32 SUVs disabled across Oxford

18.07.2008
Up to 32 SUV own­ers awoke this morn­ing to dis­cov­er that their destruc­tive vehi­cles had been dis­abled.

18.07.2008
Up to 32 SUV own­ers awoke this morn­ing to dis­cov­er that their destruc­tive vehi­cles had been dis­abled.

Using the ‘mung bean trick’, where­by a mung bean is insert­ed into the valve of a tyre before the cap is screwed back on, tyres were let down in Marston, Head­ing­ton, and the high­ly afflu­ent area of Sum­mer­town. Mes­sages were left under wind­screen wipers warn­ing the own­ers not to attempt to dri­ve their 4x4s, and explain­ing why it was felt that direct action had to be tak­en to resist their assault on this plan­et.

They were informed that more than a quar­ter of the UK’s CO2 gen­er­a­tion is attrib­ut­able to the trans­port sec­tor, and that many Sports Util­i­ty Vehi­cles emit up to 300% more green­house gas­es than the aver­age car.

They were also told that dri­ving a car is not a ‘right’, and that dri­ving an SUV is an unac­cept­ably self­ish act in the face of what may become unstop­pable cli­mate change.

This is a sim­ple action that any­one can do, any­time or place.

Melting Point: the new frontline in eco-activism

The Ecol­o­gist Film Unit (EFU), a col­lab­o­ra­tion between the eth­i­cal inves­ti­ga­tions agency Ecos­torm and the Ecol­o­gist mag­a­zine, has recent­ly pro­duced a short film called ‘Melt­ing Point: the new front­line in eco-activism’.

CO2The Ecol­o­gist Film Unit (EFU), a col­lab­o­ra­tion between the eth­i­cal inves­ti­ga­tions agency Ecos­torm and the Ecol­o­gist mag­a­zine, has recent­ly pro­duced a short film called ‘Melt­ing Point: the new front­line in eco-activism’. Ahead of next mon­th’s ‘Cli­mate Camp’ at Kingsnorth pow­er sta­tion, Kent, the film expos­es gov­ern­ment tac­tics in reac­tion to envi­ro­men­tal protests.

Espi­onage, news manip­u­la­tion, legal threats and even vio­lence have become the knee-jerk response of Gov­ern­ment and big busi­ness to the increas­ing and vocal con­cerns of envi­ron­men­tal activists in the UK. This exclu­sive and pow­er­ful film expos­es the extra­or­di­nary tac­tics being used to reframe con­cerned cit­i­zens engag­ing in their right to protest, as dan­ger­ous ter­ror­ists.

The film can be viewed on var­i­ous web­sites includ­ing Green TV (www.green.tv) or the Ecol­o­gist web­site (www.theecologist.org/etv/).

The youtube URL is http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=I08J2BCPBDY.

Alter­na­tive­ly the video can be down­loaded at www.ecologistfilmunit.com.

Watch it, show it at events, spread the mes­sage!

con­tact: anna@eco-storm.com

Oxford Climate Action Spin The Spinners!

16.07.2008

Edelman protest16.07.2008
Oxford Cli­mate Action activists have today block­ad­ed the head­quar­ters of Edel­man PR. They arrived at 9:30 to protest the PR giant’s col­lu­sion with E‑On in “green­wash­ing” its pro­posed Kingsnorth pow­er sta­tion devel­op­ment. Sev­er­al pro­tes­tors gained access to the firms offices. Oth­ers out­side climbed onto the roof to unfurl a ban­ner read­ing “Edel­man: Spin­ning The Cli­mate Out Of Con­trol” as anoth­er colour­ful con­tin­gent spoke to passers by about the protest. MP John MC Don­nell has also dropped by to lend his sup­port.

Edel­man have been employed by E‑On to pro­mote “E.On’s inter­ests across the gas, coal, nuclear and renew­ables sec­tors, not just lob­by­ing for Kingsnorth”[1]. Today, they have spon­sored a cli­mate change sum­mit along with BMW. The pro­tes­tors claim that this is a con­scious tac­tic to become green by asso­ci­a­tion with­out tak­ing mean­ing­ful action to stop cli­mate change. The pro­test­ers also aim to high­light the insan­i­ty of invest­ing in new coal pow­er sta­tions like Kingsnorth, in the face of human caused cli­mate change[2].

