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Greta Thunberg briefly detained at German coal mine protest

Photo: INA FASSBENDER / AFP

January 18 | By AFP |

Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg was hauled away and briefly detained on Tuesday during a protest near a German village being razed to make way for a coal mine expansion, police said.

Thunberg has been in Germany for several days to support protests against the demolition of Luetzerath, which have become a symbol of resistance against fossil fuels. 

Images showed the activist, smiling and dressed in black, being picked up by police officers wearing helmets and then escorted to a waiting bus. 

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Police said a group of activists were detained after having “broken away from the demonstration”, and run towards the edge of the open-cast coal mine.

They were taken away from the “danger zone” by bus, their identities were checked, and then they were released, a spokesman said. 

The process took “several hours” as there were a large number of protesters, he said, without giving a precise figure.

The activists were not formally arrested, police said. 

On Saturday, Thunberg joined thousands of demonstrators in a large-scale protest against the demolition of the hamlet, marching at the front of a procession.

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She said it was “shameful” that the German government was “making deals and compromises with fossil fuel companies”.

On Monday, the last two climate activists occupying the hamlet to stop it from being razed left their underground hideout, marking the end of the police operation to evict them.

Around 300 activists had occupied the village, staking out emptied buildings and constructing positions in the trees, to try to prevent the expansion of the adjacent Garzweiler open-cast coal mine. 

‘Stop coal’

Luetzerath has been deserted for some time by its original inhabitants, as plans move forward to expand the open-cast mine, one of the largest in Europe, operated by energy firm RWE.

Police launched an operation last week to clear the protest camp, making quicker progress than expected, and by Sunday had succeeded in removing all but the last two, holed up in a self-built tunnel under the settlement.

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The end of the operation came despite Saturday’s demonstration, which was attended by thousands, with protesters holding banners with slogans including “Stop coal” and “Luetzerath lives!”

Protest planners accused authorities of “violence” after clashes between police and participants, which resulted in injuries on both sides.

RWE has permission for the expansion of the mine under a compromise agreement signed with the government, led by Social Democrat Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

Under the deal agreed in October, Luetzerath will be demolished, while five neighbouring villages are spared.

At the same time, RWE also agreed to stop producing electricity with coal in western Germany by 2030 — eight years earlier than planned. 

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With Russia’s gas supply cut in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine, Germany has fallen back on coal, firing up mothballed power plants. 

The extension to the mine is deemed necessary to secure Germany’s future energy supply.

But activists argue extracting the coal will mean Germany misses targets under the key Paris climate agreements.

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International

Bolsonaro is transferred to São Paulo to continue the treatment for an erysypela

Former President of Brazil Jair Bolsonaro moved this Monday from the Amazon city of Manaus, where he was hospitalized with an erysipelas, to a hospital in São Paulo, where the treatment against that skin infection will continue.

The lawyer of the leader of the far right, Fabio Wajngarten, said on his social networks that Bolsonaro will also be examined for a possible intestinal obstruction, although he did not give more details on the matter.

Bolsonaro, 69, arrived last Friday in Manaus for some political commitments and on Saturday he was hospitalized once it was found that he suffered from erysipelas, a bacterial infection that affects the skin and subcutaneous tissue.

The Santa Julia hospital, where he was treated, reported that the former president, from 2019 to 2022, had a “table of dehydration and infectious skin process.”

The doctors did not mention the possible intestinal obstruction cited by Wajngarten, but it is a problem that Bolsonaro suffers repeatedly since, in the campaign for the 2018 elections, he was stabbed in the abdomen in the middle of a rally.

Since then, they underwent four surgeries to correct stomach problems resulting from that attack.

The former president faces serious difficulties in Justice, which investigates him in various cases, one of them linked to alleged plans to prevent the inauguration of the current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who defeated him in the 2022 elections.

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International

The number of deaths in a passenger bus accident in southern Peru rises to eleven

The number of deaths in Peru when a passenger bus crashed from the southern department of Puno to Cuzco, when it was traveling through the province of Melgar, rose to 11, official sources reported on Monday.

The head of the road police of the Puno department, David Sota Paredes, told the RPP station that the number of deaths from the accident increased to eleven, including a five-month-old baby, who have already been identified, and that in addition, 11 other injured people were transferred to the Ayaviri hospital.

