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The Greenwar Chronicles Part 42. Activists get suspended sentences for wrecking crop
Two Greenpeace activists have received nine-month suspended sentences for destroying a genetically modified wheat crop with whipper snippers at the CSIRO in Canberra.
Jessa Latona, 36, and Heather McCabe, 49, destroyed the crop in July last year.
Greenpeace then sought publicity for their actions by contacting the ABC and releasing vision of the protest.
The CSIRO had permission to conduct the GM wheat trials. The genes in the wheat had been changed to lower the grain’s glycemic index, and also to increase fibre in the hope it could increase nutritional value and improve bowel health.
Greenpeace has since paid more than $280,000 in compensation to the CSIRO.
Justice Hillary Penfold told the ACT Supreme Court this morning that she appreciated the actions were motivated by deeply held beliefs and altruistic intentions, but the law had been deliberately broken.
She also took aim at Greenpeace for allowing two junior staff members to being exposed to the consequences of breaking the law.
But Ben Pearson from Greenpeace says the two activists knew what they were getting themselves into.
“The crop that we targeted was one that we had cause to believe would be used in trials, including human trials. We were very concerned about the lack of transparency around that trial,” he said.
Greenpeace will never resile from undertaking acts of civil disobedience, we simply will not do that. We won’t walk away from that now or in the future.
It’s not a matter of saying would we do that particular action again, it’s a matter of whether we would engage in civil disobedience again and we certainly will if we believe it’s necessary.
“As the judge noted, we have made a number of Freedom of Information requests in the month leading up to our action, seeking further details about the trials and the CSIRO refused to provide that information to us.”
Mr Pearson says despite the charges and fine, the conservation group would not ruling out undertaking similar acts in the future.
“Look Greenpeace will never resile from undertaking acts of civil disobedience, we simply will not do that. We won’t walk away from that now or in the future,” he said.
“It’s not a matter of saying would we do that particular action again, it’s a matter of whether we would engage in civil disobedience again and we certainly will if we believe it’s necessary.”
‘Full supportive’
Ben Pearson says while it is a large amount, Greenpeace members will continue to support the organisation.
“Well Greenpeace paid it on behalf of the activists in recognition of the fact that they had, while undertaken the activity in their own personal capacity,” he said.
“Greenpeace supporters give us money exactly because we undertake these kind of activities, because we actually physically stand up to environmental harm and those causing it.
“I think Greenpeace supporters possibly will be disappointed that it was such a large amount but I think they’ll remain fully supportive of Greenpeace’s use of civil disobedience.”
There are currently eight GM wheat trials in Australia. Six are being run by the CSRIO, and two are being run by the University of Adelaide.
Mark Tester is from the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics at the University of Adelaide.
Professor Tester says the attacks put research back by up to a year.
“We did lose some plants, although what we suffered was much less than CSIRO researchers,” he said.
“They’ve certainly made things a lot harder for us, directly destroying field trial sites isn’t really the way to undertake a grown up debate and it does set back work where we’re trying to get results to help address the questions Greenpeace are raising.”
He says environmental activists should limit themselves to protesting through legal means.
“Well of course they should raise concerns in our democracy and they should do that through legal means and do that through informed debate in the media and in our public forums,” he said.
The CSIRO says it welcomes that those responsible for damaging the trial have been dealt with by the criminal justice system.
Both women have also been placed on 12-month good behaviour bonds.
The sentencing was delayed last month so Latona could give birth to her first child.
@ Activists get suspended sentences for wrecking crop – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation):
The Pundit: This lenient sentencing only allows Greenpeace to get away with damage to other projects such as Golden Rice — vitamin fortified rice for India, Bangladesh, China, the Philippines and other regions.
The Greenpeace response to the trial verdict –No apology, and no remorse about the harm they cause:
Greenpeace statement on ACT Supreme Court decision
Today, the 19th November, 2012, ACT Supreme Court judge, Justice Penfold, sentenced Jessa Latona and Heather McCabe to a nine-month suspended sentence for the charge of destroying Commonwealth property – an experimental GM wheat trial being conducted by CSIRO. The women had already pleaded guilty to the charges in March 2012.
Justice Penfold also directed the women to pay CSIRO the sum of $282,560 in reparations for the damage. The amount will be paid for them by Greenpeace. The women accepted full legal responsibility for their actions by entering a guilty plea in March 2012.
The two women made the following statement:
We accept the sentence handed down today by Justice Penfold and we accept and commit to paying the $282,000 in compensation also ordered to be paid today by Justice Penfold.
We would like to take this opportunity to briefly explain our motivation for taking the action we did.
Our motivation for taking the action we did was pretty simple. We did it because we’re deeply concerned about the future of our food. We care about our community. We care about our children.
GM is not proven safe to eat. The only thing we are sure about is that it’s a major threat to our environment.
We believe our farmers have the right to grow crops without the threat of contamination from GM and we believe we all have the right to know what we are eating.
Thank you, Jessa Latona and Heather McCabe
Greenpeace will continue to campaign against the introduction of GM wheat technology into Australia. We will do this by working with farmers to ensure they get protection from the threat of contamination this technology poses to them and their crops, and thus their livelihoods. We will support the introduction of farmers’ protection legislation to shift the liability of GM contamination from individual farmers back to the company that profits from GM crops.
We will work with consumer groups to ensure foods that have been genetically modified, or include ingredients that have been genetically modified, are labelled as such. We believe mums and dads want to know what they are feeding their families and that labelling should reflect the truth of the contents.
We will continue to work with global initiatives to support sustainable agriculture and sustainable agricultural policies across the globe.”
Some of the Greenwar Sabotage Portfolio outside Australia:
- The Greenwar Chronicles Part 33. Greenpeace on China GM laws. Nice pictures, shame about the misleading text
- Eggplant war: Scientists defend GMO in the Philippines
- NGO, GMO, OGM — Indian PM indicates foreign NGOs behind GMO protests
2012-11-19 03:01:43
Source: http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-greenwar-chronicles-part.html
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