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Activists forcibly removed from logging equipment
UPDATE: Greenpeace activists forcibly removed from logging equipment
Auckland October 29 2008 - Police have removed the four Greenpeace activists who'd halted a major land conversion in the Central North Island by locking on to forest logging equipment.
Climate Campaigner Simon Boxer said the activists who were arrested had shown real bravery in facing up to New Zealand's biggest climate crime. "Now all we can hope is that our politicians show the same kind of courage."
Greenpeace is calling for a halt to forest conversion for intensive dairy in light of the worsening global climate crisis and wants both major political parties to explain how they'll address what the National Party has termed a "chainsaw massacre" and how they'll deal with intensive dairy farming.
The land being converted is part of the Kinleith Forest and owned by Carter Holt Harvey. 25,000 hectares are being cleared to make way for corporate farms.
"The Labour Party says the emissions trading scheme (ETS) has stopped the massacre, but this is demonstrably untrue," said Greenpeace Climate Campaigner Simon Boxer from the site. "Meanwhile National has been happy to draw attention to deforestation, but refuses to talk about one of the key drivers - corporate dairy farming - nor offer up any real solutions.
"If ever there was a climate crime, intensive dairy farming and the associated chainsaw massacre is it."
Greenpeace is calling on all political parties to ban further conversion of forests to pasture, to bring agriculture into the ETS before 2013, and to set an emissions reduction target of 30 per cent by 2020.
See http://www.greenpeace.org.nz/smartfarming for more information.
A briefing and Q and A can be found at: http://www.greenpeace.org.nz/tokoroa
--
High resolution
images and video of the activity will be available free of
charge
at:
http://www.greenpeace.org.nz/media
(Multiple
images can be added to the 'lightbox' and downloaded as
a
single zip
file).
ENDS
Greenpeace
Greenpeace exists because this fragile earth deserves a voice.
Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning organisation that acts to change attitudes and behaviour, to protect and conserve the environment and to promote peace.
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