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Civil Society Declares: ‘Our Climate, Not Your Business!’
COPENHAGEN - Fed up with the lack of progress in the climate negotiations, campaigners marched on the Bella Centre. NGOs at the negotiations staged a walkout to connect with civil society outside, but police violently broke up this ‘people's assembly' and arrested the ringleaders.
A morning of protest started around 10.30 at the Bella Centre with a sit-in of ninety members of international environmental NGO Friends of the Earth (FOE), who despite having access passes to the conference venue were excluded for security reasons.
"This is a militarisation of the conference," said Friends of the Earth chairmen Nnimmo Bassey. "Copenhagen is a city under siege."
UNFCCC Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer, who came to speak to protesters, admitted that accreditation had been withdrawn because of indications FoEI would try to break out of the centre to meet protesters outside.
Just after De Boer agreed to negotiate with the activists, hundreds of indigenous people marched through the Bella Centre towards the exit beating drums and chanting "Join the people's assembly!", "Claim power now!" and "Respect the rights of indigenous people!"
"We demand the rights of indigenous people be respected in this agreement," said a protester from Mexico, Maria Sanchez from Mexico. "The Kyoto protocol must be respected and developed nations must lower their emissions."
Police in riot gear arrived outside the Bella Centre in massive numbers and prevented the indigenous people from joining the People's Assembly outside the Bella Centre. The ‘people's assembly' was declared illegal despite having been granted a permit earlier.
Outside, helicopters hovered overhead and wounded cops were carried away behind the barricades, police stormed the truck from where organisers were rallying the protesters.
"Come help us now, the police are getting in," screamed one organiser through the speakers before he was silenced and loaded into a police van.
The protest caused chaos at the Bella Centre's entrance which was immediately sealed off for security reasons. Ministers and diplomats were stuck in the waiting crowd. Journalists rushing to the scene of the protest were turned away.
Reporter Jose Siles from A-TV in Spain was arrested when he tried to get inside. "They are hurting me," he cried out in pain when dragged away by Danish police. "I have done nothing wrong, this is not a democracy."
Inside the Bella Centre, journalists were barred from covering the ongoing sit-in in an attempt to isolate the protesters.
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23 Comments so far
Show AllCopenhagen seems like Seattle all over again, except ten years later the situation of climate change has been excerbated to a point of no return if something is not done soon by the wealthy countries. But same ol same ol. The Copenhagen conference is really the ad hominen conference. One has to wonder what it would take to eliminate industrial greed and avarice. I guess nothing will happen until thousands of the super wealthy, corportocracy and millions of U.S. citizens are dying in the U.S. from some kind of climate plague!
THIS is what fascism and dictatorship looks like. We ordinary people no longer are allowed to exercise any rights. Even though permits had been issued by the "authorities", they were rescinded when it looked like people might actually join together in a large demonstration....
This is what it looks like, and this is when it occurs: when the colloquial interests of the elite are challenged by reality.
Read "Camp of the Saints". The third world really gets their marching orders in that story.
The Danish Text IS the Deal ...
Cap and Trade markets with derivatives managed by the World Bank for the profit of banksters and the domination and control of developing countries.
Best thing the G77 could do is unilaterally resign from the WTO. Only in this way will the developed countries listen to anything developing countries have to say ...
Time to declare COP15 dead ... otherwise the EU and the US will slip Trogan horses and trap doors into the agreements while buying off weaker countries.
A microbe sensing killing heat will back away to save itself.
Microbes are geniuses compared to us!
This is an interesting article:
http://www.counterpunch.org/bryce12162009.html
Energy Poverty, Population and Carbon Emissions
The Copenhagen Conundrum
By ROBERT BRYCE
and raises some valuable points. And sadly, I think he might be right (that the world will never stop burning fossil fuels so long as this MASS INEQUITY in energy exists), barring some miracle technology.
In a nutshell, may very well be fucked, regardless of what states agree to.
See what you get when we allow the greedy capitalist class to run things? Capitalism is causing the environmental crisis in its inherent need for continuous growth to keep profits going. Nothing matters but the capitalist system should go on so the rich can grow richer and the rest of us and the planet be damned. Capitalists offer no real solution. It's all smoke and mirrors. We must change the system to save our planet. There is simply no other way. The change starts with real political and economic democracy for the masses of people on this planet. Socialism now!
I agree with almost all that you say. But 'socialism' hasn't proven itself any differently in relation to the land, given that it's proponents are materialists hard core. What I am really getting at is that we need a modern critique of the state, moving away from centralized industrial systems. Historically, socialists in power have not proven themselves in any way to be a friend to the earth.
However, I will say that Cuba, whatever you want to call their state system, has been forced to change it's agricultural and energy policies because of the embargo, and has been proven to be a leader here. So that is a good sign.
