Fascinating: Greg Palast Arrested Busted by BP in Azerbaijan

[kpete]

Palast Arrested
Busted by BP in Azerbaijan

I'm out of there. Out with the evidence we need about BP and how it led to
the Gulf of Mexico blow-out and an extension of the occupation of Iraq.

Monday, December 20, 2010

by Greg Palast

I was here in the desert to investigate a tip-off I'd had that BP had a near-disaster at its Caspian offshore rig that was extraordinarily similar to the Deepwater Horizon blow-out. But BP covered it up

What I didn't know was that WikiLeaks was about to release a State Department memo which referred to a small piece of this BP game. Rather than go to Azerbaijan to check the facts, the Wiki newspapers called BP in London for comment.

That put BP on high alert and my sources in high danger.
So the Baba-BP police were more than curious about our film which we promised was about nothing more than, "the business boom in Central Asia." Of course, we didn't add that the only business booming here is corruption and BP's oil drilling. (I don't use the plural here because it is a single industry.)

Palast pictured in front of BP offshore oil rig in Baku, Azerbaijan, December 2010

How the crew and I (and the poor shepherd on a little horse swept up with us) were released is a complex story involving an impromptu banquet with the Secret Police and the poignant recanting of a statement about BP made to us by an environmental activist.

...............................

MUCH MORE:
http://www.gregpalast.com/palast-arrested-busted-by-bp-in-azerbaijan/