Activists aboard the Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise exposed a pirate vessel fishing with a driftnet in international waters early this morning and retrieved a length of the illegal net. The Arctic Sunrise confronted the fishing vessel Luna Rossa in the Mediterranean Sea, around 40 miles west of the Italian island of Marettimo, off Sicily (1).

G8 leaders in Hokkaido, Japan (7-9 July) have the responsibility to fight climate change through committing to binding emission reduction targets and ending the global food crisis by addressing the causes behind it. These include industrial farming, bad harvests related to climate change, unjust terms of trade and the rush for unsustainable biofuels.

Greenpeace today condemned French President, Nicolas Sarkozy's announcement of plans to build a second European Pressurised nuclear Reactor (EPR) in France (1). The decision comes just three days after France took over the EU Presidency.

27 Greenpeace activists are taking non-violent direct action to stop climate-changing coal from being burnt at Eraring, Australia's most polluting coal-fired power plant. The activists, including an ex-miner from the Hunter Valley, have blockaded the coal supply to the plant by locking on to the conveyor.

A court in Aomori, Japan has ruled that two Greenpeace peaceful protestors who exposed a major scandal around the embezzlement of whale meat from the Japanese government-sponsored Southern Ocean whaling programme will spend the maximum time in custody without charge permissible under Japanese law - 23 days.

Out of the 18 electronics companies evaluated in the 8th edition of Greenpeace’s Guide to Greener Electronics, only two companies - Sony Ericsson and Sony – score above 5/10. The overall score of the ranked companies has plummeted as Greenpeace tightens requirements on electronic waste (e-waste) and toxic chemicals, and adds new requirements for evaluating companies’ impact on climate change.

20 Greenpeace activists this morning stopped construction of the European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) in Flamanville from restarting today by blocking the entrance to three quarries which supply sand and gravel for the build, as none of the safety problems that shut the construction down in May has been addressed.

Two Greenpeace Japan activists, arrested last Friday for exposing an embezzlement ring at the heart of the Japanese government's so-called scientific whaling programme have been ordered to spend a further nine days in jail without charge , after an appeal for them to be released was rejected by a court in Aomori.

More than 150 Chilean children today celebrated the creation of a Chilean whale sanctuary by president Michelle Bachelet, with chairman William Hogarth cutting the ribbon to launch the "whale kingdom" outside the International Whaling Commission meeting in Santiago. The young "Ocean Defenders" also joined tens of thousands of people worldwide calling on Japan's government to release two Greenpeace whale activists currently held without charge in Tokyo [1] for exposing a stolen whale meat scandal [2] within the Japanese government's Southern Ocean whaling programme.

Two Greenpeace activists who exposed large scale embezzlement of tax payers' money from the Japanese government whaling programme will be kept in custody for a further 10 days, without charge, under the order of the Aomori Court.

Following an extraordinary and unnecessary police operation to arrest two Greenpeace Japan activists involved in exposing a scandalous whale meat embezzlement ring operating within the Japanese whaling fleet, a court hearing will be held on Sunday June 22nd in Aomori to decide their fate. Greenpeace has engaged its international pool of online activists to petition the Japanese Prime Minster to end this embarrassing charade and free the innocent activists.

Two Greenpeace activists in Japan have been arrested for exposing a stolen whale meat scandal involving the Japanese government-sponsored Southern Ocean whaling programme.

Greenpeace welcomes the decision to extend by one year the Amazon soya moratorium, made today at a press conference in Brasilia by the soya traders association (Abiove), together with Brazil's new Environment Minister Carlos Minc, Greenpeace and other NGOs.

Greenpeace today launched a new seafood campaign website, publishing its 'Red Grade' Criteria for Unsustainable Fisheries and Aquaculture. Greenpeace has used the criteria to create an international red list of seafood species at high risk of being sourced from overfished stocks or having been caught using destructive fishing methods, or both. Greenpeace calls on companies not to trade in red-listed seafood unless they can prove that the fish stocks they source from are in a healthy state, and are not fished using destructive techniques.

Greenpeace activists boarded the Yang Ming Success and prevented the offloading of an illegal container of waste electronic devices (e-waste) from Port of Oakland in the United States, on its way to Sanshui district in mainland China, via Hong Kong. Activists unfurled a banner reading, “Toxic waste not welcomed here,” and demanded that Hong Kong authorities refuse entry of the container and return it to the US.

Greenpeace activists returned electronic waste (e-waste) to Philips’ head offices around the world today, to highlight the company’s failure to take responsibility for its end-of-life products. With protests in the Netherlands, Denmark, India and Russia, Greenpeace is urging the Dutch electronics giant to introduce global voluntary take-back systems.

Today’s publication of the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) latest energy forecast, to coincide with the start of the G8 Energy Ministers meeting, should be welcomed for its recognition that half the world’s energy could be supplied by renewable sources by 2050 said Greenpeace. However, the IEA’s vision of increasing nuclear power by a factor of four and relying on carbon capture and storage to meet greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets should be rejected as an expensive and dangerous distraction.

As European Environment Ministers arrived in Luxemburg for a meeting which will include discussions about limiting greenhouse gas emissions for cars, five Greenpeace activists dropped banners from a crane next to the venue accusing the car industry of “Driving Climate Change” and calling for tough limits.

Tonnes of endangered fin whale meat from Iceland and minke whale meat from Norway have been exported to Japan has been left sitting in deep freezers in customs, despite claims by the Icelandic exporter that there is a market for the meat.

Greenpeace welcomes the United Nations Environment Programme’s criticism of plans to build 2014 Winter Olympics facilities on a site critical to rare and endangered species.