MOSCOW, September 29 (RIA Novosti) – A Russian court on Sunday remanded to two months’ pretrial detention the last of 30 people detained aboard a Greenpeace ship being used to protest a Gazprom oil rig in Arctic waters, the environmental activist group said on Twitter.
The arrestees, who face charges of piracy, have all been ordered to stay in pretrial detention until at least November 24, according to the reported Murmansk court decisions. Piracy in Russia carries a maximum punishment of 15 years in prison.
The 30 people, who represent 19 different nationalities, were detained when Russian border guards stormed the Greenpeace icebreaker Arctic Sunrise on September 19, a day after two activists scaled the Gazprom rig in the Pechora Sea to protest the potential impact of drilling in the Arctic’s fragile ecosystem.
