Greenpeace is targeted with fake news by Minister of the Environment

The Minister of Environment took to Twitter to diffuse fake news amid the oil spill crisis. He posted a picture of the Greenpeace ship MV Esperanza along with a text that read: “There are coincidences in life…It seems that the #greenpixe ship was fitly sailing international waters in front of the Brazilian coast right around the time of the venezuelan oil spill…”.

The infamous tweet generated a lot of backlash towards the Minister. Deputy Rodrigo Maia, President of the Chamber of Deputies, also used Twitter to challenge Minister Salles on presenting an official position about the accusation. Salles then responded Maia by attacking Greenpeace from a different angle: “the Greenpeace ship confirmed that it sailed close to the Brazilian coast by the time the Venezuelan oil showed up, and, just like their members on land, did not engage to help”.

Later on the same day, Greenpeace published a note clarifying that the ship was en route from the Caribbean to Uruguay and announced that the filing of a diffamation criminal complaint against Minister Salles at a Federal court.