(Aboard a boat in the English Channel) “Stop drilling, start paying”: two Greenpeace activists boarded a ship on Monday carrying a Shell platform intended to expand an oil and gas field in Scotland, thus joining four members of the NGO who have been there since January 31, noted AFP journalists.
Despite the presence of an escort boat, the two activists managed to hold on to ropes to climb onto the huge building, without any agent on board being able to prevent them.
“We, Greenpeace and several representatives from countries in the south which are already impacted by climate change, are here to raise awareness of the utter madness of Shell and other oil companies which continue to invest in new fuel exploration. fossil fuels in the middle of the climate crisis,” Ansgar Kiene, head of Greenpeace’s European action campaign, told AFP aboard one of the boats accompanying the operation.
Two activists from the environmental defense association went up to the white marlina ship that transports a 34,000 tonne oil and gas platform to the North Sea for Shell.
Four members of the NGO invested this ship last week and are still there despite a restraining order obtained by Shell, confirmed Greenpeace.
“We want to strengthen the struggle with more activists and more voices,” Kiene said, adding that the action was “peaceful” and that the activists had “no intention of interfering with the route”. of the ship.
Greenpeace plans to camp on the platform as far as Norway, he said.
“Shell will not silence us. The whole world must know that Shell plans to destroy the planet, by aggravating the climate crisis and without paying a penny to repair the carnage”, testified the German Silja Zimmermann, one of the two activists mounted on the White Marlin.
The platform, now occupied by six members of Greenpeace, should allow Shell to drill eight new wells in the Penguins gas and oil field in the North Sea.
According to the NGO, “the consumption of the oil and gas contained in these wells would generate 45 million tonnes of CO2. That’s more than Norway’s entire annual emissions”.
The British-Dutch giant, which announced $ 42.3 billion in profits in 2022, denounced an action last week “which raises real concerns about safety”.