Greenpeace Rainbow Warrior, Floating Hub for Radical Activism, Docks in San Francisco

At the San Francisco Chronicle, "Greenpeace's 'hippie ship' stops by S.F.'s waterfront."

Actually, these people, in Russia, have erred badly in challenging the power of the state.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Activist sits in Russian jail; family waits, worries":

The irony is cruel for Lara Litvinov. Nearly half a century ago, she and her brother, Dima Litvinov — children in a family with a long history of civil disobedience — were living in exile with their parents in Siberia. When the family emigrated from the country in 1974, they believed they had left Russian oppression behind.

Now, Dima sits in a Russian jail along with the nearly 30 other Greenpeace activists for protesting oil drilling operations in the Arctic. He has become the third generation in his family to be imprisoned in Russia.

"I didn't expect this in my life again," said his father, Pavel Litvinov, 73, who was banished to Siberia for protesting the Soviet Union's 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia. "When I took Dima and Dima, 51, has been a Greenpeace activist for nearly 25 years. "He wanted to make a difference in the world," Lara said in an interview at her home in Torrance. "Money was never important to him. He was just interested in doing what is right."

In September, Dima and other Greenpeace activists attempted to stage a demonstration against what is said to be the world's first ice-resistant oil platform. Russian authorities acted swiftly, arresting them — and two journalists — as charges are investigated.

The family is trying to stay optimistic, but Lara is scared. She has seen photographs of her brother in handcuffs and in a courtroom, standing inside a metal cage. She hears he's being kept in a 12- by 24-foot cell for 23 hours a day with only an hour outside. It's cold, and it's dark.

"There is so much that is unknown, and the Russian government is so unpredictable," she said. out of Russia, I thought I had taken them away from that country so that this could never happen."

Charged first with piracy and then with hooliganism, Dima faces the possibility of years in prison with a substantial fine...

Continue reading.