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April 23, 2025 | 03:20 pm
TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - A number of Greenpeace Indonesia activists held a peace rally in front of the South Korean Embassy in Jakarta today, April 23, 2025, demanding the release of five activists detained in the country since November last year.
Based on Tempo's observation at the location, the activists began arriving at 9:05 a.m. Jakarta time, right at the entrance gate of the embassy. About 20 people, mostly wearing all black, assembled while carrying various protest attributes, including a yellow banner reading “Bring Our Activists Home.” Some also display the same message on their cell phones.
Amidst the protesting crowd stood a giant banner twice the height of an adult person, depicting a “Plastic Chemicals Tanker” floating in a waste-filled ocean. Five figures were featured in the illustration—with the names Captain Hettie, Ash, Al, Jens, and Sam—representing the five Greenpeace activists who have yet to be permitted to return to their respective countries.
The five detained Greenpeace activists were part of the Rainbow Warrior boat tour titled 'Sailing for Change: The Plastic Free Future Tour,' which calls for an end to single-use plastic production and urges world leaders to take concrete steps against plastic pollution.
Zero Waste Campaigner at Greenpeace Indonesia, Ibar Akbar, said today's rally was intended to support the detained activists. “Because some of our friends, Greenpeace International activists, are still detained in South Korea since their action to board the ship,” he said when met by Tempo at the location, Wednesday, April 23, 2025.
Ibar explained that the five activists came from various countries: Taiwan, Germany, the UK, Mexico, and the Netherlands. They were arrested after a peaceful protest on a tanker carrying propylene, a plastic raw material sourced from fossil fuels, at the Hyundai Daesan refinery complex in South Korea on November 30, 2024.
“Hopefully, environmental actions like this (in South Korea) can get legal protection and advocacy,” said Ibar, adding that his side respects the legal proceeding underway in the East Asian country.
“We are awaiting the legal process until May 16 at the South Korean court.”
Greenpeace also submitted an official request to the South Korean Ambassador during the protest to lift the travel ban against the five activists, as well as return them to their respective homelands.
“Detaining environmental activists for months because of a peaceful protest rings an alarm for democracy,” said Leonard Simanjuntak, Head of Greenpeace Indonesia.
Plastic crisis is an unaddressed global threat, said Leonard. According to United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP, 2023) data, more than 430 million tons of plastic are produced annually, but only a fraction is managed sustainably. A 2022 OECD report noted that only 9 percent of global plastic waste is successfully recycled, while 12 percent is incinerated, and nearly 80 percent ends up polluting the environment, from land to ocean.
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