GREENPEACE BLOCKADE MOVES TO CITY: ACTIVISTS OCCUPY WFP HEADQUARTERS

GREENPEACE BLOCKADE MOVES TO CITY: ACTIVISTS OCCUPY WFP HEADQUARTERS
Blockade enters Day 10 of rainforest protest
Vancouver, B.C. - May 30, 1997
In a surprise move, Greenpeace has moved its protest from the rainforest to the boardroom of Western Forest Products. Late last night the protestors left the logging site and came directly from a successful ten-day blockade of Western Forest Products clearcut logging operation in the Great Bear Rainforest.
The Greenpeace activists entered the downtown Vancouver headquarters of Western Forest Products, one of the largest destroyers of temperate rainforest in the world, and occupied the office. They carried banners saying "Western Forest Products - Help us Save the Great Bear Rainforest".
At the protest Greenpeace released a report on the record of Western Forest Products showing 96 acts of non-compliance with the Forest Practices Code during the 23 months the Code has been in effect. A report commissioned by the Better Business Bureau said of WFP; "its record of environmental fines leads the industry sector and ranks among the highest in Canada".
"Our fight is not with the workers and not with the courts, we have moved our fight to the belly of the beast - the company hell bent on destroying one of the world's last great rainforests for it's own benefit" said Karen Mahon, Greenpeace forest campaigner.
"We successfully stopped the clearcutting of this great rainforest for 10 solid days, by the company's estimate - that means we saved 10,000 rainforest trees. And now we've come to the source of the destruction" said Tzeporah Berman of Greenpeace. "For the past 10 days Western has been using the workers, and First Nations to fight their fight for them, we're here to confront the company directly," Berman continued.
"These forests belong to all of us - they are our global heritage and we will not sit idly by and watch them be destroyed" said Patricia Fromm of Greenpeace Germany, one of the activists who has been physically stopping the clearcutting for the past 10 days.
Greenpeace is calling on WFP to end to clearcut logging, and to stay out of the last remaining pristine rainforest valleys.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
Tzeporah Berman, Greenpeace,604- 313-0159, cell on site
Karen Mahon, Greenpeace, 604-220-7701, cell on site