WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Greenpeace is anticipating several hundred people to rally during US President Barack Obama’s visit to Alaska to participate in an international conference on Arctic cooperation on August 31, Greenpeace spokesperson Travis Nichols told Sputnik.
"We are expecting a few hundred people right now. It’s just pretty remarkable. I think there will be a lot of groups to show their support for the President as well as to show where they disagree with the President, and there will be just a lot of Alaskans out to see it, because it’s the first time the sitting president will visit Alaska," Nichols said.
The Conference on Global Leadership in the Arctic: Cooperation, Innovation, Engagement and Resilience, or GLACIER, will be held on August 30 and 31. The event will be hosted by the US Department of State, and is strongly supported by the US government.
On July 17, the White House announced that Obama would address the GLACIER conference.
"We want to be there to show the Alaskans who we are partnering with that while the President might care about the climate change, by permitting Shell to drill for oil in the Arctic Ocean off Alaska, he is going to make the climate change worse. The speakers at the rally will talk about how Shell’s drill will impact local communities and the Alaskan Arctic," he underlined.
Shell recently received the drilling permission even though it had not operated in the Arctic since 2012, when it faced a number of safety and operation difficulties, including an oil rig running aground.
Environmental organizations have condemned the decision, pointing out that drilling poses a grave risk to marine life, especially given the technical difficulties of merely staying alive in the region.
Critics have also raised concerns over Shell’s ability to respond to an environmental disaster, as well as the limited US search and rescue capabilities in the Arctic.
Greenpeace is the leading independent campaigning organization that uses peaceful protest and creative communication to expose global environmental problems and to promote green solutions.