But, I fear (based partly on the article i posted below, and on the history of industrial civilization), that nothing will stop the capitalist nations from destoying the earth till our near extinction. I know we have to keep trying, but I fear that Lovelock may be right.
keynesian capitalism works
keynesian capitalism works
Let me complete your sentence ... "for the capitalist class."
Socialism works, until it runs out of other people's money.
Why should governments legislate to tax us even more based on the hysterical ramblings of a bunch of ill-informed young people who have 'got' climate change like theocrats have 'got' religion?
This is a serious business. Since the crush of population is the nub of the worlds problem I don't want to hear any protest form any person who has bred children, or intends to. These people are just hypocrites.
Your fascist capitalism works, your excessive wealth plunder continues
to enrich itself upon the misery of the poor, but only until we get
organized enough to your ungodly government out of its misery.
For democracy, socialism or communism would all work equally well
if the politicians were all honest, as the end game is equality.
But capitalism with its excessive wealth, surely that would corrupt
the morals of the most honest politicians on earth.
Oh puleeeese! Who is it exactly who is ill informed?
NO MONEY ELECTION
If no money was allowed in the election process,
all of media required to give major candidates so much free advertising,
could capitalism continue past the first election?
No, because capitalism is the unlimited freedom to compete for excessive
wealth, this makes democratic equality impossible. For only the super-
intelligent rich would vote for it to continue in a free and honest election.
When I Walk By the Waters
When I walk by the waters
the stems of my birth tangle
in the reeds of the egrets.
When I shout to the mountains,
when the glaciers
all slide down
my thirst will succeed
and all my offspring will wilt
in the sun of the long season.
We imagine, then, the people will
keen and shiver
but it will not last that long
the flowers fall fast
the bees have turned to dreams
under that last nasturtium
and all the people leave
the cities that close like those flowers
and lose their light
and their fertile breaths
the same as ours the same
as the cirrus and the rain.
When I fall into the last grass
and the lawns have gone dust
where will my children live?
Who shall we sing to the moon?
Will it matter what world you lead
when the dust all blows away?
I have given you my home
from the moment I smelled the river
and the fish left my lines
for the far shore of stars.
When I sleep within the last dimness
of the everlasting shroud
will the mountains slide off into the sea?
No. The end can be as quiet as oats
leaning into the sun
or how our memories fail us
and our dreams turn grey
when our dreams turn grey.
--- Bob Vance
Everyone is getting a bit hysterical because NOTHING is being done. It's the same old GREED. The house is burning down and the owners are having tea upstairs while their children scream fire!
Our Climate not your business!! , is a powerful statement.
Polluters have gained much in the 20th century, They have made countries into Industrial and developing countries.
We have been duped by the material world they have patented, industrialized and marketed to us . It took us 100years to realize the poison in its creation and distribution.
Since it is our climate, we have to repent our foolishness and gullibility by parting large quantities of self sacrifice till we leave this earth.
Retreat from the heat.
People - Grow food! That's how we'll survive. In the city, suburbs, wherever you live, you can grow at least some of your own food.
Encourage young people to become farmers, or at least home gardeners.
Growing our own food locally, organically without pesticides or chemical fertilizers (both need oil to create), and eliminating the thousands of miles our food now travels (much more oil), would go a long ways towards eliminating greenhouses gases.
I've read estimates of 40 - 60 percent towards zero goal of greenhouses gases just by growing our own food locally world-wide without manmade chemicals. Rule should be that no food gets exported until everyone is fed locally/regionally.
Start your own garden this Spring - see http://www.fedcoseeds.com (beautiful website) for non-gmo, lots of organic (not all, but many) seeds - and they're a co-op here in Maine so prices are good. Good people, too.
Yes, keep up the political activism but grow your own garden, too, no matter how small. Gotta do it, People. More ideas at http://www.cleanearth.net
- Nancy Oden, North Coastal Maine on the Atlantic Ocean - where it's 5 below zero this morning and the woodstove is trying hard to heat this old fisherman's cottage - all the way up to 45F. so far - if we didn't have indoor plumbing, we could let our houses freeze up when we go to town - but we do insist on our inside running water, don't we? {~;> Be of good cheer, we will survive and we will prevail......http://www.cleanearth.net
To show you all how much fun farming can be (see my comment next) - and to lighten things up a bit, here are some Scottish Highlander sheepmen with Extreme Shepherding. As someone who's kept sheep for years, I can attest to the challenge this posed, as well as the energy and intelligence of the sheep dogs....
Go here - we have to keep our sanity and sense of humor even in these times...
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1137883380?bctid=17075685001
- Nancy Oden, Maine
Whether it was the civil rights movement, soldiers with PTSD, or climate change, the ruling class always insists that the problem is not the problem. The problem is the people who call attention to the problem.
Denmark's behaviour in all of this COP 15 is disappointing and shameful.