Swedish Peace Activists Repeatedly Break Into Weapon Factories

23.10.2008

23.10.2008
Using ham­mers and bolt cut­ters, peace activists repeat­ed­ly broke into weapon plants and dam­aged weapons in Swe­den. Activists from the Swedish group OFOG/Avrusta admit­ted dam­ag­ing twen­ty high explo­sive grenade launch­ers as well as inter­nal parts to a How­itzer 77. Five peo­ple were arrest­ed. Two remain in jail. Two activists who were arrest­ed and released were re-arrest­ed after they returned to the weapons plant to do more dam­age. A fifth per­son was arrest­ed Sat­ur­day in anoth­er break in. All are fac­ing tri­al on charges from crim­i­nal dam­age to tres­pass at places of nation­al secu­ri­ty.

Mem­bers of the Swedish peace and dis­ar­ma­ment group OFOG/Avrusta say they have been prepar­ing for more than a year to car­ry out the actions. OFOG, which loose­ly trans­lates as the word mis­chief, is a net­work of activists work­ing for a nuclear free and demil­i­ta­rized world. Avrus­ta is Dis­arm in Eng­lish. The group released infor­ma­tion to the press announc­ing their actions and post­ed videos of their entry and dam­age on You Tube. See: http://www.ofog.org/avrusta_aktionsvideo

At about 2:30 a.m. Thurs­day morn­ing, activists approached the BAE Sys­tems weapons facil­i­ty in Karl­sko­ga, Swe­den, about 240 kilo­me­ters away from Stock­holm. Accord­ing to state­ments to the press, they used bolt cut­ters cut open a hole in the secu­ri­ty fence and entered. They left behind a ban­ner wel­com­ing oth­ers, which said “The door is open — you are free to start dis­arm­ing.” The activists used ham­mers to dam­age inter­nal parts like cool­ing aggre­gates and hydraulic cylin­ders for the How­itzer 77. A ful­ly oper­a­tional How­itzer 77 can fire 6 rounds every sec­ond for 20 min­utes and has a fir­ing range of 30 kilo­me­ters. Inside, media reports note that the duo man­aged to affix a poster to the door that said, “In this fac­to­ry are man­u­fac­tured weapons that are used to wage wars — Dis­ar­ma­ment is under­way.” Dis­ar­ma­ment activists, Cat­tis Las­ka, 24, and Pelle Strin­lund, 37, were arrest­ed and charged with tres­pass­ing and crim­i­nal dam­age. Las­ka is a youth leader and Strin­lund is a writer. Both remain in jail pend­ing a hear­ing.

Simul­ta­ne­ous­ly, oth­er activists entered a weapons facil­i­ty run by Saab in Eskil­stu­na, Swe­den, about 135 kilo­me­ters away. Accord­ing to OFOG/Avrusta, they dam­aged twen­ty grenade launch­ers with ham­mers and then alert­ed guards to their pres­ence. Anna Ander­s­son, 26, and Mar­tin Smed­je­back, 35, were arrest­ed and charged with tres­pass, severe crim­i­nal dam­age, and enter­ing a pro­tect­ed nation­al secu­ri­ty area. Ander­s­son is a web devel­op­er. Smed­je­back is a train­er in non-vio­lence. Both were released from jail on Fri­day.

The weapons dam­aged in the Saab plant were described as Carl Gus­tav type grenade launch­ers. These are shoul­der mount­ed anti-tank weapons that can fire high explo­sive rounds. The weapons were report­ed­ly found in box­es labeled for deliv­ery to “US” and “New Del­hi.” BAE has a long term con­tract with the Indi­an gov­ern­ment for how­itzers and grenade launch­ers, accord­ing to reports in the Hin­du Times.

After being released from jail Fri­day, Ander­s­son indi­cat­ed she was glad to be going to tri­al. “I look for­ward to a chance to eth­i­cal­ly and legal­ly argue for our actions in court. I hope one day the arms man­u­fac­tur­ers will be charged for the crim­i­nal dam­age that Swedish arma­ments cause in wars and con­flicts around the world.”

In a sur­prise move ear­ly Sat­ur­day, Ander­s­son and Smed­je­back returned to the weapons plant where they were arrest­ed again. They now remain in jail.

Also ear­ly Sat­ur­day morn­ing, a fifth mem­ber of the group, Anni­ka Spalde, 39, cut her way through the fence around a weapons plant in Karl­sko­ga and hung a ban­ner encour­ag­ing more dis­ar­ma­ment actions. She was lat­er arrest­ed. She is charged with severe crim­i­nal dam­age and tres­pass in a place of nation­al secu­ri­ty. Spalde, who was lat­er released, is a dea­con in the Swedish church, an author and peace activist.

