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Russia closes first case against Greenpeace activists

Russia has closed the criminal case against one of the 30 crew members of a Greenpeace ship who were charged with hooliganism over a protest against Gazprom oil drilling in the Arctic, the group said Tuesday.

The move, part of a Kremlin-backed amnesty, should pave the way for the other 29 crew to have their cases closed and then allow the 26 foreign nationals charged in the saga to finally leave Russia.

"The first of the Arctic 30 has today heard the good news that the Investigative Committee has closed its criminal case against them," a Greenpeace spokesman told AFP, naming the activist as Anthony Perrett of Britain.

After their criminal cases are closed, the activists will still need exit visas to leave Russia as they have never officially entered the country on their Arctic Sunrise protest ship.

"They will be free to leave Russia once they get the right stamps in their passports from the migration service," said the Greenpeace spokesman in a statement to AFP.

"We know that getting those stamps would be the best Christmas present for the Arctic 30 and we hope it can occur quickly, but until such time as they do, we cannot say when they will leave."

Russia had held the 30 crew members since September after two activists scaled an oil rig in the Barents Sea owned by Gazprom to protest against oil prospecting.

Their initial arrest came when the Dutch-flagged Arctic Sunrise was seized by the Russian security forces who winched down from a helicopter in a commando-style operation.

They were initially detained in the Arctic Circle city of Murmansk and then transferred to Russia's second city of Saint Peterburg.

It was courts in Saint Petersburg that in November ordered the release of all 30 on bail. Since then they have all been free but unable to leave the city. The Arctic Sunrise ship remains under Russian control in Murmansk.

Greenpeace said Perrett, from the city of Newport in Wales, has now requested an exit visa from the Federal Migration Service to allow him to leave Russia. He will hear back from the Service on Thursday to collect his visa, it added.

"It's time to go home, it's time to get back to Wales, and I just got one big step closer," Greenpeace quoted Perrett as saying.

He added he was "proud" of what he did. "The Arctic is melting before our eyes and yet the oil companies are lining up to profit from its destruction," he said.

In apparent defiance of Greenpeace, Gazprom on Friday announced it had begun oil production at the Prirazlomnaya oil rig that had been the target of the activists' actions.

Greenpeace argues that the ageing oil rig is an environmental catastrophe waiting to happen which risks ruining the pristine Arctic ecology of the southern Barents Sea where the deposit is located.

Gazprom -- already owner of the world's largest natural gas reserves and a growing presence in the oil sector -- says it planned to produce six million tonnes of crude per year (120,000 barrels per day) at the site by 2021.

The arrest of the so-called Arctic 30 -- who hail from 18 different countries -- risked becoming another bone of contention in increasingly tense relations between Russia and the West.

A photo journalist and video reporter were among those detained. Along with the 26 foreigners, there are four Russian citizens.

The Russian parliament had passed amendments to the initial Kremlin amnesty apparently specifically aimed at allowing the "Arctic 30" to benefit from it, stipulating that cases on those charges be closed even before reaching trial or verdict.

The two jailed members of Pussy Riot punk band, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, were freed on Monday after benefitting from the same amnesty.

The amnesty comes less than two months before the start of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, and critics have described it as an attempt by the Kremlin to shore up Russia's human rights image ahead of the Games.

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China's first lunar rover lands on moon

China on Saturday carried out the first soft landing on the moon since 1976, joining the United States and former Soviet Union in accomplishing the feat in a major step for Beijing's ambitious space programme.

The emerging superpower is also set to become the third country to complete a lunar rover mission when it deploys its Yutu, or Jade Rabbit vehicle.

Scientists burst into applause as a computer generated image representing the spacecraft, named Chang'e-3, was seen landing on the moon's surface via screens at a Beijing control centre, state broadcaster Chinese Central Television (CCTV) showed.

"Chang'e-3 has successfully carried out a soft-landing on the moon. This makes the China world's third nation to achieve a lunar soft landing," said the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in an online post on the mission's official page on Sina Weibo, a Chinese Twitter equivalent.

The landing came 12 days after blast-off and was the first of its kind since the former Soviet Union's mission nearly four decades ago.

Many Chinese took to the country's Internet message boards expressing joy at the news, which state news agency Xinhua described as a "historic breakthrough" in an emotional editorial.

"Space exploration is the cause of mankind, not just 'the patent' of a certain country," the commentary said.

"China will share the achievements of its lunar exploration with the whole world and use them to benefit humanity."

The landing marks the latest step in an ambitious space programme which is seen as a symbol of China's rising global stature and technological advancement, as well as the Communist Party's success in reversing the fortunes of the once impoverished nation.

It comes a decade after the country first sent an astronaut into space, and ahead of plans to establish a permanent space station by 2020 and eventually send a human to the moon.

News of the landing quickly made an impact on China's hugely popular Internet message boards, with the words 'Chang?e-3 lunar landing' racing to the top of the list of searched items on Weibo just minutes after touchdown.

"Congratulations on Chang'e-3's successful lunar landing. Long live China!" said one netizen.

"Felt so excited when it landed!" added another.

The probe touched down on an ancient 400-kilometre (250-mile) wide plain known in Latin as Sinus Iridum, or The Bay of Rainbows.

The landing was previously described as the "most difficult" part of the mission by CAS on Chang'e-3's Weibo site.

The probe used sensors and 3D imaging to identify a flat surface. Thrusters were then deployed 100 metres (330 feet) from the lunar surface to gently guide the craft into position.

The landing process started at 9pm (13.00 GMT) and lasted for about 12 minutes.

Karl Bergquist, international relations administrator at the European Space Agency (ESA), who has worked with Chinese space officials on the Chang'e-3 mission, told AFP the key challenge was to identify a flat location for the landing.

Lunar exploration

The rover is set to be released from the landing craft in "a few hours", according to a post on Chang'e-3's Weibo page late Saturday.

Following separation, the rover will spend about three months exploring the moon's surface and looking for natural resources.

The rover can climb slopes of up to 30 degrees and travel at 200 metres per hour, according to the Shanghai Aerospace Systems Engineering Research Institute.

The Chang'e-3 mission is named after the goddess of the moon in Chinese mythology and the rover vehicle is called Yutu, or Jade Rabbit, after her pet.

Yutu's name was chosen in an online poll of 3.4 million voters.

"China wants to go to the moon for geostrategic reasons and domestic legitimacy," said Joan Johnson-Freese, a professor of national security affairs at the US Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, and an expert on Chinese space activities.

"With the US exploration moribund at best, that opens a window for China to be perceived as the global technology leader -- though the US still has more, and more advanced, assets in space," she added.

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