Yesterday afternoon, climate activists from Climate Liberation Aotearoa were gagged and tied up in front of the honorary consulate of Uganda in Paeroa, in order to expose the mistreatment and silencing of climate activists by the government of Uganda. This follows the arrest on Friday Aug 9 of 49 members of Students Against Eacop (East African Crude Oil Pipeline) whilst they were attempting to present a petition against the pipeline to the Ugandan government. Two of these protestors are still being held in remand.

“We are asking the Ugandan Government to release all of the protestors and cease their pattern of harassing peaceful climate protectors in Uganda. We also call on the government to agree to their demand to stop the EACOP pipeline which will have disastrous climate and environmental consequences and will also displace many thousands of people from local communities without adequate recompense.” said Spokesperson Zenith Rose-Wills

“The EACOP project is an example of the fossil fuel colonial project which has seen French multinational TotalEnergies and the China National Offshore Oil Corporation partner with the governments of Uganda and Tanzania to crush local dissent by young people and the most vulnerable affected communities.”

In March this year Human Rights Watch called for earlier charges against these “legitimate protests” to be dropped, and highlighted the repeated pattern of police beating protestors and remanding them to maximum security prison for nonviolent peaceful protests.

Students against EACOP were protesting as part of the international “Oil Kills” campaign which has included high profile protests such as disrupting and spray painting private jets in countries including the UK and Germany.

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