and in the res­i­dent com­pa­nies they strong­ly con­tribute to the fact that the world’s cli­mate pass­es sev­er­al points of no return. There­after, the fur­ther warm­ing would get unpre­dictable and irre­versible. Our teams ham­per them, as far as pos­si­ble with­out being beat­en by Team Blue. Their game objec­tive is to enable a smooth flow of the work of destruc­tion.

This year, a team in the Rhineland has stum­bled over the fact that the play­ing field is not lim­it­ed to the Ams­ter­dam West Port. While it is fold­ed by all sorts of bound­aries togeth­er, but we can unfold and make our move at any time, any­where – after all, the oth­er side also works as good as any­where in the world.

Our “new” expan­sion pack is the Rhen­ish lig­nite min­ing area between Aachen and Cologne. This indus­tri­al-scale clock­work (con­sist­ing of five pow­er sta­tions, three mines, a net­work of coal rail­ways, tens of kilo­me­ters of con­vey­or belts and pipelines for pumped off ground­wa­ter) is the largest sin­gle source of green­house gas emis­sions in Europe – and in many places it is damn easy to attack for sab­o­tage! A good man on this game board is the occu­pa­tion of exca­va­tors: In the largest machines in the world, that [destroy] land­scape around the clock here and pro­duce coal, a lot of cap­i­tal is at work – until we stop them! On the occa­sion of the last occu­pa­tion, a spokesper­son of the group pub­licly con­firmed, that RWE can not stop actions of this kind in the future just because of the huge dimen­sions of the open pits.

The mot­to of this year’s Cli­mate Games is “BIGGER, BOLDER, STRONGER”, and so we want to do things in style. There­fore, this time since 2:55 h we are occu­py­ing four exca­va­tors : The first as usu­al at the rim of the open pit, where now it can not swal­low any more land­scape for a while. The three oth­er occu­pied exca­va­tors are at the bot­tom of the open pit: This means that in the Ham­bach mine, for the first time in the Rhen­ish min­ing area, among oth­er things, the two coal dig­gers them­selves are occu­pied! At least one per­son did not reach her/his des­ti­na­tion and now sup­ports oth­ers by bug­ging her/his warders of Team Blue. He/she will cer­tain­ly not be alone a very long time …

The game goes on – also in the Rhen­ish lig­nite min­ing area. From august 14 to 16, our friends of the Cam­paign “Ende Gelände“ (“end of the area”) mobi­lize to a mass block­ade action in the Rhineland, and we are very keen to see what is about to hap­pen around there. In octo­ber, a Skills Shar­ing Camp will be held again on the occu­pat­ed mead­ow at the rim of the Ham­bach­er Forst, which is acute­ly threat­ened by defor­esta­tion. And in Decem­ber del­e­ga­tions of the Unit­ed Nations gath­er in Paris on the ques­tion of how to talk cli­mate change away, with­out chang­ing any­thing in their exploita­tive eco­nom­ic sys­tems – and, of course, many oth­er teams are also there to play to unmask the lies. Make Your Move!

If you have got time and desire, we would be glad if you look in on the mead­ow to sup­port the occu­pa­tions and retain the tick­er track of when sol­i­dar­i­ty is need­ed out­side the police sta­tion!
Here you will find pic­tures of the most recent sim­i­lar occu­pa­tion of a sin­gle exca­va­tor. (Click in thumb­nails to enlarge.) Pic­tures of the cur­rent action will fol­low here.

Please spread out the Action State­ment (above) and also the press release and com­mu­ni­ca­tion.

Press Release

Dear Sir or Madam!

We here­by send you a press release enti­tled “Four buck­et wheel exca­va­tors occu­pied in open-cast mine Ham­bach”.
You can reach us at the fol­low­ing phone num­ber:

+49 1573 7181446

You are also invit­ed to vis­it us for more infor­ma­tion or sound bites at the mead­ow occu­pa­tion in Morschenich. On our blog

www.hambacherforst.blogsport.de

incom­ing news are switched in a live tick­er.

