ST. PETERSBURG — The 30 people arrested following a Greenpeace protest at an Arctic oil rig were transferred to St. Petersburg on Tuesday, Greenpeace International and Russian transport officials said.
A sealed wagon attached to a passenger train transported the group from the northern city of Murmansk to St. Petersburg's Ladozhsky Station, the officials said.
While Russia has not given an official reason for the transfer, it comes after widespread international protests over the arrest of the 28 crew members, Russian photographer, and a British videographer aboard the Greenpeace ship.
St. Petersburg is a more accessible destination for the activists' lawyers and family members than Murmansk, a far-flung city north of the Arctic Circle that gets little light during its long winter.
Greenpeace International Arctic campaigner Ben Ayliffe said in a statement that the organization did not know which pre-detention center the activists would be taken to in St. Petersburg.
