July 2010

With fake oil actions spilling out all over the place, it's high time someone did some skill sharing. Step up our international office with their "activist recipe for fake oil".

Basically, you mix up some molasses with some corn oil, corn starch, chocolate powder and some flour and away you go (well, there's a bit more to it than that - full recipe here).

How The Sun saw last week's spat between Osborne and Fox © Andy Davey

Trident replacement is looking less likely today after Chancellor George Osborne told media that the Treasury weren’t willing to stump up for the project out of central funds.

Speaking in New Delhi, where he is accompanying David Cameron on his visit to India, Mr Osborne told the Bloomberg newswire: "All budgets have pressure. I don't think there's anything particularly unique about the Ministry of Defence. I have made it very clear that Trident renewal costs must be taken as part of the defence budget."

Fishermen scoop oily sludge from the oil spill in Dalian, China (c) Arthur JD/Greenpeace

Arthur JD writes from Dalian in China...

I arrived in Dalian on the day of the funeral for firefighter Zhang Liang, who drowned beneath the thick crude when his crew jumped into the ocean - without safety gear - to attempt, in vain, to fix an underwater pipe. Our lead photographer, Jiang He, who by now has reached legendary status globally for capturing the final seconds of Zhang's life, continued to cover the very emotional moments of this oil spill disaster.

This morning, starting at  5.30am, teams of Greenpeace volunteers have been shutting down BP stations across London. We aim to close dozens down this morning.

Watch the action as it happens - pictures, video and text updates from the teams.

The teams - each named after an animal threatened by BP's reckless oil exploration - fanned out across the capital in their electric and hybrid cars, going station to station and disabling the pumps.

Why today? Because BP is expected to announce later the appointment of Bob Dudley as the company's new head to replace the gaffe-prone Tony Hayward, who led BP during the disastrous Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Greenpeace co-founder Dorothy Stowe passed away on July 23, 2010 in Vancouver, Canada, at the age of 89. Rex Wyler remembers her.

Dorothy Anne Rabinowitz was born in Providence, Rhode Island on December 22, 1920, from Jewish immigrant parents from Russia and Galicia. She described her father Jacob as "idealistic and political. He cared about justice not only for Jewish people, but for everyone." Dorothy's mother, Rebecca Miller, taught Hebrew and inspired Dorothy to pursue an education.

Greenpeace USA's Mike Gaworecki reports from the Arctic Sunrise as it makes its way to the Gulf to conduct a three-month expedition documenting the true impacts of the BP Deepwater Disaster on the region's marine life and unique ecosystems.

Since the Deepwater Horizon offshore rig exploded and sank in April, BP has devoted inadequate resources to the oil spill response, withheld information from the American public, and denied access to spill sites to journalists.

So our ship the Arctic Sunrise is heading to the Gulf to do an independent assessment of the impacts. We believe it’s way past time the full, unabridged truth about the extent and nature of this oil catastrophe was told to America and the world.

Read the full blog »

As efforts to contain the oil spill continue, a new slideshow from our US colleagues details the ongoing consequences of the massive slick from the BP Deepwater Horizon platform in the Gulf of Mexico.

And you can see the complete Gulf Oil Spill photoset on Flickr as well.