Word: zealanders
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...Greenpeace answered some questions but left others as tantalizingly mysterious as ever. All through the summer, Paris papers and French politicians had speculated endlessly about whether the government was responsible for the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior, the flagship of the environmental group Greenpeace, in Auckland harbor in New Zealand on July 10. Tricot's conclusion: "Everything I have seen and heard gives me the certitude that at the government level there was no decision aimed at damaging the Rainbow Warrior...
...report admitted that agents had been sent to New Zealand to spy on the ship before it set sail to lead a protest against French nuclear tests in the South Pacific. But the inquiry cleared the agents of any involvement in the bombing, in which a Greenpeace photographer was killed. Wrote Tricot: "I believe in their innocence...
While the report cooled pressure for the resignations of top government officials, it brought sharp criticism from David Lange, the Prime Minister of New Zealand, who claimed that Tricot had ignored evidence submitted by the New Zealand authorities. The report, fumed the angry Prime Minister, was "too transparent to merit the description of whitewash." Lange seemed somewhat mollified later in the week when Premier Fabius made a conciliatory public statement calling the bombing "a criminal act" and pledging that "the guilty, whoever they are, will have to be punished...
Seven French agents had been sent to keep the Rainbow Warrior under surveillance before it set out on its protest mission, the report said. Two of them, Dominique Prieur and Alain Mafart, are being held in custody in New Zealand on charges of murder and arson. Three other agents, all men, were identified by the report as crew members of the Ouvea, a chartered yacht spotted in New Zealand waters shortly before the explosion. The fact that Mafart and the Ouvea crew members were all experts in underwater demolition raised new suspicions. Alain Madelin, a rightist member of the French...
...October. In a sharply worded statement immediately following the ship's departure, Mitterrand vowed to continue testing in the area and to repel all protests "by force if necessary." Greenpeace officials have said that the group would abide by the twelve-mile barrier imposed by France, but New Zealand's Lange was dismayed by the warning. The threat, he said, "reflects the consistent ly insensitive attitude of the French...