Greenpeace oil protestors arrested after scaling Wellington's tallest building

July 23, 2019

Nick Hanafin and Abigail Smith began their climb before dawn, and aim to reach the 20th floor.

Two Greenpeace activists who climbed the exterior of Wellington's tallest building - The Majestic Centre have been arrested.

In a statement, Greenpeace said their aim was to reach the 20th floor of the 29-storey skyscraper - outside the headquarters of Austian oil company OMV.

Two people have been taken into custody following the incident, police say.

They were arrested for trespass at the Majestic Centre on Willis Street at around 9:10pm.

The two climbers are Abigail Smith and Nick Hanafin and they began climbing this morning before dawn.

Greenpeace oil protestor Abigail Smith on the side of Wellington's Majestic centre during their climb.

Greenpeace New Zealand climate manager Amanda Larsson said that "oil companies like OMV have known for 30 years that burning fossil fuels is driving climate change".

"Instead of acting, the industry has poured billions of dollars into climate change denial and lobbying while continuing to push ever deeper into remote ends of the Earth in search of new oil and gas."

Police have been called to the scene, but have said they have now immediate plans to intervene.

Ms Smith, along with three others, also climbed parliament in June of 2015, where they unveiled a banner reading "Cut pollution, create jobs? Yeah, nah".

She and the others were soon after convicted of trespassing and ordered to pay reparation of $750 each.

In January of 2018, Ms Smith was among a group who broke into Port Taranaki and boarded a supply ship involved with seismic surveying survey in protest against oil and gas exploration.

They were charged with unlawfully getting into a motor vehicle, and most were charged with wilful trespass, and they were also ordered to pay reparations of $750 each.

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