The Tarnac Nine are nine alleged anarchist saboteurs arrested in the village of Tarnac, France in November 2008 in relation to a series of instances of direct action.[1][2] The gendarmerie, French police, entered Tarnac with helicopters and dogs and dragged the suspects from their beds.[3]
Around twenty people were arrested on November 11, 2008, and nine of those were charged with "criminal association for the purposes of terrorist activity".[4] Of those nine, Yildune Lévy was released, under review, on Jan 16th 2009 but Julien Coupat is still being held in prison despite being ordered for release in December 2008.[5] The nine are predominantly graduate students from middle-class backgrounds, from 22 to 34 years old.[3] Five of the nine had been living in a farmhouse on a hill overlooking the village.[3]
They stand accused of associating with a "terrorist enterprise", causing delays to the French rail network by disabling over 160 trains.[3] Coupat has also been charged with writing The Coming Insurrection, a popular anti-capitalist text.[5] Academics and Coupat's family have said that the threat from the "violent left" is being exaggerated, and that the Tarnac Nine are "scapegoats for a generation who have started to think for themselves about capitalism and its wrongs". Support groups have emerged across France, in Greece, Spain and in the United States.[1]