Iceland holds UK protestor for alleged £40,000 damage using yoghurt

Paul Gill, a British pro­test­er against Ice­land’s eco­log­i­cal­ly dev­as­tat­ing Karah­n­jukar dam project, is being held for alleged­ly com­mit­ting £40,000 worth of crim­i­nal dam­age using ‘yoghurt’.

Details are sketchy at the moment, but it seems Paul and two ice­landers attend­ed an inter­na­tion­al alu­mini­um indus­try con­fer­ence and made their protest felt using the medi­um of but­ter milk — they emp­tied out the con­tents of two buck­ets con­tain­ing a mix­ture of “sour­milk” (Not real­ly yoghurt but a milk prod­uct, some­times described as “but­ter milk” — makes more of a stink than yoghurt), water and green colour. Dam­age was done to com­put­ers, fur­ni­ture and con­fer­ence par­tic­i­pants cloth­ing, accord­ing to the hotel.

Sub­se­quent­ly the three were arrest­ed. The two Ice­landers were released, but Paul is being held at Lit­la Hraun prison in Reyk­javik. The hotel, Hotel Nordi­ca, host­ing the con­fer­ence is appar­ent­ly seek­ing to press charges for £40,000 of crim­i­nal dam­age. The action was a total suc­cess but all three who were arrest­ed will need all the sup­port they can get.

There was a demon­stra­tion out­side the Min­istry of Jus­tice in Reyk­javik demand­ing the imme­di­ate release of Paul.

Please con­tact any or all of the fol­low­ing:

Lit­la Hraun Prison, Reyk­javik: 00354 4809000 (between 6pm and 10pm), then press 3.
The British Con­sul: Simon Mitchell, 00354 6901501. Please be polite, we want these peo­ple on our side!
If any­one’s read­ing this in Ice­land, Paul could real­ly do with some sup­port — legal, mate­r­i­al and finan­cial.

• Can any­one rec­om­mend a good lawyer for this sort of thing? At the moment Paul’s hav­ing to rely on a police-appoint­ed lawyer.
• He could do with some clothes, soap and wash­ing stuff and books in Eng­lish.
• Mon­ey would­n’t go amiss, for phone cards etc.

Please do what you can to help! Email icelandsupport@trition.org.uk with any queries.