Greenpeace activists cleared over protest and blocking tanker of Russian oil in River Thames

The protests of 10 Greenpeace demonstrators at an oil terminal forced a tanker carrying Russian diesel to U-turn in the River Thames.

They were cleared of aggravated trespass, with a judge stating Russia’s war in Ukraine ‘could be described as terrorism’.

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The defendants, aged between 27 and 72, claimed they were ‘preventing a crime’ by occupying a jetty at Navigator Terminals in Grays, Essex, preventing the vessel from unloading the diesel.

One of them is Rhiannon Wood, 27, of Hedge End. District judge Christopher Williams, who returned his judgment at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court today, said: ‘I take the view it’s more than likely the Russian war could be described as terrorism.’

The 10 defendants had denied, and were each cleared of, a single charge of obstructing or disrupting a person engaged in a lawful activity under the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994.

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The charge said that they trespassed on land at Navigator Terminals and blocked the jetty, obstructing or disrupting ‘a lawful activity, namely fuel distribution’.

Henry Blaxand KC, defending, questioned whether the unloading of the Russian diesel was lawful activity, and the judge said that ‘in my view the unloading of the oil was the potential offence’.

Protesters took two dinghy boats to access the jetty from the riverside late on May 15. Activists attached themselves to the structure and displayed a banner stating ‘oil fuels war’. The Andromeda tanker, which was Greek-flagged and carrying Russian oil, was turned around in the Thames the next morning.