Pro­tes­tor Deb­bie Locke said, “Coal is the dirt­i­est form of fos­sil fuel. Edel­man are telling E‑On to say that Car­bon Cap­ture and Stor­age can help. But CCS is an unproven tech­nol­o­gy and 20 years away at the earliest.[3][4] We’re here to reclaim the PR machine for nor­mal peo­ple who want to see real action on cli­mate change not anoth­er dose of cor­po­rate green­wash”.

The pro­tes­tors have been inspired to take action by the Camp for Cli­mate Action which will take place at Kingsnorth from 3–11 August this year.

Edel­man have a long record of involve­ment with eth­i­cal­ly ques­tion­able com­pa­nies seek­ing to improve their image, includ­ing AstraZeneca[6], WalMart[7], Pfizer[8].

Con­tact: 0781 8021 298

— ENDS —

Notes For Edi­tors

[1] Clare O’Con­nor, ‘EON turns to Edel­man as nuclear debate rages’, PR Week, 13.03.08 prweek.com/uk/news/article/790575/EON-turns-Edelman-nuclear-debate-rages
[2] See ipcc.ch
[3] DBERR, Ener­gy Mar­kets Out­look states that CCS will deliv­er “no car­bon sav­ings in the fore­cast years until 2020 and then 0.3 MtC”.
http://www.berr.gov.uk/files/file41995.pdf
[4] The IPCC says that it is unlike­ly that CCS would be deployed until the mid 21st cen­tu­ry.
http://arch.rivm.nl/env/int/ipcc/pages_media/SRCCS-final/SRCCS_WholeReport.pdf
[5] The Camp For Cli­mate Action believes that “large num­bers of deter­mined and well-organ­ised peo­ple get togeth­er they can turn things around, mak­ing a his­toric dif­fer­ence.” Last year’s camp engaged sev­er­al thou­sand peo­ple to take direct action at Heathrow Air­port. http://www.climatecamp.org.uk/home
[6] http://www.prweek.com/uk/sectors/healthcare/article/825671/edelman-overhauls-team-md-leaves/
[7] “AstraZeneca, the large phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­ny, plead­ed guilty today to a felony charge of health care fraud and agreed to pay $355 mil­lion to set­tle crim­i­nal and civ­il accu­sa­tions that it engaged in a nation­wide scheme to ille­gal­ly mar­ket a prostate can­cer drug.”
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C07E7D8163BF932A15755C0A9659C8B63
[8] Wal­Mart has been called “The most ruth­less com­pa­ny in the world” due to its appalling record on human rights, con­tempt for com­mu­ni­ties and the envi­ron­ment
http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2004/03/16/low-hanging-fruit/
[9] Pfiz­er has been involved in price fix­ing, ille­gal­ly test­ing drugs on chil­dren, block­ing efforts to allow peo­ple in devel­op­ing coun­tries access to life-sav­ing drugs and sell­ing drugs linked to adverse side effects in pets:
http://www.corporatewatch.org.uk/?lid=330#aids

Oxford Cli­mate Action

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

Aldermaston Nuke Frocks and shots: on cocktail parties and builder blocking

Yet anoth­er fan­tas­tic oppor­tu­ni­ty to mix busi­ness with plea­sure! Alder­mas­ton Wom­en’s peace camp(aign) host anoth­er fab­u­lous wom­en’s cock­tail par­ty at the peace camp on Sat­ur­day 12 July, while Block the Builders meet in near­by Read­ing the fol­low­ing after­noon to plot the down­fall of the nuclear-indus­tri­al com­plex 😉

Aldermaston camp cocktail flierYet anoth­er fan­tas­tic oppor­tu­ni­ty to mix busi­ness with plea­sure! Alder­mas­ton Wom­en’s peace camp(aign) host anoth­er fab­u­lous wom­en’s cock­tail par­ty at the peace camp on Sat­ur­day 12 July, while Block the Builders meet in near­by Read­ing the fol­low­ing after­noon to plot the down­fall of the nuclear-indus­tri­al com­plex 😉

Since 2002, the Atom­ic Weapons Estab­lish­ment Alder­mas­ton has been the recip­i­ent of a sub­stan­tial invest­ment pro­gramme to upgrade and devel­op new nuclear weapons facil­i­ties. The project is on the same scale as Heathrow’s Ter­mi­nal Five. Alder­mas­ton is where Britain research­es, designs and man­u­fac­tures it’s nuclear weapons. Lat­est news and back­ground info on devel­op­ments at the site can be found at http://www.aldermaston.net/news.

