Amnesty International Seeks Criminal Inquiry into Shell over Alleged Complicity in Murder and Torture of Activists in Nigeria

by Hannah Summers / The Guardian

Amnesty International is calling for a criminal investigation into the oil giant Shell regarding allegations it was complicit in human rights abuses carried out by the Nigerian military.

A review of thousands of internal company documents and witness statements published on Tuesday points to the Anglo-Dutch organisation’s alleged involvement in the brutal campaign to silence protesters in the oil-producing Ogoniland region in the 1990s.

Amnesty is urging the UK, Nigeria and the Netherlands to consider a criminal case against Shell in light of evidence it claims amounts to “complicity in murder, rape and torture” – allegations Shell strongly denies.

While the cache of documents includes material Shell was forced to disclose as part of a civil case brought against the company and many of the allegations are long-standing, the review also examines some evidence which has not been previously reported. (more…)

Rail Sabotage Near Medford Oregon in Solidarity With Olympia Train Blockade

from Puget Sound Anarchists

A few days ago, inspired by the Olympia train Blockade, we used copper wire to signal a blockage and disrupt rail traffic near Medford Oregon. Railways are easily accessible and everywhere. Sabotage is fun and easy.

-some more anarchists

Olympia Commune Raided by Police

from It’s Going Down

This is a breaking story. Check @Olystand and Puget Sound Anarchists for updates.

Starting at five this morning [Nov. 29], the Olympia commune that has been blockading the railroad tracks leading into the port for the past twelve days was raided by a large police force comprised of officers from multiple agencies, many of which drove unmarked cars. The police force included roving detachments of bike cops who followed people as they tried to leave the area.

At 9 AM, the police were still clearing debris out of the camp and maintaining a perimeter of officers in riot gear. At present it seems no arrests were made and no serious injuries were sustained.

Editor’s Note: Please submit more in-depth accounts from the raid or stories to Puget Sound Anarchists, It’s Going Down, or the EF!J Newswire.

Train Stopped and Banner Dropped in Solidarity with #OlympiaBlockade

from It’s Going Down

In solidarity with the ongoing #OympiaBlockade, people are taking action in solidarity.

According to an anonymous post on Puget Sound Anarchists, persons unknown shorted the wires on train tracks, sending a message to the train to stop: 

Dear Olympia commune,

Standing in solidarity with your port blockade preventing the transport of fracking supplies we temporarily shutdown train lines throughout the larger oakland area by shorting the track circuits with jumper cables. Stay strong.

In every single town,
Until every officer is down,Love and solidarity,The Bay

 OlyStand, a banner was dropped in solidarity:

Banner reads: “NO PIPELINES, NO PRISONS ON NATIVE LAND.

#NOLNG253 #BLOCTHEJUVIE #OLYSTAND”

For updates on the struggle against fracking and its world, check out @OlyStand on Twitter here.

Chile: Large Iceberg Breaks off From Grey Glacier

from The Guardian

A large iceberg broke off the Grey glacier in southern Chile, authorities said on Tuesday, adding that the cause of the rupture was unclear.

Chile’s Conaf forestry service shared photos on social media of the enormous block of blue-white ice, which measured 350m (1,148ft) long by 380m (1,247ft) wide, as it floated free in waters of a glacial lagoon near the southern tip of the South American continent.

Park officials at Chile’s Torres del Paine National Park, home to the glacier, said such ruptures were rare and had not occurred since the early 1990s.

Dr Ricardo Jaña, glaciologist from the Chilean Antarctic Institute, said the iceberg was bigger than expected.

“This is a situation we had anticipated, but the most singular and anecdotal thing is that it is an iceberg of much larger dimensions, which is notable.”

Torres del Paine is one of Chile’s most popular tourist attractions, famous for its mountain views and visited by more than 115,000 tourists annually, according to Conaf.

(more…)

Locked Down

by Jade / Earth First! Newswire

[This story about fighting DAPL in Iowa was written over the summer, so some of the statements are now out of date. Most notably, the author is no longer in jail and the Dakota Access Pipeline is now operational.]

If this drill moves forward, my arms are going with it. The 20,000 pound machine shook forcefully under me. Will I lose my arms? With each engine pulse, rubber tubes in front of my face expanded to press into my cheeks. The smell of burnt rubber enveloped me as cold sludge sputtered onto my face in unison with the rhythm of the engine.

I had locked myself to a horizontal drill in Boone, Iowa, as part of a non-violent protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL). As a non-native, I was acting in solidarity with the Indigenous-led movement at the Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota. There, native people and allies were fighting the same pipeline to protect their land and water and halt centuries of theft and exploitation.

By law, companies are required to turn equipment off when a person is attached to it. This was not happening. My arms were locked to the base of the drill and for thirty minutes my whole body vibrated with the rhythm of the machine. The drill was then turned off, and I remained for hours.

Terrifying, yes. But it also felt good. Even if it was just one night at one river of one pipeline, it felt satisfying to have my body physically and peacefully stopping this system that makes decisions based on profit and disregards human and ecological cost.

Construction companies use horizontal drills to place pipes under waterways, and I was trying to interrupt this from taking place under the Des Moines River. This river is a source of drinking water for over half a million people in Des Moines alone, and a spill would put clean water at risk for downstream residents. In 2012, there were 6,000 oil spills in the US, equivalent to 16 spills each day.ⁱ It is not a matter of if oil from this pipeline will spill, it is a matter of when. DAPL is not yet complete and already 104 gallons have spilled in South Dakota. This is enough to contaminate drinking water for one million people.ⁱⁱ

The Dakota Access Pipeline stretches 1,172 miles to bring oil from the Bakken oil fields in northwest North Dakota through South Dakota, Iowa, and Illinois. Pipelines are currently being constructed in half of the states in the US and construction shows no signs of slowing.ⁱⁱⁱ At this rate, the reductions in carbon dioxide emissions needed to avoid climate catastrophe are impossible.

The line where oil and gas companies end and the government begins is murky at best. Oil and gas companies have one goal: maximize quarterly profits for shareholders. In 2013, $400,000 per day was spent by US oil and gas industry lobbyists.^iv When Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was CEO of ExxonMobil, he made over $100,000 every day^v. From excessive campaign contributions, powerfully funded lobbyists, and maintaining a revolving door between business and government, these oil and gas companies ensure the government prioritizes and protects the economic self-interest of the oil and gas industry at the expense of the health of its citizens.

Although my cheeks are no longer pressed into the engine of a drill, I am still locked to a machine that prioritizes corporate profits over my right to a glass of clean water. I am currently writing this from the floor of my jail cell in Boone, Iowa. When I emerge and take a breath of fresh air for the first time in one month, I will owe DAPL $5,000 (originally $27,000) for unsubstantiated and legally unprecedented restitution claims. I will owe the jail $1,700 ($65/day) for my boarding fees.

Even if it feels like our hands are tied and cold sludge is being slung in our face, we can still find a way off this machine. We know a better world is possible. This means creating economic alternatives, de-privatizing our energy sources, limiting the political power of corporations, engaging in community, and removing hyper-consumption from its altar. The oil and gas industry is powerful and relentless and the roots run deep, but so do we and so do ours.

Commune Against Civilization #3: The Encampment Grows

from It’s Going Down

Dispatches from an uninvited guest on COAST SALISH TERRITORY, SQUAXIN AND NISQUALLY LAND

“In the winter of 1846, Levi Smith and Edmund Sylvester arrived at the Bus-chut-hwud village (centered at today’s 4th Avenue and Columbia Street) and staked a joint claim of 320 acres, taking over the Indian village and the entire peninsula comprising Olympia and the State Capitol of today. Smith built a cabin among the Indians [sic], trading with them on a daily basis, and enclosed two acres for a garden and livestock near the current intersection of Capitol Way and Olympia Avenue.

When Smith drowned in 1848, Sylvester alone held the claim. January 12, 1850, Sylvester platted the town, named it Olympia after the Olympic Mountains, and donated blocks for a public square, a school, a customs house and 12 acres for the Capitol grounds. The area around Chinook Street (Columbia Street today), which once housed a thriving Coastal Salish community, was now dotted with cabins and a few store fronts.

