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Romanian Officials Say Russia Finances European Fracking Protests
HughPickens.com writes Andrew Higgins reports in the NYT that Romanian officials including the prime minister point to a mysteriously well-financed and well-organized campaign of protests over fracking in Europe and are pointing their fingers at Russia's Gazprom, a state-controlled energy giant, that has a clear interest in preventing countries dependent on Russian natural gas from developing their own alternative supplies of energy and preserving a lucrative market for itself — and a potent foreign policy tool for the Kremlin. "Russia, as part of their sophisticated information and disinformation operations, engaged actively with so-called nongovernmental organizations — environmental organizations working against shale gas — to maintain dependence on imported Russian gas," says NATO's former secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen. A wave of protest against fracking began three years ago in Bulgaria, a country highly dependent on Russian energy. Faced with a sudden surge of street protests by activists, many of whom had previously shown little interest in environmental issues, the Bulgarian government in 2012 banned fracking and canceled a shale gas license issued earlier to Chevron.
Russia itself has generally shown scant concern for environmental protection and has a long record of harassing and even jailing environmentalists who stage protests. On fracking, however, Russian authorities have turned enthusiastically green, with Putin declaring last year that fracking "poses a huge environmental problem." Places that have allowed it, he said, "no longer have water coming out of their taps but a blackish slime." For their part Green groups have been swift to attack Rasmussen's views, saying that they were not involved in any alleged Russian attempts to discredit the technology, and were instead opposed to it on the grounds of environmental sustainability. "The idea we're puppets of Putin is so preposterous that you have to wonder what they're smoking over at Nato HQ," says Greenpeace, which has a history of antagonism with the Russian government, which arrested several of its activists on a protest in the Arctic last year.
He only has to convince the people you would follow in protests, not the minions like you or me.
The problem is that fracking is not a bad thing either.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I'm Romanian, and there is some information missing from this "news". First of all, the Russian company Gazprom has been given a lot of exploration/exploitaition licences in Romania, including the rights for prospecting for shale gas. They operate through a Serbian subsidiary called Nis, and they have already started prospections in the Western area of the country. Therefore, I really doubt Russia finances the civic campaigns against fracking. Then, the Romanian officials quoted include a very controversial mayor of the village where Chevron first started to look for shale gas. That mayor happened to buy the field where the prospections were to be started just before Chevron came. He made a nice profit in the meanwhile, and the non-governmental organizations have acused him from the start of being - possibly - "persuaded" financially by Chevron itself. So these officials are far from being unbiased on the matter.
The other thing the story fails to tell about is that the movement against dangerous mining operations (not only fracking) is very strong in Romania for several years now, we had massive demostrations, with tens of thousands of protesters gathering in major cities each time such a danger was percieved. And they are the same protesters that actively despise Russia and its influence in the region. Because, unlike Hungary, Serbia and other neighbours, Romania has managed to keep the political Russian influence away -- we've had enough of their bright ideas when they imposed communism on us, and we do not forget that easily.
All in all, this looks like a manipulative story, possibly put forward by those who would have something to gain from fracking in a country where the population density/distribution makes this method dangerous if not criminal -- and this includes Russians. They won't succeed, of course, they keep underestimating our resolve/intelligence.