Two arrested for blocking tar sands megaloads in USA

News from Moscow Ida­ho, two arrest­ed blockad­ing Exxon’s mega­load trucks bound with tar sands equip­ment for Alber­ta.

News from Moscow Ida­ho, two arrest­ed blockad­ing Exxon’s mega­load trucks bound with tar sands equip­ment for Alber­ta.

Ear­ly News: More Pro­test­ers Arrest­ed for Block­ing Tar Sands “Mega­loads” in Moscow, Ida­ho

PRELIMINARY NEWS RELEASE

March 5, 2012

Four remark­ably brave activists elud­ed the bar­ri­cades and put their bod­ies between enor­mous Alber­ta tar sands upgrad­er parts and the eco­log­i­cal and cli­mate dev­as­ta­tion they will vis­it on us all.  As three of the last five of 78 ExxonMobil/Imperial Oil mega­loads moved through down­town Moscow, Ida­ho, two pro­test­ers were arrest­ed for link­ing arms and sit­ting down in Wash­ing­ton Street late Sun­day night, March 4.  Police arrest­ed two men but pulled two women to the side and detained and released them when the con­voy passed.  The women did not appre­ci­ate the dis­crim­i­na­tion.

In a video by Joshua Yei­del of a KRFP Radio Free Moscow inter­view, We Won’t Be Acces­sories to Geno­cide: Moscow ID, March 4, 2012, one of the dis­missed women explained her and her many allies’ moti­va­tions for march­ing, chant­i­ng, and even obstruct­ing mega­loads and risk­ing arrest in cold and dark win­ter con­di­tions.  “We’re not going to be acces­sories to geno­cide and cli­mate change and increased can­cer rates and all the oth­er eco­log­i­cal dam­ages that the tar sands intends to cause…”

Wild Ida­ho Ris­ing Tide (WIRT) and com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers have gath­ered along Moscow streets to raise their voic­es in protest more than forty times since July 15, 2011, when the first trans­ports of out­sourced equip­ment rum­bled up to 425,000 pounds on High­way 95 from the Port of Lewis­ton to the cli­mate-wreck­ing tar sands.  Despite heavy, indus­try-spon­sored police pres­ence and clo­sure of entire rights-of-way, some cit­i­zens have entered the cross­walks and streets to briefly block the ship­ments and halt their eco­log­i­cal death march, before state, coun­ty, and city police offi­cers sur­round, harass, and drag them away and/or arrest them.

For a video shot by Joshua Yei­del of Sun­day night’s action, Mega­loads and Arrests, Moscow, Ida­ho, March 4, 2012, please see this video.

Fifty-one of Zachary Johnson’s pho­tos of the March 4 demon­stra­tion are avail­able on the Wild Ida­ho Ris­ing Tide Face­book page

WIRT mem­bers extend our grat­i­tude, love, and high­est esteem to the four good souls who sac­ri­ficed their free­dom to stand up for what’s right last night and to all of the sup­port­ive cit­i­zens on the streets and side­walks, who spoke out and bore wit­ness for a green­er plan­et, health­i­er human­i­ty, and a liv­able, worth­while future for everyone’s descen­dants.  Please join friends and activists at 9 am on Mon­day, March 5, at the Latah Coun­ty Cour­t­house for the arraign­ments of Cass Davis and Jim Prall.  One of their spous­es report­ed that they are doing well in jail.  Besides this brief press release com­piled from WIRT activists’ input, we will send a more com­pre­hen­sive, cam­paign-inclu­sive sto­ry lat­er today.

Mean­while, for more news, pho­tos, videos, and inter­views, please see the WIRT Face­book page and web site/blog and lis­ten to the Cli­mate Jus­tice Forum radio pro­gram on Mon­days at 7:30 to 9:00 pm PST on KRFP Radio Free Moscow.

More info, pho­tos and past protests at http://wildidahorisingtide.org/