Daniel Chatard
Shortly before the eviction, the mood in the occupied town is tense. There have not been any violent clashes between the police and coal opponents so far – apart from scuffles and insults. But both sides expect violence in the next few days.
The tone is rough, which meets the police from parts of the demonstrators in Lützerath on Tuesday. “Cops, piss off”: the officials, who appeared in full gear, advance in long chains. The occupiers of the village, which is to make way for lignite mining, are slowly pushing them back a few steps. The result was occasional scuffles with the demonstrators. After that it comes to a standstill again. The mostly very young demonstrators and the often hardly older police officers stand face to face again for a while.
There are also insults that would be much more justiciable than the quote mentioned at the beginning. Many of the demonstrators also consider police officers to be “fascists”. The term is mentioned again and again in the chants that are intoned. But the officials don’t seem to be bothered. In the afternoon, a spokesman for the responsible Aachen police had no indication that the insults had been reported. “Unfortunately, the public tends to overlook the tone our officials are exposed to.”
Complaints about alleged police violence
Since early Tuesday morning, dozens of police officers have been trying to clear the former country road that once provided access to the hamlet, which consisted of a few houses. The demonstrators have erected barricades of branches and stones on it. They want to delay, if not prevent, the clearing of the site under which large amounts of lignite lie, at least as long as possible. The piled up obstacles are no problem for the heavy excavators and clearing vehicles that have approached.
The situation is different with the so-called tripods, high three-part linkages, reminiscent of photo tripods, with people tied to the top. “We wanted to defend the tripods because they are the most difficult obstacles to clear,” says a 24-year-old young woman from Cologne. She doesn’t want to reveal her name. She is upset and out of breath. She was just carried by the police out of a ditch dug by demonstrators.
Demonstrators are digging trenches to make it more difficult to clear the illegally occupied site.
Opponents of coal block access to Lützerath.
A protester prepared his hands with super glue and glitter dust to make it more difficult for police to identify him.
“I’m still full of adrenaline,” she says as she sorts her clothes and tries to shake off the wet earth. “The fuck bulls pressed hard on my temple without need and squeezed my wrist. It could have been solved a hundred percent less violently,” she is convinced. In the end, she didn’t put up a fight.
The police defended their actions when asked. All demonstrators would have been given places. But if you don’t give way despite being spoken to several times over the loudspeaker, you have to expect more robust measures, including the so-called pain grip. In fact, staying in the former village, which is owned by the energy company RWE, has been illegal since Tuesday. Until now, a vigil had been tolerated in the town.
On Monday, the Higher Administrative Court for the state of North Rhine-Westphalia confirmed the ban on entry, which a lower court had declared to be lawful. The decision is not contestable. The court also recalled the state’s monopoly on the use of force. “The state monopoly on the use of force as a cornerstone of modern statehood is fundamentally inaccessible to relativization through any form of civil disobedience.” The final clearing of the site could begin on Wednesday or in the following days. The police didn’t want to be specific.
“95 percent are absolutely against violence”
She expects considerable resistance since stones flew at emergency services on Sunday. The young woman who has just been carried out of the ditch waves her away. “I was there. Only two stones flew. And immediately all of us said that this has to stop. 95 percent are absolutely against violence,” she says. And the remaining five percent?
Former police officer Kurt Walter expects violent protesters. He himself advocates non-violent resistance.
Piles of stones block the way to the meanwhile uninhabited hamlet of Lützerath.
“People are glued to the gate from the inside here”: access to a former barn has been barricaded from the inside and outside.
In any case, the German domestic secret service assumes that there are also violent people from the left-wing extremist scene among the demonstrators. His President Thomas Haldenwang therefore expects violent riots.
So did 63-year-old former police officer Kurt Walter. The coal opponent has arrived from Saarland. In addition to predominantly peaceful demonstrators, he also sees violent people among the participants. «I want to de-escalate. I keep calling out to people: Violence is always wrong,” he says in an imploring tone.
By Tuesday afternoon, the police had counted two criminal charges for “acts of resistance”. She didn’t want to reveal exactly what these consisted of. Nor how many police officers will be deployed in the coming days to clear the occupied premises. However, the police representative did not contradict the assessment that the relative calm before the storm can at best be described as fragile.
With the help of a pallet truck, the police removed demonstrators from so-called tripods.
It is only a few meters from Lützerath to the edge of the lignite mining area.
