Gay Today: Technology

Greenpeace Caps Week of Demonstrations Against U.S. Oil Interests

Environmental News Service

Greenpeace demonstrators drape an oil-drenched United States flag from an oil production platform in the North Sea

DEN HELDER, The Netherlands, June 18, 2001 (ENS) - To demonstrate its opposition to climate change induced by the burning of oil and gas, Greenpeace activists occupied an oil production platform owned by the U.S. oil company Conoco in the North Sea on Saturday.

After shutting down Conoco's K/18 Kotter oil production platform 30 miles off the Dutch coast for 36 hours, Greenpeace took its activists off the rig Sunday and ended the occupation due to deteriorating weather conditions, the environmental group said.

Early Saturday morning, five activists from the MV Greenpeace boarded the rig which then shut down operations. The Dutch, German and British activists suspended a survival unit from the platform, from which they could not easily be removed. They hung an oil stained American flag from the oil rig to show their opposition to the oil industry which they say has taken over the direction of the American presidency.

This latest action against U.S. oil interests caps a week of Greenpeace protests around President George W. Bush's visit to Europe last week, including actions against President Bush and U.S. oil interests in France, Spain, Norway, Belgium, Sweden, The Netherlands and Slovenia. In late March, President Bush announced that the United States was abandoning the Kyoto Protocol, an international climate change treaty that limits the emissions of six greenhouse gases linked to global warming. The most abundant of these gases, carbon dioxide is emitted by the combustion of coal, oil and natural gas.

"We got what we wanted out of Gothenburg," said Greenpeace campaigner Paul Horsman from aboard the Greenpeace ship, referring to the European Union Summit in the Swedish city that wound up Sunday.

"The European Union has publicly stated that it will ratify the Kyoto Protocol with or without the United States. George Bush's administration is completely isolated on climate change, including from the majority of American people," Horsman said.

On June 11, just before leaving Washington in his European trip President Bush put the Kyoto Protocol in the past tense. He said, "The Kyoto Protocol was fatally flawed in fundamental ways."

The President did pledge the cooperation of the United States in finding "an effective and science based response to the issue of global warming."

That approach does not satisfy Greenpeace. "Around the world people are dying, ecosystems are crumbling, and economies face ruin because of climate change, and all Bush and the oil industry can think of is how to maximise their profits and continue business as usual," said Horsman. "The rest of the world needs to tell Bush and the U.S. that they will not stand by and let the U.S. get away with it."

For its part, Conoco is making an effort to recognize that development should be sustainable with its newly issued first annual sustainable development report. "Conoco is aggressively pursuing opportunities in three energy related businesses that will be critical to our future: carbon fibers, natural gas refining and power generation," the company says on its website. "These businesses directly address four of the most fundamental environmental and social issues related to sustainable development - resource conservation, waste management, air quality and global climate change."

Greenpeace will now prepare for a new round of actions against U.S. oil interests, in the lead up to the next round of climate negotiations, scheduled for July 16 to 27 in Bonn, Germany.