Protest stop against more commitment to climate protection: A deal from the last generation with a town hall chief is causing a nationwide sensation. Such talks have so far been the exception in the southwest. The police meanwhile see themselves armed against the climate stickers.
Stuttgart (dpa / lsw) – The police in the southwest see themselves well prepared for climate adhesive. At the request of the German Press Agency, the Ministry of the Interior announced that the new forms of action of the Last Generation group had been dealt with very early on. The majority of the officers at the regional police headquarters could break up their tapes within 30 to 90 minutes. Conventional vegetable oils are mostly used as a solvent for the superglue used.
According to a dpa survey, there are no talks about stopping the actions like in Hanover in the largest cities in Baden-Württemberg. Tübingen’s Lord Mayor Boris Palmer met with the activists last week and recently published his response in which he supports the group’s goals.
The police registered 31 blockades of road traffic in Baden-Württemberg last year. Activists stuck themselves to the road surface 22 times. In another case, a person abseiled from a bridge over a roadway.
In Bavaria there are regional special units that are available around the clock to get activists off the streets quickly and to avoid or quickly resolve traffic obstructions. North Rhine-Westphalia is also arming itself against climate activists. Around 10,000 police officers are being trained there to remove activists who have been taped.
According to the ministry in Stuttgart, police departments were already provided with recommendations for action on tactical and legal issues of dealing with the climate stickers in March 2022. The topic is also included in further training courses.
The police are also required by the protests in terms of personnel: last year they were on duty for around 1020 hours in this context. Around 948 hours of this were due to traffic blockades.
According to the country head of the German police union, Ralf Kusterer, it is not the dissolution of the blockades that is exhausting, but the consequences in the form of traffic jams and diversions. According to a response from the ministry to an AfD request, the effort for this has so far corresponded to around 60,650 euros. During the illegal actions, the police registered 130 suspects, including those who were accompanying them.
Kusterer spoke out in favor of preventive detention based on the Bavarian model, which threatens people if they announce actions. You have to be able to react “before the child falls into the well”. According to the Bavarian Police Responsibilities Act, citizens can be detained for up to a month on the basis of a judicial decision to prevent an administrative offense of significant public importance or a criminal offense from being committed.
Kusterer complained that the Baden-Württemberg regulation was not tailored to the facts of climate action, but to cases such as the arrest of a drunk or a person at risk of suicide. In addition, it is only limited to two weeks.
The Ministry, on the other hand, emphasized that in Baden-Württemberg, too, detention in the event of announced actions could in individual cases ward off imminent significant disruptions to public security. This happens in consideration of the fundamental right to freedom of assembly. “Nevertheless, in connection with the climate protests, detention in the majority of cases does not appear to be expedient,” it said. Because the place and time of the actions are mostly unknown beforehand, the crimes cannot be prevented permanently.
By January 24, the anniversary of the first action in Berlin, the group itself had counted 1,250 street blockades throughout Germany, and around 800 people had taken part. Activists have been taken into police custody more than 1,200 times.
The last generation is now offering to stop their protests across Germany if the federal government agrees to their demands. It is about the reintroduction of the 9-euro ticket, a speed limit of 100 kilometers per hour on motorways and the convening of a so-called social council on the question of how Germany could no longer emit climate-damaging CO2 by 2030.
In Hanover, Mayor Belit Onay (Greens) assured the activists after a meeting that they would support their demand for a social council with a letter to the democratic parliamentary groups. The climate protection group then agreed to stop the adhesive protests in the Lower Saxony state capital.
A spokeswoman for the group announced on Monday that cities and mayors had also been contacted in Baden-Württemberg. Some cities did not respond to the offers of talks, she said, naming Ulm and Heidelberg as examples. However, when asked, the local press offices denied that there had been a concrete offer of talks.
“Apart from well-known and publicly formulated calls and appeals, the town hall has not received any such offer,” said a spokeswoman in Ulm. According to the dpa survey, no direct offer of talks was known in the other urban districts of Stuttgart, Mannheim, Karlsruhe, Freiburg, Heilbronn and Pforzheim either.
Tübingen’s town hall chief Palmer, in turn, wrote in his response published on Facebook that he supported the proposal for citizen participation at federal level. In doing so, the principles of parliamentarianism should be respected: Parliament and government would have to set up such a council of their own accord and should undertake to “consider the results seriously and translate them into political decisions”. In this context, Palmer referred to the Citizens’ Council mentioned in the coalition agreement.
According to Last Generation, other cities are in contact with the activists. “However, these talks are not public,” it said.
