Greenpeace reacts to Harper-Obama Meeting

FORT MCMURRAY, AB, Sept. 16 /CNW/ - Responding to the Harper and Obama meeting today, speaking from inside a Greenpeace blockade of a Shell tar sands mining operations, Mike Hudema of Greenpeace Canada said:

"We haven't seen nearly enough concrete commitments from the Harper-Obama meeting that they will move quickly to help the world avert catastrophic climate change."

"Greenpeace has been occupying a mining site in the heart of the tar sands - the frontiers of climate destruction - for the last 24 hours to focus attention on the urgent need for action on climate change.

"It is clear that world leaders still need to get the message. We will continue to expose the horror of the tar sands until they face the urgent facts and wean themselves off the brutal addiction to fossil fuel which threatens us all with catastrophic climate change.

"The message going into critical UN climate negotiations in Copenhagen this December is that climate leaders don't buy tar sands."

Greenpeace will continue to bear witness to the total devastation that is the tar sands - http://www.greenpeace.org/stoptarsands

For further information: Jessica Wilson, Greenpeace media and public relations officer, [phone]; Mike Hudema, Greenpeace climate and energy campaigner, [phone] (at the blockade)