Luetzerath is about to be stripped from the map - but its impact will linger on
Police have moved on the hundreds of protesters who made their last stand here against the expansion of a lignite coal mine in western Germany
Saturday 14 January 2023 21:45, UK
It is an utterly miserable day in Luetzerath. The cold rain falls, the wind billows and the mud sticks to your feet, pulling you down. And all around is destruction and anger.
This small village is being pulled apart before our eyes. Buildings are being pulled down and roads ripped up. Police vans are parked everywhere, with officers summoned from all across the country.
And if you want to know why, you have to look up. Because there, built into some of the trees that still stand in this area, are treehouses, and inside them are protesters. They are in no hurry to leave; the police are desperate to get rid of them and are using cranes to get up to their level.
It is an unequal battle, and everyone knows it. The police will win this, they will move the protesters out and Luetzerath will, surely, be demolished. But the idea is to delay as long as possible and make as much noise. To draw the attention of the world to this tiny little hamlet that's about to disappear off the map.
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I first came here 18 months ago, when the destruction of Luetzerath was planned, but not imminent. The village was, even then, largely the preserve of protesters, who were camped out in space offered to them by a local farmer.
It felt like an alternative commune. A man calling himself Tomato was very influential; there were children being taught circus skills and volunteers preparing home-grown meals.
But even then, there were people building treehouses to live in, ready for the day when the diggers would turn up.
It seemed such an abstract, curious idea in the summer of 2021 - and let's be honest, even now it's hard to imagine a country as rich as Germany allowing a community to be levelled for the sake of a coal mine. But then you stand and watch a digger taking chunks out of one of the few remaining houses and realise that, yes, that's what's happening.
In truth, it's not the first time. Luetzerath is simply the latest in a long line of towns that have been wiped out in order to make more space for coal mining. The German government, which includes the Green Party, says that it needs to support coal-mining in the short-term, albeit that it will be phased out eventually, but that it will now save five other villages that had been threatened.
But Luetzerath is doomed. Thousands of people braved the weather here to join a protest in the fields near the village, letting off fireworks and welcoming an address from Greta Thunberg, probably the world's best-known climate activist. "What happens in Luetzerath doesn't stay in Luetzerath," she told them.
"Germany, as one of the biggest polluters in the world, has an enormous responsibility. They need to be held accountable. And that is why we are here."
As so often at these events, the momentum seems to come from younger people. Among the thousands at this demonstration, there was a cross-section of society but I would guess that the big majority were under the age of 30, some bringing children and even babies. There was a sense of frustration and anger.
We saw clashes with the police, who brought hundreds of officers, and positioned two water cannons in front of the crowd, even though many were already soaked. But this wasn't a riot. It was more of a cry from people who clearly feel disenfranchised from politics. Little wonder that this whole episode is excruciatingly awkward for the German Greens.
Beyond the demonstration, one of the massive digging machines loomed over the people in the fields. It is a symbol of how this mine has become inexorably bigger, fuelling Germany's desire for lignite, a particularly grubby form of fossil fuel.
A hundred metres away, treehouses are being entered by police and protesters are being thrown out. Lutzerath will go - it will be stripped from the map and the very land will be ripped up. But its impact, and its symbolism, will linger on.
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