Greenpeace Arctic case: Russia bails 9

A court in St Petersburg has granted bail to nine foreign nationals who were among 30 people arrested during an Arctic protest by Greenpeace.

Greenpeace Arctic case: Russia bails nine foreigners

A court in the Russian city of St Petersburg has granted bail to nine foreign nationals who were among 30 people arrested during an Arctic protest by Greenpeace.

The condition for release is a bail sum of 2m roubles (£38,000; $61,000) each, to be paid within the next four days.

The released activists come from Argentina, Brazil, Canada, France, Finland, Italy, New Zealand and Poland.

On Monday, the court granted bail to three Russians from the group of 30.

But Greenpeace expressed caution about what the terms of the bail would be.

“We still have no idea what conditions our friends will endure when they are released from jail, whether they will be held under house arrest or even allowed outside,” Greenpeace’s Kumi Naidoo said in a statement.

The 28 Greenpeace activists and two journalists were arrested after a protest at a Russian offshore oil rig in the Arctic two months ago.

Their ship, the Arctic Sunrise, was seized by armed security men.

The rest of the group are due to face similar hearings this week. Six Britons are among the 30.

A separate court has extended the pre-trial detention of an Australian activist, Colin Russell, for a further three months.

The 30 were originally charged with piracy, but Russian authorities dropped those charges and replaced them with hooliganism, which carries a lesser prison sentence.

The nine bailed on Tuesday were named as: Miguel Orsi (Argentina), Camila Speziale (Argentina), Ana Paula Maciel (Brazil), Paul Ruzycki (Canada), Sini Saarela (Finland), Francesco Pisanu (France), Cristian D’Alessandro (Italy), David Haussman (New Zealand) and Tomasz Dziemianczuk (Poland).

Source: BBC.