Best Regards,

Kathrin Schnei­der
Tino Sturm

Press Release

Four buck­et wheel exca­va­tors occu­pied in open-cast mine Ham­bach

Düren – Last night 2:55h cli­mate activists start­ed again to occu­pie buck­et wheel exca­va­tors of RWE. This time it were four exca­va­tors in the open pit mine near Ham­bach. Two of them are locat­ed on the bot­tom of the mine in depth 450 m, where the coal lay­er is. For the first time, the declared aim is to stop coal pro­duc­tion. With the action they are protest­ing against the min­ing and burn­ing (elec­tric­i­ty pro­duc­tion) of lig­nite and this way they offer direct resis­tance.

As with pre­vi­ous exca­va­tors occu­pa­tions, the activists climbed up the stairs, lad­ders and walk­ways on the machines to the top.
At 70 meters high they installed them­selves, with tar­pau­lins for sun pro­tec­tion, and they rolled out ban­ners on which they demand­ed once more an imme­di­ate with­draw­al from coal min­ing and a clear­ing stop in the Ham­bach for­est. “It has long been known that the hab­it­abil­i­ty of the plan­et is at stake. Is just as clear that there are alter­na­tives to inef­fi­cient elec­tric­i­ty pro­duc­tion out of coal,” said an activist who wants to remain anony­mous, and added: “An eco­nom­ic sys­tem that is depen­dent on con­stant growth, can­not do any­thing else than exploit the envi­ron­ment at the expense of us all.”
The action state­ment puts these occu­pa­tions in the con­text of the “Cli­mate Games” in Ams­ter­dam. There, the West Port will be expand­ed, which is an impor­tant coal trad­ing cen­ter. Via Ams­ter­dam among oth­ers coal from South Amer­i­ca is trans­port­ed to the Rhineland to be incin­er­at­ed togeth­er with lig­nite.

The action end­ed at 9 pm, July 4th, when the last arrest­ed activists left the police sta­tion.

BUILD GARDENS, NOT PRISONS: International Reclaim the Fields Action Camp 2015

Inter­na­tion­al Reclaim the Fields Action Camp 2015

Inter­na­tion­al Reclaim the Fields Action Camp 2015

When: Fri­day 28th August (From 6pm) – Wednes­day 2nd Sep­tem­ber 2015

Where: Dudle­ston Com­mu­ni­ty Pro­tec­tion Camp, Shrop­shire (near the Wales/England Bor­der).

About:

Reclaim the Fields UK (RTF) was born in 2011, as a star in a wider con­stel­la­tion of food and land strug­gles that reach­es around the globe. Since 2011, camps and oth­er RTF gath­er­ings have helped sup­port local com­mu­ni­ties in strug­gle, share skills, devel­op net­works, and strength­en the resis­tance to exploita­tion, in Bris­tol, west Lon­don, Glouces­ter­shire, Not­ting­ham and Fife, among oth­er loca­tions.

Every two years there is also an inter­na­tion­al camp, where peo­ple from around Europe and beyond meet togeth­er to sup­port a local strug­gle (stand­ing against exploita­tive gold min­ing in Roma­nia, and open cast coal min­ing in Ger­many, are some exam­ples). Peo­ple at these camps have shared their local sto­ries and grown their ideas about resis­tance and reclaim­ing our food sys­tem, beyond nation­al bor­ders. This year, an inter­na­tion­al gath­er­ing will be held in the UK, in Dudle­ston, Shrop­shire, on the Welsh/English bor­der.

The aims of the camp are:
• To sup­port local com­mu­ni­ties in the west and north west of Eng­land, and the north of Wales with their strug­gles against frack­ing
• To increase par­tic­i­pa­tion in Reclaim the Fields
• To demon­strate vis­i­ble, active oppo­si­tion to prison con­struc­tion
• To sup­port Dudle­ston Com­mu­ni­ty Pro­tec­tion Camp build a gar­den and infra­struc­ture to become more self-reliant
• To demon­strate the inter­con­nec­tion between these strug­gles
• To inspire and rad­i­calise every­one involved

What is hap­pen­ing:

• Two days of Action – Tues­day 1st & Wednes­day 2nd Sep­tem­ber – demon­stra­tions & actions against com­pa­nies involved in the con­struc­tion of the North Wales prison, as well as local frack­ing-relat­ed tar­gets.
• Work­shops & Skill­shares – Over the bank hol­i­day week­end there will be abun­dant oppor­tu­ni­ties to learn, share, dis­cuss and con­nect with oth­er peo­ple.
• Build­ing & Grow­ing on the site – Be part of installing gar­dens & low impact infra­struc­ture at the com­mu­ni­ty pro­tec­tion camp. Learn about per­ma­cul­ture, agroe­col­o­gy, for­est gar­den­ing, mush­room grow­ing, pal­let con­struc­tion, com­post toi­let mak­ing, off-grid electrics and more.

