Stop Esso Letter to Indymedia re. 22 Feb Stop Esso Day

national | miscellaneous | news report Sunday January 26, 2003 17:16 by Eamonn C.

From William St. Leger / [email protected]

"As a citizen, sometimes direct action is necessary to make a positive contribution to something you care about” Esso UK website

From: William St. Leger
mailto:[email protected]

Hello Indymedia,

When President Bush announced that the US would pull out of the Kyoto
Protocol in March 2001, the mark of the fossil fuel industry was all over
his policy. One company stands out in its efforts to bring about climate
climb-down.

For more than a decade ExxonMobil (or Esso in Europe) has been working
consistently and systematically to derail any international action the
combat global warming. Esso’s decade of dirty tricks include convert funding
and support for industry lobbying organisations, Misleading the US public
about the urgency of climate action, Feeding climate sceptic scientists and
even secretly requesting to remove the chair of the UN’s panel on climate
change. Esso is doing more than any other company to keep the US hooked on
oil. This oil dependence is fuelling Bush's war and causing global warming.

StopEsso in the UK was launched in the May 2001 and by July that same year
the StopEsso campaign began in Ireland. Friends of the Earth took to Grafton
Street with a Esso Tiger and ‘Dubya’ himself to inform the public about Esso
’s dirty tricks. We took StopEsso to both U2 concerts in Slane with the band
’s support and even played a “Stop Esso - Stop Bush” animation on big
screens to the 80,000 strong crowd.

Last year during the second StopEsso Day, Clare Green Party members and
others protested at Esso stations in Limerick and Ennis. This year StopEsso
has grown in Ireland and on 22nd February 2003 people around Ireland will
take part in peaceful and legal protest at Esso stations in Limerick, Cork,
Dublin and beyond for Ireland’s own StopEsso Day.

If you would like to cover or feature the first StopEsso national day of
peaceful protest on 22nd February. Email [email protected]

"As a citizen, sometimes direct action is necessary to make a positive
contribution to something you care about” Esso UK website

William St. Leger
Co-ordinator