Dramatic video showing Spanish navy brutally attacking peaceful Greenpeace protest against oil exploration in Canarian waters. Activist seriously hurt

NBC News reported:

''Spain's navy rammed into a Greenpeace dinghy during a protest in the Atlantic Ocean against oil exploration near the Canary Islands on Saturday, injuring four of its activists, one of them seriously, the environmental organization said.

However, the navy disputed that account. The navy said it dispatched two boats from one of its ships in the area to prevent Greenpeace from boarding a large oil drilling ship and that one of its activists was seriously injured when she fell out of her dinghy and was hit by its propellers.Speaking by radio-telephone from Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise in the area, Capt. Joel Stewart identified the woman as a 23-year-old Italian activist and said the other three injuries were minor. The navy said it rushed the activist to a Spanish hospital in a helicopter. 

Last month, at the Spanish government's request, the Constitutional Court blocked a proposal by the Canary Islands regional government to hold a referendum on oil exploration in waters off the popular tourist archipelago off northwestern Africa. The government licensed the Spanish energy company Repsol YPF S.A. to begin oil exploration there, and it is doing that now from a large oil drilling ship with a platform.''

Update 1:

The president of the government of the Canary Islands Paulino Rivero meanwhile has visited the injured female Greenpeace activist in hospital on Gran Canaria and pledged his and his government's support for all present and future protests against oil drilling in the vicinity of the Canaries. He called the navy's actions ''disproportionate, abusive and erroneous''. He stressed that he is not blaming the navy ''whom Canary citizens help to finance'', but he is blaming the central Spanish government for having caused the incident by giving orders to the armed forces ''to attack a peaceful action in an exaggerated fashion''. He is demanding an explanation from the Spanish prime minister Rajoy of the navy's attack in which four protesters were injured, one of them seriously.

The distant Spanish state has vehemently opposed the will of the Canarian people to hold a referendum and keeps treating the Canary Islands as its last colony, brutally conquered about 500 years ago, in an exploitative and domineering way.

Update 2:
The Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise has arrived in port at Lanzarote to the applause of a large crowd which had gathered in support of the protest: