Saving Iceland tour coming to Oxford

Mon­day 23 April 7.30pm
Oxford Action Resource Cen­tre (OARC) 44b Princes St (cor­ner of Cow­ley Road)

Activists from the Sav­ing Ice­land cam­paign to defend Europe’s last great wilder­ness from destruc­tion by dams and cor­po­rate ‘devel­op­ment’ will be in Oxford next Mon­day (23rd). Come and meet them to hear about the cam­paign, this sum­mer’s protest camp and forth­com­ing con­fer­ence. Find out what peo­ple in Britain can do to help.

Dead Icelandic reindeerMon­day 23 April 7.30pm
Oxford Action Resource Cen­tre (OARC) 44b Princes St (cor­ner of Cow­ley Road)

Activists from the Sav­ing Ice­land cam­paign to defend Europe’s last great wilder­ness from destruc­tion by dams and cor­po­rate ‘devel­op­ment’ will be in Oxford next Mon­day (23rd). Come and meet them to hear about the cam­paign, this sum­mer’s protest camp and forth­com­ing con­fer­ence. Find out what peo­ple in Britain can do to help.

Tea and cof­fee avail­able. Venue unfor­tu­nate­ly not wheel­chair acces­si­ble.

http://www.savingiceland.org/camp2007
http://www.savingiceland.org/conference

Support the Eco-Prisoners, Easter 2007

Spir­it of Free­dom (East­er 2007)
Pro­duced by EARTH LIBERATION PRISONERS SUPPORT NETWORK

“I thank you all dear­ly for writ­ing” (Jon Able­white, Ani­mal Rights Pris­on­er)

Spir­it of Free­dom (East­er 2007)
Pro­duced by EARTH LIBERATION PRISONERS SUPPORT NETWORK

“I thank you all dear­ly for writ­ing” (Jon Able­white, Ani­mal Rights Pris­on­er)

Wel­come to the East­er 2007 edi­tion of Spir­it of Free­dom. First off I’d like to apol­o­gise in the delay in pub­lish­ing this edi­tion of Spir­it of Free­dom.
A lot of things have been hap­pen­ing recent­ly for ELP’s vol­un­teers and a delay was inevitable. How­ev­er, despite the delay in pub­li­ca­tion ELP has some fan­tas­tic news. For the first time in ages ELP is able to bring some good news! A lot of the ‘Il Sil­vestre’ pris­on­ers have been released! Mar­co Camenisch has had his sen­tence reduced at appeal! Jeff Luers may have his sen­tenced reduced! Rod Coro­n­a­do has been released! Garfield Gab­bard has been released! And long-term pris­on­er Dave Blenk­in­sop has been released!!!
This is all bril­liant news. How­ev­er despite our cel­e­bra­tions, ELP has also seen a num­ber of new pris­on­ers added to our list. So lets cel­e­brate the good news of our friends and then lets sup­port the news pris­on­ers. Also before we end this edi­to­r­i­al we’ve been asked by Joy­an­na Zach­er to remind every­one on ELP’s pol­i­cy towards police infor­mants. We do not sup­port them! Regard­less of how long they are jailed for, we do not sup­port them. Regard­less of who they are, we do not sup­port them. A police infor­mant relin­quish­es their right to be regard­ed as an eco-pris­on­er as soon as they inform. ELP sup­ports eco-pris­on­ers, not police infor­mants. But remem­ber, no mat­ter where you are in the world, sup­port the real eco-pris­on­ers and no com­pro­mise in defence of Moth­er Earth!

COURT REPORTS & LEGAL UPDATES

MARCO CAMENISCH APPEAL NEWS
In mid March 2007 ELP received some news from Switzer­land that at his appeal, Mar­co Camenisch, has had his 17-year prison sen­tence, for alleged­ly killing a Swiss board­er guard, reduced to 8 years. The Appeal Court ruled that the orig­i­nal Judge had not tak­en into account Mar­co’s time spent in prison in Italy for destroy­ing elec­tric­i­ty pylons, nor had the Judge ful­ly con­sid­ered the out­stand­ing prison sen­tence Mar­co had to serve for destroy­ing elec­tric­i­ty pylons in Switzer­land. Added alto­geth­er (39 years), the prison sen­tence was exces­sive­ly long and so was reduced so now Mar­co is serv­ing an 18-year sen­tence.

JEFF LUERS APPEAL UPDATE
On Valen­tines Day (Feb 14th) the Amer­i­can media announced that the Court of Appeal has declared Jeff ‘Free’ Luers, 22+ years prison sen­tence is too long and sug­gest­ed it should be reduced to between 11+ to 13+ years. ELP will bring you more news as we get it.

ARRESTS IN MEXICO
On the 30th of Novem­ber 2006 two Mex­i­can anar­chists, Oscar San­ta Maria Caro and Sacra­men­to Delfi­no Cano Her­nan­dez, were arrest­ed for as yet unknown rea­sons. Oscar is a well known ani­mal rights activist who is involved with RATA (Resis­tance Against Ani­mal Tor­ture). Reports are com­ing out of Mex­i­co alleg­ing that both Oscar and Sacra­men­to have been tor­tured whilst inside. There are also reports alleg­ing that their inter­roga­tors have threat­ened to rape female polit­i­cal pris­on­ers if the two men do not con­fess to their alleged crimes. ELP is try­ing to obtain more infor­ma­tion about these arrests and will bring you more news as we get it.

ROD CORONADO UPDATE
In late March, Amer­i­can Earth First! activist, Rod Coro­n­a­do, was released from prison hav­ing served his sen­tence for sab­o­tag­ing a moun­tain lion hunt. ELP has learnt that Rod’s tri­al for “demon­strat­ing the use of a destruc­tive device,” relat­ing to a speech he gave in San Diego in 2003, is sched­uled to begin in June.

FINNISH ‘GREEN SCARE’
ELP has learnt that the author­i­ties in Fin­land appear to be copy­ing Amer­i­can tac­tics and are tar­get­ing known ani­mal rights and envi­ron­men­tal activists. No mat­ter how minor the ‘offence’ the Finnish police seem deter­mined to pros­e­cute. One per­son end­ed up in court for ring­ing the door­bell of an ani­mal abuser whilst on a demo. The activist was fined for “dis­turb­ing home peace”. Anoth­er activist was ques­tioned for ‘crim­i­nal dam­age’ after they alleged­ly spat on a fur shop win­dow! Two more activists were raid­ed and ques­tioned for alleged­ly putting a leaflet through a post box and putting a stick­er on the win­dow of a fur shop. The police accused them of ‘crim­i­nal dam­age’.
ELP’s Finnish friends, who wish to remain anony­mous for obvi­ous rea­sons, say these are just a few exam­ples of the types of police activ­i­ty hap­pen­ing in Fin­land at the moment.
ELP is informed that the police have set up a spe­cial unit to inves­ti­gate ani­mal rights activists and the unit has said intend to get activists involved in the ear­ly stages of activism ‘before it gets more seri­ous’. Trans­la­tion, the police want to intim­i­date peo­ple away from activism.

SERIOUS ORGANISED CRIME!
Every so often ELP brings you sto­ries of ridicu­lous pros­e­cu­tions of non-vio­lent activists under Britain’s new ‘Seri­ous Organ­ised Crime’ leg­is­la­tion. Who can for­get the fines imposed on two peace activists for read­ing out the names of the British war dead, killed in Iraq, whilst stand­ing next to Britain’s main war memo­r­i­al! Sad­ly the courts have now moved beyond just fin­ing peo­ple and have start­ed to hand out prison sen­tences to activists under this new law. In ear­ly March three British ani­mal rights activists were jailed for between 15 months to 4 years for their part in a non-vio­lent cam­paign against Huntin­don Life Sci­ences.
Accord­ing to the BBC, the three were accused of being key fig­ures in a cam­paign against com­pa­nies with links to HLS. They were accused of enter­ing the offices of the com­pa­nies and demand­ing that those com­pa­nies cut their links to HLS. They were also accused of organ­is­ing loud demon­stra­tions against the com­pa­nies build­ings. Plus they were accused of tak­ing pho­tos of the peo­ple who worked for the com­pa­nies.

MAN ARRESTED IN AMERICA
At the end of March the Amer­i­can media report­ed that a 24-year old man, Grant Barnes, had been arrest­ed accused of set­ting fire to SUVs in Den­ver, CO. The media quot­ed the cops as say­ing incen­di­ary devices were used to dam­age the vehi­cles and one of the vehi­cles had ELF spray paint­ed on it. The police also stat­ed they did not believe that Grant Barnes was a mem­ber of the ELF.

IL SILVESTRE UPDATE
At the end of Feb­ru­ary 2007 the Ital­ian courts ruled that Sil­via Gueri­ni and Fed­eri­co Bonam­i­ci should be released under house arrest. This means that only three Il Sil­vestre mem­bers are cur­rent­ly impris­oned. They are Benedet­ta Galante, Francesco Gioia and Costan­ti­no Ragusa.

ECO-DEFENCE PRISONERS

Fadal­la Idris Ala­jaimy (address unknown). Sudan anti-dam pro­test­er on remand accused of Wag­ing War against the State for protest­ing against the con­struc­tion of a dam.

Mohamed Ahmed Ala­jaimy (address unknown). Sudan anti-dam pro­test­er on remand accused of Wag­ing War against the State for protest­ing against the con­struc­tion of a dam.

Tre Arrow, CS# 05850722, Van­cou­ver Island Region­al Cor­rec­tion Cen­ter, 4216 Wilkin­son Rd., Vic­to­ria, BC, V8Z 5B2, Cana­da. On remand accused of involve­ment with an arson on log­ging trucks and an arson on vehi­cles owned by a sand & grav­el com­pa­ny. Both arsons occurred in the USA. Tre is fight­ing his extra­di­tion to the USA.

Grant Barnes #1533241, PO Box 1108, Den­ver, CO 80201, USA. On remand accused of set­ting fire to a num­ber of SUV vehi­cles. On one of the vehi­cles the let­ters ELF was spray-paint­ed.

Nathan Block, #1663667, Lane Coun­ty Jail, 101 W 5th Ave., Eugene, OR 97401, USA. Await­ing sen­tenc­ing hav­ing admit­ted involve­ment in an arson against a Poplar Tree Farm and an arson against an SUV deal­er­ship. Also admit­ted involve­ment in a con­spir­a­cy to car­ry out direct action in Ore­gon.

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.

Ibai Eder­ra, Car­cel de Pam­plona, C/San Roque. Apdo. 250, 31080 — Iruñez Pam­plona, Navar­ra (España), Spain. Serv­ing just under 5 years for sab­o­tag­ing machin­ery at the con­tro­ver­sial Itoiz dam con­struc­tion site.

Benedet­ta Galante, Casa Cir­con­dar­i­ale, Con­tra­da Capo di Monte, 82100 — Ben­even­to (BN), Italy. Il Sil­vestre activist sen­tenced to 3 years 6 months for pro­mot­ing & par­tic­i­pat­ing in COR direct action. Also await­ing tri­al accused of using explo­sives to dam­age an elec­tric­i­ty pylon in protest at nuclear ener­gy.

Francesco Gioia, Via Maiano, 10, 06049 Spo­le­to, Italy. Il Sil­vestre activist sen­tenced to 5 years 2 months for pro­mot­ing & par­tic­i­pat­ing in COR direct action. Also await­ing tri­al for escap­ing from house arrest.

Jef­frey Luers, #13797671, OSP, 2605 State St. Salem, OR 97310, USA. Serv­ing 22 years & 8 months for arson on a SUV deal­er­ship & the attempt­ed arson of an oil truck.

Ali Mohamed Alhas­sen Mas­sad (address unknown). Sudan anti-dam pro­test­er on remand accused of Wag­ing War against the State for protest­ing against the con­struc­tion of a dam.

Eric McDavid X‑2972521 4E 231A, Sacra­men­to Coun­ty Main Jail, 651 “I” Street, Sacra­men­to, CA 95814, USA. On Remand accused of plan­ning to destroy the prop­er­ty of the U.S. Forestry Ser­vice, mobile phone masts and pow­er plants.

Costan­ti­no Ragusa, Casa Cir­con­dar­i­ale, Via Prati Nuovi 7, 27058 Voghera (PV), Italy. Il Sil­vestre activist serv­ing 7½ years. 1) Five years for pro­mot­ing & par­tic­i­pat­ing in COR direct action. 2) 18-months for bur­gling and fire­bomb­ing a multi­na­tion­al com­pa­ny. 3) 12-months for organ­is­ing an anti-GM protest. Costani­no is also await­ing tri­al accused of using explo­sives to dam­age an elec­tric­i­ty pylon in protest at nuclear ener­gy.

John Wade #38548–083, FCI Peters­burg Low, Satel­lite Camp, PO Box 90027, Peters­burg, VA 23804, USA. Serv­ing 37 months for a series of ELF actions against a num­ber of tar­gets includ­ing McDon­alds & Burg­er King; urban sprawl; the con­struc­tion indus­try; and an SUV deal­er­ship.

Joy­an­na Zach­er #1662550, Lane Coun­ty Jail, 101 W 5th Ave, Eugene, OR 97401, USA. Await­ing sen­tenc­ing hav­ing admit­ted involve­ment in an arson against a Poplar Tree Farm and an arson against an SUV deal­er­ship. Also admit­ted involve­ment in a con­spir­a­cy to car­ry out direct action in Ore­gon.

ANIMAL LIBERATION PRISONERS

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.

Made­line Buck­ler PR7492, HMP Mor­ton Hall, Swinder­by, Lin­coln, LN6 9PT, Eng­land. Serv­ing 2 years for send­ing hate mail to a fam­i­ly who sup­plied guinea pigs for vivi­sec­tion.

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.

Don­ald Cur­rie TN4593, HMP White­moor, Longhill Road, March, Cambs, PE15 OPR, Eng­land. Serv­ing an Inde­ter­mi­nate Sen­tence, of not less than six actu­al years, for car­ry­ing out arsons against tar­gets asso­ci­at­ed the vivi­sec­tion indus­try includ­ing HLS.

Josh Dem­mitt 12314–081, FCI Saf­ford, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, P.O. Box 9000, Saf­ford, AZ 85548, USA. Serv­ing 30 months for an ALF arson on a Uni­ver­si­ty ani­mal test­ing facil­i­ty.

Dar­ius Fullmer #26397–050, FCI Fort Dix Satel­lite Camp, P.O. Box 1000, Fort Dix, NJ 08640 USA. Serv­ing 12 months for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign.

Lau­ren Gaz­zo­la #93497–011, FCI Dan­bury Route #37, 33 1/2 Pem­broke Road, Dan­bury, CT 06811 USA. Serv­ing 54 months impris­on­ment for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign.

Sarah Gis­borne, LT5393, HMP Cookham Wood, Rochester, Kent, ME1 3LU, Eng­land. Serv­ing 5½ years for con­spir­a­cy to cause crim­i­nal dam­age fol­low­ing the dam­ag­ing of 8 vehi­cles owned by peo­ple linked to Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ence.

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.

Joseph Har­ris TN5728, HMP Bulling­don, Patrick Haugh Road, Arn­cott, Nr. Bices­ter, Oxon, OX25 1WD, Eng­land. Serv­ing 2 years for dam­ag­ing the prop­er­ty of peo­ple asso­ci­at­ed with Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (His orig­i­nal sen­tence was reduced on appeal).

Kevin Kjon­aas #93502–011, FCI Sand­stone, PO Box 1000, Sand­stone, MN 55072 USA. Serv­ing 72 months impris­on­ment for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign.

Josephine Mayo PR6508, HMP Drake Hall, Eccle­shall, Stafford­shire, ST21 6LQ, Eng­land. Serv­ing 4 years for attempt­ing to black­mail a farmer who sup­plied guinea pigs for vivi­sec­tion.

Trish Portwine, TM7153, HMP Cookham Wood, Rochester, Kent, ME1 3LU, Eng­land. Serv­ing fif­teen months for her role in loud demon­stra­tions out­side the offices of com­pa­nies with links to HLS.

John Smith TB4887, HMP Lowd­ham Grange, Lowd­ham, Not­ting­ham, NG14 7DA, Eng­land. Serv­ing 12 years for attempt­ing to black­mail a farmer who sup­plied guinea pigs for vivi­sec­tion.

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.

Mark Tay­lor TT6636, HMP Bel­marsh, West­ern Way, Thames­mead, Lon­don, SE28 0UB, Eng­land. Serv­ing four years for organ­is­ing loud demon­stra­tions out­side the offices of com­pa­nies with links to HLS.

Suzanne Tay­lor, TM7154, HMP Cookham Wood, Rochester, Kent, ME1 3LU, Eng­land. Serv­ing two and a half years for help­ing organ­ise loud demon­stra­tions out­side the offices of com­pa­nies with links to HLS.

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.

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.

OTHER ANTI-WAR PRISONERS

Bren­dan Walsh, 12473–052, FCI Allen­wood Low, PO Box 1000, White Deer, PA 17887, USA. Serv­ing 5 years for an arson on an army recruit­ment office in protest at the War on Iraq.

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

Lasan­dra Bur­well W063658, Ohio Refor­ma­to­ry for Women, 1479 Collins Ave. Marysville, OH 43040, USA. Serv­ing 5 years for tak­ing part in an anti-fas­cist demon­stra­tion which turned into a riot.

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.

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.

Tomasz Wiloszews­ki, Zak­lad Karny, Orze­chowa 5, 98–200 Sier­adz, Poland. Serv­ing 15 years for acci­den­tal­ly killing a neo-nazi whilst defend­ing him­self.

PARTY & PROTEST
Around the world there have been sev­er­al mas­sive protests against glob­al cap­i­tal­ism and its envi­ron­men­tal impact. The fol­low­ing have all been jailed in con­nec­tion with the protests.

Jonathan Philip Robert, Crisp Coun­ty Deten­tion Cen­ter, 197 Ga. Hwy. 300 South, Cordele, GA 31015, USA (12 months)

OTHER PRISONERS

Oscar San­ta Maria Caro, CERESO, Miahu­at­lan de Por­firio Diaz, Oax­a­ca en Hall B, Cell 5., Mex­i­co. On remand. The exact charges against Oscar are unknown but Oscar is a mem­ber of RATA, a known ani­mal rights group.

Sacra­men­to Delfi­no Cano Her­nan­dez, CERESO, Miahu­at­lan de Por­firio Diaz, Oax­a­ca en Hall B, Cell 5., Mex­i­co. On remand. Co-defen­dant of Oscar San­ta Maria Caro.

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.

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.

MOVE
MOVE is an eco-rev­o­lu­tion­ary group who car­ried out protests in defence of all life. 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 Grate­ford, PO Box 244, Grate­ford, PA 19426–0244, USA.

Edward Good­man Africa (AM4974), 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.

MAPUCHE PRISONERS & OTHER LAND RIGHTS PRISONERS
Due to space lim­i­ta­tion we can­not pub­lish the names & address­es of the Mapuche & Land Rights pris­on­ers in this edi­tion of Spir­it of Free­dom, how­ev­er if you would like a list please con­tact Spir­it of Free­dom.

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 bimonth­ly pub­li­ca­tion (avail­able via e‑mail or in a paper ver­sion). If you would like to receive a copy con­tact Spir­it of Free­dom, BM Box 2407, Lon­don, WC1N 3XX, Eng­land. Or e‑mail ELP4321@hotmail.com

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

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

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.

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

North Amer­i­can ELP Pris­on­er Fund. The North Amer­i­can ELP group has set up a fund where peo­ple can pay mon­ey, for North Amer­i­can Eco-Defence and Ani­mal Rights pris­on­ers, which will then be dis­trib­uted to the North Amer­i­can pris­on­ers. For infor­ma­tion about the Fund and how to make a dona­tion please con­tact naelpsn@mutualaid.org

DEDICATION
This Edi­tion of Spir­it of Free­dom is ded­i­cat­ed to Russ­ian antifa activist, Stanislav Korepanov, who died in hos­pi­tal on the 31st of March 2007, hav­ing been attacked a few days ear­li­er by an armed gang of neo-nazis. Stanislav is the sec­ond Russ­ian antifa activist to have been bru­tal­ly attacked in recent months. On the 14th of Jan­u­ary 2007 veg­an ani­mal rights activist, Ivan Elin, was sur­round­ed and attacked by ten neo-nazis in St. Peters­burg after he had tak­en part in a week­ly “Food not bombs” peace ral­ly. Ivan suf­fered 21 stab wounds and was rushed to hos­pi­tal where he is mak­ing his recov­ery. Fol­low­ing on from the knife attack on Ivan, on the 4th of Feb­ru­ary, with a small bomb explod­ed in Vladimirskaya Square of St. Peters­burg, near to where Food Not Bombs organ­ise their week­ly protests. The bomb was hid­den in a kiosk sell­ing flow­ers. Luck­i­ly the bomb only dam­aged the kiosk and did not injure any­one.
This is not the first time neo-nazis have used knives or explo­sives to tar­get Russ­ian activists. On the 22nd of Decem­ber 2006 a num­ber of police were injured whilst try­ing to defuse a device, which set to mur­der antifa activists in Moscow. In August 2006 eleven peo­ple were killed in Moscow when a neo-nazi bomb explod­ed in Cherk­isovs­ki mar­ket­place. The bru­tal mur­der of Stanislav Korepanov and the attack against Ivan are a remind­ed of why fas­cism must nev­er be allowed to go unchal­lenged. ELP wish­es Ivan Elin a speedy recov­ery from his injuries and we con­grat­u­late the Russ­ian ‘Food Not Bombs’ move­ment for not giv­ing into this neo-nazi intim­i­da­tion.
Our thoughts and sor­row are with the fam­i­ly and friends of Stanislav Korepanov who was only 18 years old when he died.

The New Bristle — it’s shit-brown (not pro-Brown)

The Bris­tle col­lec­tive are delight­ed to announce that issue 24 of our bel­liger­ent & bristling mag­a­zine has been pub­lished, and should be in the usu­al out­lets by the end of this week.

Bristle 24The Bris­tle col­lec­tive are delight­ed to announce that issue 24 of our bel­liger­ent & bristling mag­a­zine has been pub­lished, and should be in the usu­al out­lets by the end of this week.

We’ll be cel­e­brat­ing pub­li­ca­tion by host­ing the week­ly veg­an cafe at Kebele social cen­tre ( http://www.kebelecoop.org) on Sun­day 15 April, from 6pm. At 7.30pm we’ll be show­ing the excel­lent film “The day the coun­try died — a his­to­ry of anar­cho-punk 1980–84” dur­ing which you can relive your youth, or find out what your par­ents were up to!

Issue 24 comes in a shit-brown cov­er, because we have a shit gov­ern­ment that con­tin­ues to shit on us all whilst aid­ing & abet­ting the plun­der of the plan­et. Our spe­cial fea­ture this issue is on 10 years of New Labour – we look back to the 10 key pledges of their 1997 man­i­festo and see how they mea­sure up, tak­ing spe­cial note of their impact on Bris­tol.

In addi­tion we’ve got Bristling in Bath, lac­tivism, a look at the Fair­ford tri­als farce, guns in Acadamies, the defence of green spaces, Bristol’s ris­ing tide, news, com­ment, reviews, some dodgy humour, local polit­i­cal art­work, and even a t‑shirt com­pe­ti­tion! In fact you even get an extra four pages for the usu­al price of £1.20.

Bris­tle is the south west’s longest run­ning reg­u­lar, inde­pen­dent, anti-cap­i­tal­ist, think-glob­al-act-local media pub­li­ca­tion. We are a vol­un­teer, non-hier­ar­chi­cal col­lec­tive of activists who believe in the need for alter­na­tive print media – if you like it, come and get involved, we meet bi-week­ly on Sun­days at Kebele social cen­tre, 14 Robert­son Rd, Eas­t­on, BS5 6JY.

Our web­site is being updat­ed over the next few days with a list of out­lets and oth­er info – see http://www.bristle.org.uk

Thanks to all who helped with this issue.
Love & sol­i­dar­i­ty — the bris­tle col­lec­tive
editors@bristle.org.uk

M For Media Malarkey — SchNEWS Alternative Media Gathering 2007

M For Media Malarkey — the SchNEWS Alter­na­tive Media Gath­er­ing 2007

May 11–13th 2007: Cow­ley Club, 12 Lon­don Rd, Brighton, BN1 4JA

You are invit­ed to SchNEWS’ first mul­ti-media-activist gath­er­ing. As well as a com­ing togeth­er of those already involved in web, video, print, pho­tog­ra­phy, and radio in alternative/independent media – as well as activists who use this media — this event will also be for new peo­ple want­i­ng to get involved. Start­ing on Fri­day evening and going through to Sun­day evening, there will be a range of dis­cus­sions, hands-on prac­ti­cal work­shops in the var­i­ous media, as well as stalls and screen­ings through­out the week­end to show­case what’s cur­rent­ly being pro­duced.

M For Media Malarkey — the SchNEWS Alter­na­tive Media Gath­er­ing 2007

May 11–13th 2007: Cow­ley Club, 12 Lon­don Rd, Brighton, BN1 4JA

You are invit­ed to SchNEWS’ first mul­ti-media-activist gath­er­ing. As well as a com­ing togeth­er of those already involved in web, video, print, pho­tog­ra­phy, and radio in alternative/independent media – as well as activists who use this media — this event will also be for new peo­ple want­i­ng to get involved. Start­ing on Fri­day evening and going through to Sun­day evening, there will be a range of dis­cus­sions, hands-on prac­ti­cal work­shops in the var­i­ous media, as well as stalls and screen­ings through­out the week­end to show­case what’s cur­rent­ly being pro­duced.

After dis­cus­sions amongst SchNEWS, as well as oth­ers’ imput, about what aspects of inde­pen­dent media should be high­light­ed dur­ing the gath­er­ing, sev­er­al key points have emerged:

* Pro­mot­ing cam­paigns and mobil­is­ing com­mu­ni­ties: eval­u­at­ing and improv­ing the way inde­pen­dent media helps the cam­paigns and actions it cov­ers, as well as how cam­paigns use var­i­ous media them­selves – with speak­ers from cam­paigns talk­ing about their expe­ri­ences, and those work­ing in alter­na­tive media.

* Improv­ing Skills: Acknowl­edg­ing that many peo­ple in alter­na­tive media come from ‘activist’ back­grounds, and are often get­ting by with very lit­tle ‘train­ing’. For video activists it may be about the bat­tles with tech­nol­o­gy to pro­duce and dis­trib­ute video, for writ­ers it may mean they have lim­it­ed research or ‘jour­nal­is­tic’ skills, and those cre­at­ing leaflets/flyers/publications would often ben­e­fit with more knowl­edge about design etc. There will be work­shops and dis­cus­sions to help improve skills in these and oth­er rel­e­vant areas.

The gath­er­ing will accom­mo­date for the fact that while both these top­ics, and many oth­ers, are com­mon to all media, and many peo­ple work in sev­er­al media — there is also areas spe­cif­ic to each — so there­fore some of the key ses­sions will start with the whole group togeth­er, then split off into the var­i­ous types to dis­cuss aspects in more detail.

As well as this there will be talks from those involved in Pirate Radio, mobile Indy­media set-ups for such events as the G8 protest in Scot­land, and more to be con­firmed.

While some speak­ers are con­firmed, if you have rel­e­vant expe­ri­ence in these areas and would like to be involved, please con­tact SchNEWS now.

Like­wise if you want to come along, and need accom­mo­da­tion, con­tact SchNEWS — we need to know num­bers as soon as, so please give us fair notice.

The event will be free/donation, and veg­an food will be avail­able dur­ing the week­end in the Cow­ley Club.

email schnews@brighton.co.uk tel 01273 685 913
Keep check­ing www.schnews.org.uk for updates.

Spray Building ‘spring into action’ open for business

Here in Not­ting­ham, A ‘free space’ has been made avail­able and is now pre­pared for use. There will be many work­shops here and at the oth­er loca­tions around town.

Spring into Action EF bannerHere in Not­ting­ham, A ‘free space’ has been made avail­able and is now pre­pared for use. There will be many work­shops here and at the oth­er loca­tions around town.

Thu 5th — Wed 11th Apr, Spring into Action — A week of work­shops, events, music and action on cli­mate change hap­pen­ing at dif­fer­ent venues across Not­ting­ham. It is expect­ed that with­in this peri­od, there will be some work­days, were you will be able to turn up, and get involved in help­ing build the project

Spring Into Action — A week of events on Cli­mate Change, hap­pen­ing in Not­ting­ham

Thurs­day 5th — Wednes­day 11th April 2007

This is the ‘full’ Pro­gramme of Events, with dates, time, loca­tions .…. and every­thing

http://www.eastsideclimateaction.org.uk/workshops/programme/

info@eastsideclimateaction.org.uk
http://www.eastsideclimateaction.org.uk

Please check Not­ting­hamshire Indy­media on the ‘Events’ col­umn [left hard side] for details of what when, how and where, near­er the time.

A week of work­shops, events, music and action on cli­mate change hap­pen­ing at dif­fer­ent venues across Not­ting­ham.

Cli­mate change is real and its hap­pen­ing now. Gov­ern­ments and cor­po­ra­tions dream of con­tin­ued eco­nom­ic growth — eco­nom­ic growth can’t solve this cri­sis, but we can. A mas­sive and con­cert­ed effort is need­ed on the scale of ‘Dig for Vic­to­ry’ or the ‘Home Front’: A war on cli­mate change.

We can’t con­tin­ue our cur­rent way of life — the oil on which it all depends is run­ning out too fast. A shift to a local­ly based econ­o­my will have to hap­pen, with food and ener­gy being pro­duced by the peo­ple that use it. The only ques­tion is when? We could start now, or we could wait for a future of war, famine, hur­ri­canes, droughts and floods. We need to gain the courage and change fast enough to cul­ti­vate a new world, before it’s too late.

‘Spring into Action’ is part of an emerg­ing grass­roots move­ment against cli­mate change. Born out of the Camp for Cli­mate Action (www.climatecamp.org.uk), ‘Spring into Action’ unites peo­ple across the east of Eng­land into mak­ing changes in our own lives, cre­at­ing small scale solu­tions in our com­mu­ni­ties and resist­ing those who still seek their own short term gain over a safe future for us all.

So get involved, come join a work­shop or run one your­self, come and help organ­ise the change that you want to expe­ri­ence in our world.

info@eastsideclimateaction.org.uk
http://www.eastsideclimateaction.org.uk

Climate Camp How to Deliver Direct Action Workshops Workshop in Oxford

We have space for some more peo­ple to attend a small week­end work­shop deliv­ered by Seeds for Change, on HOW TO DELIVER direct action train­ings for cli­mate activism. The idea is that peo­ple come to this, get trained up on how to give train­ings on direct action tac­tics, talk­ing to the media/cops, some legal stuff, quick con­sen­sus deci­sion mak­ing, maybe tri­pod usage etc… So that they can then go off and train peo­ple up in the run up to the Camp for Cli­mate Action (14–21 August).

We have space for some more peo­ple to attend a small week­end work­shop deliv­ered by Seeds for Change, on HOW TO DELIVER direct action train­ings for cli­mate activism. The idea is that peo­ple come to this, get trained up on how to give train­ings on direct action tac­tics, talk­ing to the media/cops, some legal stuff, quick con­sen­sus deci­sion mak­ing, maybe tri­pod usage etc… So that they can then go off and train peo­ple up in the run up to the Camp for Cli­mate Action (14–21 August).

This way we can max­imise the effec­tive­ness of our actions, and try to share the work­load.

Can you come? It’d be over the week­end of 14–15th April, at the Oxford Action Resource Cen­tre, Princes St, East Oxford.

( http://www.streetmap.co.uk/newmap.srf?x=452768&y=205877&z=1&sv=princes+st&st=6&tl=Princes+Street,+Oxford,+OX4&searchp=newsearch.srf&mapp=newmap.srf)

Crash space pro­vid­ed.
Let us know as soon as pos­si­ble at:
actionsupport@climatecamp.org.uk

Action Sup­port at Cli­mate Camp
http://www.climatecamp.org.uk

Machinery occupied near anti-pipeline camp (plus camp directions, carnival footage, news of court ruling on terminal…)

2.04.2007

Activists have once again climbed on machin­ery to delay work on Nation­al Grid’s 200 mile gas pipeline. Work was stopped near the anti-pipeline tree camp for sev­er­al hours on two con­sec­u­tive days.

2.04.2007

Activists have once again climbed on machin­ery to delay work on Nation­al Grid’s 200 mile gas pipeline. Work was stopped near the anti-pipeline tree camp for sev­er­al hours on two con­sec­u­tive days.

Trees around the anti-pipeline tree camp in Pen­pont have been chopped down in recent days and heavy machin­ery has been brought in to enable work on the pipeline to start in the area. How­ev­er, the anti-pipeline camp has still not been evict­ed. More peo­ple are urgent­ly need­ed to take part in the grow­ing resis­tance to the pipeline, which is caus­ing huge destruc­tion to the envi­ron­ment and pos­es seri­ous safe­ty risks.

For more infor­ma­tion on the dam­ag­ing effects of the pipeline: fightthepipe.co.uk

DIRECTIONS to Pen­pont tree camp:

The protest camp is in ancient wood­land at Pen­pont, 4 miles west of Bre­con on the A40 close to Bet­tws Pen­pont church. It is locat­ed at Ord­nance Sur­vey nation­al grid ref­er­ence SN9728728525. There is a bus going from Cardiff coach sta­tion to Bre­con town (X43, takes aprox 1hr, costs around £4). From the bus stop you get off at in Bre­con town (the only bus stop there) there is anoth­er bus that goes right past the camp (£1.60, aprox 10 mins- ask dri­ver for tree camp, you will prob­a­bly see ban­ners on the left).

DONATIONS:

Peo­ple on site are request­ing any dona­tions. Please send sup­plies of all sorts, espe­cial­ly beams for build­ing, tarp, rope, nails, D‑locks, heavy chains, stuff for lock-ons (sand, cement, grav­el.), har­ness­es and oth­er climb­ing gear, scrap met­al, cud­dles etc etc etc.
We can use almost any tat…

Please come vis­it the camp before it’s too late!

Footage of Sat­ur­day 24th March Tre­banos car­ni­val against pipeline.

News of court rul­ing stop­ping work on ter­mi­nal — http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/6510957.stm

Bath Climate Camp — info and wish list

Between late after­noon on thurs­day 19th of April and sun­day 22nd April, there is going to be a cli­mate camp just out­side of Bath focus­ing on Land and Marines offices (the com­pa­ny build­ing the gas pipeline smash­ing through Wales).

Between late after­noon on thurs­day 19th of April and sun­day 22nd April, there is going to be a cli­mate camp just out­side of Bath focus­ing on Land and Marines offices (the com­pa­ny build­ing the gas pipeline smash­ing through Wales).