The Universal company bus overturned at kilometer 1,170 of the Longitudinal road, in the district of Santa Rosa, in the province of Melgar in Puneña, in the early hours of Monday morning, confirmed the Superintent of Land Transport of People, Cargo and Goods (Sutran).

This official entity reported that it activated all its immediate attention protocols and initiated coordination with its inspectors in the region, the National Police of Peru (PNP) and the Health Emergency Operations Center of Puno to “help with the investigations that allow the causes of the accident to be determined.”

Likewise, Sutran indicated that the vehicle, with B2R959 plate, had authorization from the General Directorate of Transport Authorizations of the Ministry of Transport and Communications for the regular passenger transport service, with accident insurance and technical review in force.

“The Sutran expresses its condolences to the relatives and relatives of the victims of the unfortunate accident and vows for the speedy recovery of the injured,” he said in a statement shared on his social networks.

Last week, the roads in northern Peru recorded another accident of a passenger bus that left 27 people dead from the fall of the vehicle into a chasm in the department of Cajamarca, while another public transport unit rushed into a river, in the jungle of Amazonas, and caused the death of a policeman and 10 people injured.

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Israel says it will continue to negotiate a ceasefire while bombing the east of Rafah

The Israeli War Cabinet, headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, agreed on Monday to continue “the operation” in Rafah, south of Gaza, but agreed to send a delegation to Cairo to continue negotiating a possible ceasefire.

“Despite the fact that Hamas’ proposal is far from meeting Israel’s fundamental demands, Israel will send a high-ranking delegation to Egypt in an effort to exhaust the possibility of reaching an agreement on acceptable terms,” the Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement.

Benny Gantz, also a member of the War Cabinet, agreed with Netanyahu. “The military operation in Rafah is an inseparable part of our continuous efforts and our commitment to return our kidnapped,” he said tonight in a statement quoted by Israeli media.

Gantz confirmed that Israel will send a delegation to Cairo although, he said, the proposal agreed by Hamas “does not correspond to the dialogue that has taken place so far with the mediators and contains important gaps.”

Both messages come after the announcement of Ismail Haniyeh, head of the political bureau in Hamas, that the Islamist group accepted a proposal for a ceasefire in Gaza, a few hours after the Israeli Army issued an “immediate” evacuation order from the east of Rafah.

In a final statement released tonight, Hamas confirmed that both Haniyeh and the secretary general of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Ziad al Nakhala – a faction also present in the Gaza Strip – discussed on Monday whether or not to approve a ceasefire, and said that the decision was made as a result of “the evolution of the current situation” in Gaza.

“It was also emphasized that the resistance factions will not back down on their demands included in the proposal they agreed, in particular a (comprehensive) ceasefire, an integral withdrawal (from Israeli troops), an honorable exchange (of hostages for prisoners), reconstruction and the end of the (Israeli) siege,” Hamas recalled.

The Israeli Army confirmed that it is currently bombing the southern city of Rafah, where more than one million Gazans take refuge after the start of the ground offensive on October 27, which forced the northern population to leave their homes, many of which are now destroyed.

Despite the heavy bombings and firing of flares, according to EFE on the ground, Israeli troops and tanks have not crossed the fence that separates Israel from southern Gaza.

The Army “is currently carrying out targeted attacks against Hamas terrorist targets in the east of Rafah, in the south of the Gaza Strip,” a military statement confirmed tonight, announcing that there would be more details shortly.

For its part, the official Palestinian news agency, Wafa, confirmed Israeli attacks in the city of Rafah against “roads, agricultural land, residential houses and farms” in the eastern neighborhoods of Al Salam and Al Jinaina, among others, which coincide with some of the places included this morning in the evacuation letter.

In a press conference in Hebrew tonight, the Army spokesman, Daniel Hagari, recalled that the troops are prepared for a land incursion into Rafah after this morning’s evacuation order, which only affects about 100,000 Gazans among more than a million people who are overcrowded in Rafah.

Hamas warned Israel on Monday that any military takeover of Rafah will not be something simple and that his armed wing, the Qasam Brigades, are ready to defend his people.

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