From:From the Moby Dick.

Date: Wednesday June 7th 1995

About three o'clock this morning, five of our climbers from the Moby Dick, climbed up the Brent Spar using ropes and grappling irons, to hang banners and paint slogans.

We were all very much aware of Shell's vessel, the Rembas loitering below, but nobody was prepared for the appalling actions that were about to take place.

Firstly, Shell workers approached the climbers' ropes with knives, and much to our horror tried to cut them. They didn't succeed and went away, allowing us to continue dropping the banner which read: "Save Our Seas".

But obviously after some consultation, they decided to try and remove them again, but this time with water cannons. We watched aghast as they were knocked back with the sheer force of the freezing water spray. It was an incredible effort to keep holding on. One of the women on the rope was sprayed for a continuous 20 minutes.

Eventually after five hours, they had to climb down back onto the Moby, because they were so cold and tired.

I radioed the Captain of the Rembas four or five times, urgently asking him to stop the sprays. He ignored me. We, on the Moby, were shocked at Shell's violent acts of behaviour. It seems they are oblivious to the seriousness of threatening human lives. Ironic really, when only a few weeks ago they stressed concern on the safety conditions for the protesters on the rig. In actual fact, Shell seems to have the same disregard for the safety of people as it does the safety of the environment.

Later we were told that the men on the Rembas were just testing equipment, and denied what we witnessed they were really doing, which was target practice rather than fire practice.

June 7,From:From activist at Aberdeen harbour.

Determind to fight to the very end -- late last night we locked ourselves to the mooring ropes and the superstructure of the Smit Singapore; the tug that will tow the Brent Spar to its dumping ground.

When the police showed up, they arrested ten activists, and left two others perched on the mast, delaying the dumping for over 12 hours.

On the day North Sea states are discussing discharges of hazardous substances into the sea, it's disgusting that Shell and the UK Government are going ahead with dropping the toxic-laden Brent Spar into the ocean. The North Sea states put their environmental credentials to the test this week -- they can agree zero emissions as soon as possible or allow the seas to be used as a dumping ground.