2009-12-17

17th December 2009 Copenhagen

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CJA calls for an announced demo tomorrow at 15.00

The cop 15 comes to an end - and it has not coped with what politicians promised. There is no treaty that might preserve us from the catastrophic consequences of runaway climate change. The summit's agenda didn't even include real solutions to the climate crisis - such as tackling economic growth, leaving fossile fuels in the ground and implementing food souverainity. Neither has it adressed the ecological debt the global north has with the south or measures for a just transition towards a low carbon economy and society.

Furthermore, critics and adversairies of the climate politics carried forward by the industrialized nations, market-based false solutions as carbon offsetting and emissions trading have suffered from a whol array of repression: Delegates from the civil society have been excluded from the process, some of them beaten up by the police when trying to join the peoples assembly for climate justice outside the Bella Center.

More: http://indymedia.dk/articles/1922

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Nearly 2,000 signatures in less than 24 hours: International petition demands ‘Release Tadzio Mueller and the other climate prisoners!’

Press Release for Immediate Release

Thursday, December 17 2009

15.00 hours
Copenhagen, Denmark

In response to the arrest of Climate Justice Action spokesperson Tadzio Mueller, as well as over a thousand others taking part in protests around the UN Climate Conference in Copenhagen, hundreds of academics, journalists and members of civil society have signed an Open Letter of protest to the Danish Parliament.

More: http://www.gipfelsoli.org/Repression/8084.html

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VIDEO RELEASED OF COPENHAGEN DELEGATES AGRESSIVELY INTIMIDATED BY POLICE

CLIMATE JUSTICE ACTION
PRESS RELEASE
17th December 2009

Video came to light today of COP15 delegates being aggresively intimidated by police. (1) http://bit.ly/6DOBHe

Many delegates who marched out of the UN talks during Wednesday’s protests were intimidated and threatened with arrest by Danish police, preventing them from joining a People’s Assembly outside the conference.

Danish police were filmed as they surrounded and attacked official delegates who were attempting to join activists and other accredited delgates to form a Peoples’ Assembly calling for climate justice.

More: http://www.gipfelsoli.org/Repression/Copenhagen_2009/8080.html

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TWO ARRESTED AFTER CLIMBING

BANNER DROP IN THE HEART OF COPENHAGEN

Two activists from got arrested after an 'Egality' action, dropping a banner in Copenhagen's town hall square today (see pictures attached). (1) (2) The Banner, 8x5 meters, shows two arrows, "democracy" and "Copenhagen", pointing in opposite directions.

James Sadri, an Egality activist that participated in the action, said: "The fight for democracy is world wide: in Iran, my cousins are struggling for democracy, and here in Copenhagen we are doing the same."

More: http://www.gipfelsoli.org/Repression/Copenhagen_2009/8089.html

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Activists reveal tactics used by police to 'decapitate' Copenhagen climate protests

Danish police used wire traps, deployed undercover officers and detained people in cages to ‘decapitate’ protests in Copenhagen, activists claim

Danish police used wire traps, deployed undercover officers and detained people in cages they called “Guantanamo junior” to “decapitate” climate protests in Copenhagen this week, activists claimed today.

The details of police tactics came as three of the spokespeople for the campaigning group behind yesterday’s protests around the Bella conference centre, where UN climate talks are taking place, were charged and imprisoned following preliminary hearings.

More: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/17/copenhagen-police-tactics-revealed

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Gregoire: Copenhagen cops learn from WTO

Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire is working the Copenhagen climate summit to market Washington's "green" economy, but is finding Danish police have learned lessons from Seattle's men and women in blue.

"To the person, they have seen the film of WTO," Gregoire said, referring to demonstrations and riots at the World Trade Organization ministers meeting in Seattle a decade ago.

The Danes share Seattle's appreciation of the right to dissent, Gregoire added in a phonecall with reporters. But they move quickly to thwart potentially violent actions -- a lesson learned from the "Battle of Seattle."

"They also saw when you allow it to go too far, the consequences are severe," Gregoire added. "Nothing has gotten out of control."

Protesters did try to disrupt one meeting attended by Gregoire, but she said the disruption was quickly suppressed.

More: http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattlepolitics/archives/188447.asp

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From Pittsburgh to Copenhagen: Actions for the Earth in Solidarity with the COP15 Protesters

The United Nations COP15 Climate Conference is taking place in Copenhagen (from December 7-18, 2009). In Pittsburgh, individuals from a variety of local networks organized multiple actions with a diversity of tactics to stand in solidarity with the protesters in COP15 and to demand solutions to the suffering of our planet and inhabitants.

More: http://news.infoshop.org/article.php?story=2009cop15-solidarity

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Solidarity demo in Copenhagen - 16.12

Demonstration showing solidarity with political prisoners took place in Copenhagen at night on December 16.

Several dozens of people came to show their support to political prisoners. Demonstration happened in front of the Vestre Faengsel prison's gate between 22 and 23 hours. In this prison several persons who were arrested during climate protests are kept. They will face different charges.

More: http://indymedia.dk/articles/1900

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Account of mass arrest experience on Dec 12th

On Saturday 12th December, myself and my friend were arrested along with 966 other protestors whilst participating in a peaceful climate change protest in Copenhagen. We were never given any explanation as to why we were arrested and were treated abusively by the Danish police. In total, we were detained for 8 and a half hours.
In the attached document, myself and my friend have written up a chronological account of what happened. This includes examples of illegal behaviour by police and breaches of human rights. The Danish police must be held to account for their actions. We must not let their disgraceful and illegal tactics set a prcedent for future police operations at peaceful demonstrations.

More: http://indymedia.dk/articles/1909

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Most Danes back hardline climate summit policing: poll

COPENHAGEN, Dec 17 (AFP) Six out of 10 Danes say they approve of the controversial preventive detention of climate protesters at the ongoing UN summit in Copenhagen, according to a poll published on Thursday.

Some 58 percent of people questioned in the Megafon survey for the Politiken daily and the TV2 network said they backed police's new powers of pre-emptive arrest which enabled them to detain hundreds of environmental activists during protests on the sidelines of the 12-day conference.

The poll found 32 percent of those surveyed disapproved of the pre-emptive arrests made by police as a result of legislation passed by lawmakers shortly before the gathering began on December 7. The rest did not express an opinion.

More: http://www.spacedaily.com/2006/091217130836.rx2v5sdj.html