A press conference was to be held in Murmansk on July 21, at which representatives of the "Greenpeace Russia" had planned to inform journalists about the current condition of the vessel Arctic Sunrise and a readiness of the icebreaker to head for Amsterdam. But it turned out that suddenly most hotels of the polar capital lost electricity. So "green" had to communicate with the media on the street.
Photo: Denis Prokopenko
“You were all invited to the hotel "Meridian", but, unfortunately, it turned out that electricity was down there. Then we had to move to the hotel «PARK INN», where we called you later, but all rooms were booked up there. The third time we have invited you to the hotel "Gubernsky", but there were some repairs, voltage variations. I honestly don't understand why we are not welcomed here, but we apologize and now we are going to communicate with you. But what we are doing now, is an unauthorized rally, so we ask you to understand that we can have troubles,” a spokesman of "Greenpeace Russia" Tatyana Vasilyeva said.
“And now Tanya will step aside, and it will be a "one-person picket", and we'll be able to speak,” a coordinator of the Arctic project «Greenpeace Russia» Yevgeniya Belyakova mounted the press conference with a smile.
“Technically, the ship is ready; for the last few weeks, a team of 15 people have put the ship in condition so that it could sail as soon as possible. The vessel is on the go, it will bound itself. Good news: nobody will drag it in tow, it means that Sunrise had passed through winter,” Yevgeniya Belyakova continued.
Despite the sad result of "Prirazlomnaya" take over", environmentalists are sure it was not in vain.
“The case itself is not closed, although all suspects were released under an amnesty, and the ship is going to be released. The investigation extended until September 24. Thus, the past 10 months were not enough for the Investigative Committee to analyze all the data; and they are not going to return personal items and computers, they need more time to do it. We hope that they will finish the investigation procedure on the anniversary. The situation with the arrest of the vessel and people caused a wide resonance in the world, the whole world began to talk about the problems of oil production in the Arctic region. And of course, the Arctic project won't end there. We will probably carry out our events in other way, and we intend to carry out an "oil camp" this year, "oil patrol", to talk about local issues in our Russian oil industry, oil spills, and how we can make our country better and cleaner,” Belyakova said.
Communication with the representative of the "Greenpeace" at the entrance to the hotel "Gubernsky" almost ended with a protocol and ride to the nearest police station. Half an hour after environmentalists began to communicate with the media, a patrol and inspection service squad arrived at the venue of "the street press conference". However, law enforcement officers politely asked questions about the purpose of the meeting of "green" and journalists, and then together with Tatyana Vasilyeva went to the hotel "Gubernsky" to ensure that obstruction of the hall rental really took place.
Let us recall, that September 19, 2013 after the action on the platform "Prirazlomnaya" Russian security services took up the vessel «Arctic Sunrise» and arrested all aboard. December 24, 2013 all 30 crew members were released under an amnesty, and June 6, 2014 the investigating committee reported that the vessel was released from attachment. All 30 activists and journalists appealed to the European Court of Human Rights, demanding compensation for the violation of their rights and recognition of their arrest illegal.
Alexander Borisov, «7x7»
