Shell’s efforts to kill negative newspaper coverage

In February 2007, someone at Shell stated an intention in an internal email dated 2 February 2007, to put pressure on The Sunday Times to “kill” an article about our intervention in the Sakhalin 2 project (which according to The Sunday Times article cost Shell £11 BILLION).

Extracts from the ebook “John Donovan, Shell’s Nightmare” (now available on Amazon websites globally)

Extracts from pages 168 to 170 inclusive

We also discovered that from 2006 onwards Shell secretly kept and regularly updated “Focal Point” information about our activities. Some of the information in the reports is inaccurate.

We have copies of reports updated in 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010. I have supplied one example from each year.

The “Focal Point” seems to be a person rather than the title of the document. I believe the person was Xxxxxxx Xxxxxxx.

It is plain from the reports that there was anxiety at Shell about the possibility that I would ask a question at the AGM. A list of possible questions and rehearsals of responses are listed in the Focal Point reports.

Surprising bearing in mind that the last time we asked a question at a Shell AGM was over two decades ago, in 1995. My fathers’ exchange with the then Shell Transport and Trading Company chairman, John Jennings, self-evidently made a long-lasting impact!

Shell even discussed internally the possible impact of my father growing older and what might happen to the website:

In one Shell internal email dated 11 March 2007, someone at Shell expressed the hope that “with AD getting older, his interest might wane… but it looks as though JD is just as determined.”

In 2007 & 2010 Shell secretly considered putting pressure on national newspapers concerning my activities.

In February 2007, someone at Shell stated an intention in an internal email dated 2 February 2007, to put pressure on The Sunday Times to “kill” an article about our intervention in the Sakhalin 2 project (which according to The Sunday Times article cost Shell £11 BILLION).

The entire content of the article was read out to me on a Saturday morning by Steven Swinford, the then Sunday Times journalist and the paper was due to go to press later that day. The article included an interview with a Russian Government minister Oleg Mitvol. I had supplied Mitvol with leaked Shell internal communications. Mr. Mitvol made damaging comments about Shell management during the interview.

By coincidence or otherwise, the article was duly killed. Shortly thereafter, The Sunday Times published a color Shell/Ferrari advertorial.

On 27 July 2010, Shell discussed in internal emails the possibility of applying pressure to the Financial Times concerning me and my website.

In September and October 2010 Shell engaged in email correspondence with an unknown third party about my activities and accused my father and me of blackmailing Shell.

Logic suggests that the person who made the blackmailing allegation was Xxxxxxx Xxxxxxx, who by then was the Chief Ethics & Compliance Officer of Royal Dutch Shell Plc and at that time, our designated contact with Shell.

We knew nothing about the correspondence until we obtained it from Shell in response to a SAR application.

The blackmail allegation was totally without foundation. We have never sought any payment from Shell since the High Court litigation ended in 1999. All of our website actively has always operated on an entirely non-profit basis.

If the peace treaty had still been in force, this false accusation, put in writing to a third party, would have been in blatant breach of the agreement. It is therefore further proof that Shell considered the settlement agreement to be dead.

It is evident from the SAR generated information that Shell transmitted information about me across national borders. In a Shell email dated 19 March 2007 it is self-evident that Shell in the USA was busy making investigations about us in the USA (with the US government) and in Europe. They wrongly thought we were brothers.

The aforementioned Reuters article published on 2 December 2009, quoted from a confidential Shell internal email (dated 17 June 2009,) which mentioned “CAS” (Shell Corporate Affairs Security) and “NCFTA”.

The latter being a reference to the National Cyber Forensics and Training Alliance, a Pittsburgh-based organisation founded and partly funded and staffed by the FBI. Shell is a member of the NCFTA.

EXTRACTS END

One name has been redacted

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