Why:

• This camp has been organ­ised to sup­port the local com­mu­ni­ty in Dudle­ston to resist frack­ing in their area (as well as work­ing with oth­er local anti-frack­ing groups & pro­tec­tion camps in the North West who have been resist­ing extreme ener­gy devel­op­ments for a num­ber of years). To find out more about their strug­gle vis­it: http://frack-off.org.uk/blockade/dudleston-community-protection-camp/
• It has also been organ­ised to give atten­tion to the North Wales Prison Project that is being con­struct­ed. This will be Europe’s sec­ond largest prison hold­ing 2100 pris­on­ers and the first of a num­ber of ‘mega pris­ons’ that the UK Gov­ern­ment wish to build. Click here for more infor­ma­tion about the prison, why we are against it & links to arti­cles about the prison indus­tri­al com­plex in the UK

How to get involved:

Click on the links below to find more prac­ti­cal infor­ma­tion about the camp and how to get involved:

This is a DIY/DIT(ogether)* camp and every­one is need­ed to get stuck in to make it hap­pen. Peo­ple are need­ed to:
• Sup­port with pub­lic­i­ty before the event – shar­ing the gath­er­ing online, putting posters up, encour­ag­ing your local group to get involved. Peo­ple are also need­ed to help design the pro­gramme, respond to emails & plan facil­i­ta­tion.
• Help­ing with site set up & build­ing infra­struc­ture (plan­ning this in advance & being on site a few days before the gath­er­ing)
• Sign­ing up to a shift over the week­end to help with cook­ing, site set up & safe­ty, being on the wel­come tent & so forth
• Sup­port­ing local groups to organ­ise actions

If you can help with any of these tasks please email info@reclaimthefields.noflag.org.uk

Spread the word:

• Poster design here: reclaimthefields.noflag.org.uk/wp-conte…

• Face­book event: https://www.facebook.com/events/560637597407933/

Reclaim the Fields International Gathering 2015

Reclaim the Fields

About the camp

Reclaim the Fields (or RTF) UK was born in 2011, as a star in a wider con­stel­la­tion of food and land strug­gles that reach­es around the globe. Since 2011, camps and oth­er RTF gath­er­ings have helped sup­port local com­mu­ni­ties in strug­gle, share skills, devel­oped net­works, and strength­ened the resis­tance to exploita­tion, in Bris­tol, west Lon­don, Glouces­ter­shire, Not­ting­ham and Fife among oth­er loca­tions.

Every two years there is also an inter­na­tion­al camp, where peo­ple from around Europe and beyond meet togeth­er to sup­port a local strug­gle (from gold min­ing in Roma­nia to open cast coal min­ing in Ger­many, for exam­ple). Peo­ple share share sto­ries and ideas about resis­tance and reclaim­ing our food sys­tem beyond nation­al bor­ders. This year, an inter­na­tion­al gath­er­ing will be held in the UK, in Dudle­ston, Shrop­shire, on the Welsh/English bor­der.

The aims of the camp are:

  • To sup­port local com­mu­ni­ties in the west and north west of Eng­land, and the north of Wales with their strug­gles against frack­ing
  • To increase par­tic­i­pa­tion in Reclaim the Fields
  • To demon­strate vis­i­ble, active oppo­si­tion to prison con­struc­tion
  • To sup­port Dudle­ston Com­mu­ni­ty Pro­tec­tion Camp build a gar­den and infra­struc­ture to become more self-reliant
  • To demon­strate the inter­con­nec­tion between these strug­gles
  • To inspire and rad­i­calise every­one involved

What’s taking place?

