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Tag: Germany

  • Europe cracks down on ‘direct action’ climate protests

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    Insight: Europe cracks down after rise in ‘direct action’ climate protests

    • Summary
    • France, German states use wiretaps, GPS to track activists
    • Bavaria tries to stop protests with preventative detention
    • Berlin police spend more than 400,000 hours on climate cases
    • France outlaws one group, German states consider ban

    BERLIN, Aug 10 (Reuters) – Simon Lachner had plans to glue himself to a German city thoroughfare in June to call public attention to climate change. Instead, he ended up in police custody before he’d even left his home.

    Lachner, 28, is one of thousands of activists caught up in a European crackdown on a wave of direct action protests that gathered pace last year demanding urgent government action against climate change.

    Roadblocks on major motorways in Britain have caused traffic chaos, protests at oil installations in Germany have disrupted supplies, and in France, thousands of activists and police clashed over water usage, leaving dozens injured.

    Determined to prevent such protests from strengthening further, states in Germany and national authorities in France are invoking legal powers often used against organised crime and extremist groups to wiretap and track activists, Reuters found, based on conversations with four prosecutors, police in both countries and more than a dozen protesters.

    In Berlin alone, police have spent hundreds of thousands of hours working on more than 4,500 incidents registered against the “The Last Generation” and “Extinction Rebellion” groups, according to previously unreported data from police.

    State authorities in Germany are widely using preventative detention to stop people from protesting, including holding at least one person for as long as 30 days without charge, which is permissible under Bavarian law, the prosecutors consulted by Reuters said.

    Lawmakers passed new surveillance and detention laws in France in July and in Britain in May, with Britain making it illegal to lock, or glue, yourself to property.

    …

    Insight: Europe cracks down after rise in ‘direct action’ climate protests

  • Germany: Climate activists block 26 cities

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    Last Generation protest at 26 German cities 14 July 2023.
    Last Generation protest at 26 German cities 14 July 2023.

    https://www.breakinglatest.news/news/climate-activists-block-26-cities-violation-of-ban-on-adhesives-in-nuremberg/

    Climate activists from the “Last Generation” group blocked traffic in several places in Berlin – and masked themselves as politicians to attract more attention. Photo: Paul Zinken/dpa

    Dozens of activists from the climate group “Last Generation” blocked the streets in several large cities in Germany on Friday – to the displeasure of motorists. In Nuremberg, the activists deliberately opposed a municipal decree that explicitly forbids such sticking actions.

    Climate activists of the “last generation” obstructed car traffic in several German cities on Friday with adhesive campaigns. According to the protest group, at least 36 sit-ins took place in 26 cities across Germany.

    According to their own statements, the activists in Berlin began the blockade actions at 8:00 a.m. In sight: several large “main traffic arteries”, for example at the Victory Column and near the main train station.

     

    Some activists wore masks of Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck (Greens) and Transport Minister Volker Wissing (FDP) in front of their faces during their actions. They stretched banners with the inscription “We are breaking the law”.

     

     

    https://www.breakinglatest.news/news/climate-activists-block-26-cities-violation-of-ban-on-adhesives-in-nuremberg/

    allegation against the government

    According to the information, the actions were directed against the federal government, which the group accused of breaking the climate protection law. “The federal government is breaking the law and leading our society to collapse,” said spokeswoman Carla Rochel. “It is our democratic duty to resist peacefully.”

    See also The Pope ‘s Angelus from Gemelli: “Health accessible to all is a precious asset”

    According to the police, there were traffic delays and diversions in dozens of cities. In Potsdam, activists stuck to a bridge. In some cases, people prevented the activists from sticking around, for example in Recklinghausen in North Rhine-Westphalia. One activist was slightly injured. There were other adhesive protests in Dresden, Leipzig and Koblenz, among others.

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  • Climate activists block runways at two German airports

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    Police officers and security personnel stand on the airfield and try to detach activists of the group Last Generation who have stuck themselves to the asphalt in the airport area, in Duesseldorf, Germany, July 13, 2023
    Police officers and security personnel stand on the airfield and try to detach activists of the group Last Generation who have stuck themselves to the asphalt in the airport area, in Duesseldorf, Germany, July 13, 2023

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/climate-activists-block-runways-at-two-german-airports

    CLIMATE activists blocked a runway at Hamburg airport early today, causing numerous flights to be cancelled on the first day of the school holidays in the north German city.

    The group Last Generation said several of its members entered the grounds of Hamburg airport in the early morning and glued themselves to the runway.

    …

    Members of the group also cut through a security fence at Dusseldorf airport and blocked an access route to the runway.

    In a statement, the group accused the German government of lacking a strategy to tackle the climate crisis and called for immediate measures to cut emissions in the transport sector, including ending tax exemptions for airline kerosene.

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    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/climate-activists-block-runways-at-two-german-airports

  • German authorities conduct series of raids to investigate climate activists

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    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/german-police-conduct-series-of-raids-to-investigate-climate-activists

    Police officers carry a cardboard box to a vehicle during a raid in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, May 24, 2023.

    GERMAN authorities raided 15 properties across the country and seized assets in an investigation into the financing of protests by the Last Generation climate activist group, prosecutors said today.

    Munich prosecutors said they were investigating seven people on suspicion of forming or supporting a criminal organisation.

    They launched the inquiry following numerous criminal complaints they received since mid-2022.

    Members of Last Generation have repeatedly blocked roads across Germany in an effort to press the government to take more drastic action against climate change.

    In recent weeks, they have brought the traffic to a halt on an almost daily basis in Berlin, glueing themselves to busy intersections and highways.

    Over the past year, they have also targeted various artworks and exhibits.

    …

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/german-police-conduct-series-of-raids-to-investigate-climate-activists

  • Saluting Gary Lineker: challenge state racism. Don’t conform to it

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    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/e/saluting-gary-lineker-challenge-state-racism-dont-conform-it

    THE BBC has reportedly rebuked Gary Lineker for describing the government’s anti-refugee rhetoric as “language not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the ’30s.”

    The famous footballer and presenter’s tweet has enraged Tory MPs, some of whom have called for him to be sacked. But he is not the first to have called out the grim historical precedent.

    It was child Holocaust survivor Joan Salter who confronted Home Secretary Suella Braverman earlier this year, pointing to exactly the same parallels between Nazi demonisation of Jews and the language she uses when attacking refugees.

    …

    This Tory administration is extremist. Braverman admits she thinks it more likely than not her plans breach the European Convention on Human Rights, which we as a country are obliged to respect: she doesn’t care.

    But the countering voice for a more compassionate, principled approach is absent from Westminster. Labour scaremongers over boat crossings as well to claim the Tories have lost control.

    …

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/e/saluting-gary-lineker-challenge-state-racism-dont-conform-it