ACTIVISTS FROM ENVIRONMENTAL group Greenpeace have been moved to pre-trial detention centres in and around Russia’s far northern city of Murmansk after being questioned over their open-sea protest, the group said today.
The New York Times reports that Russia has opened a piracy investigation against the 30 activists who scaled an offsore oil platform in the Arctic last week.
“They have been transferred to pre-trial detention centres,” Yevgenia Belyakova, a Greenpeace activist in Murmansk, told AFP, adding the 30 Russian and foreign activists have been taken to jails in and around Murmansk after being questioned last night.
Among the group are citizens from 18 different countries and if convicted of piracy, they could face up to 15 years in prison.
- © AFP 2013 with additional reporting by Michelle Hennessy.
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