In the early hours of 30/07/07, saboteurs struck at Smurfit Kappa, a plastics factory owned by Rio Tinto Alcan in Chelmsford, Essex. The gates were locked shut, office doors and loading bays were sabotaged with glue and a message left painted on the wall. Vehicles belonging to Rio Tinto were also sabotaged.
Rio Tinto, who have recently acquired the business have arguably the worse record of any corporation for abuse of the earth and its people. Whether they’re sponsoring and training paramilitaries committing genocide in the South Pacific, removing entire mountain tops in Africa or strip mining virgin rainforest that belongs to indigenous tribes, they must be stopped.
Rio Tinto’s recent acquisition of Alcan makes them party to the greatest ecological crime currently being committed in Europe. They are looking to turn Iceland’s great wildernesses into a series of monolithic power stations to power aluminium smelters; one of the most polluting and energy intensive industries in the world. Rio Tinto bring repression wherever they go, in Bouganville in the South Pacific they hired mercenaries to rape and murder all who opposed their massive copper mine, Panguna. Their invasion into Iceland is no different and protests against heavy industry are being met with police violence and activists are fitted up and subject to state sponsored slander.
It’s necessary to hit Rio Tinto where it hurts, on the bottom line, the balance sheet. Where it matters.
EARTH LIBERATION FRONT