Tech | December 21, 2010 | 27 comments

WikiLeaks: US Ambassador Planned "Retaliation" Against France Over Ban on Monsanto Corn

source: http://www.truth-out.org/wikileaks-us-ambassador-planned-retaliation-against-france-over-ban...

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JanforGore
The former United States ambassador to France suggested "moving to retaliation" against France and the European Union (EU) in late 2007 to fight a French ban on Monsanto's genetically modified (GM) corn and changes in European policy toward biotech crops, according to a cable released by WikiLeaks on Sunday.

Former Ambassador Craig Stapleton was concerned about France's decision to suspend cultivation of Monsanto's MON-810 corn and warned that a new French environmental review standard could spread anti-biotech policy across the EU.

"Country team Paris recommends that we calibrate a target retaliation list that causes some pain across the EU since this is a collective responsibility, but that also focuses in part on the worst culprits," Stapleton wrote to diplomatic colleagues.

President George W. Bush appointed Stapleton as ambassador to France in 2005, and in 2009, Stapleton left the office and became an owner of the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team. Bush and Stapleton co-owned the Texas Rangers during the 1990s.
Monsanto is based in St. Louis.

The EU's 1998 approval of MON-810 corn has since expired. In recent years, several European countries joined France in banning MON-810 and similar biotech crops while the products are reassessed in light of research showing they could harm the environment and human health.

It is not clear if Stapleton's retaliation scheme was ever implemented.

"In our view, Europe is moving backwards not forwards on this issue with France playing a leading role, along with Austria, Italy and even the Commission ... Moving to retaliation will make clear that the current path has real costs to EU interests and could help strengthen European pro-biotech voices," Stapleton wrote.

MON-810 is engineered to excrete the Bt toxin, which is poisonous to some insect pests. A stacked version of MON-810 is also engineered to be resistant to glyphosate, a herbicide first popularized by Monsanto under the brand name Roundup.

The debate in France over Monsanto's GM products has grown ugly in recent years.
A recent Truthout report detailed the story of Dr. Gilles-Eric Seralini, a scientist at the University of Caen in France. Seralini's supporters claim the scientist has faced intimidation from within the French scientific community after he published several studies showing Monsanto GM corn and glyphosate posed risks to human health.
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27 comments // WikiLeaks: US Ambassador Planned "Retaliation" Against France Over Ban on Monsanto Corn

  • gerardange
    • +2
      gerardange  
    • Image

    • Okay now what?

      So now we all go back to sleep? Back to business as usual & doing nothing?

      Doing nothing is stupid!

      Doing something is courageous...

      WIKILEAKS IS A WAKE-UP CALL !!!

      Wikileaks is a global "Virus Protection Software" that has shown all of us that our systems are infected.... That there is a trojan virus running in the background - doing things against the interests of the People of the Country that the government is mandated to represent.

      This is a real wake-up call for people everywhere.... that Corporations have taken over all our government systems... Stealing all our freedoms and making us slaves of their corporate system.

      LEARN FROM HISTORY.....

      Mussolini quote: " Fascism should be appropriately called Corporatism because of a merger of State & Corporate Power."

      That is what is going on here...

      This is a wake-up call for everyone.. and

      Wikileaks is the Alarm Bell !!!

      Truth is courageous...

      ~

    • 1 year ago
  • PressCore
    • +2
      PressCore  

    • Hiitler & Musolini would have been proud of an UnAmerican ambassador
      seeking to retaliate against the very country that helped the USA win it's
      independence in the American Revolution. Corporate Fascism at its worst.
      Thank God we have Wilileaks to continue the fight to make the USA free.

    • 1 year ago
  • JanforGore
  • CalgarC
    • 0
      CalgarC  

    • its not leaking its overflowing...
      omg he filled up the whole pig silo in just 2 days

      haha don't you just love Julian

    • 1 year ago
  • figgdimension
  • MrMxyzptlk
  • trut
  • MrMxyzptlk
  • Swisher
  • RaceBannon
    • +1
      RaceBannon  
    • MrMxyzptlk:

      bad assessment, I'm literally there now. Europeans in a general sense are very educated people with significant exceptions. Better yet with the internet many people are up to date with the latest "ideas" coming out of the states so this a grass roots thing. While a side benefit is to assist local farmers with all the austerity measures for the benefit business the government still answers to the people. Lets use anecdotal evidence for kicks.

      Like anyone I myself like to eat the best possible food I can, and immediately upon going to markets here I notice the food is way better. The produce is natural fresh, smaller and rots quickly. On the other hand the American counterpart produce is usually twice the size and for some reason can last a week or two. The meat comes from the butcher (i don't eat red meat), the chickens are a normal size and filling with little fat on the bird ( I'll admit which is difficult for making sauce). Fish is an exception, I haven't seen to much "farmed" fish yet

      Another element of Europe is the left is very pro active, I just had lunch with some friends from a collective and some cool ideas are emerging I must admit. I applaud France for this one and the EU. If societies treat the food supply like a commodity, well we get what we pay for in the end. Further I must admit the US government is so interested in promoting mosantos crap unto the world is an unsettling matter. I hate vigilance but for now Europe will have do exactly that to maintain quality.

      There a saying my mother still repeats to this day, "est bon marché cher".

    • 1 year ago
  • MrMxyzptlk
  • MrMxyzptlk
  • BrushwithDeathToothpaste
  • BrushwithDeathToothpaste
  • trut
  • keepthinkingboo
  • artemis6
  • pjacobs51
  • projectmayhem
    • projectmayhem  
    • This comment was removed as a violation of community guidelines.
  • ozoneocean
  • trut
    • +9
      trut  

    • I think most of the world is tired of having to bend over for these multi-national corps and their lackies, the american federal government.

    • 1 year ago
  • JanforGore
  • JanforGore
    • +9
      JanforGore  
    • Image

    • http://current.com/technology/92738342_gmo-promoters-continue-attacking-and-inti...

      Intimidation of scientists from Drs. Armad Pusztai to Ignatio Chapela, to Seralini is more proof of what this is really all about.

      Cultivation of BT corn is declining in Europe. It's time that U.S. farmers follow suit for the biodiversity of this planet. We have more than enough corn for food if we stop ethanol subsidies and stop giving companies like Monsanto free reign over our economy in market speculation that causes smoke and mirror food shortages that hike food prices for their profit. This while people in the developing world who lack proper access also get this cr^^ dumped on them in food aid because of it while the food they grow either lays rotting or is used as export instead of feeding their own people.

      This is also why the Obama administration as well with all of its Monsanto appointees can no longer state they are for addressing climate change effectively or believe in indigenous rights if they continue to allow Monsanto and other companies to deforest land to grow these crops for profit to make animal feed and corn ethanol that does nothing to feed the world or to qualify as anything nearing sustainable agriculture.

    • 1 year ago
  • JanforGore
  • JanforGore
  • JanforGore
  • JanforGore
    • +7
      JanforGore  

    • Is it really the job of the US government to think they have the right to bully other countries in shoving this Monsanto sh** down everyone's throats? How totally ugly and fascist, but then that's Monsanto in a nutshell.

    • 1 year ago
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