Fwd: Shell blocks 70,000 employees from learning about Supreme Court case

Shell Blocks Employee Access to Activist Website
71,010 employees blocked from tweeting Oprah about Supreme Court murder case

Houston, TX (October 2, 2012) — Early Monday morning, 71,010 Shell
employees received an email from the company's "Grassroots Employee
Empowerment Division" providing information on Kiobel v. Royal Dutch
Petroleum, a pivotal human rights case being argued in the U.S.
Supreme Court. The email contained links to news stories, as well as a
tool to help employees tweet their feelings about the case at key US
news anchors (and Oprah Winfrey).

The only thing is, Shell has no "Grassroots Employee Empowerment
Division," and they don't want publicity for the case. The email was
in fact the work of an activist group called People Against Legalizing
Murder (PALM), who received the list of Shell emails from what they
believe to be a group of disaffected employees. (A similar leak
occurred two years ago.)

Within minutes of the email being sent out, Shell internally blocked
the site, preventing employees from accessing it. "I would love to
participate, but access is denied to all links you sent out," wrote
one employee among many. The 71,010 employees were informed this
morning of the situation and the site's new URL.

PALM intended the action to help shine a spotlight on the case,
brought by the widow of Dr. Barinem Kiobel, who was hanged along with
novelist Ken Saro-Wiwa for opposition to Shell's drilling plans in
West Africa. Shell is alleged to have aided paramilitary forces that
raided more than 60 villages, killed over 800 people, and displaced
30,000 more.

To prevail, Shell lawyers must overturn a 200-year-old law, the Alien
Tort Statute (ATS), that compensates victims of international crimes.
(The law has been used to compensate Holocaust survivors who sued for
restitution from corporations that profited from slavery and forced
labor during World War II.) Shell's lawyers are arguing that their
corporation is not subject to the ATS because it is not a person.

"When it comes to things like election spending, Shell and other
corporations want to have all the rights of people," said Sean Dagohoy
from PALM. "But when accused of murder, Shell conveniently argues that
they aren't a person. A ruling in their favor would be a very
dangerous precedent, and would badly undermine the United States'
reputation as a place that cares about human rights. That's why we
attempted to reach out to Shell employees to help get the word out."

"Surely most Shell employees, like most people, don't want
multinationals to get away with murder just because murder's
convenient," said Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Lab, which provided
technical assistance for the action.

"Shell needs to let its employees speak," said Mike Bonanno of the Yes
Lab. "They can prevent it for a day, but in the long run they have no
choice."

Contact

Sean Dagohoy
People Against Legalizing Murder (PALM)

Andy Bichlbaum or Mike Bonanno
The Yes Lab