  • Two days of Action – Tues­day 1st & Wednes­day 2nd Sep­tem­ber – demon­stra­tions & actions against com­pa­nies involved in the con­struc­tion of the North Wales prison, as well as local frack­ing-relat­ed tar­gets.
  • Work­shops & Skill­shares – Over the bank hol­i­day week­end there will be abun­dant oppor­tu­ni­ties to learn, share, dis­cuss and con­nect with oth­er peo­ple.
  • Build­ing & Grow­ing on the site – Be part of installing gar­dens & low impact infra­struc­ture at the com­mu­ni­ty pro­tec­tion camp. Learn about per­ma­cul­ture, agroe­col­o­gy, for­est gar­den­ing, mush­room grow­ing, pal­let con­struc­tion, com­post toi­let mak­ing, off-grid electrics and more.

Why this camp? Why now?

  • This camp has been organ­ised to sup­port the local com­mu­ni­ty in Dudle­ston to resist frack­ing in their area (as well as work­ing with oth­er local anti-frack­ing groups & pro­tec­tion camps in the North West who have been resist­ing extreme ener­gy devel­op­ments for a num­ber of years). To find out more about their strug­gle vis­it: http://frack-off.org.uk/blockade/dudleston-community-protection-camp/

Practical Information about the Camp

Click on the links below to find more prac­ti­cal infor­ma­tion about the camp and how to get involved:

Getting involved

This is a DIY camp and every­one is need­ed to get stuck in to make it hap­pen. Peo­ple are need­ed to:

  • Sup­port with pub­lic­i­ty before the event – shar­ing the gath­er­ing online, putting posters up, encour­ag­ing your local group to get involved. Peo­ple are also need­ed to help design the pro­gramme, respond to emails & plan facil­i­ta­tion.
  • Help­ing with site set up & build­ing infra­struc­ture (plan­ning this in advance & being on site a few days before the gath­er­ing)
  • Sign­ing up to a shift over the week­end to help with cook­ing, site set up & safe­ty, being on the wel­come tent & so forth
  • Sup­port­ing local groups to organ­ise actions

If you can help with any of these tasks please email info@reclaimthefields.noflag.org.uk

Who are Reclaim the Fields?

We are a group of peas­ants, land­less and prospec­tive peas­ants, as well as peo­ple who are tak­ing back con­trol over food pro­duc­tion.

We under­stand “peas­ants” as peo­ple who pro­duce food on a small scale, for them­selves or for the com­mu­ni­ty, pos­si­bly sell­ing a part of it. This also includes agri­cul­tur­al work­ers.

We sup­port and encour­age peo­ple to stay on the land and go back to the coun­try­side. We pro­mote food sov­er­eign­ty (as defined in the Nyéléni dec­la­ra­tion) and peas­ant agri­cul­ture, par­tic­u­lar­ly among young peo­ple and urban dwellers, as well as alter­na­tive ways of life. In Europe, the con­cept ‘food sov­er­eign­ty’ is not very com­mon and could be clar­i­fied with ideas such as ‘food auton­o­my’ and con­trol over food sys­tems by inclu­sive com­mu­ni­ties, not only nations or states. We are deter­mined to cre­ate alter­na­tives to cap­i­tal­ism through coop­er­a­tive, col­lec­tive, autonomous, real-needs-ori­ent­ed, small-scale pro­duc­tion and ini­tia­tives. We are putting the­o­ry into prac­tice and link­ing local prac­ti­cal action with glob­al polit­i­cal strug­gles.

In order to achieve this, we par­tic­i­pate in local actions through activist groups and coop­er­ate with exist­ing ini­tia­tives. This is why we choose not to be a homo­ge­neous group, but to open up to the diver­si­ty of actors fight­ing the cap­i­tal­ist food pro­duc­tion mod­el. We address the issues of access to land, col­lec­tive farm­ing, seed rights and seed exchange. We strength­en the impact of our work through coop­er­a­tion with activists who focus on dif­fer­ent tasks but who share the same vision.

Nev­er­the­less, our open­ness has some lim­its. We are deter­mined to take back con­trol over our lives and refuse any form of author­i­tar­i­an­ism and hier­ar­chy. We respect nature and liv­ing beings, but will nei­ther accept nor tol­er­ate any form of dis­crim­i­na­tion, be it based on race, reli­gion, gen­der, nation­al­i­ty, sex­u­al ori­en­ta­tion or social sta­tus. We refuse and will active­ly oppose every form of exploita­tion of oth­er peo­ple. With the same force and ener­gy, we act with kind­ness and con­vivi­al­i­ty, mak­ing sol­i­dar­i­ty a con­crete prac­tice of our dai­ly life.

