German police on Saturday arrested 30 environmentalists protesting plans to destroy Hambach Forest in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
An Aachen police spokesperson said dozens of people were ordered to leave the area as an operation to clear out protesters entered its fourth day on Sunday.
Firefighters had to pump fresh air into a tunnel after at least five activists attempted to defy authorities by hiding out there. Firefighters said the makeshift tunnel was 5 meters (16.5 feet) beneath the ground.
Read more: Hambach Forest: Battleground for climate action
'Jeopardizes supplies'
The area is owned by German energy company RWE. The company wants to clear the forest to mine brown coal, which it says is necessary to guarantee fuel for coal-powered energy plants.
The occupation of Hambach Forest "jeopardizes supplies to nearby power plants and refining plants," RWE said in a statement. "Around 15 percent of North Rhine-Westphalia's electricity requirements are covered by coal supplies from the Hambach opencast mine."
The police operation has been described by some as heavy-handed
Continued resistance
But environmentalists have argued that Germany should be heading in the opposite direction and winding down consumption of coal.
Those who had occupied parts of the forest have noted that the woods are home to centuries-old trees and host a protected species of bats. The forest is said to be 12,000 years old.
Despite several attempts by activists to disrupt the operation, police are expected to continue clearing them from the forest on Sunday.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Primal forest
At the heart of Europe, in western Germany, near the border to France and Belgium, a scrap of ancient forest holds thousand-year-old trees along with abundant wildlife. But there's another species living there in the forest as well — our own.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Life among the treetops
About 150 people currently live in what's left of Hambach forest, many in makeshift tree houses. Although living in a tree house may appear idyllic, many of the environmental activists have uprooted their lives for the better part of six years — living without electricity and running water — to protect the forest, and take a stance against the power of the fossil fuel industry.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Evictions begin
Several hundred police officers accompanied RWE workers for protection as they visited the forest on Wednesday, September 5, to expel the protesters in preparation for clearing. Although the operation was mostly peaceful, one activist was arrested after resisting police.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Nonviolent resistance
Activists joke about their "dangerous weapons," such as an empty fire extinguisher. Just days before the police action on September 5, Herbert Reul, the interior minister for the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, warned that police and RWE staff in the Hambach forest were dealing with "extremely violent left-wing extremists." Members of the protest group have denied Reul's description.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Not the first forest confrontation
Over the years, police have clashed with protesters in the Hambach forest. In 2017, police employed pepper spray to disperse protesters in advance of planned logging. The looming eviction is likely to result in the largest confrontation there yet.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Trees for coal
Here is the result of a recent RWE clearing campaign, which ran from October 2016 to March 2017. In the background, the smokestacks of the Niederaussem power station can be seen. With a CO2 output of more than 29 million tons yearly, this is Europe's third-dirtiest power plant. Due to massive toxic emissions such as mercury and sulfur, it is also considered Germany's second-most-toxic power plant.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
'Critical turning point' for climate policy
"Clumsy" has lived among the treetops in the Hambach forest since the resistance against the RWE coalmine project began in 2012. He believes the battle over the forest is a critical turning point for German climate policy, and the government's decision is one between "giving in to the lignite hardliners, [or] protecting our life support basis on this planet."
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Small forest with big stakes
Only about 10 percent of the once sprawling Hambach forest has survived the mine's onslaught. What's left appears miniscule in comparison to the vast expanse of the mine, which already covers about 85 square kilometers (33 square miles). But environmentalists say the forest holds enormous ecological value, and is home to abundant and biodiverse ecology, including endangered animal species.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Ever-hungry coal industry
The Hambach mine, located between Aachen and Cologne, is Germany's largest open-cast mine. Here, RWE uses enormous excavators to extract brown coal, also known as lignite, from the earth. Lignite is among the fossil fuels that emit the most carbon dioxide when burned. What remains of Hambach forest is the last bastion in a long battle against the expansion of the mine.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Save the forest, save the world
Environmental activists have undertaken nonviolent resistance against the RWE coal mine expansion for more than six years. Through their actions, they claim to not only want to save the Hambach forest from destruction, but also send a message to the world about the dangerous consequences of prioritizing fossil fuel extraction over important ecological sites.
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6 years of coal protest coming to an end at Germany's Hambach forest?
Global support
Activists from all over the world have supported the action by staying for days or weeks at a time. Over the past six years, activists have literally built up an alternative community within the forest. Although it is still unclear what exactly will happen in the struggle between the protesters and the fossil fuel giant, potential eviction is an ever-present possibility for the forest dwellers.
Author: Charli Shield
ls/sms (dpa, AP)
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