BAE Sys­tems, own­er of the Karl­sko­ga plant, describes itself on its web­site as “the pre­mier glob­al defense and aero­space com­pa­ny” with 100,000 employ­ees world­wide and annu­al sales of $31.4 bil­lion. BAE author­i­ties con­firmed the break in. Curi­ous­ly, BAE press peo­ple in the US report­ed “very minor” dam­age while the BAE secu­ri­ty man­ag­er in Swe­den told the press there that he esti­mat­ed dam­age at 50,000 euros and was not cer­tain whether the dam­age would cre­ate delays in sched­uled deliv­er­ies of the weapons or not.

Saab, own­er of the Eskil­stu­na plant, pro­claims it serves the glob­al mar­ket with prod­ucts, ser­vices and solu­tions rang­ing from mil­i­tary defense to civ­il secu­ri­ty. It says it has 13,700 employ­ees and world­wide sales of $2.5 bil­lion. Lasse Jon­s­son, spokesper­son for Saab, told the media, “They have scrapped a quan­ti­ty of weapons’ spare parts that await­ed export. Only after the police inves­ti­ga­tion has been com­plet­ed will we be able to cal­cu­late the exact extent of the dam­age caused.”

Maja Back­lund, spokesper­son for OFOG, was quot­ed in the Hin­du Times: “Civ­il dis­obe­di­ence and action are most vital parts of demo­c­ra­t­ic devel­op­ment. Our col­leagues who breached the Saab fac­to­ry man­aged to dam­age 25 grenade launch­ers of the Carl Gus­tav brand that are in exten­sive use in Kash­mir and oth­er war zones in India.” OFOG also claims that some of the weapons dam­aged were of the same type as used by the U.S. mil­i­tary in Iraq.

Mem­bers of OFOG claim Swedish weapons exports have risen 88 per­cent since the US inva­sion of Iraq. They fur­ther claim that the Swedish gov­ern­ment is vio­lat­ing its pol­i­cy of peace and neu­tral­i­ty by sup­ply­ing war­ring coun­tries with arms.

Dea­con Spalde insist­ed these actions were nec­es­sary. “When your gov­ern­ment sup­ports an ille­gal war and sells arms to dic­ta­tor­ships, it’s time for ordi­nary cit­i­zens like us to take action.”

OFOG/Avrusta said “This action is the first dis­ar­ma­ment cam­paign in the 21st cen­tu­ry in Swe­den.” At this point, the cam­paign says it con­sists of activists will­ing to risk arrest and anoth­er fifty sup­port peo­ple.

“Our activists have pre­pared them­selves for more than a year for this cam­paign,” said a group mem­ber who asked to remain anony­mous. “They are ready to serve time in prison if Swedish soci­ety should fail to see that non­vi­o­lent civ­il dis­obe­di­ence to sus­pend the dis­as­trous Swedish arms exports to wars and dic­ta­tor­ships is less of a breach of law than these amoral arms exports.”

More dis­ar­ma­ment actions, OFOG/Avrusta promis­es, will be forth­com­ing.

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/10/swedish-peace-activists-repeatedly-break-into-weapon-factories/

http://ofog.org/about-campaign-avrusta

Guerrilla Gardening Comes To Chester

A group of Chester res­i­dents, hav­ing noticed that there is neglect­ed and orphaned land all over the city, decid­ed to form a guer­ril­la gar­den­ing troop. The term ‘guer­ril­la gar­den­ing’ is used loose­ly to describe dif­fer­ent forms of rad­i­cal gar­den­ing. Some­times this is gar­den­ing with polit­i­cal aims — per­haps high­light­ing land use issues — or some­times it is about grow­ing food.

A group of Chester res­i­dents, hav­ing noticed that there is neglect­ed and orphaned land all over the city, decid­ed to form a guer­ril­la gar­den­ing troop. The term ‘guer­ril­la gar­den­ing’ is used loose­ly to describe dif­fer­ent forms of rad­i­cal gar­den­ing. Some­times this is gar­den­ing with polit­i­cal aims — per­haps high­light­ing land use issues — or some­times it is about grow­ing food.

The troop of Guer­ril­la Gar­den­ers have been out and about in Chester. Their first project inv­oled trans­form­ing three lit­ter strewn planters on Christle­ton Road, one of the main gate­ways to the city. Lit­ter and weeds were removed and replaced with win­ter pan­sies, daf­fodils, for­get-me-nots and hon­ey­suck­le.

