Blocking traffic in Zurich on Monday
Keystone / Ennio Leanza
Climate activists from Extinction Rebellion blocked three junctions in the centre of Zurich on Monday, demanding the government declare a state of climate emergency. Police moved in to break up the unauthorised demonstration.
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Keystone-SDA/ts
The Swiss News Agency Keystone-SDA reported that about 200 activists, including many from French-speaking Switzerland, had sat in the middle of Uraniastrasse, not far from the main station, with the aim of disrupting traffic.
They set up a boat in the middle of the street and waved banners reading “We want to live”, “Act now”, “Listen to science” and “We’ll be there again tomorrow”.
People of all ages had decided to demonstrate peacefully because they “can no longer accept that urgent action is not being taken”, Extinction Rebellion said in a statement. They are “alarmed by the climate catastrophe unfolding before their eyes”.
The city police cordoned off the area and gave the demonstrators an ultimatum to leave. Officers then started carrying demonstrators to the pavement. The activists did not resist their removal.
Zurich police said the demonstration had lasted from noon until 5pm and tram service on main shopping street Bahnhofstrasse had been disrupted for about 45 minutes.
The protest comes amid a wave of civil disobedience by activists in Switzerland, where the climate is warming at about twice the pace of the global average and changing its mountain landscapes.
In June Extinction Rebellion asked the government to declare a state of climate emergency. In the absence of a response, they decided to bring traffic to a standstill in the centre of Zurich.
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Climate activists block roads in Switzerland
Climate activists aligned with the Extinction Rebellion (XR) environmental movement created traffic disruptions on Saturday across Switzerland.
"I am terrified by the state's inaction in the ecological disaster," said a student in the Plainpalais district of Geneva, before his sign was confiscated by police
Calling their demonstration a ''Rebellion Of One,'' activists set up single-person roadblocks in about a dozen cities–including Geneva, Lausanne, Zurich, Bern–and smaller towns such as Morat.
The demonstrations come one month before citizens go to the polls to decide on a revised national CO2 law.
It is impossible to determine how many people staged such single acts of protests, according to Keystone-SDA news agency.
"As we are working in a decentralised way, each group is organising itself independently," an organiser in Zurich told the agency.
Angry motorists
In Geneva and Lausanne, several roads were blocked in the morning and afternoon by activists. Most of them were dislodged and fined by the police, sometimes after only a few minutes.
In Lausanne, one activist lasted five minutes before being taken away in handcuffs. Angry drivers and passersby dislodged another activist in the same city before police arrived
Among onlookers, reactions ranged from applause and support to annoyance and outright anger.
"What do we care about the climate? There are all the cars waiting", a young woman in Geneva complained. Another contested the notion of "ecological catastrophe".
Vulnerability
By sitting alone on the pavement, each activist wanted to show the vulnerability of individuals to global warming.
"Behind every activist there are emotions," said the one from Zurich. "Climate change did not go away with the pandemic"
Switzerland’s climate activists want the government to tackle climate change more quickly and to convene a citizens assembly on climate and ecological justice.
They want the Federal Council (executive body) to declare a climate emergency and make the country carbon neutral by 2025 rather than 2050.
XR activists held protests in Britain last week and plan further actions in cities across 10 countries until June.
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