French farmers consider suing GM crop activists
Date: 04-Sep-01
Country: FRANCE
"The aggressors should be sued," AGPM President Christophe Terrain said at a news conference. "We have asked our lawyers to look at how it would be possible for us to file a complaint. Too much is too much."
Terrain also said AGPM expected to demand compensation for the owners of those fields recently destroyed by anti-GM protesters.
Last week, seeds producer Biogemma, which had one of its GM maize crops ravaged by activists, said it would file a civil lawsuit for what it described as "intolerable" destruction.
The activists have accused the government of underestimating the possibility of cross-pollination between genetically modified and natural crops, and have threatened to continue their blitz on experimental fields across the country.
Their campaign to destroy GM crop tests began in late June, when the farm ministry published the list of French districts where genetically engineered plants were being tested.
The campaign received a mental boost in late July after the French food safety agency AFSSA released a report saying it had found traces of GM organisms in several conventional crops across the country.
AGPM urged the French government to continue protecting GM experimental fields against what it called "terrorists".
"The government is obliged to protect us," said Daniel Segonds, who represents seed producers belonging to AGPM.
He stressed that GM test fields were government approved.
On Saturday, between 100 and 150 police prevented activists from hacking down three fields of GM tests in Sigalens, soutwestern France, after Prime Minister Lionel Jospin publicly criticised the destruction, describing the protests as illegal.
While GM crops are common in the United States, France and other European countries remain highly reluctant to sanction new genetic technology in agriculture. France nonetheless grows experimental GM crops on around 100 sites.