The troop wants to reclaim land from per­ceived neglect and mis­use. Armed with trow­els, bulbs and vision, their idea is to gar­den every­where, any­where.

One Guer­ril­la Gar­den­er stat­ed:

’ I was fed up of see­ing these planters filled with rub­bish and weeds every time I walked into the City Cen­tre. I want­ed to reclaim this resource for us all to enjoy’

The Guer­ril­la Gar­den­ers want to make Chester a more appeal­ing place to live, beau­ti­fy­ing the neigh­bour­hood and giv­ing it back to the com­mu­ni­ty.

To get involved or donate plants/saplings/ shrubs

con­tact chesterguerrillagardeners@hotmail.co.uk

The latest EF! Action Update is out, bringing you reports of eco-resistance for the darkening days…

Bring­ing light & inspi­ra­tion to the dark­er evenings are the action sto­ries in the lat­est Earth First! Action Update.

Block­ades of nuclear pow­er, roads & rivers around the world were joined “with this Shell-blockad­ing D‑lock I thee wed”.

Adjustable spanner photoBring­ing light & inspi­ra­tion to the dark­er evenings are the action sto­ries in the lat­est Earth First! Action Update.

Block­ades of nuclear pow­er, roads & rivers around the world were joined “with this Shell-blockad­ing D‑lock I thee wed”.

And if anti-fas­cist action, quar­ry sab­o­tage, squats, tree plat­forms, wrekin’ open­casts, scal­ing lux­u­ry hotels & the lat­est protest camp news was­n’t enough for you, chuck in some glue, arm tubes, a pool of oil, stink bombs, air­borne rape alarms and a Lego-sized occu­pa­tion, then there’s full reports from this sum­mer’s antics at the Camp for Cli­mate Action, Ross­port sol­i­dar­i­ty camp, EF! sum­mer gath­er­ing and Sav­ing Ice­land camp, plus a crop of glob­al cli­mate camps & news of protest & resis­tance from all 5 con­ti­nents.

“No nukes, no coal, no kid­ding” — with peo­ple dying (both lit­er­al­ly & sym­bol­i­cal­ly) from the activ­i­ties of the Earth-destroy­ers, peo­ple have been shout­ing to just “Leave it in the Ground”, drag­on boats have clashed with navy gun­boats in Ire­land, an oil war was declared in Nige­ria, and ‘moles’ spent a week under­ground dig­ging fur­ther and fur­ther away from the forces of dark­ness at an open-cast coal site.

Details of the new Coal Action Net­work, upcom­ing dates & a full con­tact list should help launch (or boost) you into the orbit of eco-resis­tance.

Sub­scribe and get it sent direct to a let­ter­box near you — you’d also be sup­port­ing the EF!AU to get print­ed and sent out to pris­on­ers & protest camps. If you want some to dis­trib­ute, con­tact us at: actionup­date (AT) earthfirst.org.uk

Down­load the lat­est issue or past issues here.

The EF!AU is there to inspire peo­ple to take eco­log­i­cal direct action, to pro­vide info to help you just get out and do it. Don’t feel shy, put your best foot for­ward.

The EF!AU is the quar­ter­ly newslet­ter of peo­ple tak­ing eco­log­i­cal direct action — send us news of your action or cam­paigns, and come along to the Win­ter Moot if you want to get involved in any of the cam­paigns you’ve read about.

What is Earth First!?

World Anti Mcdonalds Day

McCru­el­ty: “We’re not lov’in it” – Cam­bridge

McDonalds World Food Day protest CambridgeMcCru­el­ty: “We’re not lov’in it” – Cam­bridge

Two cam­paign­ers held a belat­ed mini protest for World Day Against McDon­alds today 18th Oct 08 in Cam­bridge city cen­tre. The ‘What’s Wrong With McDon­alds’ leaflets were dis­trib­uted. (For a copy see http://www.mcspotlight.org/campaigns/current/resources/index.html ) Passers by showed an inter­est and took leaflets. Some peo­ple took pic­tures.

Back in June one of the activists was arrest­ed on a walk in protest at the same McDon­alds and is await­ing tri­al in Decem­ber. The activist is charged under Sec­tion 5 of the Pub­lic Order Act. See http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/cambridge/2008/06/401637.html
A pre-tri­al hear­ing was held in July where a tri­al was set for Sep­tem­ber. How­ev­er it was lat­er post­poned until Decem­ber after a wit­ness was appar­ent­ly ill.

—–

World anti mcdon­alds day began for us in Coventry.Around 9 of us gave out hun­dreds of anti mcdon­alds leaflets and yum­my veg­an burgers.Most of the pub­lic we’re supportive,especially as there was free food,and showed gen­uine interest.One guy who start­ed with “I hate veg­ans & love big juicy cheese­burg­ers” left with one of our burg­ers and a smile on his face.

