Greenpeace again offends indigenous people

Radical global warming campaigners trespass on treasured Inca cultural sites

Craig Rucker

Greenpeace likes to pretend it’s on the side of local people, especially indigenous peoples. But time and again they demonstrate a shocking degree of cultural boorishness.

Now Greenpeace activists have Peruvians up in arms, after trespassing all over treasured Incan cultural sites at Machu Picchu and Nazca, while doing ridiculous publicity stunts to highlight their claim that tiny amounts of plant-fertilizing carbon dioxide are causing “dangerous” planet-wide climate change.

The Times of London’s Ben Webster says a Peruvian prosecutor investigating the incident was angry that the activists had caused “irreparable damage” to a large area of the “Nazca lines,” an ancient monument that UNESCO lists as a World Heritage Site. The “lines” are a series of ancient glyphs in the country’s southern desert region. Hundreds of figures include stylized fish, hummingbirds, lizards, monkeys and spiders. Archeologists believe they were created by the Nacza culture 1360-1615 years ago.

The damage affects some 1,600 square meters (0.4 acres) next to a hummingbird etched into the desert soil. A spokeswoman for the prosecutor said that, under Peruvian law, damaging the historic site could be punishable by a prison sentence of three to six years. The Peruvian cultural ministry is also considering suing Greenpeace for damages, Webster said.

I challenged the inconsiderate Rainbow Warriors inside the UN climate confab, during their press conference. You can watch the exchange here. A year ago, Russia jailed another band of Greenpeaceniks for trespassing on one of its oil rigs. It will be interesting to see how Peruvian authorities punish these thoughtless desecrators of Incan cultural sites. Stay tuned to our www.CFACT.org website.

Big Green and other Leftist ideologues are blind to the harm their actions cause. As blind as so many people in Southeast Asia will be if Greenpeace propaganda succeeds in denying them access to the GMO “Golden Rice” that their diets need to ensure good visual health.

Eco activists cry a river for plants or bugs, but think nothing about parents and children dying from malaria, because of their opposition to insecticides and the powerful spatial repellant DDT; going blind from Vitamin A deficiency, because of Golden Rice boycotts; or getting sick and dying from lung and intestinal diseases, because these radical greens also oppose large-scale electrical generating plants.

The huge letters the Greenpeace gang used to desecrate this sensitive cultural site are plastic! Which is made from petroleum! Which Greenpeace denounces as evil and planet-destroying! The “go solar” slogan on the mountains above Machu Picchu was projected using equipment that was powered by hydrocarbons. What hypocrites these campaigners be!

CFACT representatives had an opportunity to speak with some Inca people at their sacred places, and with local Peruvian leaders in Lima. We visited with respect and forged friendships. That's what happens when you care about people.

Many politicians and business people are afraid to stand up to Big Green bully groups. CFACT is unafraid. We have challenged Greenpeace and Big Green at every opportunity, such as here, here, here and here. We are committed to working for people, as well as nature.

Greenpeace has hundreds of millions of dollars a year at its disposal for its fight against human freedom, health and prosperity. We have a tiny fraction of that. But we make it count – not just on educational efforts, but for programs that directly support and assist poor indigenous villages and people.

Meanwhile, also in Peru, our Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow was holding a press conference during the latest United Nations meeting on climate change. It featured the notable skeptic of “dangerous manmade global warming” NASA Apollo VII astronaut and American hero Col. Walt Cunningham, along with me and CFACT director of communications Marc Morano. As is always the case with events at the UN climate confabs, we had been given a 30-minute slot to present our entire program. It was one of a very few “skeptical” presentations during the entire week-long gabfest.

But then, barely 18 minutes into our presentation, we were abruptly told we were being booted off the stage, to create a platform for a photo op for newly arrived U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who is attending the UN talks to promote a new UN climate treaty. This is the same John Kerry who said in October that, “if skeptics are wrong: catastrophe … Life as you know it on Earth ends.” Kerry has also declared that climate change “may be, in fact the most serious challenge we face on the planet” – posing even “greater long-term consequences” than Islamic State, terrorism or Ebola.

Kerry was scheduled to do a talk in a different room, but supposedly needed our press room for his photo op. CFACT’s speakers politely left as requested – and then the room remained empty for at least another 35 minutes. Col. Cunningham’s informative talk was interrupted for no just or valid reason.

This was outrageous. We are one of the few voices of reason at the conference. To interrupt and abruptly end our press conference smacks of censorship. It was particularly obnoxious since the room remained vacant for more than a half hour after we left. But as others have noted, in Massachusetts people have long called Mr. Kerry “John Live Shot,” because he eagerly crashes other people’s events to get on camera.

Before being told to leave, Col. Cunningham had slammed the UN climate Summit for perpetrating “one of the biggest frauds in the field of science.” Our panel also featured Marc Morano, editor of our hugely successful ClimateDepot.com news and information service, who told the gathered media that, “the UN climate process will do nothing for climate change and is completely designed to enrich the UN.”

CFACT’s delegation at the UN climate talks did not break stride. We got right back to work. Selected highlights of our shortened press conference can be read and viewed here.

The UN climate process needs more voices like CFACT’s, presenting reason, sound science and concern for the world’s poor. The UN bureaucrats could surely have allowed us the courtesy of concluding our presentations during our last 12 minutes – which would still have left 23 minutes of vacant space before Secretary Kerry’s photo op!

Turning energy policies over to callous, inefficient, arrogant and unaccountable UN bureaucrats should certainly anger people who are struggling with skyrocketing energy prices – or with the abject poverty, disease and premature death that comes from not having any access to reliable, affordable energy. These are just a few of the many reasons for opposing any new UN climate treaty, which Greenpeace, President Obama and IPCC Chairman Rajendra Pachauri want to impose without our consent.

As we have seen all too often, the road to hell is paved with “good intentions” – as though purportedly good intentions can in any way make up for the horrid, destructive results that are actually imposed.

In reality, Greenpeace and outfits like it typically represent two kinds of people: sincerely worried and gullible young followers, who want to salve their guilt for enjoying modern living standards – and callous, arrogant leaders, who understand all too well the lethal consequences of their policies, but take advantage of the naïveté and good intentions of their followers, to drive their agenda forward.

CFACT will continue to educate the former, while blasting the latter.
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Craig Rucker is executive director of CFACT and has attended numerous UN climate conferences.