Quite simply pathetic ... when eco terrorists want to blow up refineries there we can talk about "main threat" ... Until pollution kills 40 people per year in France ... So who are the real terrorists ?
Good reading...
These eco-terrorists who worry Europe
The fire occurred between 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. on Saturday, June 28. The Charles River laboratory, 325 employees in Saint-Germain-sur-L'Arbresle (Rhône), saw three commercial vehicles and part of its premises go up in smoke. On the ground, an acronym, as a signature: ALF, Animal Liberation Front.
A subsidiary of an American group, Charles River is one of the first breeders of laboratory animals. The fire having been caused by explosives - a gas cylinder and an "original" firing device - the file landed in the anti-terrorism section of the Paris prosecutor's office. A cell of ten gendarmes is in charge of the investigation within the counterterrorism office of the gendarmerie, already in charge of the attack which had targeted, a year earlier, in April 2007, the company specializing in the manufacture of cages, Tecniplast, in Limonest, also in the Rhône. There too, ALF had appeared. "With Charles River, it is no longer a subcontractor, but a full-fledged player in research, we have taken a step forward", worries an expert.
The actions of the Animal Liberation Front (ALF in English) are claimed on Bite Back, a very militant website which lists, country by country, all manifestations of radical ecology. In the case of Charles River, photos have been published, one of which shows the fire at night, accompanied, as always, by a violent commentary, in English and French, and a threat: " We're not done with you ... "
ENLOCKED LOCKS
Faced with these attacks, manufacturers are worried. At the request of its members, - around forty firms and 32 associations which bring together laboratories -, the European Federation of Industrialists and Pharmaceutical Associations (Efpia) is organizing, on Monday July 28, in Brussels, a meeting on "ecoterrorism" in presence of Europol, the European police network. A first motivated by a series of recent incidents across Europe attributed to animal activists, and assimilated to terrorist attacks. "We are seeing more and more that this is becoming an international activity, which is exported and extended to continental Europe, with franchisees", comments Efpia lip service, which would have liked to preserve the confidentiality of its meeting.
Franchisees? Under the acronym of ALF, numerous sabotage actions are carried out against laboratories which practice animal experimentation, or their subcontractors, but also against furriers, traders or even restaurateurs.
Appeared in Great Britain in the 1970s, the phenomenon spread to the United States, then to Europe, and more and more to Russia. This "emerging threat" has mobilized police services in many countries over the past decade. In 1999, an English journalist was briefly kidnapped and branded with the letters ALF on the back. The novelist Tom Clancy, specialist in American intelligence and the CIA, devoted, in 1998, one of his books, Rainbow Six. More recently, academician Jean-Christophe Rufin, French ambassador to Senegal, in a well-documented story, Le Parfum d'Adam (Flammarion, 2007), took an interest in the activism of fanatic ecologists who are turning to conspiracy. "The FBI considers radical ecology as the second most important terrorist threat after Islamic fundamentalism", explained the writer then.
Until now, France, used to the campaigns of Brigitte Bardot, considered itself relatively spared. But it has now joined, according to an investigator, "the leading pack" of the countries concerned. "It is growing," admits Christian Dupouy, head of the counter-terrorism office at the general direction of the national gendarmerie. The peak was reached in 2007 with 53 actions claimed, including 25 "journeys" (more or less coordinated but simultaneous actions). In 2008, an initial assessment drawn up on March 31 gave hope for a slight lull: 13 actions on 16 targets (including 8 insignificant sabotages) during the first three months of the year, against 18 in 2007 targeting 45 targets. But, with the Rivers affair, the Home Office must have been disillusioned.
One to two actions are listed per month in France on Bite Back, some folklore, such as the release of a magpie from its cage in Midi-Pyrénées. But there is more worrying. In January, a Bordeaux furrier, Michel Grama, owner of two stores, was the victim, in addition to the ritual tags, of a fire near the door of his home, which could have gone wrong. His name, address and private telephone number had been made public ...
Others were the target of a real harassment intended to cause their closure: insulting tags, stuck locks, broken windows, intimidation messages, such as the Leather Center stores in Orgeval (Yvelines), a butcher's shop in Carcassonne (Aude ) or this Parisian restaurateur accused of supporting bullfighting. Even the Pinder circus has dealt, in Montpellier, with animal activists.
All these operations remain most often "on the edge of terrorism", to use the expression of a police officer. But some activists who love going underground and their black hooded photos have taken the plunge. "The modes of action are quite comparable: informal cells, night commandos, great paranoia and the desire to strike public opinion with large-scale actions", notes an investigator.
In August 2007, WARC, the Animal Rights Militia, another small group also of British origin, had made believe, in its first operation launched in France, that it had introduced hydrogen peroxide in solutions for lenses manufactured by the Novartis laboratory, forcing the French authorities to request the recall of these products. Police from the Anti-Terrorism Branch (SDAT) closed the file without finding the perpetrators.
Other characteristics close to "classic" terrorism: the mobility of militants and the intensive use of the Internet to disseminate, mobilize and recruit. "ALF does not exist, it is a rallying acronym, any action can be claimed by ALF", judge Bruno Verschuere, representative of Gircor. Created in 1991, this association, which brings together French public and private laboratories to defend research based on animal experimentation, fears an intensification of "green commandos".
At the same time as the United States, which adopted the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act in 2006, Great Britain took the lead by adding in the Homeland Security Act promulgated after the London bombings of 2005 a codicil intended to protect seekers of "threats", slander and "harassment". In France, nothing distinguishes ecoterrorists, prosecuted under the classic incriminations of "threats under conditions" or "association of criminals in connection with a terrorist enterprise".
Isabelle Mandraud
26.07.08.
THE WORLD
if we kill bees, we kill humans! ............
So for the moment the kids are not capricious and stupid at the same time, but what if it develops !?