We had the Mcdon­alds manager,who pro­claimed to be veggie,come out with:“What about vegetables,u kill veg­eta­bles!”. Despite us telling him that veg­eta­bles have nei­ther ner­vous system,brain or a heart beat…he disagreed(saying they did! haha).

It was real­ly pos­i­tive day,with no police hassle,and plen­ty of warmth from the pub­lic

Shell Pulling Out of Glengad till early Spring

Impor­tant Update from Erris.
The word is – Shell are pulling out of Glen­gad and sus­pend­ing work till ear­ly Spring. Shell ‘con­sul­tants’ are inform­ing local res­i­dents that the beach is being ‘rein­stat­ed’ and the work will take a num­ber of weeks.

The Soli­taire has moved on and is ‘off hire’ to Shell.

Impor­tant Update from Erris.
The word is – Shell are pulling out of Glen­gad and sus­pend­ing work till ear­ly Spring. Shell ‘con­sul­tants’ are inform­ing local res­i­dents that the beach is being ‘rein­stat­ed’ and the work will take a num­ber of weeks.

The Soli­taire has moved on and is ‘off hire’ to Shell.

No press release has issued from Shell and they are behind in their week­ly ‘progress’ reports to the PAD (Petro­le­um Affairs Divi­son) of Min­is­ter Eamon Ryan’s Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion, Ener­gy and Nat­ur­al Resources, which can nor­mal­ly be read here: http://www.dcenr.gov.ie/Natural/Petroleum+Affairs+Division/Corrib+Gas+Field+Development/SEPIL+Weekly+Progress+Reports+to+PAD.htm

It appears that Shell are wrap­ping up oper­a­tions at the pro­posed land­fall site in Glen­gad. The trench exca­vat­ed through the cliffs into the pro­tect­ed areas is being back­filled, and the cause­way built out into Broad­haven Bay is being removed. Also one side of the site fenc­ing on the beach has been removed. And the cable drum has been removed from the winch.

Unfor­tu­nate­ly the com­mence­ment of remov­ing the cause­way will not be able to remove the hun­dreds of tonnes of fine mate­r­i­al, which has been washed away, pol­lut­ing the local sea area for miles. Fish­er­men have said they can see the dis­coloura­tion in the water 5 or 6 miles away from the Shell beach com­pound.

Var­i­ous mate­ri­als which Shell were sup­posed to have kept stored and sep­a­rate in the com­pound, have in fact been mixed and stored on the beach and much of this, as well as unsuit­able cause­way mate­ri­als, has been wash­ing away for months now, through high tides and rain.

Bro­ken con­crete and steel have also been added to these mate­r­i­al heaps, which I would assume will be dumped or buried on site, whether on the beach or inside the com­pound in the SAC/SPA. It appears that this ‘for­eign rub­ble’ is now being used to fill the trench which was dug through the cliff to take the pipe.

The Soli­taire has left Scot­land for the Span­ish port of Algee­rias, near Gibral­tar, a main bunker port, sev­er­al days ago.

For unknown rea­sons Shell con­tin­ue to employ boats to sit in the bay a few hun­dred metres from the land­fall site, with 3 boats there this morn­ing, includ­ing a small tug / winch boat. Its not clear what if any­thing they are doing.

The road widen­ing and upgrades to facil­i­tate Shell have con­tin­ued, with Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil clos­ing or block­ing the road for long peri­ods despite vehe­ment local objec­tions to these upgrade works, with peo­ple liv­ing along the route being forced to block the sides of the road at their prop­er­ties to pre­vent the Coun­cil steal­ing their mar­gins to widen the road for Shell.

I would remind peo­ple who are inter­est­ed that AFRI are hold­ing a Hedge School, which looks to be even bet­ter than last year’s with a week­end of talks from some very rel­e­vant peo­ple, http://www.corribsos.com/index.php?id=515&event=1 or http://www.afri.ie for details. That’s the 24th, 25th & 26th Oct.

World Food Day

Octo­ber 16th, World Food Day is also the 23rd Inter­na­tion­al Day of Action Against McDon­alds, once again to be marked by Veg­gies in Not­ting­ham, this year with a Veg­an Free Food Give­away at Exchange Walk, and in Lon­don by Veg­an Cam­paigns with a protest at Regents Street.

