As reported in June 8 issue of Voice of Revolution, the G-8 Summit in Heiligendamm, Germany was successfully blockaded by thousands of protestors. In this issue, VOR is continuing its coverage of actions against the G-8 in Germany based on independent media sources.

June 8

As the G-8 Summit came to a close, the inhabitants of Rostock and surrounding area joined the protesters at the harbour. They took food and drink, they applauded, they went into the streets. Thousands and thousands of people were in the harbour of Rostock to celebrate. Celebrations and spontaneous demonstrations went on late into the night.

In Rostock it is said that the protesters DID manage to block the G-8 summit for 3 days!

June 7

On the second day of the blockades, thousands of activists were in the streets and fields to block the roads to the G-8 summit in Heiligendamm.

From early morning, access routes were closed off with street barricades in support of demonstrators who spent the night at the blockades. Around 9:30 am, 1500-2000 demonstrators from Reddelich took to the fence through the fields. The blockade at the eastern gate continued throughout the afternoon, while the police began to violently disperse the blockade at the western gate. The passage remained impossible to use because of the several thousand protesters in the fields around the gate. Throughout the day, activists were everywhere along the fence.

In the morning, the street at the Börgerende blockade was filled with three hundred metres of sleeping bags. The police remained quiet throughout the night and kept an eye on the protesters with a huge search light. A night watch of activists kept their own eye on the other side. Local residents showed their solidarity by bringing water and food to the blockaders.

At Hinter Bollhagen, at the western gate past the fence around Heiligendamm, a group of about three hundred people was removed forcefully by the police. Next, the police came upon the larger group of 2500 activists. The police beat the protesters, sprayed them with pepper spray and used water cannons.

While the blockade at the western gate was violently removed, activists held out in Börgerende and at the racetrack throughout the afternoon.

June 6

On Wednesday, hundreds of G-8 delegates and their staff were supposed to get to the meeting space, but the mass blockades prevented their smooth arrival to the fenced security zone. Thousands of activists successfully blocked all access roads to the G-8 meeting location in order to show the arriving G-8 summit guests they are neither welcome nor legitimately present here or anywhere else.

Around 2500 people left Reddelich camp in the early morning headed towards the west side of the fence to join the blockades. After around 4 hours of walking, mostly seeking the cover of the forests so to hide from the police helicopters, the protesters finally made the final push through a big field to block the road leading to the west gate.

By this time police had already brought in water canons, and were ready to protect the road. Even though several groups of people managed to cross the police lines and do sit downs as well as building some barricades. Near Hinter Bollhagen, around a thousand blockaders spread out along the fence. The police did not succeed in keeping the situation under control, despite massive reinforcements. At 3:15 pm, around 1000 people sat in front of the fence at the western gate. The stand off lasted for most of the day, effectively blocking the road 200 meters away from the gate for the whole day. The police themselves blocked the street with water canons. Later in the afternoon, whilst the main group of people that by that time had grown to more than 3000 people, several smaller affinity groups spread around the fence trying to stretch out police resources or carried on with smaller actions in different parts of the road. Some G-8 delegates had to wait at the fence for 45 minutes.

At the eastern gate as well, hundreds of people gathered along the fence. People from the anti-G-8 camps brought food in solidarity. In the evening, wooden barricades were erected in the direction of the western gate.

Altogether, more than 10,000 people blocked the gates of the fence Wednesday. By doing this, they forced their way into the area around the fence where all demonstrations had been declared illegal. Barbed wired intended to protect the meeting place was partly dismantled. Other activists took to the streets around the Rostock-Laage airport. In the evening, the police violently broke up one of the blockades. In the evening, one of the delegation buses was spotted with a hole in the back windshield.

End Note from Indymedia

You could call this summit protest a tale of two blockades. The east gate where the authorities permitted the protest and secured "good" media coverage of their tolerance, and the west gate (and others too) where police attacked sit-down blockaders with water cannons, pepper spray and batons. Not to mention all the hit and run blockades and barricades, Robin Hood pixie missions and more.

(Sources: Indymedia)

Protestors Thrown Overboard after Police Ram Greenpeace Vessels

A 30-foot long Swedish built "combat boat" capable of 50 knots — rammed and swamped a Greenpeace inflatable and pitched all four of the boat's crew into the sea. Three of the crew were injured in the ramming and had to be taken to hospital. A second Greenpeace inflatable was swamped and stopped. The activists unfurled a banner reading "G8 Act Now."

"Ramming and then running over inflatables is very heavy-handed when the inflatables were engaged in a peaceful, non-violent protest to deliver a petition calling for action on climate change on behalf of the people of the world who are being kept out of the resort courtesy of an 8ft high barbed wire fence," said a spokesperson for the organization.

Daniel Mittler of Greenpeace Germany said the environmentalal organization had wanted to deliver a petition to the G-8 leaders by sea. "The G-8 countries have caused most climate change and their leaders should face up to their responsibilities. The world is tired of empty words and demands action now," he said.

"Greenpeace's success in breaching the summit's security zone marked another defeat for the 16,000 police drafted in from throughout Germany for the meeting of G8 leaders in the Baltic town of Heiligendamm. By the time world leaders had arrived at the summit on Wednesday, thousands of anti-G8 protesters had breached the security zone on the land side and managed to block all roads leading to the venue," the Belfast Telegraph wrote.

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