Mitterrand 'gave approval' for Warrior attack
11 July 2005
By LOUISE BLEAKLEY and AGENCIES
Greenpeace New Zealand is unsurprised by revelations in the French newspaper Le Monde that the attack on the Rainbow Warrior 20 years ago was done with the "personal authorisation" of France's late president, Francois Mitterrand.
Le Monde newspaper published extracts in its Saturday edition of a 1986 account written by Pierre Lacoste, the former head of France's DGSE foreign intelligence service, giving the clearest demonstration yet of Mitterrand's direct involvement in the sinking of the campaign vessel on July 10, 1995.
Portuguese photographer Fernando Pereira was killed in the attack, and yesterday his daughter, Marelle, joined members of the original crew and police investigators at a ceremony at Matauri Bay to mark the bombing.
The Rainbow Warrior was leading Greenpeace's campaign against French nuclear tests on the Mururoa Atoll in the Pacific when two explosions on the Warrior rocked Auckland's Waitemata Harbour.
Two French agents were later tried and imprisoned for blowing up the ship.
They began their sentences in New Zealand, but were later transferred to a military base in French Polynesia and were released within three years of the attack.
Mitterrand's involvement had been suspected from day one, Greenpeace New Zealand campaign manager Cindy Baxter said yesterday.
"(The president) was determined to go ahead with those tests," she said.
Uncovering Mitterrand's involvement had taken over two decades because of efforts by French authorities to cover it up.
"It takes the French media 20 years to discover who put their name to the bombs," Baxter said.
"The French would rather the whole thing had gone away."
The same newspaper that uncovered Mitterrand's role in the plot was also responsible for proving French agencies planned the dangerous operation 20 years ago.
Baxter said despite the strong evidence linking top French leaders with the bombing, no-one had yet apologised to Greenpeace.
In Le Monde, Lacoste wrote that he "would not have launched such an operation without the personal authorisation of the President of the Republic".
"I asked the president if he gave me permission to put into action the neutralisation plan that I had studied on the request of Monsieur (Charles) Hernu," Lacoste said.
Hernu was defence minister at the time. "He gave me his agreement while stressing the importance he placed on the nuclear tests," Lacoste said.
"I didn't go into greater detail on the plan as the authorisation was explicit enough."
At yesterday's commemorations, Greenpeace France disarmament campaigner Xavier Renou called on his Government to get rid of its nuclear weapons.
"France is currently using the data gathered from nuclear tests in Mururoa during the '80s and '90s to upgrade its nuclear weapons systems, flying in the face of its international commitments to disarm," he said.
"Hypocrisy is the real driver of nuclear proliferation."
Original Warrior skipper Pete Willcox dived down 25m to the wreck and placed a memorial sculpture on the bridge.
The present Rainbow Warrior, with a banner reading "NZ: proud to be nuclear free," was joined by several other vessels in the bay.
Crew member Steve Sawyer, whose birthday was being celebrated on the night of the bombing, urged world leaders to stop spending money and intelligence on more sophisticated nuclear weapons and to promote peace, combat climate change and preserve the world's forests and oceans.
Greenpeace New Zealand executive director Margaret Crozier noted that 20 years later New Zealanders remained firm in their commitment to being nuclear free
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