Rich pig eats poorOcto­ber 16th, World Food Day is also the 23rd Inter­na­tion­al Day of Action Against McDon­alds, once again to be marked by Veg­gies in Not­ting­ham, this year with a Veg­an Free Food Give­away at Exchange Walk, and in Lon­don by Veg­an Cam­paigns with a protest at Regents Street.

On 7–8 Octo­ber 2008, the Euro­pean Com­mis­sion, the Euro­pean Par­lia­ment and the Unit­ed Nations marked the anniver­sary of the Dec­la­ra­tion of Human Rights which assures every­one’s enti­tle­ment ‘to a stan­dard of liv­ing ade­quate for the health and well-being of him­self and of his fam­i­ly, includ­ing food’.

Six­ty years after sign­ing that dec­la­ra­tion of good will, the Food and Agri­cul­tur­al Orga­ni­za­tion (FAO) is plan­ning the cel­e­bra­tion of World Food Day 2008 to ‘high­light the plight of 923 mil­lion under­nour­ished peo­ple in the world’.

What went wrong?

Why are almost one bil­lion peo­ple still exclud­ed from the most basic of Human Rights in the 21st cen­tu­ry?

“Every child who dies of hunger in today’s world has been mur­dered,” accused Jean Ziegler, for­mer Unit­ed Nations Spe­cial Rap­por­teur on the Right to Food. Indeed, how can any soci­ety call­ing itself civ­i­lized accept that while world­wide every five sec­onds a child dies because she or he is hun­gry, around 1.5 bil­lion cows and bulls and an astro­nom­i­cal num­ber of oth­er farm ani­mals are being fed with a huge share of avail­able crops?

More than the pop­u­la­tions of USA, Cana­da and the EU do not have enough to eat

Nation­al and inter­na­tion­al deci­sion mak­ers have ini­ti­at­ed a mul­ti­tude of projects and cam­paigns in their fight against hunger; unfor­tu­nate­ly, noth­ing has improved the sit­u­a­tion. The non-stop mis­ery caused by hunger calls urgent­ly for fresh strate­gies, of which veg­e­tar­i­an­ism must be one!

In the inter­est of jus­tice and human­i­ty the present wast­ing of 7–16 kg of grain or soy beans, up to 15,500 litres of water, and 323 m² of graz­ing land that yields just one kilo of beef can­not be allowed to con­tin­ue.

23 Sep­tem­ber 2008 was ‘Over­shoot Day’ — mile­stone when human­i­ty will have used all the resources nature will gen­er­ate this year: http://www.footprintnetwork.org/gfn_sub.php?content=overshoot

Con­sid­er­ing that glob­al­ly, we now require the equiv­a­lent of 1.4 plan­ets to sup­port our lifestyles, ‘Over­shoot Day’ should be a wake-up call for politi­cians and indi­vid­u­als alike.

With the aim of help­ing peo­ple in need, sav­ing the envi­ron­ment and boost­ing pub­lic health, the reduc­tion or the end of eat­ing meat is the eas­i­est and most ben­e­fi­cial way ahead.

The fact that we do have more than enough resources to feed every­one must no longer be com­pro­mised by the greed for meat.

For ref­er­ences see http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/sep/07/food.beef and http://www.evana.org/index.php?id=38147

Inter­na­tion­al Day of Action Against McDon­alds: http://www.veggies.org.uk/event.php?ref=50

Veg­an Cam­paigns (Lon­don): http:www.vegancampaigns.org.uk

Not­ting­ham Veg­an Free Food Give-Aways: http://www.veggies.org.uk/event.php?ref=1400

Past events have includ­ed:

July 31st & August 21st out­side McNasty — http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/nottinghamshire/2008/08/405531.html

July 4th, in advance of Viva!’s Incred­i­ble Veg­gie Road­show — http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/nottinghamshire/2008/07/402884.html

June 3rd: Day of Action on Food and Cli­mate Change — http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/nottinghamshire/2008/06/400106.html

May 15th: McLi­bel Human Rights Anniver­sary — http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/nottinghamshire/2008/05/399158.html

info@veggies.org.uk
http://wwwveggies.org.uk/nvvs

Picnic in the Park — mass trespass in Derbyshire, 25th October

Pic­nic in the Park, the Sequel
Sat­ur­day 25 Octo­ber

A new open-cast coal mine site is gear­ing into action in beau­ti­ful Der­byshire and must be stopped. Leave it in the Ground, sup­port­ed by Earth First!, invites you to a sec­ond Pic­nic in the Park for a Mass Tres­pass to get to know the area, meet the locals and have fun…

Picnic in the Park 2 mass trespassPic­nic in the Park, the Sequel
Sat­ur­day 25 Octo­ber

A new open-cast coal mine site is gear­ing into action in beau­ti­ful Der­byshire and must be stopped. Leave it in the Ground, sup­port­ed by Earth First!, invites you to a sec­ond Pic­nic in the Park for a Mass Tres­pass to get to know the area, meet the locals and have fun…

So come and Dis­cov­er Der­byshire!