We sup­port the strug­gles and visions of la Via Campesina, and work to strength­en them. We wish to share the knowl­edge and the expe­ri­ence from years of strug­gle and peas­ant life and enrich it with the per­spec­tives and strength of those of us who are not peas­ants, or not yet peas­ants. We all suf­fer the con­se­quences of the same poli­cies, and are all part of the same fight.

Read this in: French, Ger­man, Span­ish

 

Turkey: Environmentalists Block Road to Mining Company

A group of locals and envi­ron­men­tal­ist activists blocked the road to an untouched forest­ed area in the Black Sea province of Artvin to pre­vent the activ­i­ties of a min­ing firm.

Activists and locals guard the moun­tain­ous forests of Artvin in sep­a­rate loca­tions to pre­vent Forestry Min­istry offi­cials from enter­ing the area.

Artvin Forestry Min­istry offi­cials, how­ev­er, aim to enter the area in order to make cal­cu­la­tions to com­plete the pro­ce­dures for the firm to start its work in the area. Min­istry offi­cials attempt­ed to enter the area from a dif­fer­ent path, after their pre­vi­ous attempt was stopped by the activists’ road block.

Local activists, who orga­nized them­selves via social media in a short time, gath­ered in the Cer­at­te­pe neigh­bor­hood, which is locat­ed at an alti­tude of 1,800 meters. They moved trees cut by the forestry offi­cials to the road and blocked traf­fic, stop­ping the entry of the offi­cials. They have tak­en pic­tures with the tree bar­ri­cades they have made and shared them via social media. The group called itself “300 Cer­at­te­peli” in ref­er­ence to the leg­end of 300 Spar­tans who stood their ground against the Per­sians, immor­tal­ized in the movie “300.” They are deter­mined at all costs to block any pos­si­ble con­struc­tion and min­ing work in the area. 

Green Artvin Association’s head Nur Neşe Kara­han said they had to walk the whole way to the forest­ed area, as it was blocked in sev­er­al loca­tions. “The road was blocked due to a col­lapse in the tun­nel. We had to walk 3 kilo­me­ters around it. We came across with the firm’s vehi­cle, as they are not using the well-known road any­more. They said offi­cials from the firm will come here and we are deter­mined to wait here to talk to them,” said Kara­han.

Hakan Akın, a shop keep­er in Artvin, said it is a promis­ing devel­op­ment for him to see many peo­ple could gath­er in the area min­utes after they heard rumors the firm would start work there.

“The experts said this area is not suit­able for min­ing. We are locals here. We already told them that it is not pos­si­ble for them to oper­ate here. This place is our green, this is where we live. We have giv­en enough to the dams; we will no longer allow any more con­struc­tion,” said Akın, among the group.

Hasan Yük­sel, a mem­ber of Green Arvin Asso­ci­a­tion, said they will con­tin­ue to hold their posts on mul­ti­ple roads in the Cer­at­te­pe neigh­bor­hood to pre­vent the entry of min­ing firms.

“They are wrong if they think we will give up.  They will come across an Artvin local on every cor­ner of these trees when­ev­er they come here,” said Yük­sel.

Main oppo­si­tion Repub­li­can People’s Par­ty (CHP) provin­cial branch head Ali Yücel Kurt also held a meet­ing in the area. He claimed that some peo­ple are also burn­ing the vehi­cles in order to pro­voke locals by blam­ing the locals for the arson. “We com­plete­ly deny such claims,” said Kurt.

Milan (Italy): Incendiary Sabotage Against high-speed TAV trains

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from cettesemaine.info /trans­lat­ed Act for free­dom now!

The night of May 25 to 26, the offices of Italferr(Italian nation­al rail­ways) locat­ed in Via Tor­cel­lo, close to the goods sta­tion of Gre­co Pirelli, were delib­er­ate­ly set on fire. This com­pa­ny is the engi­neer­ing branch that deals with research and devel­op­ment for the Ital­ian nation­al rail­way com­pa­ny, and is par­tic­u­lar­ly involved in stud­ies for the devel­op­ment of the high speed rail (TAV) between Turin and Pad­ua.