By 1855, the Indian [sic] village had disappeared, the past residents of Bus-shut-hwud no longer called the peninsula their home. A massive stockade had been built along 4th Avenue where their village was located and most tribal people were living in internment camps on Squaxin and Fox islands where many became sick and died. In early fall of 1855, Michael T. Simmons had interned 460 Indians [sic] on Squaxin Island and 1,200 on Fox Island.

After the stockade, Indians [sic] never returned to settle in any considerable numbers in the immediate neighborhood of the town.”

– “What Happened to the Steh-chass People,” by Pat Rasmussen

Another End of the World is Possible

–graffiti near the site of the Olympia railroad blockade

“After the general assembly, “Black Snake Killaz” is shown to great satisfaction in camp, prefaced with a group reading of the Invisible Committee’s text “Power is Logistic. Block Everything!”’

What follows is not an official position of the many-headed hydra of the olympia blockade.

TODAY [Nov. 27], the railroad blockade preventing the shipment of fracking materials in downtown Olympia, WA is entering its 11th day. The front wall of the barricade is reinforced, and adorned by more and more splashes of decoration. Gradually, more and more of the surrounding area is brought into use and enjoyment by the aspiring commune. In our spacious “backyard,” a femmes auxiliary tent and a quiet zone have been set up. More beds and medical materials arrive. The back staircase now has a sturdy looking meet-and-greet platform to bolster the spirits and effectiveness of our sentinels. Surrounding buildings look like a teenage graffiti artist’s dream, and a ton of hay bales from who-knows-where have appeared out front, strung with rope lights to create a charming enclosure for our second kitchen, for use as a sports rink and show space, and for our pups and little ones to play within.

(more…)

Nocturnal Visit to the Home of Jean-Yves Lavoie, President of Junex

from Montreal Counter-Information

Anonymous submission to MTL Counter-info

The night of November 16, we went to visit the suburbs of Quebec City, or more precisely 1205 rue Imperiale, so as to leave a message for Mr. Jean-Yves Lavoie. For those who aren’t familiar with him, Mr. Lavoie is the president of Junex, a company that generates its profits (or, at least, tries to) from exploiting the territory of so-called “Quebec”, meaning among other things fracking projects in “Gaspesie”.

We have decided to combine our efforts with the powerful ongoing struggle, which is taking place on multiple fronts, that seeks to make the dream of Mr. Lavoie impossible. In other words, rather than allowing colonial extractivist industry and companies like Junex to continue to threaten the soil and the water of Gaspesie or any other region of Turtle Island, we have chosen to heed the call of the Mi’kmaq and other water and land protectors. We will do what is necessary in order to stop companies like Junex from carrying out their destructive plans.

It is in this spirit, and with our own objective of dismantling the oil and gas industry in “Quebec”, that we have smashed the windows of his cars, without forgetting to slash the tires. We also covered his house in paint.

We also left him a voice message, which you can listen to here.

His dream of becoming rich through the destruction of territory will not come to pass. Collective efforts of earth defense – blockades, support camps, demos, education campaigns – as well as all the autonomous initiatives put forward by a multitude of indigenous and non-indigenous groups will be much more powerful than the work of Mr. Lavoie and Junex can accomplish in one life.

Quebecers against Quebec!

Suburbia Banner Drop Against Pipelines

from Puget Sound Anarchists

Banner reads: “NO PIPELINES, NO PRISONS ON NATIVE LAND.

#NOLNG253 #BLOCTHEJUVIE #OLYSTAND”

Vietnamese Blogger Sentenced to 7 Years in Prison for Reporting on Toxic Spill

by Richard C. Paddock / New York Times

BANGKOK — A chemical spill that devastated the coast of central Vietnam last year claimed another casualty on Monday when a 22-year-old blogger was sentenced to seven years in prison for posting reports on the disaster.

After a brief, closed trial in Ha Tinh Province, the blogger, Nguyen Van Hoa, was found guilty of spreading anti-state propaganda for producing videos and writing about protests over the toxic spill, news agencies reported.

The discharge, which occurred when a new Taiwan-owned steel factory flushed cyanide and other chemicals through its waste pipeline, killed marine life and sickened people along a 120-mile stretch of coastline. It is one of Vietnam’s largest environmental disasters. (more…)