UN Chief Praises 'Moral Voice' of German Climate Activists Targeted in Police Raids
"It is clear that a lot of the progress that we have seen on awareness on climate change and positive movement on climate change is due to the fact that people have been demonstrating peacefully throughout the world."
The spokesperson for United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres on Monday commended climate activists in Germany after police raided their homes following months of traffic-disrupting protests against the government's failure to adequately address the climate emergency.
"Climate activists—led by the moral voice of young people—have continued to pursue their goals even in the darkest days," the spokesperson, Stéphane Dujarric told reporters in New York. "They need to be protected and we need them now more than ever."
"It is clear that a lot of the progress that we have seen on awareness on climate change and positive movement on climate change is due to the fact that people have been demonstrating peacefully throughout the world," he added.
"The government's approach is intended to intimidate and create fear. But we cannot and will not allow ourselves to remain in this fear."
Last Wednesday, around 170 masked and armed police officers raided the homes of activists from the Germany-based international direct action group Letzte Generation—or Last Generation—in seven German states while shutting down the organization's website and freezing multiple bank accounts.
Among those targeted were Last Generation spokesperson Carla Hinrichs, who said around two dozen armed police broke down the door of her apartment in Berlin's Kreuzberg district while she was in bed at around 7:00 am, with one officer pointing a gun at her.
"I'm afraid that this state is sending its civil servants with weapons drawn to storm my apartment," Hinrichs said in a video posted on Twitter. "But I'm even more afraid that it is letting us speed into this disaster without doing anything."
\u201cBREAKING: German police are staging the world's first nationwide raid on climate activists. The goal: shut down a group called "Last Generation" that engages in peaceful protest to save the planet.\n\nWill they also arrest the fossil fuel executives?\nhttps://t.co/W5RxXfmDmq\u201d— Steven Donziger (@Steven Donziger) 1685012163
No arrests were reported. However, authorities accused seven activists of raising at least $1.5 million to finance "criminal acts."
Police also claimed two Last Generation members are suspected of plotting to sabotage an oil pipeline running from the southern state of Bavaria to the Italian port of Trieste.
Last Generation has become a household name in Germany due to the group's nationwide acts of civil disobedience. Last week, activists blocked 12 streets in the capital Berlin, gluing themselves to the road and to vehicles, and enraging motorists and many other people.
In January, Last Generation was at the center of protests against the expansion of an open-pit coal mine in Lützerath, a depopulated village in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Members of the group made headlines last year after they threw mashed potatoes on a protected Claude Monet painting in the Museum Barberini in Potsdam.
\u201cClimate protesters from Last Generation threw mashed potato at Claude Monet\u2019s Les Meules (Haystacks) at Potsdam\u2019s Barberini Museum.\u201d— VICE World News (@VICE World News) 1666625542
Last Generation has also held protests in countries including Austria and Italy, where members poured charcoal in Rome's Trevi Fountain to demand an end to government fossil fuel subsidies.
Earlier this month, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz of the center-left Social Democratic Party called Last Generation's protest tactics "completely crazy."
In response, Last Generation asked when police would target "lobby structures and confiscate government fossil funds."
"The government's approach is intended to intimidate and create fear. But we cannot and will not allow ourselves to remain in this fear," the group said on its new website. "The federal government is leading us into climate hell and is stepping on the accelerator."