Meet at the Vis­i­tors Cen­tre, Ship­ley Coun­ty Park, off Slack Lane, Heanor DE75 7GX at 12 noon on Sat­ur­day 25 Octo­ber (map).

For more info see www.leaveitintheground.org.uk or call 0780 4018214

Spirit of Freedom (October 2008) — support the eco-prisoners

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)

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)

Wel­come to the Octo­ber 2008 edi­tion of Spir­it of Free­dom. The last month has been a month of mixed emo­tions for ELP. On the one hand we heard the bril­liant news that the Dutch ani­mal rights activist, Ger­ben Jan, was found not guilty of assault­ing a police offi­cer, caus­ing the offi­cer to break his leg, dur­ing an ani­mal rights demo in Swe­den. Instead Ger­ban was found guilty of resist­ing arrest for which he was fined and deport­ed. Also in an unex­pect­ed move, all the Aus­tri­an Ani­mal Rights pris­on­ers were released from prison pend­ing their tri­al! Plus, the Amer­i­can veg­an, Nathan Kno­erl, was grant­ed bail in his case where he is accused of involve­ment in an anti-vivi­sec­tion protest. Fol­low­ing Nathans release a sup­port cam­paign has been set up to try and help raise mon­ey for Nathan’s forth­com­ing legal case. For more info please e‑mail supportnathan@gmail.com. How­ev­er, just as ELP start­ed to think our pris­on­er lists might start to go down, we received news of fur­ther police raids in Aus­tria. ELP also learnt that, due to Frank Ambrose, grass­ing every­one up, the Amer­i­can’s Marie Mason, Stephanie Lynne Fultz, and Aren Burth­wick, have all had to enter Plea Bar­gains and admit some of the charges set against them. In Marie’s case she has admit­ted her direct role in an ELF arson on a Uni­ver­si­ty build­ing involved with GM crop tests, whilst Stephanie and Aren have admit­ted not report­ing a fire (Stephanie has admit­ted cut­ting Marie’s hair which was burnt fol­low­ing the arson). We don’t know what sen­tences Stephanie and Aren are like­ly to receive, but Marie is look­ing at 15 to 20 years and has been remand­ed into cus­tody. This is real­ly bad news, espe­cial­ly as it was hoped Marie might remain free until her sen­tenc­ing ear­ly next year. Around the world, peo­ple are being impris­oned for stand­ing up for what they believe in and try­ing to
help the ani­mals and the earth. So please, no mat­ter where you are in the world, sup­port the eco-pris­on­ers. And no com­pro­mise in defence of Moth­er Earth.

ECO-DEFENCE PRISONERS

Tre Arrow, #70936–065, (in tran­sit), USA. Serv­ing 78 months for his involve­ment in two ELF 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 Bor­der 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).

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. (Meat eater).

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).

Bryan Lefey #38664–086, FDC SeaT­ac, Fed­er­al Deten­tion Cen­ter, P.O. Box 13900, Seat­tle, WA 98198, USA. On remand accused of an ELF action that saw the dam­ag­ing of GM trees and the dam­ag­ing of US Forestry Ser­vice vehi­cles. (Diet unknown).

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).

Marie Jeanette Mason, Neway­go Coun­ty Jail, PO Box 845, White Cloud, MI 49349, USA. Await­ing sen­tenc­ing hav­ing plead­ed guilty to involve­ment in ELF arson against a Uni­ver­si­ty build­ing car­ry­ing out Genet­i­cal­ly Mod­i­fied crop tests. Marie also plead­ed guilty to con­spir­ing to car­ry out ELF actions and also admit­ted involve­ment in 12 oth­er ELF actions. Marie is expect­ed to receive a sen­tence of between 15–20 years. (Marie is a veg­an).

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, #63794–053, USP Mar­i­on, US Pen­i­ten­tiary, PO Box 1000, Mar­i­on, IL 62959, 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, FCI Dan­bury, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, Route 37, Dan­bury, CT 06811, 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).

Dan Amos VN7818, HMP Win­ches­ter, Rom­sey Road, Win­ches­ter SO22 5DF, Eng­land.
On remand hav­ing plead­ed guilty to con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Dan is a veg­an)

Gregg Avery TA7450, HMP Win­ches­ter, Rom­sey Road, Win­ches­ter, SO22 5DF, Eng­land. On remand hav­ing plead­ed guilty to con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Gregg is a veg­an).

