World Ecology Newswire Archive

Activists braved the cold of New York City today to protest yesterday's kidnapping of Giles Lane and Benjamin Potts by an illegal Japanese whaling ship. They were released earlier today to the Ocean Viking (Australia's ship).

The activists -- Australian Benjamin Potts, 28, and Briton Giles Lane, 35 -- were detained Tuesday after boarding the harpoon ship to protest Japan's whaling programme. They were handed over to Austrialia's 'Ocean Viking' earlier today.

Within days of last week's announcement by Gordon Brown in favour of building new nuclear power stations, P.A.W.B (People Against Wylfa-B). have launched a website  http://stop-wylfa.org/ as part of the campaign to prevent a second nuclear plant at Wylfa on Anglesey, north Wales.

Demonstrators today held a protest outside the Japanese Consul in Barcelona, also delivering a letter to the General Consul demanding the immediate release of two Sea Shepherd crew members currently held hostage by Japanese whalers.

"All whaling activities have come to a halt," said Captain Paul Watson from onboard the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society’s ship Steve Irwin. No whales have been killed since January 11th.

After two days being held hostage on the Yushin Maru No 2, two Sea Shepherd anti-whaling activists may be returned within the next day to the Sea Shepherd ship Steve Irwin by the authorisation of the Australian Government to use the Customs and Fisheries patrol vessel Oceanic Viking as an intermediary.

"Using hostages to make demands is the hallmark of terrorism and Sea Shepherd has no interest in negotiating with terrorist groups," said Captain Paul Watson. "The hostages must be released unconditionally."

"The Institute of Cetacean Research is acting like a terrorist organization," said Steve Irwin’s 1st Officer Peter Brown. "Here they are taking hostages and making demands. Our policy is that we don’t respond to terrorist demands."

The Japanese harpoon vessel Yushin Maru No. 2 has taken two Sea Shepherd volunteer crew members hostage. Benjamin Potts 28, an Australian citizen and Giles Lane, 35, a citizen of Great Britain are being held hostage onboard the whaling vessel. Both men were assaulted and then tied to the railings of the whaler. They were then moved and tied to the radar mast by the whalers.

Mr Watson said his crew would consider a rescue mission if the men were not returned to his craft. "It is always a possibility. I mean, we do have a reputation for being aggressive. We are non-violent, we have never injured anybody, but we are certainly not afraid of taking aggressive measures," Mr Watson said.

It seems that any corporation, however bad their past, can sponsor WWF in order to make them look good. Surely this is wrong, but that's what's going on.

In what has been an unpredictably dramatic day for the campaign against whaling in Antarctica, the crew of a Japanese harpoon gunboat have seized Australian and British crew mebers of the Sea Shepherd vessel, Steve Irwin.

As well as the SOCPA event you may have noticed another demonstration taking place in Trafalgar Square on Saturday. It was against the expansion of an airport, not Heathrow, but at Siena, Italy.
Pictures are copyright (C) Peter Marshall, 2008

The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society is about one day away from making contact with the Japanese whaling fleet. "We have our sources in Greenpeace. There are quite a few disgruntled Greenpeacers who are opposed to Greenpeace's policy of non-cooperation. They are being very helpful," said Captain Watson.

A video about a climate action that happened before xmus.

There is an interesting thread on the MediaLens discussion board about the following article, "Does the progressive left really believe in climate change?".

While the following article makes good points about the left and climate change the same thing can be said of the left and peak oil — however all these things were brought together in a talk that Nafeez Ahmed gave last November.

One minor thing struck me from the MediaLens discussion, a poster there comments that:

I've seen anarchists on Indymedia arguing fiercely in support of mobile phone companies against residents living near masts who have suffered alarming health problems - on the grounds that they have no scientific proof of their complaints as compared to the mobile companies.

Which appears to indicate to me that she hasn't appreciated the extent that this site is troll'ed...

Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed speaking on The Hidden Holocaust — Our Civilizational Crisis at a public meeting held on 20th November 2007 at Imperial College, London.

See also the notice of the meeting and the first three parts of a four part write-up of the talk:

1. The Hidden Holocaust—Our Civilizational Crisis Part 1: The Holocaust in History
2. The Hidden Holocaust—Our Civilizational Crisis Part 2: Exporting Democracy
3. The Hidden Holocaust—Our Civilizational Crisis, Part 3: The End Of The World As We Know It?

On Friday 4 January the Risaing Tide Greenwash Guerilla Brigade decided to pay Tate Britain a lil' visit.

Part three (see part one and part two) of an article by Nafeez Ahmed on the history of imperial genocide follows, the subject of this article was the subject of recent public meeting, The Hidden Holocaust - Our Civilizational Crisis.

The price for West Texas Intermediate (WTI) oil touched $100 on January 2, 2008, a new milestone. According to TheOilDrum.com, WTI oil price has been giving a very clear signal of pending shortage for over five years now, and in breaching the symbolic $100 a barrel mark, continues to do so. Those driving the world economy have steadfastly ignored this red warning light. In doing so, they are steering the world toward an energy disaster characterized by shortages, high energy prices, inflation, growing inequity, civil unrest and famine.