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“Under the pretence of defending the conservation of the environment … this group encourages sabotage and material damage”, mentioned a authorities decree saying the shutdown of the group.
France is shutting down the environmental activist group Les Soulevements de la Terre (SLT) for scary armed protests or violent actions, the federal government mentioned on Wednesday, a transfer instantly criticized by the leftist opposition and NGOs.
Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin has referred a number of occasions to “eco-terrorism” in relation to SLT actions in current months, saying some activists had confirmed “extreme violence against police forces”.
“Under the pretence of defending the conservation of the environment … this group encourages sabotage and material damage”, mentioned a authorities decree saying the shutdown of the group.
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The decree referred to a number of protests that resulted in clashes with police, together with these in opposition to a farm reservoir in western France in March and a rail hyperlink within the Alps final week.
“It’s an infringement on freedom of expression, it targets speech and not actions,” SLT lawyer Rapheal Kempf mentioned of the decree, including that they’d contest it in court docket.
Rights teams mentioned the transfer mirrored a authorities crackdown on inexperienced curiosity teams, which they mentioned included heavy-handed policing of protests and arrests of activists.
“It’s part of a wider trend,” mentioned Patrick Baudouin, head of the French Human Rights League (LDH).
“For the past few months there have been attacks on several freedoms (freedom of protest, expression and association), that primarily concern the ecologist movement,” mentioned Baudouin.
Activist Florian Lemerle advised Reuters that, irrespective of the federal government’s determination, the SLT was too broad a bunch to be dissolved.
“Les Soulevements are a coalition, there are 190 local committees,” Lemerle mentioned.
First revealed on: 21-06-2023 at 18:56 IST
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