The New Battle of Seattle
By Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan
It has been more than 15 years since tear gas filled the streets of
Seattle and tens of thousands of people protested the meeting of the
World Trade Organization, or WTO. That week of
protests in late 1999 became known as “The Battle of Seattle,” as the
grass-roots organizers successfully blocked world leaders, government
trade ministers and corporate executives from meeting to sign a global
trade deal that many called deeply undemocratic, harming workers’
rights, the environment and indigenous people globally.
A new Battle of Seattle has been raging in recent weeks, pitting a
broad coalition of people against a multinational corporate behemoth,
Shell Oil. Citizens and elected officials alike, concerned about Shell’s
plans to drill for oil in the Arctic, swarmed the waters around
Seattle, trying to block the massive oil-drilling platform, Polar
Pioneer, from leaving on its journey to the Arctic. As fossil-fuel
corporations intensify their exploitation of the world’s oil,
protesters, as well as the pope, are weighing in as never before about
the catastrophic effects of climate change.
The Polar Pioneer arrived in Puget Sound in mid-May in preparation
for its trip to the Chukchi Sea in the Arctic Ocean. Royal Dutch Shell
has the vessel under contract from Transocean, the same company whose
Deepwater Horizon oil rig caused the blowout and oil-spill disaster in
the Gulf of Mexico five years ago. As the platform was tugged into the
Port of Seattle’s Terminal 5, the first wave of the “Mosquito Fleet”
paddled out to block it. The protest flotilla is made up of
“kayaktivists,” people in small kayaks that establish a blockade, much
like the protesters in 1999 linked arms on the rainy streets of Seattle
to block the delegates attempting to attend the WTO Ministerial Conference.
Read More
It has been more than 15 years since tear gas filled the streets of
Seattle and tens of thousands of people protested the meeting of the
World Trade Organization, or WTO. That week of
protests in late 1999 became known as “The Battle of Seattle,” as the
grass-roots organizers successfully blocked world leaders, government
trade ministers and corporate executives from meeting to sign a global
trade deal that many called deeply undemocratic, harming workers’
rights, the environment and indigenous people globally.
A new Battle of Seattle has been raging in recent weeks, pitting a
broad coalition of people against a multinational corporate behemoth,
Shell Oil. Citizens and elected officials alike, concerned about Shell’s
plans to drill for oil in the Arctic, swarmed the waters around
Seattle, trying to block the massive oil-drilling platform, Polar
Pioneer, from leaving on its journey to the Arctic. As fossil-fuel
corporations intensify their exploitation of the world’s oil,
protesters, as well as the pope, are weighing in as never before about
the catastrophic effects of climate change.
The Polar Pioneer arrived in Puget Sound in mid-May in preparation
for its trip to the Chukchi Sea in the Arctic Ocean. Royal Dutch Shell
has the vessel under contract from Transocean, the same company whose
Deepwater Horizon oil rig caused the blowout and oil-spill disaster in
the Gulf of Mexico five years ago. As the platform was tugged into the
Port of Seattle’s Terminal 5, the first wave of the “Mosquito Fleet”
paddled out to block it. The protest flotilla is made up of
“kayaktivists,” people in small kayaks that establish a blockade, much
like the protesters in 1999 linked arms on the rainy streets of Seattle
to block the delegates attempting to attend the WTO Ministerial Conference.
Read More
