ERKELENZ (dpa-AFX) - The end of Lützerath is coming within reach: five days after the evacuation of the lignite site began, two remaining climate activists voluntarily left an underground tunnel under the settlement on Monday. According to RWE, these were the last activists on site. The eviction by the police had thus ended. The dismantling of the former settlement will be completed "in the coming days." Elsewhere in the Rhenish lignite mining region, however, protests against coal-fired power generation continued.

On Monday morning, for example, eight activists occupied a lignite excavator in the Hambach open pit mine, 20 kilometers from Lützerath. The unit then had to temporarily cease operations. However, the protest action ended after only a few hours. On Monday afternoon, the eight occupants had left the excavator voluntarily, RWE reported.

A good four kilometers as the crow flies from Lützerath, five climate activists - including two in wheelchairs - also rappelled down from a highway bridge on Monday morning. The traffic on the freeway 44 ran during the action further, on the highway under the bridge went against it nothing more. According to the police, however, this action was also over by midday.

The energy company RWE emphasized that the two activists who were still holding out under Lützerath had left the tunnel voluntarily. One was "relieved" that the "life-threatening situation" had been ended in this way. "A rescue from the tunnel against the announced resistance of the people would have been associated with high risks, also for the rescue forces," the group said.

The Lützerath activists also stated on Twitter that the two people had left the tunnel "by themselves." "A thousand thanks for your life-threatening commitment against lignite & capitalism," they wrote.

Meanwhile, German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser condemned the methods used by climate activists during the evacuation of the Lower Rhine lignite village. "With burning barricades, a tunnel in danger of collapsing and rickety tree houses at great heights, activists have not only put themselves in great danger, but also the emergency forces," the SPD politician wrote in a statement on Monday.

Political conflicts should not be carried out on the backs of emergency forces, she added. "Those who want to force their concerns with violence are leaving the democratic discourse," Faeser stressed. One risks thereby the support of the society for the fight against the climate crisis.

Faeser announced at the same time that the "individual accusations of violence by police officers" against activists would also be examined. "If the accusations are confirmed, they must have consequences," Faeser made clear.

Activists had accused the police of excesses of violence at the large demonstration on Saturday. A "high double-digit to triple-digit number" of participants had been injured, a spokeswoman for the demonstrators' ambulance service said on Sunday. Among them, she said, were many seriously injured and some with life-threatening injuries. According to police, nine activists were taken to hospital by ambulance.

Meanwhile, North Rhine-Westphalia's Minister President Hendrik Wüst (CDU) appealed to the synod of the Evangelical Church in the Rhineland for support for the coal compromise, which currently leads to the conversion of larger quantities of coal into electricity, but also includes an exit from coal-fired power generation in NRW brought forward to 2030. He said that no one had taken the easy way out.

Once Lützerath has been completely demolished, the energy company RWE plans to excavate the coal underneath. Bucket-wheel excavators could reach the former village as early as March or April, a company spokesman said./rea/DP/jha