Skip Nav | Home | Mobile | Editorial Guidelines | Mission Statement | About Us | Contact | Help | Security | Support Us

World

22/03/07 - Norwegian Embassy/Statoil protest - human rights in Rossport

Oscar Beard | 23.03.2007 01:15 | Rossport Solidarity | Ecology | Repression | Social Struggles | London | World

Today saw a human rights demonstration at the Norwegian Embassy in London in support and solidarity with the people of Rossport, County Mayo, Ireland.

From the press release:

"The demonstration held today, by a nation-wide autonomous collective (and one dog), was highlighting Norway's state-owned Statoil and gas company's present involvement in the West of Ireland at Rossport, County Mayo.

Statoil has an alleged "ethical policy", but there are no ethics involved in this development and no local support or consultation. The company, and thus the Norwegian government, are promoting human rights abuses by supporting the Irish State's policy of brutal suppression of the right to protest using the Irish police (Garda), and polluting Carrowmore Lake, the local drinking water supply.

This group is issuing a demand to Norway and Statoil to stop its part in this development or face a call for a tourist boycott of Norway and disruption of Norwegian trade and commerce to the UK."

The dog bit was not in the original release, that was my lil' add on. So, sue me.

As the video shows the banner blocking the door lasted as long as it took the ten or more heavily armed police officers from the Metropolitan Diplomatic Division to arrive. They removed the banner immediately and ushered the protestors into one specific area of the pavement.

Two Irish citizens then decided to try to apply for a Norwegian passport, as Norway has profited massively from Irish natural resources, producing far superior health and education prospects in Norway than in Ireland. So they figured the least Norway could give back was a free passport and access to their health care.

The representative, as the video shows, seemed to find the whole thing funny at first, but watch his smile drop as he is shown printed images from the recent month's of violence the local community of Rossport have suffered at the hands of the Garda.

As reported in the 6 November 2006 release of Garda Review, Superintendent Joe Gannon, who is in charge of policing the Shell/Statoil Corrib Gas Terminal construction site, was quoted: "There were no arrests. That was part of our strategy; we did not want to facilitate anyone down there with a route to martyrdom. There has been that policy ever since."

No arrests. But baton charges, throwing old men and women in ten-foot deep trenches, punching, kicking, martial arts techniques and daily intimidation are acceptable, it seems from this journalist's own experiences over the last month.

Oscar Beard
- e-mail: oscarbeard@yahoo.com.mx
- Homepage: http://www.reprogrammingthedesensitised.com

Comments

Display the following 3 comments

  1. Nice action! — extic
  2. Thanks! — Maura Harrington
  3. keep up the good fight — dedicated

Publish

Publish your news

Do you need help with publishing?

/regional publish include --> /regional search include -->

World Topics

Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista

Kollektives

Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World

Other UK IMCs
Bristol/South West
London
Northern Indymedia
Scotland

Server Appeal Radio Page Video Page Indymedia Cinema Offline Newsheet

secure Encrypted Page

You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.

If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

IMCs


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech