SOLIDARITY NOW13 juli 2006 – 11:13

Perfect Democracy needs no Protest

While Russian president Putin presented himself as the perfect democrat at the NGO-Forum Civil G8 last week. Yet, repression hits hard on activists all over Russia.

Twelve members of the environmental group Eco-Defense dared to express their opinion against nuclear power visibly at the NGO meeting ten days before the summit and barely escaped arrest when Putin told his security forces to withdraw while international guests, as well as media were watching (report on BBC). They as well as everybody else who is only vaguely suspected of wanting to participate in any action that expresses dissent with the politics of the G8 now have to pay the price. The registered demonstration of the Russian Social Forum (RSF) is forbidden. Already on Monday seven eco-activists were arrested in St Petersburg. The local group from Kaliningrad was not even allowed to leave at all. The RSF reports that all over Russia activists are being intimidated, beaten and arrested.

Two German members of a bike caravan that had just arrived from Berlin were arrested in the streets of St Petersburg and sentenced to ten days confinement, a fate they now share with several Russian and one Swiss activist who did as little as carry leaflets. [DE]

Latest Advice by the Legal Team resembles warnings before going into a war zone. International activists are now trying to contact lawyers, members of parliament and media - things that so far have happened after protests against previous summits. LINK, the Libertarian News and Information Collective of the Anti-G8 Network (SPB8) reports numerous breaches of human rights and calls for international attention. Another call was issued by the Trade Union Solidarity Action Committee.

Despite all of this, the Libertarian Forum took place in Moscow with participants from England, Wales, Finland, Ukraine, Poland, Germany and Russia [see reports: [en] 1 | 2 | [de] 1 | 2]. A first Pink-Silver-Samba-Clown action happened in Moscow on Monday (pictures | LINK statement). In St Petersburg eco-activists protested against the import of nuclear waste on Tuesday morning. All were arrested and expect fifteen days administrative arrest in a hearing, now postponed until Thursday.

Previously, in June, the front of the Russian embassy in Madrid was covered with red paint.

http://int.ru.indymedia.org/

14 & 15 July: Global Action Days

Friday, July 14th will be a Global Day of Action Against the G8 and for free Health Care for Everyone, Education for All, an End to the Nuclear Age, and an End to War. The day before the beginning of the G8 Summit in St. Petersburg, Russia where the world’s 8 richest countries will meet 15-17 July, 2006, join people everywhere in the streets! The 3 main themes of the 2006 G8 Summit are Energy Security, Education, and Aids/Health Care. This year the Russian Network Against the G8 wants to show that wherever they meet, the G8 will face protests against them. For those who can’t come to Russia, activists there appreciate your support by joining this international Global Action day on the 14th of July in as many cities as possible. The power of the elites crosses many lines, but our solidarity goes beyond any borders!

14 JULY 2006: GLOBAL ACTION DAY!

For more info, see: http://nog8.ru, http://g8-2006.plentyfact.net

Called by the Russian Network Against the G8 Saturday, July 15th will be an International Day of Direct Action Against Climate Change and the G8. As G8 energy ministers promise trillions of dollars in new subsidies to the fossil fuel and nuclear industries destroying our planet and our future, we will take action to shut them down! This is a call for autonomous, decentralized actions appropriate for your town, city, or bioregion. Use this international day of action to support local struggles against oil refineries, gas pipelines, strip mines and coal-fired power plants. Disrupt the financial backers of the fossil fuel industry. Host teach-ins to spread sustainable post-petroleum living skills. Find a weak point in the infrastructure of resource exploitation and throw a literal or symbolic wrench in the works. Visit your local polluters and give’em hell!

15 JULY 2006: CLIMATE ACTION DAY! Mobilized by Earth First!

Climate Caucus and Rising Tide North America, visit www.rtc.revolt.org for more information.

http://spb8.net/en/global_action_day/

A call out to protest against G8 summit of 2006 in St. Petersburg, Russia

In July 2006 G8 will hold its summit in St.Petersburg, Russia.

G7 was created in 1975, for informal discussions on economic and political questions between heads of most powerful capitalist states. Russia joined in 1998 - it was accepted thanks to its nuclear arsenal and vast natural resources (in 2004, Russia was only 16th largest economy of the world; e.g. China was not invited to the club). G8 has no juridical status whatsoever, so it exists outside any democratic framework. But it still has become an important spectacle and platform, where top leaders of the world may look for consensus among each other, before imposing their policies on their populations.

We have no illusions about parliamentarian democracy, we are against any governments. Current state of the world proves all too well, that with a submissive mainstream media spreading anti-terrorist hysteria, powers are yet able to submit their citizens to policy of war and destruction. Russia has been one of the forerunners of these developments, with an endless war in Northern Caucasus and suppression of independent media.

We are anticapitalists, and we do not have any illusions about national capital as an alternative to global one. Small diplomatic skirmishes between major powers in regards to North Caucasian and Iraq wars were quickly settled, and essentially all G8 states give at least passive support to policies of each other. Solidarity between elites passes any borders, so our solidarity must do this as well.

Whatever labels media put on us, we are not “antiglobalists”. We are for a free flow of people, ideas and struggles - across any borders. When G8 leaders claim to fight for freedom, they are fighting for a freedom of capital accumulation ? according to which nuclear waste must have freedom to cross borders into Russia, but people must not have this right. G8 leaders also claim to fight against poverty, but in reality it is their policies that cause poverty in the first place. Moscow has more billionaries than any other city of the world, while vast majority of Russian population has profited nothing from the politics, declared to be aimed at “economic growth”, which in any case will last just as long as there are natural resources to be looted. In contrary, it is the very poorest who have been targeted with the neoliberal reforms, such as revoking free social benefits and rising prices of communal payments, which is connected to the plan of Russia joining the WTO.

We call for protests all around the world during G8 summit in St. Petersburg. We also call for a global convergence to St. Petersburg in time of the summit. The attention of the whole world will be directed to spectacle of the G8, and we must show that they will be met with protest anywhere they will go! We are everywhere!

Network Against G8 (Russia / ex-USSR)