Climate activist, Rosemary Penwarden, has today been found guilty of forgery and sentenced to 125 hours of community service. While Climate Justice Taranaki members are relieved that there is no jail sentence, we also find the conviction cruel and unjust.
“Who are the real criminals here? Fossil fuel companies have known about the impacts of burning coal, oil and gas on our climate for many decades. Yet they did nothing about it but to employ PR firms to deny, distract and delay any efforts that could have averted the global climate crisis we are in now,” said Catherine Cheung, member of Climate Justice Taranaki.
“Here in Taranaki, drilling and fracking for more oil and gas continues to be relentless. So much so that the toxic wastes produced are filling up the many euphemistically termed ‘landfarms’, contaminating precious soil and groundwater. Since 2018, three offshore drill rigs had been and gone, having completed OMV’s various drilling campaigns. For over four years, Beach Energy have known about a leaky gas well at Kupe field, but done nothing to fix it, as far as we know. These two companies and their many partners are destroying our life-supporting climate and oceans, jeopardising the survival of our children. Yet there is no court case, no conviction.
Unjustly, there is a worldwide trend to criminalize climate activists and earth protectors who speak the truth. At the same time the real climate criminals, the oil and gas corporations, are enabled to continue their destructive behaviour” concluded Cheung.
Climate Justice Taranaki 