June, 27 2014, 01:42pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Andy Stepanian, 631.291.3010, andy@fitzgibbonmedia.com
David Pomerantz, Greenpeace, 914.584.9054, david.pomerantz@greenpeace.org
Rainey Reitman, Electronic Frontier Foundation, 415.436.9333 x140, rainey@eff.org
Diverse Groups Fly Airship Over NSA's Utah Data Center to Protest Illegal Internet Spying
Flight Promotes StandAgainstSpying.org, New Site Calling on Congress to Act
BLUFFDALE, UT
The environmental campaigning group Greenpeace, digital rights watchdog Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the Tenth Amendment Center (TAC) joined forces today to fly an airship over the NSA's data center in Utah to protest the government's illegal mass surveillance program.
Greenpeace flew its 135-foot-long thermal airship over the Bluffdale, UT, data center early Friday morning, carrying the message: "NSA Illegal Spying Below" along with a link steering people to a new web site, StandAgainstSpying.org, which the three groups launched with the support of a separate, diverse coalition of over 20 grassroots advocacy groups and Internet companies. The site grades members of Congress on what they have done, or often not done, to rein in the NSA.
"Rights rise or fall together," Greenpeace Senior IT Campaigner Gary Cook said. "Greenpeace has learned firsthand that people cannot protect their right to clean air and water if our civil rights - including the right to free association and the right to be free of unreasonable searches - are stripped away."
"The public needs to be brought into the Congressional debate around surveillance reform happening right now," EFF Activism Director Rainey Reitman said. "We're flying an airship over the Utah data center, which has come to symbolize the NSA's collect-it-all approach to surveillance, and demanding an end to the mass spying. It's time for bold action in defense of our privacy."
"Our right to privacy is not a partisan issue. It's a human rights issue," said Michael Boldin, executive director and founder of the Tenth Amendment Center an organization focused on constitutional originalism and decentralized government. "This coalition gives great hope for the future because it shows that people across the political spectrum can set aside differences to work together for common cause."
Greenpeace is a co-plaintiff on a lawsuit filed against the NSA by a broad coalition of membership and political advocacy organizations, represented by EFF, for violating their First Amendment right of association by illegally collecting their call records.
PHOTOS of the airship flight are available at: https://www.eff.org/press/releases/diverse-groups-fly-airship-over-nsas...
Greenpeace is a global, independent campaigning organization that uses peaceful protest and creative communication to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green and peaceful future.
+31 20 718 2000LATEST NEWS
Nobel Prize Winner Says G20 Falls Short by Not Embracing Global Nuclear Ban Treaty
"All G20 members must work towards the elimination of nuclear weapons as an urgent priority," said ICAN executive director Melissa Parke.
Sep 10, 2023
A renunciation of the threat posed by nuclear weapons by G20 leaders in New Delhi this weekend must be matched by action that would actually reduce such a threat and lead the way to the full abandonment of atomic weapons worldwide, according to one of the world's preeminent anti-nuclear organizations.
While the the G20 'New Delhi Declaration' released Saturday states that the "use or threat of use of nuclear weapons is inadmissible" in the context of the Russia-Ukraine war, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), which won the peace prize in 2017, said that does not go far enough.
ICAN's exective director Melissa Parke said in a statement that while the G20 leaders "reaffirmed the obvious truth that the use, or threat of use, of nuclear weapons is unacceptable," it is now vital that they "put these words into action."
"All G20 members must work towards the elimination of nuclear weapons as an urgent priority, including, for those who haven't done so already," said Parke, "by signing and ratifying the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons without delay."
The official Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), adopted by the United Nations in 2017 and implemented in 2020, bans signatories from the use, possession, testing, and transfer of nuclear weapons.
None of the nuclear powers in the world—including Russia, the United States, Israel, the United Kingdom, India, or China—have signed or adopted the TPNW, and Ukraine, along with the majority of NATO and G20 members, have also not supported or adopted the treaty.
Since its invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, numerous Russian officials have invoked the specter of a nuclear exchange or possible use of atomic weapons if Moscow deemed it necessary. Peace advocates calling for urgent diplomacy to help end the war have continued to cite the possibility of a nuclear escalation as a chief concern.
Last month, former president and current senior official Dmitry Medvedev said Russia would have no choice but to use nuclear weapons if Ukraine's counter-offensive, backed by NATO forces, took land claimed by Moscow.
"Just imagine that the offensive… in tandem with NATO, succeeded and ended up with part of our land being taken away. Then we would have to use nuclear weapons by virtue of the stipulations of the Russian Presidential Decree,” said Medvedev.
"There simply wouldn’t be any other solution," he added. "Our enemies should pray to our fighters that they do not allow the world to go up in nuclear flames."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Hurricane Lee: An Ominous Storm Even If It Doesn't Come to Land
"This is your hurricane on fossil fueled climate change."
