French GM maize decontamination action

Mon­san­to files suit against French GMO activists

Oct 19 (Reuters) — The French unit of U.S. Biotech giant Mon­san­to has filed a law­suit fol­low­ing the lat­est destruc­tion of some of its test fields for genet­i­cal­ly-mod­i­fied maize. In a state­ment issued on Fri­day, Mon­san­to said that uniden­ti­fied activists had ran­sacked three test fields in Val­divi­enne in cen­tral France after dark on Thurs­day.

Mon­san­to files suit against French GMO activists

Oct 19 (Reuters) — The French unit of U.S. Biotech giant Mon­san­to has filed a law­suit fol­low­ing the lat­est destruc­tion of some of its test fields for genet­i­cal­ly-mod­i­fied maize. In a state­ment issued on Fri­day, Mon­san­to said that uniden­ti­fied activists had ran­sacked three test fields in Val­divi­enne in cen­tral France after dark on Thurs­day.

‘This sense­less new act of vio­lence penalis­es French research into biotech crops yet again and has no sci­en­tif­ic basis,’ Mon­san­to said.

It used a pro­ce­dure in French law allow­ing legal action to be brought against unknown defen­dants.

Activists have ruined oth­er Mon­san­to GMO test fields this year, prompt­ing a series of offi­cial com­plaints which the com­pa­ny has said typ­i­cal­ly leads to court action.

Indus­try groups have denounced such attacks as dis­as­trous for the coun­try’s agri­cul­tur­al research work.

Some farm­ers sup­port­ive of GMO crops have called on the gov­ern­ment dur­ing gov­ern­ment-led meet­ings on the envi­ron­ment to pass a GMO law as soon as pos­si­ble, in part to stress the ille­gal nature of such activ­i­ties.

Heat­ed debate has sur­round­ed the use of GMO prod­ucts across Europe and in France, where many con­sumers and green groups doubt the safe­ty of GMO prod­ucts and fear that they will reduce bio­di­ver­si­ty.

REUTERS, Octo­ber 19 2007
http://www.reuters.com/article/companyNewsAndPR/idUSL1944836620071019