Government dusts off 1800s law in targeting environmental group Greenpeace

MIAMI -- When prosecutors brought charges against Greenpeace for protesting a shipment of Amazon mahogany, they dusted off a 19th century federal law enacted to stop pimps from clambering aboard ships entering port.

Environmentalists call the charges a heavy-handed attempt to stifle free speech and say the government is retaliating against Greenpeace for previous in-your-face protests against the Bush administration.

The federal government has never successfully prosecuted an entire activist organization on criminal charges over its protest methods -- not Operation Rescue, not the NAACP, not even the Ku Klux Klan.

"It's an incredible abuse of power, and this is nothing short of political retribution," said Sierra Club spokesman Eric Antebi. "We think this sets a horrible precedent for political intimidation of public interest groups."

Environmentalists want a judge to throw out the indictment and release Justice Department records on why charges were brought under an 1872 law that had not even been used since the 1800s. The judge is expected to rule sometime early this year on the requests by Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, the American Civil Liberties Union and other supporters.

Defending the prosecution in court last month, Assistant U.S. Attorney Cameron Elliot insisted, "There is no evidence that the government has discriminated against Greenpeace because of its political views."

The group's vocal opposition to the federal government "makes it no different from thousands of other political advocacy groups," he said.

The mahogany protest came as the 965-foot APL Jade approached Miami Beach on April 12, 2002. Two Greenpeace protesters jumped aboard the ship more than three miles from shore, wearing shirts emblazoned "Greenpeace illegal forest crime unit" and carrying a banner reading "President Bush, Stop Illegal Logging." The ship's crew kept them from unfurling the banner.

Six activists were arrested on federal misdemeanor charges, and the indictment against the organization based on the old law came 15 months later.

The law was enacted to keep brothel operators from infiltrating ships "about to" dock. Pimps and others from brothels would row out to the vessels and persuade the sailors to jump ship with them or come over after docking. The sailors were then wined, dined and separated from their money.

Greenpeace maintains a ship moving at 10 mph three miles at sea is not covered by the "about to" dock requirement. The prosecutor retorted that an 1890 conviction was based on a boarding at the mouth of Oregon's Columbia River 50 miles from its dock in Portland. In the only other conviction on record, a New York judge who examined the law the year it was enacted called its language "inartistic and obscure."

One reason Greenpeace is fighting so hard is the potential punishment: a $20,000 fine and five years' probation, which could hinder the organization's use of civil disobedience as a protest tactic and could potentially open Greenpeace finances, operations, support and membership to government inspection.

"For an advocacy organization dedicated to passionate dissent, that could be a crippling inhibition," the Natural Resources Defense Council said in a brief in support of Greenpeace.

The nonprofit Greenpeace also fears the government will revoke its tax-exempt status if it is convicted.

Greenpeace, perhaps best known for sailing its boats into restricted waters and interfering with whaling ships and other vessels on the open seas, has been bothersome to President Bush since shortly after his inauguration, when members put up a banner near his Texas ranch calling him the "toxic Texan."

Greenpeace claims its ship protest called attention to the crime of big leaf mahogany logging in the Brazilian Amazon and the Bush administration's failure to enforce an import ban contained in an international treaty. Greenpeace contends roads built by mahogany loggers are the root cause of Amazon deforestation.

HERE is what Greenpeace is:

Gerard Jackson
Melbourne: Australia
BrookesNews.Com
Thursday 20 March 2003

Much as Greenpeace has tried to cover up, with the help of sympathetic journalists, its Soviet links, it is a matter of public record that during the 1980s the Soviets helped Greenpeace raise funds in return for which it helped the Soviets plan propaganda campaigns.

During the 80s the Soviets helped Greenpeace raise funds, while the environmentalist group helps formulate Soviet propaganda. It appears, however, that cooperation did not stop with just aiding the Soviet propaganda onslaught against the West.

Greenpeace made Fernando Pereira it official photographer. But Pereira had been and important member of the Stasi-backed Baader-Meinhof gang, a Marxist-Leninist terrorist group. The Dutch Communist Party later made him editor of its paper Der Waarheld. Eventually he was arrest by Dutch intelligence as a Soviet agent.

(The view that Greenpeace is evidently not bothered by certain brands of terrorism was given additional weight when it not only supported the eco-terrorist group Earth First but its cofounder Michael Roselle payroll).

Pereira was brought to Greenpeace by the World Peace Council, another Soviet front whose chairman, Chandra Romesh, was a Soviet agent.

So what was Greenpeace doing hiring a Soviet agent who had been an active member of a terrorist organisation? Well, do not bother asking, because Greenpeace ain't saying. But in case anyone thinks an innocent Greenpeace had been taken for a ride by cunning Soviet agents I should direct to attention to those KGB dregs that Greenpeace is still knowingly collaborating with.

William Arkin is the director of the Nuclear Information unit at Greenpeace. He was also a member of the Marxist-Leninist Washington-based IPS (Institute of Policy Studies). The IPS is notorious for having supported every communist regime that ever existed, including every leftwing terrorist organisation I can think of. It was so brazen in its support of the Soviets it even allowed KGB operatives to work in its Washington Office.

Brian Crozier (a highly respected commentator on intelligence matters and a fellow of the prestigious Institute for the Study of Conflict) summed up the real role of the IPS when he wrote:

"The IPS is the perfect intellectual front for Soviet activities which would be resisted if they were too originate openly from the KGB."

Another Greenpeace collaborator is the National Lawyers Guild. This Marxist-Leninist front for the Soviets was set up in 1936 by a caucus of the American Communist Party (CPUSA) which was helped at the time by the International Labor Defence, which in turn was an agency of the Comintern (Communist International).

Greenpeace is also in bed with the CCR (Centre for Constitutional Rights) which was co-founded by pro-Soviet lawyers William Kuntsler and Arthur Kinoy. This pair never saw a communist totalitarian state they did not like. Michael Ratner is the organisation's current president and a notorious fellow traveller who blames the US — you guessed it — for terrorism.

The Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy is another longstanding friend of the water melons (green on the outside, red on the inside) that run Greenpeace. The IPS was instrumental in setting up SANE to oppose resistance to Soviet aggression. To make this organisation's pro-Soviet activities more effective Greenpeace helped it build a computer network to coordinate its anti-American activities.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.