In March 2007 a par­lia­men­tary vote paved the way for a new fleet of nuclear-armed sub­marines to replace the exist­ing four Tri­dent subs, with deci­sions and announce­ments on new war­heads and mis­siles expect­ed to be made over the com­ing years (…in pub­lic … though who would buy £15bn sub­marines with­out already hav­ing com­mit­ted to arm­ing it?)

Between 2006 and 2007 new leg­is­la­tion was intro­duced aimed at lim­it­ing the right to and scope of protest at Britain’s nuclear weapons facil­i­ties (SOCPA and mil­i­tary lands byelaws).
Despite this, in March 2008 an esti­mat­ed 5,000 peo­ple came to Alder­mas­ton to make their voic­es heard in oppo­si­tion to the exten­sion of Britian’s nuclear weapons pro­gramme, and the wom­en’s peace camp con­tin­ues its 23-year tra­di­tion as a vis­i­ble pres­ence at the wire.

The camp is invit­ing women to come to Alder­mas­ton on Sat­ur­day 12 July to join a cel­e­bra­tion of the right to protest (frocks and shots option­al but encour­aged) and of wom­en’s strength in the strug­gle against patri­ar­chal mil­i­tary mad­ness. Music, snacks, veg­an cake (pos­si­bly…), ice and a twist.

Non­vi­o­lent direct action net­work Block the Builders are meet­ing the fol­low­ing day in Read­ing to dis­cuss the ongo­ing builder-block­ing efforts at Alder­mas­ton, aimed at slow­ing and cost­ing the con­struc­tion of new weapons-relat­ed facil­i­ties. See http://www.blockthebuilders.org.uk for details.

Come and meet us, dis­cuss the issues and have a fab­u­lous time!

info@aldermaston.net
http://www.aldermaston.net

Camp for Climate Action: Great Rebel Raft Regatta update & newspaper launched

THE GREAT REBEL RAFT REGATTA UPDATE

RaftsTHE GREAT REBEL RAFT REGATTA UPDATE

Fol­low­ing a pro­fes­sion­al recon­nais­sance and Health and Safe­ty test trip by boat last Wednes­day, rebel rafters and expe­ri­enced sailors gave the thumbs up for the water borne dis­obe­di­ence on the Mass Day of Action, August 9th. Launch­ing with the tides and if the weath­er is not blow­ing a gale, the action was deemed total­ly do able and has the poten­tial to be a spec­tac­u­lar suc­cess. The key will be in the num­ber of rafts, the more rafts ( or any­thing that floats !) there are the more impos­si­ble it will be for the forces of dark­ness to stop the arma­da reach­ing it’s tar­get. So start pack­ing pad­dles, canoes,inflatables, rafts, dinghies, amphibi­ous vehi­cles etc.. with your tent. Try to encour­age any yacht or boat peo­ple, pirates or sailors you know to join in. All rebel rafters will be requit­ed to attend a water safe­ty work­shop that will be run dai­ly for the three
days lead­ing up to the day of action, and will have to wear life jack­ets ( if you don’t have your own, these will be pro­vid­ed by the camp). A write up is avail­able on the GRRR web­site.

Mean­while many groups across the coun­try are get­ting excit­ed by the GRRR bug and plan­ning to build rafts and get teams togeth­er. If your group has any news, pic­tures of rafts or ideas to share, then send it to the con­stant­ly updat­ed news feed on www.thegrrr.net . For any fur­ther enquiries email: pirates@thegrrr.net

CLIMATE CAMP NEWSPAPER HITS THE STREETS AND FESTIVALS

Last week 30,000 news­pa­pers, beau­ti­ful­ly designed in black and bright cyan and not look­ing any­thing like a bor­ing polit­i­cal paper, came off the print­ing press and began their jour­ney around the coun­try.

Pub­lished to inspire peo­ple to come to the camp it is filled with full pages images of last years events, por­traits of hot cli­mate campers, a stun­ning map of this years camp and texts that describe the pol­i­tics of rad­i­cal cli­mate activism. If you would like copies to hand out in the street, fes­ti­vals, drop off in cafe’s etc. con­tact distribution@climatecamp.org.uk with your address and how many you want, they will be sent out asap or ring Isa 07984158 108 to find out where you can pick some up. The pdf’s is now online here: http://www.climatecamp.org.uk/node/23

Support Sarah Whitehead

Sarah White­head is a com­mit­ted veg­an activist who has ded­i­cat­ed her life to sav­ing ani­mals and help­ing peo­ple. She worked tire­less­ly as a nurse whilst res­cu­ing and rehom­ing abused and neglect­ed ani­mals, as well as cam­paign­ing against the noto­ri­ous Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences.

