Community members from the Palestinian, climate and environment movement will be staging a peaceful protest at ANZ Bank’s upcoming Annual General Meeting (AGM) this Thursday December 19 from 8.30am at Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre (MCEC) 1 Convention Centre Pl South Wharf, Victoria.
Individuals and groups are staging the protest over the bank's financial ties to the world’s largest weapons company, Lockheed Martin. The arms dealer manufactures and supplies weapons to Israel, which are being used in the ongoing genocide in Palestine.
Palestinian community members and activists will also be inside the AGM as proxies to put questions directly to ANZ CEO Shayne Elliot on the bank’s likely complicity in war crimes, genocide, human rights abuses and environmental destruction perpetrated by Israel in Gaza.
ANZ has participated in 27 known financial deals with Lockheed Martin, including loans and bonds*. The most recent of these loans was a US $3 billion loan in August 2024, over ten months after the invasion of Gaza had begun. ANZ is also Australia’s largest funder of climate-wrecking fossil fuel projects, and has poured over $19 billion into coal, oil, and gas companies in the eight years since the Paris Agreement was signed.
Statements from Amin Abbas, Palestinian activist and advocate, Nathalie Farah, Syrian-Palestinian activist and writer, and Friends of the Earth campaigner, Elyse Cunningham will be made available on the day.
Please get in touch for more information.
A selection of photos and video footage will be uploaded here on the day.
Key Facts:
*Analysis of Bloomberg Terminal information.
Contact details:
Chris Schuringa
Member of Climate Activists for Palestine
0418 912 625
climateforpalestine@gmail.com
