GM protesters face jail under ruling


26 November 1999



GM protesters face jail under ruling


PROTESTORS will be jailed if they damage any genetically modified (GM) crop trials run by Monsanto, under a court order issued yesterday (Thursday).

The company won a permanent injunction in the Court of Appeal preventing campaigners from disrupting their trials.

The order banned the anti-GM campaign group Genetix Snowball from encouraging others to damage or destroy GM crops.

Under the terms of the order, protesters and organisers of Genetix Snowball will be jailed if they are caught damaging Monsantos trials.

The protesters are planning to fight the decision.

They are to petition the House of Lords on the ground that they have been denied the right to a fair trial.

They are prepared to take their case to the European Court of Human Rights and claim Monsanto is using the civil courts to bypass the criminal justice system.

The defendants in the case openly uprooted GM crops in front of police at Model Farm, near Watlington, Oxfordshire, in July last year.

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