A woman who climbed on top of a freight train as it crossed the Maribyrnong River on Wednesday morning said she was aiming to disrupt an economic system causing “global ecocide and genocide”.
Mia, a 27 year old from South Australia representing the activist group Whose Future, was arrested by police just after 9am on September 17 after being brought down from on top of a freight train on the Bunbury Street Railway Bridge in Footscray.
Protesters from the activist group had earlier halted the train as it crossed the rail bridge about 7.30am, with Mia believed to have then climbed aboard one of its containers from Maribyrnong Street.
It is alleged she then spray painted ‘resist or die’ on top of the container as well as hanging a banner in relation to a future protest.
In a statement released prior to the protest, Mia said the action deliberately targeted a bottleneck in a global economic system responsible for everything from wealth inequality to climate breakdown and to genocide in Gaza.
“Our future is not looking so good,” she wrote.
“The system hasn’t failed, it’s working as it was intended. Business as usual has led us to this point. Business as usual won’t get us out of this mess. Resist or die.”
It’s the second action by Whose Future aimed at disrupting operations at the Port of Melbourne this week, following a similar protest at Webb Dock.
The group called the protest on Tuesday a ‘peoples embargo’ aimed at stopping goods being exported to Israel, while they also claimed to be involved in the occupation of Fraser MP Daniel Mulino’s office on Monday where protesters demanded an end to arms sales, trade and diplomatic relations with the Netanyahu government.
Mia has been taken into custody and is expected to be charged with trespassing on a railway premises, stopping a rail vehicle, mounting a place not intended for travel, hanging a flag on rail premises, graffiti, possessing graffiti implements, criminal damage and obstructing police.
Transit police are continuing to investigate the incident.
