Climate activists 'forced to pay' for Berlin airport blockades
A group of climate activists who took part in protests Berlin's BER Airport are facing thousands of euros in police fines.
The fines are meant to cover the cost of police operations to disperse the activists after they glued themselves to the airport runways and disrupted flights on three separate occasions.
A total of around €5,330 is at stake for two incidents on December 8th 2022 and May 5th 2023, the Federal Police informed DPA.
A few days ago, the police announced that they were demanding €1,060 from six activists that took part in a demonstration at BER on November 24th, 2022.
This last amount has been divided into differing amounts and split between the six activists, the police said. So far two of the protesters have disputed the fines while four are in the process of being collected.
Airport break-ins and runway blockades have become a key tactic of the Last Generation climate activism group over the past year.
In each of the demonstrations, activists breached the security fences around the airport and cycled across the grounds at BER, while live-streaming their protests on X (formerly known as Twitter).
A number of the demonstrators then glued themselves the tarmac, causing flights at the capital's airport to be grounded until the activists could be removed by the police.
Similar demonstrations also took place at Hamburg and Düsseldorf airports in mid-July and caused major disruption to the flight schedules throughout the morning.
READ ALSO: Flights resumed at Düsseldorf and Hamburg airports after climate protest
Last Generation say that their disruptive tactics are necessary to raise awareness of government inaction to tackle the climate crisis.
However, their controversial methods - including blocking traffic on busy roads and motorways - have also led to calls for tougher action on civil disobedience and disturbances.
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The fines are meant to cover the cost of police operations to disperse the activists after they glued themselves to the airport runways and disrupted flights on three separate occasions.
A total of around €5,330 is at stake for two incidents on December 8th 2022 and May 5th 2023, the Federal Police informed DPA.
A few days ago, the police announced that they were demanding €1,060 from six activists that took part in a demonstration at BER on November 24th, 2022.
This last amount has been divided into differing amounts and split between the six activists, the police said. So far two of the protesters have disputed the fines while four are in the process of being collected.
Airport break-ins and runway blockades have become a key tactic of the Last Generation climate activism group over the past year.
In each of the demonstrations, activists breached the security fences around the airport and cycled across the grounds at BER, while live-streaming their protests on X (formerly known as Twitter).
A number of the demonstrators then glued themselves the tarmac, causing flights at the capital's airport to be grounded until the activists could be removed by the police.
Similar demonstrations also took place at Hamburg and Düsseldorf airports in mid-July and caused major disruption to the flight schedules throughout the morning.
READ ALSO: Flights resumed at Düsseldorf and Hamburg airports after climate protest
Last Generation say that their disruptive tactics are necessary to raise awareness of government inaction to tackle the climate crisis.
However, their controversial methods - including blocking traffic on busy roads and motorways - have also led to calls for tougher action on civil disobedience and disturbances.
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