Greenpeace Activists Will Likely Receive Amnesty From Russia

The New York Times reports:

A sweeping amnesty that is underway in Russia was extended on Tuesday to a member of the crew of the Arctic Sunrise, the Greenpeace International ship seized on the open seas three months ago.

If the amnesty covers the rest, as expected, it will draw to a close one of the more contentious chapters in Greenpeace’s history, in which Russian commandos boarded a ship, imprisoned the crew members and charged them, for a time, with piracy.

I discussed the original charges against the Greenpeace activists here and here.  The piracy charges were downgraded to "hooliganism," which qualifies for amnesty.   Several other prisoners who have already been released, including members of the band, Pussy Riot, have condemned Russia's amnesty approach.  The Times continues:

One member of Pussy Riot, Maria Alyokhina, stepped out of the penitentiary to say she would have preferred to stay than to accept an amnesty from President Vladimir V. Putin. The amnesty, she said, had been intended only to bolster the image of Mr. Putin and Russia before the Winter Olympics in Sochi, which start in February.

While all of the Greenpeace activists have not yet been guaranteed amnesty, it is likely that they soon will be, and will probably be able to leave the country soon.

Greenpeace Activists Charged with Piracy

The New York Times reports here Reuters reports here, Eugene Kontorovich reacts and has analysis here.  My previous posts on this issue appear here and here.  As the Times notes, this prosecution is inconsistent with Vladimir Putin's previous remarks that the activists were "obviously not pirates."

Acccording to the Times:

The lodging of such serious charges in the Greenpeace case illustrates how far apart the Russian government remains from Western governments and nongovernmental organizations on issues like freedom of speech and civil disobedience. Russian courts ignored a similar international outcry last year when they sentenced members of the group Pussy Riot to two years in prison for protesting in a church.

The piracy charges carry a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison. It was not clear how many of the 28 members of the crew and the two journalists who were aboard the Arctic Sunrise would ultimately be charged; all of them have been detained for investigation. The court in Murmansk that is handling the matter adjourned on Wednesday with the cases of the ship’s American captain, Peter Willcox, and a number of others still pending. Lawyers for Greenpeace said the hearing could continue with more charges lodged on Thursday.

Kontorovich notes that "such clearly abusive and politicized piracy charges are quite unprecedented in modern history" and argues that this signals that Russia is claiming superpower status and is unafraid of retaliation.

It will certainly be interesting to see how this case develops and how the United States and United Nations react.  Kontorovich encourages the government to challenge Russia's action as a violation of both international and customary treaty law.  Whatever happens, this case will add a notable dimension to modern piracy cases and law.

Students interested in international law would do well to explore this.  I know that if I were still slating articles, a paper piracy would get my attention pretty effectively.

Kontorovich on Why Greenpeace Activists Are Not Pirates

I posted a little while back about Greenpeace's boarding of a Russian oil platform and the subsequent arrest of the activists.  Today, at the Volokh Conspiracy, Eugene Kontorovich posted about the issue.  I suspect that he had received numerous emails following his analysis of a previous case involving Sea Shepherd, and decided to set the record straight.

I was happy to see that I was correct in my earlier conclusion (it was my first foray into piracy law, after all), although Kontorovich makes a wider variety of arguments to support this conclusion.  He writes:

The Greenpeace activities are most certainly not piracy for several reasons. The modern definition of the offense can be found in Art. 101 U.N. Law of the the Sea Convention (UNCLOS III), Art. 101(a)(1).

First, piracy requires an attack against a “ship.” The Greenpeace incident involved an oil rig, which is not a ship because it is not navigable. (The 1988 SUA Convention dealing with maritime violence beyond piracy required a separate protocol to apply to oil platforms).

Second, piracy requires “acts of violence or detention.” Here the Greenpeace activist merely put a poster on the platform. This does not constitute violence. In the Ninth Circuit case, by contrast, the Sea Shepherd vessels allegedly attempted to ram Japanese whalers, hurled projectiles at them, and so forth. While the defendants argued this did not amount to violence, it is certainly more colorable than a poster. The Greenpeace activists certainly committed trespass, but not piracy.

Indeed, it is Russia that fairly clearly violated UNCLOS by seizing the ship for the misconduct of the crew. The arrest of a vessel is strictly forbidden “even as a matter of investigation,” (Art 97(3)), except for piracy. The piracy allegations here are clearly pretextual, making Russia liable to the Netherlands for seizure “without adequate grounds,” Art. 106. 

It would appear that Kontorovich is an influential figure indeed.  The BBC reports that Russian President Vladimir Putin mentioned the Greenpeace Activists earlier today:

Mr Putin, speaking at a forum on the Arctic, said: "It is absolutely evident that they are, of course, not pirates."

But the protesters are not safe yet:

A spokesman for Russia's main investigating agency, the Investigative Committee, said the charges might be changed if new evidence emerges.

Maybe the oil platform was actually a ship.  This would be a significant development indeed.