Sarah WhiteheadSarah White­head is a com­mit­ted veg­an activist who has ded­i­cat­ed her life to sav­ing ani­mals and help­ing peo­ple. She worked tire­less­ly as a nurse whilst res­cu­ing and rehom­ing abused and neglect­ed ani­mals, as well as cam­paign­ing against the noto­ri­ous Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. She is not some­one to sit back and let ani­mals be tor­tured and abused, she stands up and fights wher­ev­er she sees injus­tice and nev­er puts her­self first.

Sarah had been informed about an abused bea­gle. It was liv­ing out­side in a wood­en cage, and was muz­zled at all times except for when it got to eat. The dog was made to wear an elec­tric shock col­lar and the neigh­bours informed Sarah that they had wit­nessed beat­ings from its own­ers. The neigh­bours had also heard the dog scream­ing on many occa­sions.

The RSPCA had been called numer­ous times, but they failed to help this dog and left it with own­ers who had on occa­sions tied it to a radi­a­tor.

All avenues had been explored in try­ing to lift this ani­mal from hell. The RSPCA, despite numer­ous com­plaints and vis­its to the own­ers, did noth­ing; even the police had been called by neigh­bours, but they just told them to call the RSPCA.

What else was Sarah to do, but res­cue the bea­gle her­self? How else could this bea­gle be saved? Know­ing how much it was suf­fer­ing, could any­one just leave this bea­gle to live in pain?

Sarah was already on a sus­pend­ed sen­tence for res­cu­ing ani­mals from a noto­ri­ous pup­py farmer in West Sus­sex, which meant that if she re-offend­ed with­in two years she would be sent to prison for that “crime”. Even know­ing this risk to her free­dom, Sarah put the dog’s life and well-being first and lift­ed him to free­dom.

Unknown to Sarah she was under police sur­veil­lance dur­ing the res­cue as part of Oper­a­tion Achilles and the cam­paign against Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. Police fol­lowed her and watched her res­cue the bea­gle, and then watched her take the dog to its sec­ond stage of its jour­ney to it’s new home.

How­ev­er, once the bea­gle was hand­ed over, instead of fol­low­ing the bea­gle in order to return it to its own­er, they car­ried on fol­low­ing Sarah. Luck­i­ly this means that the bea­gle is still safe and liv­ing in a lov­ing home.

Some time lat­er once the police had fin­ished fol­low­ing Sarah around she was arrest­ed, the police weird­ly tried to accuse her of steal­ing the dog so that she could sell it for £500 to raise mon­ey for SHAC (Stop Hunt­ing­don Ani­mal Cru­el­ty) Where this sum of £500 came from is any­one’s guess and it shows how lit­tle the police under­stand the con­cept of ani­mal rights!

Sarah went on tri­al for bur­glary in June 2008. She plead­ed not guilty to the offence as she believed she had not com­mit­ted a crime in res­cu­ing this bea­gle. She told the court she believed she had act­ed rea­son­ably and hon­est and that it was the right thing to do because the police and RSPCA had failed to save this dog. State­ments from the neigh­bours were read in court which described the cru­el­ty to the dog, the beat­ings, and the screams but bizarrely the jury took the view that Sarah should have left the dog where it was and she was found guilty.

The judge sen­tenced Sarah to two years in prison, nine months of this is from the sus­pend­ed sen­tence she was on, and the extra 1 1/3 years is for res­cu­ing the bea­gle.

