Blockade Australia gave a press conference at 2.30pm today at Pyrmont Bay Park
Media liaison Zelda Grimshaw said:
“Exactly one year ago, NSW police tried to smash our network with a highly repressive ‘strategic incapacitation’ operation at Colo and subsequently in Sydney.
Today we have come back, like the hydra, threefold.
You cannot decapitate the climate movement.
You cannot solve climate breakdown with jail sentences and anti-protest legislation.
We are committed to resisting the destructive machinery of Australian exploitation and extraction.
We are growing in number and in determination.
Blockade Australia is here for ecosystems, not empire, and we will stay the distance.”
Brad Homewood, 51, who blocked the port of Melbourne today on a monopole, said:
“This system is doing exactly what it was set up to do, extract and exploit with a callous disregard for all forms of life. You can’t solve a problem with the same thinking that created it, we can’t vote our way out of this mess, the system cannot fix the system.”
“I’m taking action with Blockade Australia because the Australian system and it’s institutions are a core part of the problem.”
Raffi, 22, suspended herself from a bipole to shut down the Newcastle coal port at the same time. Raffi said:
“Everyday people are feeling disenfranchised and disempowered. We’re breaking that down by building a resistance movement that disrupts pinch-points in this destructive machine. We all have the power to disrupt and transform the colonial project, known as “Australia”.”
Jem, 23, who closed the port of Brisbane this morning, said:
“The writing has been on the wall for a very long time, that the functioning of Australia is causing climate collapse… 98% of the trade on this continent happens through ports. The cargo and quantities that go through these ports represent the mass destruction and over-consumption of land and people. Australia’s destruction of ecosystems and gluttonous consumption can be represented by the current function of these ports.”
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