The so-called ‘TV oak’, which has stood outside the national broadcasting station’s offices for 500 years, was only chopped down last week despite demonstrations to keep it rooted.

According to SVT, which overlooks the site, many council workers have been issued with both panic alarms and personal security guards due to angry warnings received since the felling.
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“We’ve received some threats, that we’ve reported to the police and handed over to the security department,” Mats Freij, press officer at the traffic department, told Dagens Nyheter (DN) newspaper.

Most of the tree’s remains have now been burnt, but the biggest branches have found a new home in the baboon enclosure at Skansen Zoo.

“They’ve received it with great joy. They sit on it, jump around and gnaw. The bark is fresh and nice. The baboons have received it as a Christmas present,” Jonas Wahlström, head of the Skansen aquarium, told the Metro.

The protest is being held by the Organised Interest Group of Households and their demands on government are very simple: the swift removal of inflation indexing on house loans and an across the board debt ‘correction’. In a television interview this week, Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir said that universal debt forgiveness would not be fair to everyone and would not be possible so soon after Iceland’s biggest ever recession. She did, however, agree that inflation indexing should go and pointed out that non-indexed loans have recently become available.

Protest organisers say that the event is peaceful; but police cordoned off the Althingi House as a precaution and many eggs have been thrown — including one which hurt a RUV cameraman and another which hurt Left Green MP Arni Thor Sigurdsson.

First Lady Dorrit Moussaieff ditched her husband, President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, as MPs and dignitaries were entering the Domkirkjan cathedral for the traditional church service. Instead, she went and joined the protesters. Both had greeted the protesters earlier, on their way in to Althingi.

Vilhjalmur Bjarnason, vice chairman of the Organised Interest Group of Households, told RUV: “We will hand Johanna (Sigurdardottir) our protest document this morning. She has promised to accept it personally. Some 34,000 people have signed it.” Hopefully the group’s demands will be met before the New Year, he added.

(Photo: KMH // IceNews)

The resident of the house, in the Austurbaer area of the Icelandic capital, locked himself in while a large group of other people outside the house did all they could to stop the auction, RUV reports.

Events really took off at around 10.00 this morning when the a representative of the Reykjavik District Commissioner (sometimes referred to in English as sheriff) arrived at the house with orders to evict the owner because of mortgage arrears. When he arrived, he was met by a group of people from the so-called Home Protection Team, who prevented him reaching the door. Several of the protesters were removed from the scene.

During all this time the resident was locked inside the house until a locksmith arrived at 12.00 and opened the house. Representatives of the sheriff and police officers entered the house to speak with the occupant. A removals van promptly arrived to take furniture away. RUV’s reporter on the scene says it is most likely the remaining people will need to be removed by force.

Seven police cars were at the house at midday and some 20 police officers. There was also a steady stream of drivers and pedestrians eager to find out what was going on.

According to DV, the owner of the house has not paid the mortgage since 2008.

The Spanish, Swiss and Norwegian activists, who got through several security checks at Denmark’s Christianborg Castle before unfurling banners reading: ‘Politicians talk – Leaders ACT’, have each been handed down two weeks’ suspended sentences for falsifying documents, impersonating the police and trespassing. Greenpeace Nordic, which organised the elaborate protest, was also fined DKK 75,000 (EUR 10,067).

The trio were immediately arrested after the protest and held by police for 20 days over Christmas.
They were charged with trespassing in a royal building but were cleared of offending the queen, as the court ruled that the action was not directed towards her.

Issuing a statement after the ruling on Monday, Greenpeace indicated that it was satisfied with the verdict. “This is a victory for freedom of expression – the court has clearly recognised the importance of peaceful protest in our society, and of standing up for what you believe in,” Kumi Naidoo, of the environmental organisation, said.

The grizzly group of around 60 Greenpeace volunteers invaded the Scottish headquarters at around 08.15 on Monday morning, demanding that the firm publish its oil spill-response plan, and handing out leaflets to employees encouraging them to become whistleblowers.

The Greenpeace group has previously scaled Cairn’s Greenland rigs on various occasions in an attempt to force the company to reveal what measures they have in place in the event of a spill like that seen at the BP Deep Water Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico last year. Cairn announced on 6th June that such plans are not available to the public, and activists have since been banned from the area by Danish authorities.

Speaking to Bloomberg at the time of the occupation, Greenpeace campaigner Vicky Wyatt said, “About 30 of them have locked themselves to various bits of furniture and they will stay there until Cairn publish their oil spill plan.” Several activists had to be forcefully removed by police and will appear in court this week.

Cairn confirmed that the demonstrators had gained access to their offices. “Wherever it is active, Cairn operates in a safe and prudent manner,” the company said in a statement. “Cairn takes its responsibilities such as oil spill contingency and response plans very seriously,” it added.

The US Geological Survey estimates that the waters around Greenland contain as much as 50 billion barrels of oil and gas, enough to meet the energy demands of Europe for around two years.