Accord­ing to recon­struc­tions of the cops, the fire was start­ed by pour­ing inflam­ma­ble liq­uid through a pre­vi­ous­ly bro­ken win­dow, then light­ing it with a smoke bomb. With­in min­utes, the fire had devoured the fur­ni­ture, com­put­ers and all the paper­work piled there by hard­work­ing engi­neers. Fire­fight­ers who inter­vened around 3:45 am took almost two hours to extin­guish the fire.

Germany: Giant Coal Excavator Occupied 145315

from Ham­bach For­est and here (Ger­man Lan­guage link)

June 6th, 2015
(The occu­pa­tion is ongo­ing)
Last night at 1 am, four activists occu­pied a large buck­et wheel exca­va­tor in the Inden open­cast mine. They climbed to the top of the exca­va­tor about 70m high. The machine halt­ed is one of the largest machines in the world that nor­mal­ly destroys 24/7, lit­er­al­ly churn­ing the land­scape. In Inden lig­nite is pro­mot­ed for RhenAish min­ing area above ground, that is: Every­thing is about being in the way and will be destroyed; who lives about is expro­pri­at­ed and expelled.  Where vil­lages, fields, mead­ows and woods once stood incon­ceiv­ably huge holes appear in the land­scape, an indus­tri­al waste­land to the hori­zon. Of all of the ener­gy sources, lig­nite, is ridicu­lous­ly inef­fi­cient, releas­ing huge loads of CO2 and par­tic­u­late emis­sions, and the con­ver­sion of pow­er sup­ply to renew­ables sab­o­taged with inflex­i­ble “base­load plants”.
The event is also a sol­i­dar­i­ty greet­ing from the resis­tance against the Rhen­ish lig­nite min­ing area to the resis­tance against the meet­ing of the G7 in Elmau. There is a pre­sump­tion that this polit­i­cal elite of glob­alised cap­i­tal­ism wants to define the solu­tions to the prob­lems that they them­selves have cre­at­ed , The G7 did not even have the decen­cy to pre­tend to demo­c­ra­t­ic legit­i­ma­cy – they coor­di­nate as the oli­garchic gov­ern­ment of the world, sim­ply because they can. This meet­ing of glob­al pow­er elite has no oth­er aim than solid­i­fy­ing their dom­i­nance.
It remains in the sep­a­ra­tion between indus­tri­al­ized coun­tries and those that may be exploit­ed as sources of raw mate­ri­als and for­eign mar­kets. The G7 bear most of the respon­si­bil­i­ty for the glob­al cli­mate col­lapse, but the con­se­quences are so far main­ly to oth­er parts of the world, and the cli­mate refugees left behind – which unfor­tu­nate­ly is ter­ri­bly often fatal by the inhu­mane bor­der poli­cies of the indus­tri­alised coun­tries. This meet­ing is noth­ing more than the most pow­er­ful crim­i­nal car­tel of the world – so stop  the G7!
“If four peo­ple can par­a­lyze a giant exca­va­tor for sev­er­al hours in such a gen­tle way …”
“… What might hap­pen if only a small part of all the frus­trat­ed peo­ple of the soci­ety were pulled in the same direc­tion?” – From the Action State­ment
It was often said that it is when it comes to cli­mate pro­tec­tion, it is “11:55″, and that the world must act. But the world is not still, and some­one has to start some­where times. In the Rhen­ish lig­nite min­ing area was also often try­ing to stop through the legal and demo­c­ra­t­ic influ­ence on pol­i­tics, the dis­place­ment of peo­ple and the destruc­tion of the Ham­bach for­est. These expe­ri­ences have shown that the deci­sion-mak­ers from the social pow­er elites will always give pri­or­i­ty to prof­it inter­ests – as long as we give them the choice.
This block­ade is not a fur­ther appeal to the politi­cians, to final­ly use their pow­er for good, because we do not trust the pol­i­cy mak­ers any­way. The weapon­ry of the block­ade draws a clear bound­ary: thus far and no fur­ther – Respect exis­tence or expect resis­tance! This action is an appeal to all those who are ready to assume their respon­si­bil­i­ties: Desert­ing from this sys­tem of indus­tri­al destruc­tion, you defied him, the match­ing of forms of resis­tance against it – and then let it decompose.Together we will replace it with some­thing bet­ter! If four peo­ple in such a gen­tle way, can par­a­lyze a giant exca­va­tor for sev­er­al hours – what might hap­pen if only a small part of all the frus­trat­ed peo­ple of this soci­ety pulls togeth­er? If we want to bequeath a hab­it­able plan­et, there must be a thor­ough change from below. This occu­pa­tion can only be the start.