Natasha Avery NR8987, HMP Bronze­field, Woodthor­pe Road, Ash­ford, Mid­dx. TW15 3JZ, Eng­land. On remand hav­ing plead­ed guilty to con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (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).

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).

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).

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).

Sean Kirt­ley WC 6977, HMP Stafford, 54 Gaol Road, Stafford, ST16 3AW, 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).

John Smith, TB4887, HMP Lind­holme, Bawtry Road, Hat­field Wood­house, Don­cast­er, DN7 6EE, Eng­land. Serv­ing 12 years for attempt­ing to black­mail a farmer who sup­plied guinea pigs for vivi­sec­tion. (John is a veg­an).

Andrew Stepan­ian #26399–050, USP Mar­i­on, P.O. Box 1000 Mar­i­on, IL 62959, 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 DEFENDANTS
The Lec­ce Defen­dants 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).

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).

Yuri Yure­vich Milevskiy, SIZO #7 kam­era 38, g. Brest, ul. Kar­la Mark­sa 86, 224000 Belarus. On remand for fight­ing with neo-nazis. (Diet unknown).

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).

Richard Sills (Address Unknown, USA). Serv­ing 15 months for bomb hoax­ing a Uni­ver­si­ty say­ing they would be tar­get­ed by the ALF if they didn’t stop their ani­mal exper­i­ments. (Diet unknown).

Michael W. Sykes, 696693, 3855 Coop­er St, Jack­son, MI 49201, 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

Earth Lib­er­a­tion Pris­on­ers Sup­port Net­work
elp4321@hotmail.com
http://spiritoffreedom.org.uk

Halloween land squat, Birmingham — housing crisis

POSSIBLE DEVELOPMENT OF GREEN FIELD SITES FOR HOUSING

The issue of a lack of good qual­i­ty, well main­tained homes for social rent has long been an issue in Birm­ing­ham

Poor qual­i­ty and bad­ly main­tained rent­ed homes cause a vari­ety of prob­lems for their occu­pants includ­ing poor health.

POSSIBLE DEVELOPMENT OF GREEN FIELD SITES FOR HOUSING

The issue of a lack of good qual­i­ty, well main­tained homes for social rent has long been an issue in Birm­ing­ham

Poor qual­i­ty and bad­ly main­tained rent­ed homes cause a vari­ety of prob­lems for their occu­pants includ­ing poor health.

Dur­ing cold­er months the issue of insu­la­tion is a major prob­lem with those on low wages or ben­e­fits not being able to heat their home prop­er­ly. AND IT IS YET ANOTHER SOURCE OF CLIMATE CHANGE caused by a lack of insu­la­tion

On Sep­tem­ber 1st 2008 JUSTICE NOT CRISIS action group scaled the Town Hall in Birm­ing­ham to protest at the coun­cil’s social hous­ing pol­i­cy.

On Thurs­day 30th Octo­ber JUSTICE NOT CRISIS are squat­ting a piece of vacant coun­cil hous­ing land and set­ting up the JOHN LINES HOMELESS VILLAGE. We intend to cel­e­brate Hal­loween on the Fri­day and stay for as long as pos­si­ble.

For full up to date info please vis­it the web site at www.justicenotcrisis.wordpress.com
email us at justice.not.crisis@googlemail.com

We are cam­paign­ing for:

1. That the coun­cil release some of their hous­ing land to hous­ing asso­ci­a­tions so that they can use £100m worth of gov­ern­ment grants to build 2,000 new homes for social rent.
2. We oppose the build­ing of 1,000s of new homes on green field sites in and around Birm­ing­ham as part of the coun­cils aspi­ra­tion to build up to 60,000 new homes.
3. We want to see the coun­cil improve their homes to a much bet­ter stan­dard than the laugh­able “decent homes stan­dard”.

Earth First! Winter Moot — last update

Brighton, Feb­ru­ary 6–7‑8th 2009

The Earth First! Win­ter moot is an oppor­tu­ni­ty for peo­ple who feel affil­i­a­tion with the ideas behind Earth First! to net­work, dis­cuss and reflect on the eco­log­i­cal direct action move­ment and to plan for the future. In con­trast with the year­ly EF! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing, which is held out­side for around five days, the win­ter moot is a short­er week­end meet­ing, inside, less aimed at skill shar­ing and more at look­ing where we are at as move­ment and where we want to be going.

