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Greenpeace
is an independent campaigning organisation that uses non-violent, creative confrontation to expose global environmental problems and to force solutions which are essential to a green and peaceful future.

conviction

It's been called the war of the woods. But the only thing fierce about British Columbia's logging protesters, some of whom faced violent assaults to save the unique forests on Canada's western coast, is their sense of conviction.

Words overcame fists when protesters scored a major victory in April 2001 with a historic announcement by the government of British Columbia to preserve several large areas of Canada's Great Bear Rainforest. Entire valleys of 1000-year-old cedars and towering spruce are proposed to be left undisturbed to eagles, wolves, salmon, grizzlies and black bear, as well as the rare white Kermode or "spirit" bears.

An intensive global campaign by Greenpeace to target trade and investment related to BC rainforest destruction helped precipitate this development. Action after action by Greenpeace in Europe, Japan, China and the USA had effectively soured international buyers of forest products to timber derived from the unsustainable clearcut logging that erases entire valleys in Canada's western rainforests.

During peaceful demonstration in September 1999 to mark the first anniversary of a violent attack on peaceful demonstrators, 72-year-old great-grandmother Betty Krawczyk was arrested and eventually sentenced to one year in prison without parole, along with 36-year-old environmentalist Barney Kern. Greenpeace waged a campaign for Betty's release, which was granted after she had served four months.

Speaking from Vancouver in May 2001, Krawczyk describes her motives and experience.

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1991:
Greenpeace launches awareness campaign on clearcutting Canada's coastal rainforest

1993:
Greenpeace Germany's executive director joins nearly 100 people who have been jailed for protests at Clayoquot Sound

1995:
Science panel established by BC government recommends end to clearcutting in Clayoquot Sound

1997:
Campaign to save the Great Bear Rainforest is launched

1998:
Bill Sasserman and Gavin Edwards onboard the Freedom Dancer, British Columbia, Canada

Click on image to view in larger format.

Clearcutting the Great Bear Rainforest has a multitude of impacts such as: the potential extinction or extirpation of plant and animal species, loss of jobs for future generations, climate change, and infringement of traditional rights of First Nations peoples who have lived in the forest for centuries.

Threee-quarters of all the species found in Canada are represented in British Columbia. Many of these species are dependent on the temperate rainforest for essential habitat.


© 2001 Greenpeace International