WIRE AGENCIES
December 12, 3009
Danish police last night raided a climate campaigners' accommodation
centre in Copenhagen, detaining 200 activists and seizing items
including paint bombs and shields which they claimed could be used for
acts of civil disobedience. They also raided an American climate
self-immolation protester's hotel room, detained him and seized items
they claimed were set to be used for his announced public
self-immolation climate protest on Sunday.
About 200 police arrived at the shelter on Ragnhild Street, in the
Nørrebro district of Copenhagen, at 2.30am. They locked activists into
the building for two hours, and searched some of the nearby
properties. Campaigners say they took away various items including a
power drill, an angle grinder, and some wooden props. No arrests were
made.
Police confirmed the raid took place and issued a statement saying
that not only did the detain the American self-immolation protester
but also found "58 fluorescent tubes containing a mixture of paint and
oil, closed in both ends with candle wax, 193 riot shields, nine metal
cages measuring 4x2m, which are capable of rolling and constructed
inside with milk cartons, which could be used for staircases."
The American said he still planned to carry out his self-immolation
protest on Sunday, despite a strong police warning not to do so. "This
is meant as a wake up call, a call to arms,, a cri de coeur," the
activist said, requesting anonymity. "I won't die. I have planned this
out very well in detail. But it's more than a stunt. Please don't call
this a stunt. This is a cri de coeur."
WIRE AGENCIES, December 12, 3009
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French woman dies after self-immolation protest
A 60-year-old French woman died on Sunday after setting herself on fire to protest a decision to deport her partner back to Armenia, hospital staff said.
Josiane Nardi suffered third-degree burns to almost her entire body after dousing herself with flammable liquid and setting herself alight in front of a detention centre in the western city of Le Mans on Saturday.
She was rushed to the burn victims' unit at Tours hospital where she died on Sunday, hospital staff said.
Mayor Jean-Claude Boulard ordered an investigation to be opened and said it must provide answers on "how a woman was led to make the ultimate sacrifice to save her companion".
An illegal immigrant, Nardi's 31-year-old partner Henrik Orujyan had been serving a two-year jail sentence for various crimes before being transferred to a pre-deportation centre.
The sticky issue of climate change
Gordon Brown gave me the slip when I superglued myself to him this week. Here's what I would have said if he'd stayed stuck
Dan Glass
guardian.co.uk, Friday 25 July 2008 17.02 BST
Article history
I've been campaigning and taking direct action against the growth of the aviation industry for two years. Last month I found out I had won an award for my work. To collect it I was to go to No 10 and meet the prime minister, the same man who has been wilfully ignoring all campaign group Plane Stupid's work and the 70,000 London resident's rejections of the the third runway at Heathrow. It didn't take long to decide what I would do.
With a team from Plane Stupid backing me up, I put on my second-hand suit wearing a device in my pocket that was linked up to an anonymous Skype account on a computer in front of the team. At 6.15pm Brown came out into the audience to shake our hands. I knew what I was about to do as I squeezed the superglue into my left hand.
I grabbed his arm, and started to deliver my speech. This is what I started to say as I superglued myself to his arm before the PM tore my hand away from his suit.
If I could have continued talking to my captive, here's what I would have said:
"We need you to make the tough decisions you keep on talking about. If you need someone to hold your hand, then we are willing to do just that. But we are not going to wait around for politicians to catch up. Remember, you only have two possible legacies before you leave office: as the first prime minister to take climate change seriously, or the last one not to.
"It's time you stopped hiding from communities on the frontline affected by climate change. While we stand here smiling nicely for the cameras, Inuit communities in the Arctic are planning survival strategies for their families as the deep seas gradually engulf them. While we stand here drinking champagne and eating canapés, communities in Tuvalu are desperately building sandbanks to stop their island, their families, their lives and ultimately, their dignity, from going underwater. And, prime minister, as you know, the community ll forget."
Maybe when a heatwave strikes Washington DC during a climate bill debate some senators might change their ignorant opinions.
Raleigh, well said. It will take something like that to force them to change their minds, like that heat wave that hit France a few summers ago and killed 35,000 people nationwide...... when that happens in USA, maybe in 2055, then the Congress will wake up. Sigh. It takes a tsunami to wake people up, sad to say.
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