In a bid to pile pressure on Gazprom and call for the release of the so-called Arctic 30, local Greenpeace activists will be staging protests outside a Shell petrol station in Rusholme tomorrow.
Shell, who are partnered with the state-owned Russian oil giant, are together exploring potential oil fields in the Arctic Ocean.
Yet Elliot Bovill, a local representative for Greenpeace in Manchester, said that we should instead be focussing on the impacts of climate change in the Arctic rather than looking for economic opportunities there.
“It affects everybody because, at the end of the day, climate change affects every single life on the planet and if people are being arrested on ridiculous charges for trying to protect every living thing on this plant it is something very serious,” he told MM.
“Governments should be at the fore front of implementing laws that are protecting the planet instead of giving way to oil companies who just want to make a great big wad of cash at the end of it.
“The reason that we are targeting Shell tomorrow is because Shell are partnered with Gazprom. The event is to highlight Shell’s partnership with a pretty evil company who are state run by the Russians.”
A group were arrested earlier this week by Russian forces following an attempted protest at an oil rig in the Arctic Ocean and are now held in St Petersburg after being moved south from Murmansk.
The charges of hooliganism that the group face have been described as ‘excessive’ by British Foreign Secretary William Hague and Sir Paul McCartney has called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to the release of the activists.
“Everybody know Greenpeace is not a violent organisation. Vladimir Putin said himself that I know that they are not pirates however piracy is one of the only charges,” Elliot said.
“They have now changed that to hooliganism which they do not actually have authority in that part of the world to arrest people for.”
Greenpeace claim that the arctic is melting quickly and instead of seeing this as a warning sign of the rapidly changing climate the oil companies, like Gazprom and Shell, see it as an opportunity to move further and further north and explore for oil in more dangerous areas.
The protest takes place at 1pm at Shell Garage in Rusholme, Manchester.
Image courtesy of Rita Wallaert via Flickr, with thanks.
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