The government dissolved Les Uprisings of the Earth (SLT) on Wednesday in the Council of Ministers, accusing the collective of “calling” and “participating” in violence, a decision immediately challenged before the Council of State by the environmental group . “We do not dissolve an uprising”, reacted the collective on Twitter, welcoming the marks of support. “Stocks will resurface everywhere, dissolution or not,” he added.
At the end of the afternoon, his lawyers Mes Raphaël Kempf and Ainoha Pascual announced the forthcoming filing of an appeal with the Council of State, before which a rally of support took place in the presence of elected representatives from the left and climate activist Greta Thunberg. Gatherings are also planned in the evening in several cities including Nantes and Marseille. The lawyers contest the legal basis of the dissolution, the Uprisings not being a declared entity but a “protean movement”, according to them, like the feminist or environmental movements.
“The use of violence is not legitimate in the rule of law”
“It’s a question of the right to demonstrate and the defense of life,” added Greta Thunberg, present in Paris on the sidelines of the summit for a new global financial pact. “The use of violence is not legitimate under the rule of law and that is what is sanctioned,” said government spokesman Olivier Véran in the morning.
“Under the guise of defending the preservation of the environment”, this movement “incites the commission of sabotage and material damage, including by violence”, writes the government in its decree of dissolution. But, “no cause justifies the particularly numerous and violent acts” to which it “calls and provokes” and “in which its members and sympathizers participate”, adds the decree.
“Means of anti-terrorism against environmental activists”
The government had initiated the dissolution procedure on March 28, a few days after the violent clashes between gendarmes and opponents of the water reservoirs of Sainte-Soline (Deux-Sèvres) for which it had attributed responsibility to the movement. The procedure, which remained blocked for more than two months, finally succeeded after a new demonstration supported by SLT this weekend, against the Lyon-Turin rail link, marked by scuffles.
SLT, born in January 2021 in the former ZAD (zone to defend) of Notre-Dame-des-Landes, called for rallies on Wednesday evening in front of the prefectures to show the resilience of the movement, which moreover gave an appointment you on August 18 in Sainte-Soline for the departure of a convoy of tractors and bicycles towards Paris.
It is “the first time that France has used the means of anti-terrorism against environmental activists”, estimated Basile Dutertre, one of the spokespersons for the SLT who has lived for a long time in the former ZAD of Notre-Dame. Dame-des-Landes. The dissolution and the arrests were also denounced by part of the left.