1000 People Occupy A28 Motorway
Seven Hours of Utrecht Road Blockades

PRESS RELEASE June 22, 01.30 h. Yesterday afternoon 1000 people occupied the A28 motorway leading from Utrecht to Amersfoort in the Netherlands. The streetparty was a solidarity protest for the inspiring actions in Sevilla, Spain, against the EU summit taking place there now. After two hours of blockading the A28, up to the fall of night the nearby 'old highway'* was occupied. The actions had a heavy repercussion on traffic. All of the Utrecht ring and on various connecting highways in the centre of Holland's motorway network were jammed. The radical environmental movement GroenFront!, celebrating it's sixth birthday yesterday on midsummer, says that this is the answer of direct action to the gigantic plans of the new rightwing Dutch government to expand the motorway network. This was the peak of a month of ecological insurgence. Now is the time to rise up for the Earth. An end to the filthy traffic arteries! Enough written, nature strikes back, GroenFront! lends a hand.

* The Waterlinieweg was the main eastern Utrecht highway until the A27 was constructed through the middle of the Amelisweerd forest in the eighties. Construction was met by fearce resistance, including a treehouse village. The protest site was evicted when protesters were in court to demand plans be cancelled.