Tag Archives: greenpeace

Greenpeace Chooses Marketing Over Ethics in Peru Action

Once again Greenpeace chose marketing over ethics in a deeply offensive and destructive action at a sacred site in Peru last week.

While Greenpeace ED Kumi Naidoo has made a videotaped apology for this action, I don’t buy it.

I personally witnessed Kumi’s questionable tactics at the UN Climate talks in Durban where he orchestrated a fake “arrest” with UN security so that the media would run photos of him being led out of the talks in handcuffs — another marketing ploy.  How do I know this was a fake arrest?  Because a colleague and I engaged in civil disobedience at the same action, refusing to comply with UN security, and were carried out of the talks and banned permanently from all future talks. But there were no handcuffs.

Kumi, on the other hand, worked hand in hand with security throughout the youth-led action to ensure the youth left in an orderly fashion.

For my report from this incident, read my post “Showdown at the Durban Disaster: Challenging the Big Green Patriarchy.”

–Anne Petermann, GJEP

Greenpeace May Have Permanently Damaged An Ancient, Sacred Site. Now What?

Greenpeace International set off a firestorm in Peru last week, and not the kind it had hoped for. After a few of its members damaged, perhaps irreparably, one of the most important cultural heritage sites in the country, a debate is beginning over how to interpret the environmental groups offensive actions.

Read the rest of the story here

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Filed under Media

Video: Climate Justice Outcry! Dudes co-opt COP 17 final march

Note:  Nope, that headline is not from GJEP.  In fact it’s the title of one of the videos shot by the Media Co-op in Montreal during the Durban meetings of the UN climate negotiations.  Their Canadian network spans: The Dominion • Halifax • Vancouver • Montreal • Toronto.  There is a lot of controversy surrounding the action this video documents, including GJEP’s Anne Petermann’s scathing post on Friday “Showdown at the Durban Disaster: Challenging the ‘Big Green’ Patriarchy.”  GJEP and Anne are receiving many comments and emails, both pro and con on Anne’s article.  To those who disagree with Anne’s analysis:  please watch this.  To everyone else, let’s have a laugh, albeit a sad one, and resolve to up the ante for the people and the planet with concrete, meaningful action and analysis, and make Climate Justice! more than just two words to chant.  After Copenhagen COP 15, many of us lost a long time friend and comrade, Dennis Brutus: poet, scholar and  anti-apartheid activist.  If Dennis was still physically present, I believe he would have linked arms with Anne and Keith; Dennis knew what struggle meant. For more Media Co-op coverage of Durban, please go to http://mediacoop.ca/durban.  -Orin Langelle for the GJEP Team

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Filed under Actions / Protest, Carbon Trading, Climate Change, Climate Justice, False Solutions to Climate Change, Independent Media, Media

Greenpeace Occupies Oil Rigs off Coast of Greenland

Greenpeace activists evaded a massive security operation and scaled Cairn Energy’s controversial oil rig (Stena Don) off Greenland. They have stopped Cairn’s drilling.

After dodging Danish Navy commandos in Greenpeace’s inflatable speedboats, activists from 4 countries climbed up the inside of the rig and are now occupying the rig in tents suspended from ropes.

CTV Canada’s AM Reports:   The people who made it aboard the Stena Don are expert climbers and have managed to set up hanging tents from the rig’s platform. Greenpeace said they have been equipped with enough supplies to stay there for several days.

American Sim McKenna, one of the four people aboard the Stena Don, said the climbers are hoping for continued success.

“We’ve got to keep the energy companies out of the Arctic and kick our addiction to oil, that’s why we’re going to stop this rig from drilling for as long as we can,” McKenna said in a statement released by Greenpeace Tuesday.

Deen said Greenpeace has sent climbers to the oil rig to draw attention to the risks that Cairn’s oil operations pose for the environment.

Yesterday’s Global Justice Ecology Project’s Earth Minute for KPFK’s (L.A. Pacifica) Sojourner Truth show warned:

“…The initiation of oil drilling in the icy Artic seas off Greenland is a modern warning of the potentially disastrous consequences of society’s obsession with oil.

Scottish based Cairn energy is drilling for oil in an area known as “iceberg alley.”  This pristine region is home to 80% of the world’s narwhals, as well as majestic blue whales, polar bears, seals, and numerous migratory birds.

An iceberg-drill rig collision here would be devastating.  The region’s extreme weather could allow a ruptured well to continue gushing oil for 2 years.  Oil would be trapped under thick sheets of ice, making cleanup almost impossible….”

To listen to the full Earth Minute click here!

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Filed under Actions / Protest