{"id":25390,"date":"2023-07-11T17:58:48","date_gmt":"2023-07-11T17:58:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/?p=25390"},"modified":"2023-07-11T17:59:49","modified_gmt":"2023-07-11T17:59:49","slug":"police-turned-up-to-a-coal-mine-operating-without-a-licence-to-arrest-protesters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/2023\/07\/11\/police-turned-up-to-a-coal-mine-operating-without-a-licence-to-arrest-protesters\/","title":{"rendered":"Police turned up to a coal mine operating without a licence \u2013 to arrest protesters"},"content":{"rendered":"

The following article by Glen Black was first posted by The Canary<\/a>. It highlights the police role in protecting corporate lawbreakers and criminalising protestors.<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

POLICE TURNED UP AT COAL MINE OPERATING WITHOUT A LICENSE – TO ARREST PROTESTORS<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Featured image via Extinction Rebellion<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On 5 July, Extinction Rebellion (XR<\/a>) blocked access to Ffos-y-Fran\u00a0coal<\/a>\u00a0mine in\u00a0Wales<\/a>. The mine is infamous for continuing to operate despite the council not renewing its planning permission last September. When police arrived on 6 July, however, it was to arrest XR members \u2013 and not the mine\u2019s operators.<\/p>\n

10 months of unlicensed activity<\/strong><\/p>\n

Merthyr (South Wales) Limited\u00a0started operating<\/a>\u00a0Ffos-y-Fran, located about 25 miles north of Cardiff, in 2007. It is the UK\u2019s largest opencast coal mine. However, after\u00a015 years of opposition<\/a>\u00a0from local residents and ecological campaigners, Merthyr was\u00a0supposed<\/a>\u00a0to stop mining on 6 September 2022. When the day arrived, though, the company simply applied for an extension and continued taking coal from the ground, causing despair for residents and campaigners.<\/p>\n

Then, on 26 April, Merthyr Tydfil County Borough Council\u00a0unanimously rejected<\/a>\u00a0the extension. This should have stopped Merthyr completely. However, the company simply continued operating the mine, leading the council to\u00a0issue an enforcement notice<\/a>\u00a0that took effect on 27 June and gave Merthyr another 28 days to comply. By then, though, Coal Action Network\u00a0said<\/a>\u00a0Merthyr was likely operating Ffos-y-Fran \u201cunlawfully\u201d.<\/p>\n

As a result, members of XR decided to stop it themselves.<\/p>\n

\u2018Aggravated trespass\u2019 at Ffos-y-Fran coal mine<\/strong><\/p>\n

The environmental group took its pink boat to Ffos-y-Fran coal mine\u2019s access road and, along with\u00a0at least a dozen protesters<\/a>, blocked the entrance. This included \u201chalf a dozen\u201d protesters that locked on to the boat, according to XR:<\/p>\n

The\u00a0protest<\/a>\u00a0lasted for just over 24 hours before South Wales Police arrived to remove them:<\/p>\n

Police ultimately\u00a0arrested four Ffos-y-Fran coal mine protesters<\/a>\u00a0on suspicion of aggravated trespass. However, as one resident living near the coal mine said in an XR press release before the action:<\/p>\n

The law of aggravated trespass is quite clear in that it must be obstruction of a lawful activity and it is quite clear that this mine is operating illegally. So, the decision will have to be made by the authorities about \u201cWho are the criminals here?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

On 10 July, following the blockade and arrests, XR Cardiff held its long-planned March on the Mine event:<\/p>\n

State interests<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s incredible that, as the\u00a0climate crisis<\/a>\u00a0accelerates<\/a>, the state is still defending\u00a0fossil capital<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 not just in South Wales, but also in its recent approval of a\u00a0new coal mine<\/a>\u00a0in Cumbria. The story of Ffos-y-Fran coal mine lays this bare.<\/p>\n

Two parties appear to have broken the law at Ffos-y-Fran, although only one of them is doing so out of compassion for life. However, one has had little more than sternly worded letters 10 months after they were supposed to have stopped, while police arrested the other after just a day.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s clear where the state\u2019s interests lie, and it\u2019s not in fostering a better world.<\/p>\n

Featured image via Extinction Rebellion<\/em><\/p>\n

11.5.23<\/strong><\/p>\n

________________<\/p>\n

also see:-<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The following article by Glen Black was first posted by The Canary. It highlights the police role in protecting corporate lawbreakers and criminalising protestors.   POLICE TURNED UP AT COAL MINE OPERATING WITHOUT A LICENSE – TO ARREST PROTESTORS On 5 July, Extinction Rebellion (XR) blocked access to Ffos-y-Fran\u00a0coal\u00a0mine in\u00a0Wales. The mine is infamous for…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1852,1857,8865,1877],"tags":[9214],"class_list":["post-25390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-how-communists-organise","category-environmental-degradation","category-sustainable-development","category-wales-against-unionism","tag-author-glen-black"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/mastodon.scot\/@rcfscotland\/110696748146007360","error":""},"views":1771,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25390"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25390\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25394,"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25390\/revisions\/25394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}