© Florence Brochoire
Lawyer Etienne Ambroselli, March 29 in Paris.
We remember him putting on his lawyer’s robe on the last day of the trial of activists opposed to the project nuclear waste landfill Cigéo, in the small village of Bure (Meuse), in June. After having a summer time my in exam during this titanic instructionEtienne Ambroselli came “defend his comrades in struggle” prosecuted for “conspiracy” after an unauthorized demonstration.
Before the criminal court of Bar-le-Duc, he pleads, fearless and moved : “Whether you condemn us or not, it will not change anything. We will continue.” A year later, in his Paris office, the tone has not changed. Here he is who castigates “the inability of the state to accept the criticism that is expressed in the demonstrations”the “increasingly frequent drift of judicial investigations against activists”. The decision was handed down in September: six defendants were given sentences ranging from six months suspended to twelve months, the seventh was released. But the crime of“conspiracy” has been abandoned, and this is perhaps the most important. “This is the political result we wanted. How can we be considered criminals because we are against nuclear power?
No “savior”
We meet Etienne Ambroselli ten days before the first round of the presidential election. Suit jacket in gray wool on the shoulders, the forty-year-old has a lively flayed side that contrasts with his joviality. He thinks of going to vote, without being completely convinced by the usefulness of the gesture. Anyway, he “completely disinterested” of the electoral campaign, said not to seek «sauveur», is also deeply annoyed by this vision of the presidency. And prefers not to reveal the color of his vote.
Nuclear policy, a crucial issue in his eyes, was not really at the heart of the debates. Except perhaps during a small breach opened, not by the speeches of environmental activists, but by the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, when he pulled out the card of deterrence on the front of the Ukrainian conflict, reminding face of the world just how much of a threat nuclear power can be. “To continue to exercise our sovereignty, we highlight our capacity for destruction. That does not make any sense.”
A few days before the election, the only thing that matters to him is to vote for someone supporting “the abandonment of the Cigeo project». “This waste risks becoming a bomb, being a threat over the long, very long time, as long as the scale of the history of humanity”, he hammers. According to him, few policies have “the necessary courage” for “accept this scientific impasse and step back”. “Certainly, today we have no other solutions for managing this hazardous waste. But you have to be able to admit it, to show patience, to increase scientific research, which is the only way to find answers. Etienne Ambroselli castigates Emmanuel Macron’s energy policy – in particular the mini-reactor project –, firmly rooted in a “destructive neoliberalism”, reluctant to detox from nuclear power. Whatever happens in the second round, “I will not vote for the extreme right or for someone who reinforces this nuclear disaster”, he already knows.
“Deadly trend of our society”
For years this lawyer specializing in environmental law has been campaigning against nuclear power, this energy which “translates the deadly tendency of our society”. For years he has been sailing, between Paris and Bure, this small village where the State plans to bury nuclear waste, which has seen a powerful network of opponents around a “Resistance House”. “To be there is to have the impression of collectively tackling something immense, disproportionate, which can have a real impact on the course of things. It is also to defend a different relationship to life. He dreams of a “total failover” of paradigm, of the end of the “all-nuclear”. “How far is our state ready to defend this disaster?”