Reuters: President tells Argentines to boycott Shell (ShellNews.net) 10 March 05

Thu Mar 10, 2005

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (Reuters) - President Nestor Kirchner has told Argentines to boycott Anglo-Dutch energy giant Shell for hiking its gasoline prices this week.

As Kirchner lashed out at Shell for the second day for fuelling inflation, militant unemployed picketers that support Kirchner said they would occupy Shell stations in the capital.

"Argentines should not buy from them, they have to say: 'No to Shell,'" Kirchner said on Thursday at an event to give schoolchildren smocks.

"Let's unite and not even buy a can of oil from them," he added. "May they realize that Argentines no longer put up with this. A national boycott is the best thing the people can do."

But he said people should not resort to violence against Shell.

Kirchner, known to attack foreign companies that don't fit into his pro-people agenda, said other petroleum companies like Brazilian-owned Petrobras and Spain's YPF-Repsol are not going to increase their prices.

On Wednesday, Kirchner accused Shell of having "an absolute lack of collaboration with Argentine society" because its price hikes reduce the purchasing power of Argentines impoverished by the country's economic collapse in 2001-02.

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