Wissing demands harsh punishment
Last generation causes trouble in dozens of cities
07/14/2023, 3:15 p.m
After the last generation temporarily paralyzed two airports, they are now turning their attention back to road traffic. In a number of cities, activists set up sit-ins and glue themselves to the ground.
Climate activists of the last generation have blocked traffic in several German cities at important points. In cities like Berlin, Leipzig, Dresden and Braunschweig, protesters glued themselves to the road – some wore masks showing Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Transport Minister Volker Wissing and Economics Minister Robert Habeck. They held up banners that read, “We’re breaking the law.”
According to the group, the reason for the protest was the “breach of the climate protection law by the government”. The activists accuse Wissing of not having submitted an immediate program to comply with the maximum amounts specified in the Climate Protection Act, despite a legal obligation.
According to the latest generation, at least 36 sit-ins were planned in 26 cities throughout Germany. “The federal government is breaking the law and leading our society to collapse,” said the group’s spokeswoman, Carla Rochel. “It is our democratic duty to resist peacefully.”
Motorist injured in Nuremberg
A motorist was injured in a traffic jam as a result of a blockade of Autobahn 73 in Nuremberg. According to the police, the 31-year-old saw the trailer of a truck too late in a traffic jam and was trapped with his vehicle under the trailer. The police were initially unable to provide any information on the severity of the injuries.
Passers-by remove the activists from the street.
(Photo: dpa)
An 18-year-old activist from the Last Generation group is said to have been slightly injured in a road blockade in Bottrop in the morning. According to her own statements, she suffered the injury when she was pulled off the road by a man, a police spokeswoman said. According to the police, traffic was briefly significantly affected.
In Bavaria, the activists blocked traffic in Munich and Nuremberg. Eight activists paralyzed traffic in downtown Munich for about two hours in the morning. Activists from the climate protection group blocked traffic in three places in Nuremberg. The police broke up the blockades with some activists glued to the street after about 30 minutes, a spokesman said. The activists are now being investigated for coercion and for violating the general decree of the city of Nuremberg, according to which unannounced sticking actions by climate activists were prohibited.
Motorists dodge the sidewalks
Traffic was massively blocked in several places in Berlin. Among other things, more than a dozen activists protested at the roundabout around the Victory Column, as a dpa reporter observed. Several people stuck to the road there, blocking Hofjägerallee and Straße des 17. Juni in the direction of the Brandenburg Gate. According to the dpa reporter, numerous drivers tried to avoid the blockade by driving on the sidewalks. After a good hour, traffic at the Victory Column was back to normal.
The last generation announced that there were also actions near Berlin Central Station. According to the police, activists also temporarily blocked traffic at the Dorotheenstrasse/Ebertstrasse intersection in Mitte, not far from the Reichstag building. There was also a sticking action on a street in downtown Potsdam. In Dresden, six activists blocked Washingtonstrasse in the direction of the city center, the police said. Some of them glued themselves to the street. In the north of Leipzig, activists blocked federal highway 2. Both sit-ins were ended by the police.
Wissing: “The whole thing is an impertinence”
In Braunschweig, activists blocked a street in the city center during rush hour. There was criticism of this from the Lower Saxony state government. “According to the Prime Minister, this is harmful to climate protection,” said a spokeswoman for Stephan Weil. Climate protection is a major task for society as a whole. “If you then antagonize large parts of society, that doesn’t help the cause.”
On Thursday, activists paralyzed the airports in Hamburg and Düsseldorf for several hours by overcoming the fences, running onto the runways and sticking themselves near the runways. In Hamburg, air traffic was completely suspended for a few hours on the first day of vacation. Several flights were diverted or delayed in Düsseldorf.
After the airports were blocked, Federal Transport Minister Wissing called for harsh punishment for climate activists. “The whole thing is an impertinence for the entire population, completely unacceptable and must be punished with all severity,” he told the “Rheinische Post”. “People are deeply frustrated when they’ve prepared for the holiday, when they’ve saved up and are then robbed of their holiday joy by a senseless act. I condemn that in the strongest terms.”