You can write to Sarah at:

Sarah White­head VM7684
HMP Bronze­field,
Woodthor­pe Road,
Ash­ford,
Mid­dx
TW15 3JZ.
Unit­ed King­dom

Click here for Sarah’s sup­port page

Before going to prison, Sarah cam­paigned for the fol­low­ing groups, so please check out their web­sites:

Stop Hunt­ing­don Ani­mal Cru­el­ty
South­ern Ani­mal Rights Coali­tion
Grey­hound Action
Uncaged
BUAV
Veg­an Pris­on­ers Sup­port Group
Dr Had­wen Trust

Brighton squatted social centre eviction

88 LONDON ROAD SOCIAL CENTRE EVICTION

88 LONDON ROAD SOCIAL CENTRE EVICTION

At 7am this morn­ing the anar­chist social cen­tre at 88 Lon­don Road, Brighton was forcibly evict­ed, despite resis­tance. The Vic­to­ri­an church had been occu­pied since the Squat­ting Days of Action on the 4th and 5th of April. The space was intialy opened as part of a two day inter­na­tion­al event, com­mit­ted to cre­at­ing autonomous spaces and high­light­ing the impor­tance of squat­ting and glob­al net­work­ing.

Since then, the com­mu­ni­ty at 88 Lon­don Road had suc­ces­sive­ly resist­ed one pri­or evic­tion attempt from police. The space was being used as a social cen­tre for grass­roots move­ments, free cafes, work­shops and a lot of oth­er pos­si­ble projects for the ben­e­fit of the local com­mu­ni­ty.

Two of the occu­p­ing mem­bers of 88 were arrest­ed when they pro­longed the evic­tion by climb­ing to the rafters, clam­ber­ing into a car­go net and hang­ing high above the injus­tice below. The whole evic­tion was over by mid­day and the coun­cil spent the rest of the after­noon board­ing up an amaz­ing space that held so much poten­tial.

we will be back.….…

http://www.myspace.com/88londonroadsquat

Climate Camp Bike Ride

Peo­ple will be rid­ing to the cli­mate camp, start­ing from Glas­gow, descend­ing souther­ly pick­ing up thou­sands en route.

The final leg, Lon­don to Kingsnorth is on sun­day 3 August meet­ing under Water­loo bridge (south­side) at 9am
For more info on the route and how to get involved e‑mail climatecampbikeride@lists.riseup.net
Up the the veloru­tion.

Peo­ple will be rid­ing to the cli­mate camp, start­ing from Glas­gow, descend­ing souther­ly pick­ing up thou­sands en route.

The final leg, Lon­don to Kingsnorth is on sun­day 3 August meet­ing under Water­loo bridge (south­side) at 9am
For more info on the route and how to get involved e‑mail climatecampbikeride@lists.riseup.net
Up the the veloru­tion.

London, Brighton & Manchester Critical Masses commemorate dead cyclists

June’s Crit­i­cal mass in Lon­don saw a slight­ly dif­fer­ent route. As always we met at South­bank and man­aged to leave at 7.15pm.

June’s Crit­i­cal mass in Lon­don saw a slight­ly dif­fer­ent route. As always we met at South­bank and man­aged to leave at 7.15pm.

Fol­low­ing the killing of Marie Vesco on the A23 her friends, ram­pART and Food Not Bombs asked peo­ple to ride to Brix­ton, where she served free food every Sun­day after­noon with Brix­ton Food Not Bombs.

Approx­i­mate­ly 600 cyclists left Water­loo going South via Lam­beth North, then Elephant& Cas­tle, going round a few times stop­ping the traf­fic. Via the Oval we went to Brix­ton, where we stopped at Win­drush Square. By now there were maybe 300–400 cyclists left (there was a bit of North-Lon­don snob­bery). Dif­fer­ent peo­ple spoke about Marie and how they missed her. How she died and why she worked with Brix­ton Food­Not­Bombs and how giv­ing out free food was so impor­tant to her. There was a min­ute’s silence for her.

Then we cycled North again, police stopped us halfway up towards Stock­well. They had tried to dic­tate the tem­po pre­vi­ous­ly, but rogue cyclists broke through, stopped the traf­fic ahead of the police line and in that way forced the police to let the Mass go (Health and Safe­ty and all…).

They man­aged to block Stock­well Road and we did­n’t quite get the momen­tum of break­ing through. To the cop­pers’ sur­prise the tip of the Mass turned around, cycling back on them­selves and turn­ing off the main road fur­ther down (Sid­ney Road I think). We made our way to the Oval, cycling past the Crick­et knobs, some of which were using bad lan­guage, when we came in sight. Oth­ers were sup­port­ive.

