DUTCH police arrested six Greenpeace activists today after they chained a Russian oil drilling platform destined for the Arctic to a dock to prevent it from leaving the Netherlands port of Ijmuiden.

“Police have arrested six of our activists. They are still in custody but we don’t know what the charges are,” said protest co-ordinator Faiza Oulahsen.

Police said that the activists had been arrested after refusing a police order to leave the GSP Saturn platform.

Greenpeace divers and activists with climbing gear had surrounded the platform on Monday night.

“The divers chained the rig to the quay to prevent it from leaving the harbour,” Greenpeace said.

“The activists wanted to prevent the Saturn going to the Dolginskoye field to drill for oil for Gazprom.”

The Saturn rig is the second to be targeted by Greenpeace’s campaign to highlight the dangers of oil drilling in the ecologically vulnerable north polar area.

Elsewhere, another contingent of Greenpeace activists boarded two offshore drilling rigs in Norwegian waters in a different protest against oil and gas exploration in Arctic waters.

Spokesman Juha Aromaa said 15 activists had boarded a rig operated by Norwegian energy company Statoil about 109 miles off the Bear Island nature reserve early yesterday without encountering any resistance from the crew.

Statoil was given the green light to drill in the northern part of the Barents Sea late on Monday. The rig had been on a government-ordered layoff pending a complaint from Greenpeace.