KEYENBERG/LÜTZERATH (dpa-AFX) - Several hundred people protested Thursday against the evacuation of the lignite village of Lützerath. According to police estimates, about 800 people took part in the demonstration march from the Erkelenz district of Keyenberg toward Lützerath, which is about four kilometers away. The action was supported by several initiatives. Among the participants was also the Fridays for Future activist Luisa Neubauer. She carried a sign with the inscription "Climate protection is manual labor".

Neubauer had accused the police of a massive eviction immediately before the start of the demonstration. That the police had continued the eviction in the dark and into the night was dangerous and incomprehensible, she told journalists.

A large contingent of police had begun evicting the brown coal site occupied by activists on Wednesday. The settlement is to be demolished in order to be able to extract the coal deposits underneath. Climate activists want to prevent this. Meanwhile, energy company RWE has erected a double fence around Lützerath to prevent trespassers from entering./pa/DP/jha