Sep 10, 2023
Hurricane Lee, which became a monster Category 5 before weakening over the weekend and which may or may not ever make landfall, is being treated as a warning by meteorologists and climate experts who say the storm's behavior over recent days could have dire future implications.
The National Hurricane Center said Saturday that Lee would move well north of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands but that dangerous beach conditions may be seen along the Atlantic coastline of the United States. On Thursday, the hurricane jumped from a Category 3 storm to a Category 5 in less than 24 hours at a pace faster than what is called "rapid intensification"—when sustained winds increase by 35 mph over the course of a day.
Marshall Shepherd, director of the University of Georgia's atmospheric sciences program and a past president of the American Meteorological Society, explained to the Associated Press how Hurricane Lee intensified at more than double that rate, moving it into a category he called hyperintensification.
"This one increased by 80 mph (129 kph)," Shepherd said. "I can't emphasize this enough. We used to have this metric of 35 mph, and here's a storm that did twice that amount, and we're seeing that happen more frequently." If future storms, fueled by increasingly hotter ocean temperatures, continue with this trend it will have disastrous consequences for regions that rarely, if ever, experience such powerful storms.
As Lee became reached Category 5 status on Thursday, meteorologist Jeff Berardelli pointed out the increasing frequency of storms reaching that threshold:
Responding to the same trend and data, climate movement organizer Jamie Henn said: "This is your hurricane on fossil fueled climate change."
And it's a global phenomenon, not just for hurricanes forming in the Atlantic. For the first time since records began, Category 5 storms (or the equivalent) have been recorded in each of the world's designated cyclone basins.
"Hurricanes are getting stronger at higher latitudes," warned Shepherd in his assessment. "If that trend continues, that brings into play places like Washington, D.C., New York and Boston."
As science and environment journalist Matt Simon wrote for Wired on Saturday:
Rapid intensification makes hurricanes extra dangerous because they change so quickly and dramatically as they approach the coastline. It's a bit like watching a driver who’s cruising along at 25 miles per hour and then guns it right before hitting an obstruction. Residents might be expecting a storm they can ride out, but are instead faced with a full-scale hurricane that's quickly grown monstrous.
Exploring the science and talking with experts of rapid intensification, Simon explained why Lee is being treated as "a warning" and that people and communities should "get ready for more of this phenomenon as the planet warms."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Water Cannons Target 10,000 Climate Protesters Blocking Highway in Netherlands
"While the world is going up in flames, the government continues to add fuel to the fire by propping up the biggest source of the climate crisis, fossil fuels, with billions in subsidies."
Sep 09, 2023
Climate campaigners calling for an end to fossil fuel subsidies were fired upon with water cannons and physically abused Saturday near The Hague in the Netherlands as the global movement demanding an end to the dominance of the coal, oil, and gas industry continues to call on world leaders to act.
Members of Extinction Rebellion spearheaded the direct action on the A12 Utrechtsebaan highway near the center of the Dutch government. With an estimated 10,000 participants overall, the jovial protesters sat down in the road, bringing traffic to a standstill as they chanted, "The seas are rising and so are we!" even as police vehicles sprayed them with water at high velocity.
The Associated Press reported that the protesters vowed to stay until the Netherlands ends public subsidies for the fossil fuel industry or, if removed by police, to return each day until the financial support is suspended.
"This is much larger than any one of us," one participant, Yolanda de Jager, told the AP. "This concerns the whole world."
Dutch police carted some protesters off in carts while others were beaten with batons or dragged off the roadway:
Earlier this week, a new report detailed how the Dutch government spends nearly $38 billion in taxpayer funds each year to support fossil fuels. The authors of the peer-reviewed report—a joint research effort by SOMO, Oil Change International, and Milieudefensie—argued that such subsidies should be eliminated by 2025 in order to help the nation meet its emission reductions goals and also help fund the necessary transition to renewable energy.
"Phasing out fossil subsidies kills two birds with one stone: it reduces fossil fuel emissions and raises additional revenue needed to accelerate a social and equitable transition," said Audrey Gaughran, director of SOMO, also known as the Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations.
OCI director Elizabeth Bast said, "The Netherlands has taken the international stage to promise an end to fossil fuel subsidies multiple times already, but it is failing to live up to its promise."
"While the world is going up in flames, the government continues to add fuel to the fire by propping up the biggest source of the climate crisis, fossil fuels, with billions in subsidies," she added. "With an urgent and fair phase-out plan the Netherlands can deliver on longstanding promises and take the lead within the EU and internationally to ensure other countries follow through."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular
Independent, nonprofit journalism needs your help.
Please Pitch In
Today!
Today!