The camp is shap­ing up to be a real­ly good event. We have most things up togeth­er such as bands, a veg­an field kitchen, a com­post toi­let, mar­quees etc, but there are a few things we could do with more of includ­ing

- Mate­ri­als for ban­ner mak­ing, car­ni­val props etc
— vegetables/spices/pulses — we have got food sort­ed out, but could always do with some more
— reclaimed wood for fires and con­struc­tion

Most impor­tant­ly, we need peo­ple to attend the camp, as this is an oppor­tu­ni­ty to take the fight over the pipeline to the front door of those build­ing it.

as well as bands, food, work­shops, DIY ses­sions and kids activ­i­ties, we have two demos planned -

*fri­day 20th of April — All day — Shut down Land and Marine — a day of autonomous actions against Land and Marines offices. Wether you want to block­ade, make music, ban­ner drop, leaflet, or any­thing else you can think of, all non vio­lent actions and all non-vio­lent peo­ple are very wel­come!

*Sat­ur­day 21st April — Par­ty against Petrol — Meet at 11 at Bath Cli­mate Camp or 12 at Bath Abbey — A col­or­ful, noisy car­ni­val against car cul­ture and fos­sil fuels, roam­ing around Bath and stop­ping to par­ty and high­light some local cli­mate crim­i­nals!

we hold week­ly plan­ning meet­ings on Thurs­days in the hob­gob­lin (47 st. James Parade) at 7.30 in the down­stairs room, all are wel­come.

For more info, to request posters/booklets etc or to ask any ques­tions, please e‑mail bathclimatecamp@yahoo.co.uk or check out www.myspace.com/bathclimatecamp

See you in the fields!

bathclimatecamp@yahoo.co.uk
http://www.myspace.com/bathclimatecamp

New ‘Writing To Prisoners’ Leaflet

Leeds ABC have pro­duced a new ‘Writ­ing To Pris­on­ers’ laflet. Basic text fol­lows, and it can also be down­loaded as a PDF, or a hard copy can be obtained by send­ing an SAE to Leeds ABC at the address below.

Leeds ABC have pro­duced a new ‘Writ­ing To Pris­on­ers’ laflet. Basic text fol­lows, and it can also be down­loaded as a PDF, or a hard copy can be obtained by send­ing an SAE to Leeds ABC at the address below.

Leaflet — pdf 109K

WRITING TO PRISONERS

Prob­a­bly the eas­i­est and arguably most impor­tant aspect of sup­port­ing pris­on­ers is writ­ing to them. One of the hard­est things for many pris­on­ers to cope with is the feel­ing of iso­la­tion – being cut off from friends and fam­i­ly and every­thing they know in their nor­mal lives. A let­ter or post­card from the real world, even from a com­plete stranger, helps to main­tain a con­nec­tion with the out­side, relieves the infer­nal tedi­um of a regime that often involves spend­ing 23 hours of the day in the same cell. For a first-time pris­on­er, espe­cial­ly in the ear­ly stages of a sen­tence, this type of sup­port can make a huge dif­fer­ence, help­ing them cope with the unfa­mil­iar and often intim­i­dat­ing sur­round­ings. For polit­i­cal pris­on­ers, vic­tims of mis­car­riages of jus­tice and those fight­ing back from with­in, it’s a sim­ple mes­sage of sol­i­dar­i­ty – you’re not on your own.

In many cas­es, con­tact from the out­side lets the prison author­i­ties know that there are peo­ple on the out­side who care and are mon­i­tor­ing the sit­u­a­tion. For exam­ple, spe­cial dietary require­ments (veg­an etc) are more like­ly to be adhered to if an inmate is obvi­ous­ly not for­got­ten.

Please be aware that this isn’t meant to be a list of rules – we’re just try­ing to hon­est­ly answer some of the queries we get asked. And of course, the com­ments about prison pro­ce­dure only apply to UK pris­ons.

WHERE DO I FIND A PRISONER FROM?

Well, there’s cur­rent­ly around 80,000 to choose from in the UK alone but if you want to nar­row that down slight­ly the eas­i­est way is to con­tact one of the many anar­chist / ani­mal rights / pris­on­er sup­port groups you can find online. Be aware that pris­on­ers are often moved and mail not always for­ward­ed so if in doubt email or write to check details are up to date. You can con­tact Leeds ABC at the address below for a list of the pris­on­ers we cur­rent­ly sup­port both in the UK and fur­ther afield.

SO WHAT DO I WRITE THEN?

Ok this is the bit that trips most peo­ple up. You’re wor­ried about what you write might sound stu­pid, or make the pris­on­er feel worse or you sim­ply can’t think of any­thing. Of course if the pris­on­er is your mate then this bit is easy but what about a total stranger, some­one you know noth­ing about apart from their names, charges and sen­tence? Well, there’s no for­mu­la here but for the first let­ter you should intro­duce your­self. Tell them about your­self, what you do, what you’re into, where you got their address and so on. This breaks the ice and also makes a reply eas­i­er. Apart from that, just fill a side of A4 of what­ev­er you can think of – crap jokes, rem­i­nis­cences, what you did last Fri­day night after 10 pints etcetera. One for­mer inmate com­ment­ed to us that some of the best let­ters he received were an ongo­ing debate about the mer­its of var­i­ous Iron Maid­en songs which might seem inane but put a great big smile on his face once a week! Here’s a few point­ers that we’d like to remind you of:

1. Every let­ter is read by screws (the­o­ret­i­cal­ly at least) so don’t write any­thing that might incrim­i­nate your­self or oth­ers in any­thing dubi­ous. The rule of thumb here is don’t put any­thing in a let­ter that you would­n’t say to a cop­per’s face.

2. If the pris­on­er is in for a polit­i­cal charge you should obvi­ous­ly let them know you sup­port their actions but don’t start prais­ing them as some sort of hero to the cause. Rhetoric to the effect of “I’m in awe of your great sac­ri­fice blah, blah…” is frankly cringe­wor­thy. If some­one is banged up for a polit­i­cal action they don’t (or should­n’t!) want to be seen as mar­tyrs – they’re just nor­mal peo­ple unlucky enough to get caught, so write to them like nor­mal peo­ple rather than fawn­ing!

3. A lot of peo­ple seem wary of telling pris­on­ers about ‘fun’ stuff, think­ing it will depress them or make them feel home­sick hear­ing about peo­ple hav­ing a laugh on the out­side. This is rub­bish! They’ll already be home­sick and it’s just reas­sur­ing to hear nor­mal life is going on so don’t feel coy about men­tion­ing gigs, par­ties and rau­cous nights down the booz­er.

4. Always ask a few ques­tions like how they’re doing, plans they have for the future, what their inter­ests are, etc. but try to keep it gen­er­al and don’t make it sound like you’re being nosey. Bear­ing in mind that they might be reply­ing to a total stranger, it makes writ­ing a response a lot eas­i­er.

5. Sim­i­lar­ly, some back­ground about your­self, even seem­ing­ly triv­ial things like favourite bands, foot­ball teams etc, can make writ­ing a reply that bit eas­i­er…

6. Don’t EVER promise things you can’t deliv­er. If you build some­one’s hopes up about say vis­it­ing them, send­ing things into them, etc then you let them down, that’s well out of order and hard­ly con­sis­tent with sup­port­ing them.

7. Polit­i­cal lit­er­a­ture – be care­ful! Unless the pris­on­er asks for it avoid send­ing any over­ly con­tentious polit­i­cal mate­r­i­al in as it can poten­tial­ly cause them grief. Depend­ing on the pris­on­er’s sit­u­a­tion and how they “choose to do their time” unso­licit­ed sub­scrip­tions to lefty news­pa­pers for instance may cause unwant­ed has­sle with prison author­i­ties and oth­er inmates. In some cas­es, par­tic­u­lar­ly abroad, polit­i­cal lit­er­a­ture to remand­ed pris­on­ers may even be used against them at tri­al. There’s no prob­lem send­ing this kind of thing as long as you ask the pris­on­er first and always respect their wish­es.

8. Avoid turgid left­ie-isms! Phras­es like “my com­rades and I have resolved to pass a motion of sol­i­dar­i­ty” sound pompous and imper­son­al how­ev­er well mean­ing they might be. “We hope you’re doing ok” is a lot more friend­ly!

I’M NOT SURE I CAN MANAGE A FULL LETTER…

That’s fine. A quick mes­sage of sup­port on a post­card can still real­ly bright­en up some­one’s day or what about tak­ing a card to a gig or the pub and get­ting a few peo­ple to sign it?

HOW DO I MAKE SURE MY LETTER GETS IN?

Well the cor­rect postage would be a start (you’d be sur­prised!) and the cor­rect address ensur­ing the pris­on­er’s full name and prison num­ber are includ­ed. Put your name and address at the top of the let­ter and on the back of the enve­lope. These don’t have to be ‘real’ if you’ve got any reser­va­tions but bear in mind this is what the pris­on­er will see if they’re going to write you a reply. Some pris­ons will refuse to accept let­ters with ‘care of’ or PO Box address­es so it’s best to use a street address. Some pris­ons have rules for­bid­ding cer­tain imagery (e.g. gang sym­bols being banned from U.S pris­ons) and this may encom­pass polit­i­cal sym­bols as well so cir­cled A’s, scrawled all over the enve­lope may not be a good idea! Some­times hand-made cards with a pic­ture glued to the front may be refused or defaced in case any­thing’s con­cealed under­neath. If you want to make sure a pris­on­er gets a let­ter, you can send it by record­ed deliv­ery – then you can check with the Post Office whether the prison received it; and all record­ed mail is only sup­posed to be opened in the pris­on­er’s pres­ence.

WHAT ABOUT GETTING A REPLY?

Bear in mind that you’re doing this to sup­port the pris­on­er not to acquire a new pen-pal although the two might go hand in hand. You may not get a reply for sev­er­al rea­sons: obvi­ous­ly the pris­on­er might not have received your let­ter or they might be get­ting a lot of post if they’re for­tu­nate enough so might not have time to reply to all cor­re­spon­dence. They may be lim­it­ed in the num­ber of let­ters they can write by the prison author­i­ties and pre­fer to pri­ori­tise friends and fam­i­ly. They may not have access to suf­fi­cient writ­ing mate­ri­als or stamps, they may have been moved, or they may sim­ply not be very good at writ­ing let­ters. Regard­less, don’t be put out if there’s no reply and don’t let this deter you from con­tin­u­ing to write.

CAN I SEND ANYTHING ELSE IN?

Unsur­pris­ing­ly, the file in a choco­late cake rou­tine isn’t going to work. The gold­en rule here is to ask the pris­on­er if you’ve got any doubts. You can always try con­tact­ing the prison, but they are noto­ri­ous­ly elu­sive, so you could spend ages try­ing to get through – for instance HMP Arm­ley has one phone line to cov­er 1250+ inmates. More to the point, screws have a habit of lying through their teeth, so don’t assume that the first answer you get will be any­thing close to the truth! The rules vary wide­ly between dif­fer­ent pris­ons and are some­times baf­fling. Food and toi­letries are not per­mit­ted in any pris­ons for obvi­ous rea­sons but some­times appar­ent­ly innocu­ous items are denied, for instance pho­tographs with the pris­on­ers face on them (actu­al­ly to stop pris­on­ers forg­ing ID cards!). If you send any­thing in, clear­ly write at the top of your let­ter what you’ve enclosed as this lessens the chances of light-fin­gered screws hav­ing off with it. Some things you might con­sid­er send­ing in are:

Books – you may be able to send used copies in but many pris­ons will only accept books from a recog­nised shop, dis­trib­u­tor or pub­lish­er so check first. It’s pos­si­ble to get round this in some cas­es if you know a sym­pa­thet­ic sec­ond-hand book­shop who will pack­age a used book with an offi­cial look­ingre­ceipt.. Screws may with­hold some lit­er­a­ture on the grounds of con­tent but this can gen­er­al­ly be dis­put­ed by the pris­on­er, cit­ing Human Rights leg­is­la­tion. Books and mag­a­zines are only meant to be cen­sored or refused if they’re racial­ly abu­sive, iden­ti­fy indi­vid­ual screws by name, or threat­en “good order and dis­ci­pline” (how­ev­er you choose to inter­pret that!). If you’ve any doubts again ask the pris­on­er.

Mag­a­zines – again the pol­i­cy varies so as above check first. Sur­pris­ing­ly, wide­ly avail­able pub­li­ca­tions are more like­ly to be refused while obscure zines may get through okay. This is because most pris­ons have an appoint­ed local newsagent which you have to use for ‘off the shelf’ pub­li­ca­tions. You pay for a mag­a­zine, news­pa­per or puz­zle book at the shop and give them the inmate’s prison num­ber and this is for­ward­ed to them. It’s even pos­si­ble to set up a sub­scrip­tion to a dai­ly news­pa­per this way.

Stamps – pol­i­cy varies (can you spot a pat­tern here?). Stamps are gold dust for pris­on­ers, if they can receive them, not only for send­ing let­ters but also as cur­ren­cy. Many pris­ons will not allow stamps and obvi­ous­ly screws will often pock­et them. UK pris­ons should all allow stamped-addressed envelopes in, which obvi­ous­ly makes it eas­i­er for a pris­on­er to reply. These are the safest bet (after all it’s hard­ly a huge out­lay) but write your address in pen­cil so the pris­on­er can remove it if they have a more impor­tant let­ter to send. If you want a reply, an SAE is real­ly a mat­ter of cour­tesy.

Cash – while the amount most pris­on­ers can spend on a week­ly basis is lim­it­ed, their actu­al income to spend on “lux­u­ries” such as usable razors, tobac­co, paper, phone cards etc is often micro­scop­ic, par­tic­u­lar­ly if they are refus­ing work. On top of this, Ara­mark, the pri­vate com­pa­ny who run prison can­teens, only sell expen­sive brand-named prod­ucts, and incred­i­bly get away with sell­ing it at more than high-street prices! Funds from the out­side can there­fore be vital, but cash is not used in pris­ons and inmates have an ‘account’ with a cer­tain amount freed up each week as ‘spends’. Obvi­ous­ly if you’re send­ing more than a cou­ple of quid it’s worth check­ing first, but as a gen­er­al guide funds should only be sent as postal orders made payable to “The Gov­er­nor, HMP [prison name]”. It is imper­a­tive that the pris­on­er’s full name and prison num­ber is writ­ten clear­ly on the back, or they won’t get it.