Even a small reminder: For the begin­ning of August, the Alliance mobi­lizes “end area” to a mass block­ade of an open pit in Rhineland. Here should be made pos­si­ble to low thresh­old lev­el a broad mass of peo­ple, access to civ­il dis­obe­di­ence and resis­tance. In addi­tion, each of the four for­est occu­pa­tions in Ham­bach for­est clear­ance is con­stant­ly under threat, and also on the cur­rent­ly rel­a­tive­ly safe occu­pa­tion mead­ow near the for­est there are many points of con­tact for moti­vat­ed peo­ple …
Togeth­er we can make the cap­i­tal­ist lig­nite mad­ness put an end!
The hab­it­abil­i­ty of the plan­et is at stake, pre­cise­ly now.
So Let’s do it!
PRESS RELEASE
Buck­et wheel exca­va­tor in the brown coal mine Inden occu­pied
Dis­trict of Düren. In the night from Fri­day to Sat­ur­day, a buck­et wheel exca­va­tor in the open-cast min­ing inden was occu­pied. Four peo­ple climbed at 1am to the top of the engine at an alti­tude of about 70m. One aim of the cam­paign is to bring the progress of the mine for a few hours to a halt. Sec­ond­ly, the occu­piers explain in their action state­ment sol­i­dar­i­ty with the protests in Elmau against the meet­ing of the G7.
“For the three lig­nite mines in the Rhineland are entire vil­lages and forests per­ma­nent­ly destroyed for­ev­er,” says one par­tic­i­pant action. “We have a respon­si­bil­i­ty for future gen­er­a­tions. Sim­ply ask to politi­cians, and then com­plain that there is no change, is not enough. “As ear­ly as on 15 March, there had been in a sim­i­lar Inden open­cast mine exca­va­tors occu­pa­tion by six peo­ple, inter­rupt­ed in the course of the oper­a­tion of the exca­va­tor for twelve hours.
Today’s block­ade will also release a sign of protest against the meet­ing of the lead­ers of the sev­en largest indus­tri­al nations in Elmau. “There is a pre­sump­tion that this polit­i­cal elite of glob­alised cap­i­tal­ism wants to define the solu­tions to the prob­lems that they them­selves have cre­at­ed,” it says in the action state­ment. “If we want to bequeath a hab­it­able plan­et, there must be a thor­ough change from below. This occu­pa­tion can this be just an impulse. ”
The action is still ongo­ing.
They can be reached under the num­ber 0157 32 48 23 40 and are O‑tones are avail­able. (In regard to the cell phone bat­tery but only to a lim­it­ed extent.) You can also reach activists, the direct con­tact with the exca­va­tors occu­pa­tion hold, on the mead­ow occu­pa­tion under 0157 541 36 100th
16:30 rest. Exca­va­tors eas­i­ly acces­si­ble.
Peo­ple from the area are wel­come to come to the open pit edge.
“It is pos­si­ble to get pret­ty close here.”, Said grade with an activist by tele­phone, who grew up in the vicin­i­ty of the open pit. “From the vil­lage Schophoven there are only a few dirt roads until man stands in front of our exca­va­tors.”
Exca­va­tor in 70m height
14:15 A fire truck arrived.
Some peo­ple climb fur­ther down the exca­va­tor around and to get an idea of ​​the sit­u­a­tion. The police can not see them.
Morn­ing
13:00 twelve hours are man­aged.
The machine stands still; “We are now the only ones here on the exca­va­tor!”
Morn­ing
12:00 loca­tion qui­et. Clothes dry again
Still no police. The clothes are now again most­ly dry. “We hav­ing quite cozy here. Ear­li­er a dog-walk­er wave­dat us. “
Morn­ing
7:00 No more police
The day dawns. Anoth­er pho­to in bright­ness reach us via MMS.
Still no police. Only an ambu­lance is around.
3:00 Police sniffs
Less than 10 Polizist_innen appear, climb up a piece and try to com­mu­ni­cate.
“We’re fine!”, The activists call back.
After some time, the police dis­ap­pear
If four peo­ple can par­a­lyze a giant exca­va­tor for sev­er­al hours in such a gen­tle way … … what might hap­pen if only a small part of pulling all the frus­trat­ed peo­ple of the soci­ety in the same direc­tion? – From the Action State­ment
Staffed 1:00 exca­va­tor
Peo­ple arrive at the open pit and climb the buck­et wheel.
Some were lying down in the ear­ly evening with blan­kets in the woods and a lit­tle pre-sleep.
Now they are drenched by thun­der­storms and full of oil from the exca­va­tors to 70m height and try to curl up under a tarp.

