A Rome hunger strike by members of
the Extinction Rebellion group demanding action to address the
climate emergency entered its 11th day on Friday.
Three activists are putting their health on the line and staging
a daily protests outside the Ministry of Ecological Transition
(MITE) in the Italian capital as part of the Ultima Generazione
(Last Generation) campaign.
They are demanding a public meeting at which Ecological
Transition Minister Roberto Cingolani and other members of
Premier Mario Draghi's government would present the "urgent,
necessary measures they are implementing (or not implementing)
to tackle the eco-climate crisis".
They also calling for the establishment of citizens assemblies
to agree on the moves needed for the ecological transition.
The activists had a private meeting with Cingolani on Wednesday,
but were not satisfied with the outcome and decided to continue
with the hunger strike.
They accused the minister of passing the buck by saying it was
up to Draghi to decide whether to grant the demand for a public
meeting on the climate crisis.
"The minister described me as a girl with a gigantism complex
because I dared to outline the priorities of his ministry," said
Laura, one of the hunger strikers.
"I found him to be a very angry person, perhaps he's angry with
himself too and is in crisis, a sign that the strike we are
staging is extremely troublesome," added the young woman, who
has several health problems and said she already felt
debilitated on the fourth day of the strike.
Cingolani only agreed to Wednesday's meeting after receiving an
apology for raids at the start of the month in which some
Extinction Rebellion members burst into the ministry and
committed acts of vandalism, spraying paint inside and outside
the building
During the meeting the minister stressed that "a fair transition
on the environmental and social front" was a priority for the
government, "as shown by the commitments made at the
international level", the ministry said in a statement.
It said the minister reiterated that he was "working on the
front line in the fight against climate change" and was willing
to meet the activists again in the future.
But it also said that dialogue must be "civil and non-violent"
and not along the lines of the incidents at the start of the
month, saying that, among other things, the raids had scared
people working in the ministry.
The ministry statement also stated that "parliament is the place
where the representatives of the citizens sit" and where "a
democratic debate takes place and the majority decides".
Extinction Rebellion is a group with branches in many countries
that stages peaceful, but frequently disruptive protests, to
highlight the gravity of the climate crisis and trigger action.
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