(Photos: Anders Peter Amsnæs)

The Juliano’s propellers were badly damaged while in its berth in Greece where it waits to depart in the Ship to Gaza convoy which aims to break the Israeli-imposed blockade.

The boat, which is one of the smallest in the Freedom Flotilla, is jointly owned by the Greek, Norwegian and Swedish Ship to Gaza organisations, and was set to carry 25 activists. It is thought that the damage can be repaired in time for planned departure tomorrow, but at a cost EUR 12,000.

Speaking on Monday, the organisation’s Swedish spokesman Mattias Gardell called for action. “It is time for the international community to put their foot down and say: “It’s enough!” he said. “All we know is that Israel is doing everything in its power to slow us down,” added Norwegian spokesperson, Torstein Dahle, to Norwegian daily Dagbladet.

Mikael Lofgren, the organisation’s press co-ordinator, said a solution to the problem is simple. “It is not so much a question of dealing with the sabotage to our boat. The impending question is really to urge Israel to end the blockade – then our problem would disappear by itself,” he told The Local.

The aid convoy, which is expected to carry 20 Swedes, is the second international attempt to sail to Gaza. The first Freedom Flotilla had to be abandoned in May last year after armed Israeli forces stormed a boat, killing nine activists. The bloody action was widely condemned throughout the world.

The latest announcement is a U-turn for the Lundbeck firm, which claimed in an interview with the Copenhagen Post in March that they were incapable of stopping the Nembutal epilepsy drug being used in lethal injections in US prisons.

“We have been looking into the problem and there’s nothing that we can do to control where the product ends up,” a representative from Lundbeck told the paper at the time. However, the company’s chief executive, Ulf Wiinberg, met with human rights organisation Reprieve last week to discuss how to prevent the drug ending up in the wrong hands.

“We have of course continued our efforts to solve this problem, on how to make the states stop this misuse of our medicine by writing and contacting the prisons in question,” said Lundbeck representative Mads Kronborg. “Reprieve has highlighted the possibilities in terms of restricting distribution by making it harder for prisons to get the drug while keeping a supply for hospitals to get the drugs to treat patients with severe epilepsy,” he added.

“We want to do this right so we are starting an investigation to see how we can restrict the distribution. But it must be noted that it will not necessarily be 100 percent certain to prevent the prisons getting hold of the drugs,” Kronborg concluded in the Copenhagen Post report.

The news that Nembutal was being misused by correctional facilities in seven US states broke in March, shortly after exports of sodium thiopental, the prisons’ first-choice drug, was stopped due to protests. To date, 13 prisoners have been issued with the anti-epilepsy drug via lethal injection, despite warnings from health experts that it may not be humane.

Human rights organisations and the media widely criticised Lundbeck’s handling of the case, with Danish pension fund Unipension also selling millions of kroner in company shares following the scandal.

“Our immediate assessment is that Lundbeck does not violate our guidelines. But we think their handling of the matter has been inappropriate,” said Unipension chief investor Niels Erik Petersen in a press release.

The man, who lived in the Reykjavik-region town of Alftanes, lost his home when he was unable to keep up with repayments on his ISK 34 million foreign currency loan as the krona devalued following the banking crash.

The man was lauded by many for standing up to the banks which had encouraged lending in foreign currencies, then crashed the economy and then been eager to repossess people’s houses when they got into difficulty.

The man, who is in his 50s, rented a digger and demolished his entire house following its sale in an emergency auction.

Now Reykjavik police are charging the man with damaging property. They are also charging him for allegedly having sold two couples a prefabricated house in Finland which both couples have yet to see head nor tail of. The case involves ISK 20 million.

RUV reports that it is not known whether the man is in Iceland or not; but it is suspected that he is overseas. He can be arrested and deported in any country with an extradition treaty with Iceland, however.

Prime Minister Sigurdardottir received the 48,000 signatures this morning at her offices in the cabinet building. The petition asks for a referendum on ensuring Iceland’s energy resources remain public property. The petition was spurred on by dissatisfaction over the likely sale of HS Orka to Magma Energy of Canada.

The PM reportedly told Bjork that the petition is largely in line with the government’s own wishes, RUV reports. Supporters gathered outside the building and sang songs while the meeting was in progress. In accordance with the green nature of the protest, the petition was handed to the Prime Minister on a USB memory stick, instead of on paper.

The PM told the three petition organisers that she was extremely happy to receive it. Following the handover, the three; Bjork, Jon Thorisson and Oddny Eir AEvarsdottir; went for a meeting with the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Steingrimur J. Sigfusson.

Precise details of the meeting are not known, but all three protesters said afterwards that they were happy with the outcome.

As well as equal pay and promotion opportunities in the workplace and respect in the home, this year’s special theme was domestic violence.

Rallies have been taking place all over Iceland, and not just in Reykjavik. Below is a selection of photos from the north-western town of Isafjordur in the Westfjords.


All photos: Alëx Elliott/IceNews

Part of the Isafjordur rally was to stop outside of the regional courthouse to protest the lenient sentences given for violence and rape against women in Iceland.