Vaux­hall Bridge end­ed up being a bit of a split­ter were we lost a few peo­ple. Going across the bridge, past Par­lia­ment we hit the square, encir­cling it a cou­ple of times, until some­thing hap­pened with the sound sys­tem (as always) not quite sure what. music stopped. Rais­ing bikes, block­ing road, we then went to see the queen. The whole ride took about two hours and a bit. Nice atmos­phere, good mix of peo­ple and bikes and so good to have some music on the way (three sound sys­tems).

What hap­pened with the sound sys­tem on the North side of Par­lia­ment Square was that the police stopped it play­ing and rid­ers strong­ly object­ed to this ban which caused a long traf­fic holdup.

The cycle police keep on tar­get­ing Crit­i­cal Mass sound sys­tems in the SOCPA zone around Par­lia­ment while doing noth­ing to stop sound sys­tems in cars, bus­es and lor­ries. Also the SOCPA leg­is­la­tion is cur­rent­ly under review and oth­er police are tend­ing not to enforce it.

video of ride.

More videos:

cycling down brix­ton road

through brix­ton high street

out­side the ritzy, enjoy­ing some tunes, before a min­utes silence in mem­o­ry of Marie Vesco

rid­ing up the mall

bring­ing the mass & some music to the queen
============

Yes­ter­day the Brighton Crit­i­cal Mass month­ly bicy­cle ride was done in the mem­o­ry Marie Vesco — the young French woman who had been killed on her way from Lon­don to the Car­ni­val Against the Arms Trade, that was held on the 4th of June. We, at Crit­i­cal Mass decid­ed to com­plete her jour­ney to EDO MBM (ITT) bomb fac­to­ry that she could not make.

The usu­al meet­ing place The Lev­el, 6 p.m. saw police wait­ing for some sort of a demo. There were: 2 police vans full of cop­pers, 1 CCTV UNIT van, 6 motor­bikes, and none of the police on bicy­cles.

The ride had com­menced as have rode onto Lewes Road escort­ed by police motor­bikes. For a while it felt as if we were prime min­is­ters escort­ed to some impor­tant meet­ing.

When we had reached the bot­tom of the Home Farm Road there were few police wait­ing for us. We then went to the fac­to­ry to be aston­ished by the police pres­ence at the fac­to­ry. There were at least 40 offi­cers with dogs wait­ing for some sort of a riot.

We have held one minute silence for Marie and went back to town where after a half an hour police had left us alone.

Over­all a suc­cess.

video of ride.

============

This month Man­ches­ter crit­i­cal mass had a one minute silence to hon­our two pas­sion­ate cyclists that were killed this month by motorists, and to remem­ber all our cycling com­rades that have been killed on the roads.

NORMAN FAY
Nor­man Fay died on Fri­day, June 20. He was cycling to the York cycle ral­ly when a motorist col­lid­ed with him.

“He was just 72 so it’s come as a real shock.

Nor­man had a well deserved rep­u­ta­tion for fine crafts­man­ship and engi­neer­ing, and had an infec­tious love of all things cycling. His bikes have been many peo­ple’s intro­duc­tion to cycling and his exper­i­men­ta­tion with dif­fer­ent cycle forms appealed to hard core enthu­si­asts and occa­sion­al rid­ers alike. I’ve been the lucky own­er of a cou­ple of his bikes, one of which I bought when I was 18 and I still have but is sad­ly gath­er­ing dust in the hut.

Both Nor­man and his late wife Mar­i­on were both found­ing mem­bers of South Tyne­side Friends of the Earth.

Whilst he died rel­a­tive­ly young in mod­ern terms, his con­tin­ued cycling proved that you’re nev­er to old to get on your bike. Maybe it’s time I dust­ed off mine.

A true local hero.”

MARIE VESCO

Marie Vesco was killed by a car on Wednes­day 4th June while cycling to Brighton. Active in var­i­ous Lon­don social cen­tres, Whitechapel and Brix­ton Food Not Bombs, she now had plans to open a new social cen­tre.

Marie was part of a group of twelve cyclists who left Brix­ton in the ear­ly hours of the morn­ing to join the Smash EDO demo. They were on the A23 by Burgess Hill when an impa­tient gas guz­zling imbe­cile swerved across two lanes straight into Marie, then anoth­er car hit her. She died instant­ly, there was noth­ing her friends could have done. The dri­ver of the sec­ond car got straight on his phone as soon as he came to a halt — not for an ambu­lance but to call his lawyer. He then start­ed push­ing Marie’s mates around. One dri­ver has been arrest­ed.