UK Coal workers remove Wrekin protesters' treehouses

Officials have dismantled treehouses on the site of a planned opencast coalmine near Telford and stopped protesters from rebuilding them, it was revealed today.

Environmental activists have been cleared from part of the site in Huntington Lane, Little Wenlock, and they say they have been threatened with arrest if they return.

The action is the first to be taken against the campaigners who set up camp on site seven months ago in protest at plans to mine 900,000 tonnes of coal on the land.

Workmen from UK Coal moved onto the southern most part of the land last Wednesday to secure it and start removing top soil ready for the excavations.

No eviction notice has been served on the protesters but they believe one will be served imminently.

A spokesman for the activists said: "Police officers and members of the National Eviction Team arrived on Site A to find the treehouses sadly unoccupied. The treehouses have now been removed and branches lopped off the trees so they can't go back up.

"Protesters have been threatened with arrest should they trespass upon Site A.

"An eviction notice is yet to be served but this chain of events would appear to suggest its imminent arrival."

The campaigners are now calling on sympathisers to rally to the protest camp either to bolster numbers or help out with "defences". The spokesman added: "Food and supplies to take underground would be very useful."

No-one from UK Coal was today available for comment. But a spokesman for UK Coal said at the time that the current location of the protestors did not impede the firm's mining operations at the moment.