Earth to G8: Stop Funding Fossil Fuel & Nuclear Insanity! Global Day of Action against the G8

July 14, 2006 was a Global Day of Action against the G8.
July 15, 2006 was an International Day of Action for Climate Justice, and against Climate Change and the G8, organized in the U.S. and called for globally by Rising Tide North America.

On Sunday July 16th the Group of Eight industrial nations approved a statement on “Global Energy Security” encouraging nuclear energy, despite protests in the streets of St. Petersburg outside their meetings and in many other places around the globe. Protesters in St. Petersburg blockaded the city’s main thoroughfare on Sunday, July 16, raising posters saying “No G8!” Eventually 37 activists were roughly removed by Russian riot police.The sit-in took place despite the growing suppression of dissent by the Russian government in recent years. Russian authorities preemptively arrested over 200 activists before the G8 and forbade protesters from leaving an alternative conference in St. Petersburg held on Saturday, July 15.”We wanted to voice our demands to not develop nuclear energy,” said Olga Miryasova from Russia’s Network Against the G8.The G8 statement on global energy security advocates nuclear energy as one way to address global climate change, yet environmental activists warn that nuclear energy cannot be considered a favorable way to reduce carbon emissions and combat global climate change. Nuclear reactors are dangerous, extremely expensive, take many years to build, and require massive government subsidies. Activists would like this funding to instead be used to quickly reduce carbon emissions through energy efficiency measures, development of renewable energy sources, and restoration of damaged wetland and forest ecosystems.In coalition with the protests in St. Petersburg, international demonstrations occurred on July 14 and 15 in numerous cities in the United States, the United Kingdom, Venezuela, New Zealand, the Netherlands, and Germany. The protests included large “banner drops in multiple cities, protests of coal and oil companies, and rallies at the U.S. embassy in London and U.S. Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman’s home in Washington, DC.”The G8 countries represent just 15 percent of the world’s population but they produce 45 percent of all human emissions of carbon dioxide, the leading greenhouse gas,” said Ethan Green of Rising Tide North America, a group that publicized the July 15th protests against Climate Change and the G8 in the United States. “Poor, indigenous and environmentally vulnerable communities should not bear the brunt of disease epidemics, droughts, floods, melting ice, rising oceans, hurricanes, and other catastrophes caused by the global climate change that rich countries are responsible for due to our prodigious burning of coal, oil and gas for energy.”

CHRONICLE OF INTERNATIONAL ACTIONS AGAINST THE 2006 G8 SUMMIT

Below is a partial list of anti-G8 actions that happened in St. Petersburg and around the world, leading up to and during the 2006 G8 Summit.

St. Petersburg, Russia – Participants in the Russian Social Forum, which was held in St.Petersburg on July 13-15, were not allowed to have a march, although they requested permission from City Hall weeks before. Activists in St. Petersburg were arrested, assaulted and repressed by the Russian police state. As the summit opened, demonstrations in the city were either outlawed, stopped by the police, or broken up by force. Police blocked them at the Kirov stadium, where the Social Forum was held, and prevented from taking to the streets of the city. About 150 activists held a rally behind closed gates, facing lines of riot police, who outnumbered the activists. More than 200 people had already been imprisoned before the G8 Summit, some accused of “terrorism,” to prevent them taking part in possible demonstrations. On Sunday July 16 around 50 people were arrested, including more than 30 people were arrested at the blockade of a hotel in St. Petersburg used by participants in the G8 Summit. Police attacked and arrested journalists before turning on the protesters. 12 activists were also arrested during a weekly anti-war picket, and 6 Belorussian activists were arrested and physically abused by police for organising a press conference. Protest against this police violence and repression! [video | report | photos: 1 | 2]
Amsterdam, The Netherlands – Anti-G8 Critical Mass bicycle demonstration that occupied a few of the busiest ‘highways’ in town and ended at the building of Shell Research to show solidarity with activists in Rossport (Ireland) resisting a pipeline-project from Shell. In the morning a small action was also held at the Russian Embassy in The Hague. (Report and Pictures)

Asheville, USA – Climate Justice Day! Bicycle workshops and skillshares, followed by Critical Mass bike ride.

Auckland, New Zealand – Climate Justice Day! 5 simultaneous banner drops over bridges, with slogans like “Stop Climate Change Now” and “International Climate Justice Day,” followed by a Critical Mass bike ride.

Berlin, Germany – An anti-capitalist march visited the German Foreign Ministry and the Russian Embassy, where a skirmish occurred and 2 protesters were arrested.

Brisbane, Australia – Climate Justice Day! “Reclaim the Streets” party

Davis, California – Protest against Monsanto in solidarity with anti-G8 global days of action, in front of the USDA building in Davis. Rally against SB 1056, the biotech-sponsored bill that prevents local communities from their Constitutional right to vote on whether or not their town, city or county will allow Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) and Genetically Engineered (GE) seed crops to be grown in their voting district.

Gao, Mali, Africa – The fifth edition of the People’s Forum — a popular convergence to educate, exchange, communicate, inform, plan citizens’ actions and elaborate alternatives to neoliberal globalization — started on July 15 as a counterweight to the G8 summit in St Petersburg, Russia. Several hundred people attended this three-day gathering to raise awareness about the problems faced by poor people in Western Africa, including neo-colonial plunder of the natural and energy resources of the South.

Hamburg, Germany – Many groups called for a Reclaim The Streets Day under the slogan: “We are not going to demand anything. We are not going to ask for anything. We are going to take. We are going to occupy.”

Lawrence, Kansas, USA – Carnival against Capital in solidarity with the anti-G8 protests in St. Petersburg, Russia and around the world.Featuringlive music including Erik Petersen from the punk/folk group Mischief Brew, and local hip-hop and folk act Joe Carr, plus food, face painting, and other activities.

London, England – Climate Justice Day! “G ATE MY PLANET” protest party outside the Embassy of the country most responsible for setting a policy direction that can only lead to planetary catastrophe: the United States. Organized by the Campaign Against Climate Change.

London, England – Climate Justice Day! Banner unfurled featuring the digits ‘C’ ‘O’ and ‘2’ and leaflets distributed outside the office of Tulchan Communications, a public relations firm that counts Drax Group plc, which owns and runs the UK’s dirtiest coal-fired power plant plant, amongst its clients. Organized by London Rising Tide.Madrid, Spain – Actvists from the Global Action Madrid collective symbolically hanged straw-puppets representing the G8 leaders, denouncing the criminal policies and extreme impoverishment of indebted countries carried out by the world’s eight most powerful countries.

Maine, USA – Climate Justice Day! Truckload of construction and demolition debris dumbed in Governor Baldacci’s driveway, protesting and bringing attention to his continual support of the importation, dumping, and burning of toxic construction and demolition debris behind claims of supporting alternative and renewable energy.

Manchester, England – Bicycle carnival in solidarity with anti G8 protesters in Russia. The cycling protest in Manchester was a celebration of the bicycle as a mode of transport that doesn’t pollute or cause climate change. Cyclists took to the road cheering, blowing whistles and playing musical instruments as they rode. Organized by Manchester Camp for Climate Action.

Manila, Phillipines – Anarchist Festival organized in response against the G8 Summit (solidarity), in celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Spanish Revolution, and resistance to the Phillipine President’s annual “State of the Nation Address.”

Maracaibo, Venezuela – Climate Justice Day! A full week of activities against coal mining in the indigenous territory of the Sierra de Perij�, including film screenings, eco-games, mural painting, art exhibitions, culminating July 15 with a protest and rally in the streets of Maracaibo. (Schedule of events)

Paris, France – V�lorution bicyclists joined the “Grand MiliTerre Procession of the Army of Clowns” as ARMS FOR MASSIVE PROTECTION OF THE CLIMATE! ( Communique 1 / Communique 2 )

Straslund, Germany – (Thursday 13 July, 2006) Around 1,500 people rallied from the peace, counter-globalisation and anti-fascist movements in Germany against US President Bush and German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s pre-G8 meeting in Stralsund, on the Baltic coast in northern Germany.
Sydney, Australia – Protesting the ongoing brutality of the capitalist system, environmental destruction, and attacks on human rights that the goverments of the G8 countries perpetrate, activists shut down the Russian Consulate in Sydney.

Washington, DC, USA – Critical Mass bike ride through downtown DC to US Vice President Dick Cheney’s home, followed by a rally against oil, coal and nuclear energy outside the home of US Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Samuel Bodman. Organized by DC Anti-War Network.

In addition: The first international protest took place on July 13th in Gothenburg (SE), and a banner was hung on a bridge in Bristol (UK): “Geldof lied: Live Aid changed nothing! Bristol Solidarity with the Moscow G8 Crashers! “. On Friday July 14, a G8 solidarity occupation and banner-drop action at the Russian Chamber of Commerce in London (UK) was violently policed and at two were arrested. Protests in front of Russian embassies took place in Den Haag (NL), Salzburg (AT), Berlin, Bonn (DE), and Minsk (BY). Activists in Traunstein, Frankfurt/Main , Hamburg, Oldenburg, Rosenheim, Bremen, Heidelberg&Mannheim , Hannover (DE), Cardiff (UK), Zug am See (CH), Paris (F), and Warsaw (PL) also protested against the policies of the G8. In Kiev the group “The world is not a commodity” did a performance [ report | pictures ]. A part of inner-city L�neburg (DE) was “privatised.”