Germany: An Update from Hambach Forest Defenders

June 2nd, 2015

The defence of the the Mil­lenar­i­an Ham­bach­er For­est against the encroching RWE open cast lig­nite mine con­tin­ues with activist-build tow­ers and live-in bar­ri­cades.  The Ham­bach­er For­est is not only one of the last Mil­lenar­i­an Forests in Europe but also the largest on the edge of most­ly defor­est­ed area of Ruhr Val­ley and the Bel­gium, Nether­lands, Lux­em­burg region hence its impor­tance to bio­di­ver­si­ty and ani­mal migra­tion cor­ri­dors.

The lig­nite mine fought through direct action meth­ods by the activist liv­ing in the for­est for the last 3 years has been devour­ing towns, vil­lages, whole forests and drain­ing the watertable for up to 70 kilo­me­ters  and is also the largest in west­ern europe and Europe’s biggest net CO2 emmiter.

The scale of the mine itself being 12km across and near­ly half a kil­lome­ter deep con­jures analo­gies of Mor­dor or Sci­Fi Prison plan­et with the dig­gers  being the world’s largest machines feed­ing the con­vey­or belts deliv­er­ing the coal to rail links sup­ply­ing the pow­er plants on the edge of the mine itself and through­out this region .  This in turn pales in com­par­i­son to the glob­al and exter­nal­ized costs of lig­nite as a cli­mate chaos agent and a num­ber one source of mer­cury con­t­a­m­i­na­tion in worlds oceans.

The Ham­bach For­est Strug­gle con­tin­ues to expe­ri­ence peri­od­ic police intru­sions, arrests and desc­truc­tion of bar­ri­cades which are pro­tect­ing three for­est tree-sits: Oak­town, Beech­town, and Crusty­Town  which are spread through­out the for­est.  The arrest result in sol­i­dar­i­ty actions and demon­stra­tions and rel­a­tive­ly short releas­es.

This is not some­thing that can be said about the irre­versible habi­tat destruc­tion that con­tin­ues day and night and sad­ly after par­tial vic­to­ry of hav­ing the costs of evic­tions and police actions being deferred to the RWE con­cern  the Ger­man Forestry depart­ment start­ed fil­ing com­plains about the for­est being block­ad­ed against the machin­ery send to destroy it and the tax­pay­er and the Ger­man State resumed again pick­ing up the bill for the repres­sion of eco-activists and eco­log­i­cal destru­c­ion.

For that rea­son we urge all who choose to pur­sue the avenues of civic action to put grass­roots pres­sure on the appro­pri­ate­ly named Fed­er­al Min­istry of Food and Agri­cul­ture in Bonn (www.verbraucherlotse.de) Mon­day to Thurs­day from 9:00 bis 17:00 Tele­fon­num­mer 02 28 – 24 25 26 27, per E‑Mail  info@verbraucherlotse.de, 53168 Bonn und unter der Fax-Num­mer 02 28 – 68 45 72 20.

 

 

For those in the strug­gle to pro­tect the Earth through direct action we urge you to vis­it us and fol­low the strug­gle and become a part of glob­al com­mu­ni­ty of resis­tance.

Our present demand and wish list includes as always plan­e­tary eco-jus­tice fol­lowed by walkie talkies, 12v bat­ter­ies and solar pan­els.

In Sol­i­dar­i­ty,

Ham­bach For­est Defend­ers!