17/08/2024
Amy Cameron at Greenpeace, an organisation with a lot of LGBTQIA+ supporters, says that BBC-2 transmitted a series of documentaries on the environmental organisation's dramatic confrontation with the authoritarian and deeply homophobic Russian state in On Thin Ice: Putin versus Greenpeace. The series aired in mid June and is available to view on I Player. On a chilly autumn day in 2013, a group of brave activists stood on the deck of the Greenpeace ship the Arctic Sunrise looking up at an unbelievable sight - Putin’s commandos clad in balaclavas and automatic rifles abseiling from a huge helicopter to seize the ship. They were part of a Greenpeace crew that embarked on a daring mission to draw global attention to the dangers of Arctic oil drilling. This mission would become a defining moment for the environmental movement. This group of Greenpeace activists and journalists came to be known as the Arctic 30. You may remember the events that unfolded back then, how they found themselves locked up in a Russian prison, staring down the barrel of a 15-year jail sentence - for a peaceful protest. Their story sparked a global outcry and hundreds of thousands of supporters took to the streets and campaigned online on their behalf. Greenpeace UK says "The events featured in the documentary took place 11 years ago - but they are still deeply relevant today. They reveal the unjust and disproportionate lengths that giant oil companies and their allies in government will go to protect their obscene profits. As the climate crisis accelerates, they are fighting harder than ever to keep us hooked on fossil fuels. Through lawsuits and other intimidation tactics, oil giants like Shell are trying to silence any opposition - so they can continue with, and even expand, business as usual. They tried to silence us then. They failed. They will not silence us now."
