direct action

Belatedly, here's a video from the Esperanza featuring climbing superstar Sim, one of the four activists who scaled Cairn Energy's rig last week. As well as revealing Sim's personal reasons for wanting to stop the drilling, there are some spectacular shots from the action itself.

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).

The crews of the Arctic Sunrise and the Rainbow Warrior have once more come to the aid of Atlantic bluefin tuna in the Mediterranean. Although the fishing season has ended early because the quotas have been reached, there are still large cages out there filled with fish caught over the past couple of weeks. These cages are bound for tuna 'ranches', where the fish will be kept and fattened up, before being slaughtered.

Yesterday afternoon our activists again tried to free the endangered tuna from one of these cages.

Earlier today, the Greenpeace team in the Mediterranean made another attempt to free bluefin tuna caught by the purse-seine fishing vessels. The good news is nobody got hurt this time, but the bad news is that - despite a brilliant effort - they weren't able to release any tuna.

As you can see in the slideshow above, the Arctic Sunrise got close to a Tunisian tugboat towing a net cage, into which caught tuna are transferred and towed to a tuna 'ranch' where they're fattened up ready for slaughter. Lowering a cutting grapple from the deck of the Sunrise, activists tried to cut through the netting; meanwhile, the towing rope between the tug and the cage was cut by the crew of an inflatable.

Unfortunately, the fishing crews reacted quickly, launching their own inflatable and managing to put guards on the cage. So no bluefin tuna freed this time but the fishing season still has a week to go...

For a taste of the violence Greenpeace activists encountered on Friday as they tried to free bluefin tuna from purse-seine fishing nets, look no further than the video below. But be warned: there are some close-up images of a serious injury which are liable to make you lose your lunch.

We just had a discussion about whether to promote this video. Other Greenpeace offices have chosen to use it (including our Turkish colleagues, hence the Turkish title) although it's quite close to the knuckle (or shin bone, to be more precise). Yet it shows not only the determination of everyone on board our two ships to put the brakes on the extinction of bluefin tuna, but also the violence and intimidation they've been confronted with. So here it is.

After spending the night on top of the Palace of Westminster, all the Greenpeace volunteers who took our 'Change the politics, save the climate' message to the heart of our democracy have been arrested, and are now in various stages of the process of being bailed and released.

Talking to some of the activists who put their liberty at risk to demand that politicians get serious about tackling climate change, it’s obvious that they are not attention seeking troublemakers, as some in the media try to portray them. Over fifty people from all walks of life, nationalities, and aged from early 20s to over 70, felt compelled to take action. Reasonable people like you and me who perhaps a year ago wouldn't have considered climbing up there. Why? Because time to act is running out and our politicians, for all their fine words, are still stuck in their old ruts - essentially fiddling while Rome burns.

After spending the night on top of the Palace of Westminster, Greenpeace activists laid out a banner on the roof, visible to MPs returning for the new Parliamentary session. Its message "Change the politics, save the climate", is a reminder that time to act is running out, and that we desperately need politicians who are willing to rise above the dogmas of party politics and actively meet the greatest challenge of our time.