Россия приманками своей собственной ловушке Russia Baits its Own Trap Media Disinformation on Piracy and Sea Shepherd There have been allegations in some media that Sea Shepherd has been charged with piracy by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court and that this presents a precedent for the Russians to charge Greenpeace with piracy over their opposition to oil drilling in the Arctic. The fact is that Sea Shepherd has not and never has been charged with piracy. It was the opinion of a single 9th Circuit Court Judge that Sea Shepherd had committed piracy but it was an opinion only. There have been no charges of piracy, no warrants handed out, no investigation underway. Without a conviction it is hard to see how an opinion can be viewed as a legal precedent for charges of piracy in Russia. In my opinion the piracy charges will be dropped against Greenpeace although it may take two months before this happens. They will then either be released or charged with hooliganism which will not be good considering that the Pussy Riot women received two years for hooliganism. However I am quite confident that they will not be convicted of piracy. Even Vladimir Putin dismisses the action as not being piracy. And it will not serve Russia well to send any of the Greenpeacers to prison. What Greenpeace did was not a crime, it was a legitimate non-violent protest motivated by real and sincere concerns for the protection of the Arctic environment. It is gratifying to see the Netherlands stepping up to defend the Dutch registered Arctic Sunrise. There does however seem to be a quiet evolution in the definition of piracy in that any opposition to big oil or big government or to vested corporate interests exploiting the environment is being seen by some as piracy or even terrorism. Passion and compassion appears to be the new piracy or at least that is what the Russians seem to be implying. The Russians have erred greatly in bringing this charge of piracy against Greenpeace. What was the objective of the Greenpeace voyage? It was to focus international attention on Russian involvement with oil drilling in the Arctic. Very few even knew about it and if the Russians had done nothing and allowed a banner to be hung it would have been confined to the Greenpeace website and a few scattered articles. Instead, what Russia has done is to hand Greenpeace a media victory on a huge scale. It has also revived Greenpeace as an action oriented organization which for years it really has not been. And every day that the Greenpeacers are held is another public relations disaster for Russia. A couple of months in prison in exchange for a major public relations victory. All I can say is well done Greenpeace! And to the Russians all I can say is that their bureaucrats should take a course in basic communications 101 if they intend to match Greenpeace in media savvy. Greenpeace was established by journalists and communications professionals. I know because I was a founding member and a communications major at the time and the first crewmembers along with Robert Hunter, Bob Cummings, Ben Metcalfe, myself and others on the 1971 voyage to Amchitka were primarily journalists. Greenpeace was the first media oriented environmental organization and now at long last they seem to have rediscovered their roots and thanks to Russia they should emerge from this dilemma as a stronger and more influential international organization. Russia cannot win this battle and they should cut their losses and let the crew of the Arctic Sunrise go free, along with their ship.
Posted on: Mon, 07 Oct 2013 08:10:40 +0000
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