EF! Winter Moot poster 2009Brighton, Feb­ru­ary 6–7‑8th 2009

The Earth First! Win­ter moot is an oppor­tu­ni­ty for peo­ple who feel affil­i­a­tion with the ideas behind Earth First! to net­work, dis­cuss and reflect on the eco­log­i­cal direct action move­ment and to plan for the future. In con­trast with the year­ly EF! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing, which is held out­side for around five days, the win­ter moot is a short­er week­end meet­ing, inside, less aimed at skill shar­ing and more at look­ing where we are at as move­ment and where we want to be going.

Earth First! is not an organ­i­sa­tion, but a ban­ner for non-hier­ar­chi­cal organ­is­ing and the use of direct action to con­front, stop and even­tu­al­ly reverse the forces that are respon­si­ble for the destruc­tion of the Earth and its inhab­i­tants.

Top­ics that have been raised include (Updat­ed):
— the Copen­hagen cli­mate sum­mit with a num­ber of peo­ple from Den­mark com­ing over to talk about logis­tics, tac­tics and mobil­i­sa­tion
— the G20 sum­mit in Lon­don
— Leave it in the ground / coal
— GM
— Ross­port
— Strength­en­ing the EF net­work: com­mu­ni­ca­tion and secu­ri­ty, actionup­date and gath­er­ings
— Impli­ca­tions of the cri­sis
— Cli­mate and migra­tion / eco-activism and Nobor­der net­works
— Heathrow expan­sion
— UK Bio­fu­els
— Nan­otech­nol­o­gy
— Water-based actions

There will not be work­shops on any of these top­ics — please inform your­self on top­ics of your inter­est before the moot. We will be focus­ing on dis­cussing strat­e­gy and action plan­ning.

There will be a Sav­ing Ice­land meet­ing on the Fri­day after­noon before the gath­er­ing.

Please con­tact the orga­niz­ing col­lec­tive (moot2009@earthfirst.org.uk) know if you want to add any­thing, want to help with facil­i­ta­tion or have any oth­er queries. You are wel­come to use our PGP key below.
Sug­ges­tion: read the activist secu­ri­ty guide on http://www.activistsecurity.org/

There will be sleep­ing places arranged and food avail­able at cost price from Fri­day evening. The pro­gram will start on Sat­ur­day at 10 AM. Please be on time.

Venue: Cow­ley Club, 12 Lon­don Road.
http://www.cowleyclub.org.uk/
(Please do not con­tact the Cow­ley Club phone nr. with infor­ma­tion requests).
Click for direc­tions

Please note:
— No dogs please
— The week­end is not open to jour­nal­ists

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So, here’s the low­down on what the Dan­ish peo­ple com­ing over for the EF! Win­ter Moot will be talk­ing about.

*Copen­hagen Cli­mate Sum­mit*
Do we cheer them on, block them in, or close them down?

*When?*
*Where?*
*What?* Dan­ish Kli­max activists will kick off a dis­cus­sion about the move­ment to stop cli­mate change.
*Why?* The UN talks in Copen­hagen this Decem­ber are sup­posed to be the place where world lead­ers agree a new inter­na­tion­al deal to stop cli­mate change.
But progress so far has been under­mined by cor­po­rate lob­by­ing and false, mar­ket-based solu­tions. When activists from across Europe hit the streets of Copen­hagen, should we be call­ing on gov­ern­ments to do bet­ter, blockad­ing them in until they come up with a good deal, or be say­ing they are so flawed we should try to close them down?

Most peo­ple now agree that we need to do some­thing about cli­mate change. But there isn’t agree­ment on what. For cor­po­ra­tions and most gov­ern­ments its a form of green (or maybe green­washed) cap­i­tal­ism and before we even get there it will prob­a­bly be too late. In oppo­si­tion to this cor­po­rate agen­da, social move­ments in the South have pro­posed ‘cli­mate jus­tice’, a tran­si­tion to a sus­tain­able world which sees the rich minor­i­ty who caused cli­mate change pay to put it right, not try and push the costs onto the poor major­i­ty.

With­in this more pro­gres­sive agen­da pro­pos­als range from a ‘green new deal’ of state-led invest­ment for social and envi­ron­men­tal goals, to those who argue that only a grass­roots anti-cap­i­tal­ism can get us out of this mess. This is the polit­i­cal back­ground to the mobil­i­sa­tion around the Copen­hagen cli­mate talks and the strate­gic and tac­ti­cal deci­sions activists are try­ing to make about it.

This is a chance for activists who are less and more involved in cli­mate cam­paign­ing to come togeth­er and dis­cuss all these issues. We can also talk about how we mobilise for what may be one of the most impor­tant events since the ‘bat­tle’ of Seat­tle exact­ly 10 years pre­vi­ous­ly.