ERKELENZ (dpa-AFX) - The Aachen police and the Heinsberg district will provide information on Tuesday (17.00) about the planned evacuation of the hamlet of Lützerath and the police operation at the Garzweiler open-cast lignite mine. The hamlet of Lützerath belongs to the city of Erkelenz and is to be dredged so that the underlying lignite can be extracted. Activists have settled in the hamlet, which has been abandoned by its original inhabitants, and want to defend it. Police are planning a large-scale operation that they say could last up to four weeks. The timing of the eviction is uncertain; police say it could begin Wednesday at the earliest.

Aachen's police chief Dirk Weinspach and district administrator Stephan Pusch (CDU) will attend the event at the vocational college in Erkelenz. Both have called for peaceful protests. The appointment is an offer to talk to local citizens, but also to climate activists.

No town near the Garzweiler open pit mine is as affected as Erkelenz. Parts of its area have already been mined. The municipality with 43,000 inhabitants has always opposed open pit mining. The request for enforcement assistance for the evacuation to the Aachen police was made by the district administrator of the Heinsberg district./uho/DP/jha