Posted on 09/20/2013 8:33:56 AM PDT by cunning_fish
Russian border guards said Friday that they would tow Greenpeace's Arctic protest ship to port after armed officers boarded the ship and locked up the activists.
Border guards stormed the ship after Greenpeace activists scaled an oil platform owned by state energy giant Gazprom to protest against planned drilling on the Arctic shelf.
Special forces officers armed with guns locked up crew members on the Arctic Sunrise icebreaker ship after lowering themselves onto the deck with ropes from a helicopter.
"At this moment, the Arctic Sunrise ship is being taken to the port of Murmansk," Greenpeace said on Twitter on Friday morning.
"The decision was taken that the Arctic Sunrise will be taken to the port of Murmansk for further legal procedures," a spokeswoman for the Murmansk region's border guards -- a branch of the FSB security service -- told the RIA Novosti news agency.
She said that the captain had been questioned but that a full investigation would take place when the ship reaches port.
Murmansk is 1,485 kilometres (920 miles) north of Moscow. Border guards said the rest of the ship's journey would take three days.
Russia's FSB security service, which controls the border guards, has accused the ship's captain of carrying out "unlawful activities."
Greenpeace expert Roman Dolgov told RIA Novosti from onboard the ship: "We are facing quite serious accusations: of terrorism and carrying out illegal scientific research."
He said the activists were locked in the mess but allowed out to go to the toilet or smoke.
Greenpeace said border guards on Wednesday had detained two activists who were attempting to scale Gazprom's Prirazlomnaya oil platform and took them on board their patrol boat.
The border guards later returned the two activists from Finland and Switzerland to the Arctic Sunrise and locked them up with their
(Excerpt) Read more at uk.news.yahoo.com ...
I would have thought that all these Greenpeace tree huggers would find smoking repugnant. I guess that it depends on what the Russians allow them to 'smoke'!
Gee, it would be a shame if it just happened to sink while under tow...
Additionally, oil and gas platforms are never the place for "demonstrations" under any circumstances. Said "demonstrations" only purpose can be as cover for sabotage.
Commie vs commie, how sweet.
Pray for America to Wake Up
They smoke because they're too Green to burn.
Applause. This is almost as satisfying as the Russian approach to Somali pirates. Almost.
Greenpeace. Getting arrested for illegally entering Russian waters since 1985.
Back then the issue was whaling. A bunch of them got arrested in Siberia and the Mayor of Nome had to be sent over by the State Dept. to get them back.
The headline in our local paper (which I still have someplace) said...and I’m NOT making this up.....
“Release of Seamen Expected”
My immediate reaction, word for word.
“Release of Seamen Expected”
Sperm [whales] safe..................
Space Hippies.
Go Russia Go!!
Will we ever see or hear from them again? or will they be “disappeared” — with the Ruskies saying they don’t know a thing...
Eastern Europeans don’t fool around.
See ya!! Say “Hi!” to the Pussy Riot girls for me!
Damn str8.
Tear it apart and sell the scrap metal.
A five-minute swim at that latitude would solve the problem.
There are times when the Russians just make you grin from ear to ear. And this is one of them.
Back in the 1980s, Lebanese terrorist Muslims kidnapped some American’s and held them hostage for a long time. The US did nothing and it was a great hoot and victory for the terrorists.
But then they made a mistake.
They decided to kidnap some Russians. Within 48 hours, a plane from Moscow landed in Beirut. A team of very hard men got off the plane. They made no direct effort to rescue the captive Russians held deeply within the terrorist enclave.
Instead they “counter kidnapped” the “spiritual leader” of that group of terrorists, and promptly sent the terrorists a package containing a few of his less important body parts, with the instruction that unless the Russian hostages were released immediately, they would receive more parts.
Not only did the terrorists release the Russians, but they drove them to the Russian embassy, begging them to tell their fellow Russians to stop chopping. For their part, the Russians promptly turned their spiritual leader loose, with some well dressed bandages, and the strong suggestion that in future they should not mess with Russians.
This was not an intelligence operation, it was a work of art, Russian style. You have to appreciate that.
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