- Greenpeace has asked a judge in the United States to
strike out a prosecution it faces under the little-used law of "sailor-mongering".
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- The environmental pressure group is in the dock after
two activists boarded a ship in Miami, saying it was carrying illegally
logged mahogany from the Amazon. The protesters tried to unfurl a banner
reading "President Bush: Stop Illegal Logging", but were arrested
by coastguards.
-
- The protesters were sent to jail for a weekend for illegally
boarding the vessel two miles offshore in April last year. But the organisation
was then prosecuted under an 1872 law designed to stop criminals and prostitutes
boarding vessels to lure sailors to shore.
-
- The last time the law, which forbids the boarding of
"any vessel about to arrive at the place of her destination, before
her actual arrival", was used was more than 100 years ago.
-
- If found guilty, the organisation said it faces "unprecedented
supervision" by the US government. "The Justice Department wants
to brand Greenpeace a criminal operation," said John Passacantando,
the executive director of Greenpeace USA.
-
- The veteran civil rights activist Julian Bond accused
Attorney General John Ashcroft of trying to stifle legitimate protest.
He said: "If John Ashcroft had done this in the Sixties, black Americans
would not be voting today, eating at formerly all-white lunch counters
or sitting on bus front seats. This is a government assault on time-honoured
non-violent civil disobedience, as practised by Martin Luther King and
thousands of other Americans."
-
- Gerd Leipold, the head of Greenpeace International, added:
"Seventy per cent of Brazilian mahogany is destined for the American
market, most of it illegal. This is what Ashcroft should be stopping."
-
- A pre-trial hearing took place at the US District Court
in Florida yesterday, where lawyers for Greenpeace asked that the charge
be dropped.
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- © 2003 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd
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- http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?story=472811
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