At 3.15 p.m., drumbeats and chants replaced the noises of engines and honking at Place du Châtelet, in Paris. Emerging from the surrounding streets, several hundred activists of the radical environmental movement Extinction Rebellion (XR) blocked the Pont au Change and other access roads to the crossroads with straw bales, bamboo tent structures and even a boat. the wing stamped with the XR logo. A permaculture workshop settles down slowly and meditation lessons are improvised behind human chains. Over-motivated, the “rebels” promise to try to stay in place for three days.
Among all those who settle in the square, many are recent activists like Quentin, 29. “I have been at Extinction Rebellion since this morning. I had already heard about the movement and the blocking of the Italy 2 shopping center this weekend made me decide to join them ”, he explains sitting on one of the hay bales that support a suspended hammock. Many have come from afar for this week of mobilization, like Fabien, Toulousain who took a few days off to participate in the blockage. “By disrupting everyday life, we make people aware that we are facing a serious problem, we force them to ask themselves questions, and perhaps we will accelerate their militant journey”, hopes the young man.
The crowd grows hour by hour. Over a thousand people pitch tents and hang hammocks from trees and streetlights to prepare for the night. Neighbors and curious people stroll. Dolores calls out to them with her fishing net where she has hung as many plastic bottles as there are stuffed fish. “We are taking advantage of the blockage to raise awareness of the collapse of ocean biodiversity, to remind people that if we do not change anything, in 2100 there will be three times more plastic than fish in the seas. But we try to do it with this kind of installation that intrigues passers-by rather than with deadly speeches. ”
In London, Westminster Bridge blocked
The most impressive action of the “International October rebellion”, supposed to last two weeks, takes place in London, the country of birth of XR. The announced blockade of Westminster, the political heart of the United Kingdom, started slowly on Monday morning. Dams, by small but very effective crowds, were erected at various strategic points. Westminster Bridge, perpendicular to Parliament, Whitehall, the avenue where the main ministries are grouped together and 10 Downing Street, have notably been completely blocked from traffic. Under the watchful eye of dozens of police officers, several thousand activists, of all ages and some who came as a family with their children, deployed sleeping bags and camping equipment, determined to settle in the long term.
Read alsoExtinction Rebellion: fertile disobedience
Not sure, however, that the British authorities are as understanding as in April, during the last major movement of Extinction Rebellion. Several crossing points, including the Waterloo Bridge, were blocked for a week. Monday at 12:30 pm, the police announced that they had made 135 arrests, in particular during the evacuation of Lambeth Bridge, the bridge following Westminster Bridge going west of the capital.
Colorful atmosphere
A Berlin, “We must stay here and rebel until the government declares the ecological emergency and acts on it.” It is a little after midday on the Place de la Colonne de la Victoire, not far from the Tiergarten park in Berlin, and the former captain of the Sea Watch 3 Carola Rackete addresses the environmental activists of Extinction Rebellion from a wooden archway. On this huge roundabout closed to traffic, they are several hundred to camp since dawn with songs and banners announcing: “Sorry for the inconvenience, but our survival is at stake.” However, the police have planned to vacate the place for 8 p.m.
If the number of demonstrators is far from equaling those of the climate march on September 20 – more than 200,000 people took part in the capital, a record – on Potsdamer Platz, several hundred people gathered in a colorful atmosphere: music, animal costumes, body painting and multicolored umbrellas. On the podium, Luisa Neubauer, figurehead of the Fridays for Future movement in Germany, came to support Extinction Rebellion: “We need people walking the streets in droves, unprecedented masses, in order to start being part of the solution.”
Anger has been particularly strong among German environmental activists since we learned Sunday evening that the famous climate plan for Germany, unveiled with great fanfare by the federal government on September 20, should be much less ambitious than announced. Emptied of a large part of its substance according to the first elements that have leaked in the press, it will be presented to the Council of Ministers on Wednesday. That day, Extinction Rebellion activists planned to blockade the Marshall Bridge, just a few hundred yards from the Bundestag and the Chancellery.