Phone cards – a myth. Not that you can buy them now any­way but even when you could, phone cards from the out­side did­n’t work on prison phones! If you want to help some­one with the cost of calls to friends and fam­i­ly send them a postal order as they’ll have to buy cred­it inside.

Music, footwear, radios and oth­er mis­cel­la­neous goods – this varies so wide­ly that you have to check. Some pris­ons will accept almost any­thing, oth­ers will flat­ly refuse every­thing, often because pris­on­ers are made to save up their spends and buy goods from ‘approved’ mail-order retail­ers such as Argos instead.

BUT… THEY’RE CRIMINALS!

One con­cern that is often voiced to us is that that the peo­ple you are writ­ing to will be ‘dodgy’ in some way. After all, the media bom­bards us with the notion that every­one in prison is a smack-addict­ed, child-molest­ing ben­e­fit-scroung­ing can­ni­bal, and it’s only to be expect­ed that many peo­ple who have no per­son­al expe­ri­ence of prison are wary of con­tact­ing those inside. The sim­ple answer is that pris­on­ers are human, and of course there may be a small chance of encoun­ter­ing idiots – about the same sta­tis­ti­cal chance of encoun­ter­ing idiots any­where! If you are not com­fort­able about writ­ing to a par­tic­u­lar pris­on­er for what­ev­er rea­son, sim­ply end con­tact – we have heard of iso­lat­ed cas­es of peo­ple pos­ing as polit­i­cal pris­on­ers to draw in sup­port and let­ters, but these instances are so scarce that it real­ly is not worth wor­ry­ing about, and you can be assured that any pris­on­ers sup­port­ed by organ­i­sa­tions like the ABC would be dropped like hot bricks if there was any con­cern about their integri­ty.

USEFUL CONTACTS

The inter­net is a gold-mine of infor­ma­tion about prison resis­tance, but be aware that many sites aren’t updat­ed very reg­u­lar­ly, so some details can be inac­cu­rate. We’d rec­om­mend the fol­low­ing sites as good places to start:

BRIGHTON ABC — www.brightonabc.org.uk

Brighton’s Anar­chist Black Cross group keep a good web­site with up-to-date news and details of pris­on­ers, as well as links to oth­er groups.

NO MORE PRISONS — www.alternatives2prison.ik.com

This infor­ma­tive site cam­paigns for prison abo­li­tion.

HAVEN DISTRIBUTION — www.havendistribution.org.uk

Haven is a reg­is­tered char­i­ty who run an invalu­able ser­vice pro­vid­ing UK pris­on­ers with free books and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als.

GET IN TOUCH WITH US

If you want any fur­ther infor­ma­tion, please con­tact us. We do a reg­u­lar e‑mail bul­letin with updates on prison issues and a list of anar­chist pris­on­ers – let us know if you want to be added to this. We also do a dis­tro and pub­lish pam­phlets relat­ing to the prison strug­gle – get in touch for a full list. If you are writ­ing to us, please try to enclose a stamped addressed enve­lope or Inter­na­tion­al Reply Coupon if you want a reply.

Leeds ABC, PO Box 53, Leeds, LS8 4WP, Eng­land
LeedsABC@riseup.net
http://www.myspace.com/leedsabc

National Grid feeling the pressure as time runs out on giant pipeline project (& video interviews)

Nation­al Grid’s pet pipeline is way behind sched­ule. They are in a pan­icked rush to get it built and avoid hefty fines, but a deter­mined protest cam­paign and the rugged welsh land­scape are gang­ing up on the ill-fat­ed pipe.

Nation­al Grid’s pet pipeline is way behind sched­ule. They are in a pan­icked rush to get it built and avoid hefty fines, but a deter­mined protest cam­paign and the rugged welsh land­scape are gang­ing up on the ill-fat­ed pipe.

Nation­al Grid will be penalised with hefty fines if they don’t com­plete the project on time, so they are pulling out the stops — dou­bling the num­ber of dig­gers they use from 200 to 400 and work­ing in 4 places at the same time.

Phase 1 of the project, from Mil­ford Haven to Ffe­lin­dre, is 90% com­plete, but phase 2, from Ffe­lin­dre to Tir­ley in Glouces­ter­shire, is far from.

“This is one of the biggest [projects] we have ever built,” says Kees Ezin­ga, head of oper­a­tions for con­trac­tor Nacap Land & Marine Joint Ven­ture. (Nation­al Grid have con­tract­ed them to do the actu­al build­ing bit.)
“Last year, we man­aged to [lay] 100 km of pipe in two spreads. But we have four spreads to go and are bring­ing in extra equip­ment,” says Ezin­ga. “Start­ing in April, we only have four months to [fin­ish] this job.”
Full arti­cle at…
http://enr.construction.com/news/transportation/archives/070226b.asp

Clear­ly its time to step up the protests and make it as hard as pos­si­ble for them to work. A con­cert­ed effort now could push the project far beyond the dead­line, cost­ing Nation­al Grid some seri­ous mon­ey and under­min­ing the via­bil­i­ty of the whole thing. Even if they do even­tu­al­ly get the thing built, it would be mas­sive­ly over-bud­get and, as hap­pened with the road-build­ing projects of the 90s, future destruc­tive and car­bon-inten­sive projects could be scrapped.

The protest camp in Bre­con is under imme­di­ate threat of an evic­tion, just when Nation­al Grid are start­ing to pan­ic. They need peo­ple to come and sup­port them, even if you can only come for the day. Its in the Bre­con Bea­cons Nation­al Park, in beau­ti­ful wood­land. You can find the lat­est news, pic­tures, and the site con­tact phone num­ber and direc­tions here:
http://risingtide.org.uk/node/193

There are lots of events com­ing up around the pipeline.

On Sat­ur­day 24th March, there will be a Car­ni­val against the Pipe, start­ing at 2pm in Tre­banos, near Swansea.
Details:
http://www.fightthepipe.co.uk/?m=200703

There will be a bike tour of the pipe, start­ing at the Car­ni­val and going all the way along the length to Glouces­ter­shire. Have a look at…
http://risingtide.org.uk/bristol/bikethepipe
to see the route and read more about it. The bike tour will be stop­ping to spread the word about the dodgy pipeline in the com­mu­ni­ties that it pass­es through.

On 20th-21st of April, Bath Cli­mate Camp, is tar­get­ting the offices of NACAP Joint Ven­ture Land & Marine, who are the con­trac­tors build­ing the pipe for Nation­al Grid…
They are inspired by the Cli­mate Camp at Drax last Sep­tem­ber.
More info : http://risingtide.org.uk/node/199

http://risingtide.org.uk/bristol

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With evic­tion at the camp look­ing immi­nent, cam­paign­ers appeal for peo­ple to join them in the fight against the pipe.

Video 76.1MB — video/mp4 76M

Video 138MB — video/x‑ms-wmv 30M

Video also on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNzWVsO-3k4