Welcome home Mandy! At 6am on June 10, two climate suffragettes and the Yes Men barricaded Peter Mandelson's Regent's Park home in support of the Vestas workers and wind power in the UK. The climate suffragettes, chained to his gate, unfurled a banner reading 'Mandy, Put Some Wind in Vestas' Sales' while the Yes Men inflated their 'survivor balls' in preparation for the worst effects of climate change.

Camp Ashraf solidarity hunger strikers on day 11 outside US embassy, London

Around ten Iranian exiles have been on hunger strike outside the US embassy in London for the past eleven days in protest at alleged brutality by Iraqi forces against Iranian refugees in Camp Ashraf, Iraq, at least twelve of whom have been killed, 500 injured and 26 taken hostage according to the protesters.

There will be a rally outside the US embassy in Grosvenor Square, Mayfair on Saturday, 8 August, from 7pm.

Dateline: Roof-Top Occupation, Vestas Venture Quays Workshop, East Cowes, Isle of Wight, UK, Wed 05 Aug 09 – Before Vestas Wind Systems were handed an eviction order against the 15-day-old Newport turbine blade factory occupation, five climate activists, including an RMT member, occupied the roof of Vestas’ harbour-side facility. With tents set up, plenty of food, and an uninterrupted supply-line to supporters and well-wishers, this solidarity occupation is set to run indefinitely. The London Workers’ Climate Action crew stopped off on their journey home to resupply, cheer on and photograph our climbing-savvy comrades.

Previous Vestas Occupation Features: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

UPDATE: Save Vestas, Phase 2 – The Newport Factory Occupation was concluded on Fri 07 Aug, and that means we’ve six more Vestas Occupiers to tour the UK, drumming up support for the ever-expanding Save Vestas Campaign. Meanwhile the Vestas Roof-Top Occupation runs on strong, as the additional photos D1-E1 below indicate, taken on Fri 07 Aug – when Roof-Top Occupiers enjoyed the best seats on the island for the Cowes Week aerial ‘entertainments’: the RAF’s Red Arrows aerobatic display team, and subsequent fireworks display (though my ferry was in Southampton by then).

On Monday afternoon from 5pm a large group of protesters put up tents and banners next to and across the road from the Israeli embassy in central London to protest the evictions of 53 Palestinians in Sheik Jarrah on Sunday. Police initially tried to move the protest but the protesters refused to move. Eventually the inspector in charge of Kensington and Chelsea police force arrived and agreed the protesters had every right to protest Israel’s crime of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Occupied East Jerusalem.

Sex workers are routinely portrayed in the media as victims.

At London’s first ever Sex Worker Open University, over two hundred sex workers and allies from the UK and abroad took part in workshops, discussions and actions. 

This film presents an alternative and empowered image of the sex worker: http://current.com/items/90496517_sex-worker-open-university.htm

@ RampART Social Centre
15 -17 Rampart Street, London E1 2LA
(near Whitechapel, off Commercial Rd)

Dateline: Newport County Court, Isle of Wight, UK, Tue 04 Aug 09 – Despite hundreds of Vestas Workers, their families, friends, and supporters from across the UK marching in the rain to the Court House, Judge White grants an eviction order to Vestas Wind Systems bosses against the “Boys On the Balcony”, in the 15th day of their factory occupation against 625 green energy jobs cuts and the shutting down of England’s only wind turbine blade factories. But at 04:00, five Climate Campers begin an indefinite roof-top occupation of Vestas’ Venture Quays workshop building in East Cowes, dropping a huge banner reading, “Vestas workers. Solidarity in occupation, fighting for green jobs.” It ain’t over, not by a long chalk!

Previous Vestas Occupation Features: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

Outside the gates of the Israeli Embassy

2 Palace Green

Kensington

London

W8 4QB

Protesters superglue themselves to the entrance of the dept. of energy and climate change in central London over the closure of the Vestas wind plant.

[BREAKING NEWS] Ed Miliband's London offices were blockaded this morning by a coalition of "red, green and black" activists in a demonstration of solidarity for the factory workers who have been occupying the Vestas wind turbine plant on the Isle of Wight since the 20th July.

The occupation in Newport is protesting against the Vestas management's decision to shut down the factory, cutting 600 jobs and representing a severe blow to the local community and to a green economy. The workers are currently entering their fifteenth day of occupation, calling for nationalisation and workers' control of the factory.

The activists in Whitehall, holding placards saying "take back the wind power" and wearing red, green and black as a symbol of their diverse political viewpoints, glued themselves in a chain across the entrance of the Department for Energy and Climate Change, demanding that the factory be kept open.

Pics | Previous Features: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4

Outside Communications House Immigration Reporting Centre

Old Street

London EC1

Outside Communications House Immigration Reporting Centre

Old Street

London EC1

Outside Communications House Immigration Reporting Centre

Old Street

London EC1

1-2pm

Dateline: 4th Plinth, Trafalgar Square, London, UK, 05:00-06:00, Fri 31 Jul 09 – Gerry Byrne makes best use of her one hour stint on the 4th Plinth, as a part of Antony Gormley's One & Other art project, by staging a one woman “Save Vestas – Save Jobs – Save the World” protest, coping as best she can with a bunch of drunk, abusive, foul-mouthed, profoundly ignorant, laddish twenty-somethings that comprised the majority of her audience.

Vidz at YouTube
• playlist: 4th Plinth Protest -- Vestas Occupation -- Fri 31 Jul 09
» http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=FF671524FDDD744C
• video: 4th Plinth Protest -- 1. Success vs. Heckling Drunks
» http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqmV3M-GQK4
• video: 4th Plinth Protest -- 2 Interview Commences
» http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9rGLvQTM-Y
• video: 4th Plinth Protest -- 3. Interview Concludes
» http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKsyo10y_m8
• channel: Dalinian's Vidz – to which you’re invited to Subscribe
» http://www.youtube.com/user/dalinian61

School of African and Oriental Studies (SOAS), Torrington Place, central London

Dateline: Vestas Occupation Solidarity Demo No.2, Department of Energy & Climate Change, London, UK, 18:30, Tue 28 Jul 09 – On the eve of Danish wind energy corporation Vestas seeking an eviction order at Newport County Court, Isle of Wight, to turf out the Workers Factory Occupation which is opposing 625 green job redundancies, hundreds of people protested against the pathetic shoulder-shrugging inaction of Climate Change minister Ed Miliband. [More pics]

London Action Resource Centre

62 Fieldgate Street

Whitechapel

London E1 1ES

The Vestas occupation continues - DEMONSTRATE in London TONIGHT, 6pm outside the Department for Energy and Climate Change, off Whitehall.

Vestival – Because Vestas Workers need our Support and BGG is Cancelled

Start Time: Wed 29 Jul 09 at 08:00
End Time: Sun 02 Aug 09 at 12:00
Location: Camp outside Vestas Blades UK factory occupation, Newport, Isle of Wight
Address:  Vestas Blades, Monks Brook, St. Cross Business Park, Newport, PO30 5WZ, Isle of Wight, UK
Location Map: http://tinyurl.com/Vestival-map
Facebook event: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=107047038866
More Info: for more information about the campaign on the Island and what you can do, please contact:
• Patrick Rolfe – 07 905 352 751 – pat.rolfe64@googlemail.com – http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=36918891

...incorporating...

Support Vestas workers in Newport! – Let the courts know what we think of the 'posession order'

Date: Wed 29 Jul 09
Time: 10:15 - 13:00
Location: Newport County Court
Address: The Law Courts, 1 Quay Street, Newport, PO30 5YT, Isle of Wight, UK
Location Map: http://tinyurl.com/Vestas-court-map
Facebook event: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=107047038866

The Vestas workers have been served with a 'posession order' which means they, or their representatives must present themselves at Newport County Court this Wednesday, and will face forcible eviction by police if the order is upheld. Come and show your support for the Vestas occupation!

During the week a group of activists from the London Neighborhood of the Camp for Climate Action travelled down to the Isle of Wight to support the workers of the Vestas who have occupied their factory in protest at the companies decision to close the factor, export the production and dump over five hundred jobs. I went down with them to document their visit...

Demonstration held to highlight migrant situation in Calais.

YouTube video shows roadside ambush on mayor over lack of funding for rape crisis centres in London.

Campaigners say Boris Johnson failed to spend £744,000 promised for female victims of sexual violence

Direst action = Result, Only I predict a marked reluctance for politicians to embrace the cycling culture...

See video and article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/2009/jul/21/campaigners-johnson-rape

Following a call from No Borders groups in London and Brighton a group of people demonstrated outside London's French Embassy on Monday 20th to protest the repression and planned mass deportations of migrants living around Calais, France. See full article for pics and background information. More reports 1 and 2.

More Info: Calais Migrant Solidarity | Calais No Border Camp June 2009 | Video: After Sangatte, Europe's Untold Refugee Crisis.

Dateline: Climate Camp UK National Gathering, London, UK, 18:00 Sun 19 Jul 09 – At the end of an intensive weekend of planning for the forthcoming Climate Camp in Greater London, campers express their solidarity with the 600 wind turbine manufacturing workers threatened with factory closures by Vestas on the Isle of Wight.

The Royal Court of Justice, Strand, London WC2

Demonstration at the French Embassy in London, Monday 20th July

London NoBorders and No Borders Brighton are calling for a demonstration outside the French Embassy in London on Monday 20th July to protest the repression and planned mass deportations of migrants living around Calais, France. (see  http://london.noborders.org.uk/node/196 and http://calaismigrantsolidarity.wordpress.com/)

Where: French Embassy, 58 Knightsbridge London SW1X 7JT  (nearest tube Knightsbridge)
When: Monday 20th July, 12.30pm

Rampart Social Centre

Rampart Street

Whitechapel, E1

Activists from Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Greece blocked the gate of the closed detention centre in Lesquin (Lille, France). This action took place during the start of the No Border Camp in Calais, the 24th of June 2009, where an exagerated police force was summoned to avoid direct actions...

Bank of England

Threadneedle Street

London

Your Excellency,

We, the group of people from around the world, mostly creative persons and artists (but also common people) express our outraged by unlawful actions of putschists