Posted on 12/03/2004 6:55:19 AM PST by dead
BBC World said yesterday it was duped in an "elaborate deception" by a man who claimed to be a Dow Chemical Co spokesman and said the US company accepted responsibility for India's Bhopal disaster.
The British news channel, after twice running the interview with a man identified as Jude Finisterra, later said the report was wrong.
A spokeswoman for Dow Chemical in Switzerland also confirmed that the report was wrong.
The man's identity could not be confirmed and his motives were not immediately clear. BBC officials were not readily available for comment but the broadcaster said on air it was trying to determine what happened.
"We apologise to Dow and to anyone who watched the interview who may have been misled by it," the BBC said in a statement read out during a subsequent news bulletin. "Of course, the BBC is investigating how the deception happened."
The statements by the man to the BBC, had they been true, would have marked a major reversal for Dow Chemical, which has said it has no responsibility for the Bhopal disaster two decades ago.
Dow shares declined 3.4 per cent to 37 euros in Frankfurt.
The hoax was slammed as "cruel" in the city where thousands died.
"It is a cruel, cruel hoax to play on the people of Bhopal on the 20th anniversary of this tragedy," said Rachna Dhingra, an activist from the International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal.
"They have not lost hope; they have been through worse and are going to go through worse. This cannot shake their confidence," Dhingra said.
BBC World said earlier in the day the interview took place in Paris. It was aired on the 20th anniversary of the incident when more than 3,500 people died after lethal gas escaped from a chemical plant in the central Indian city.
"This morning at 9:00 and 10:00am GMT BBC World ran an interview with someone purporting to be from the Dow Chemical Company about Bhopal," the BBC said.
"This information was inaccurate, part of an elaborate deception. The person did not represent the company and we want to make it clear that the information he gave was entirely inaccurate."
The factory was owned by Union Carbide, now a subsidiary of Dow Chemical.
A Dow spokeswoman, speaking from Switzerland, told BBC World that Finisterra was not a Dow employee.
"Dow confirms there was no basis whatsoever for this report," Marina Ashanin said. "We also confirm Jude Finisterra is neither an employee nor a spokesperson for Dow."
"The bottom line is this is not true," a spokesman for Dow Chemical in Zurich told Reuters.
A spokesman for Union Carbide also told Reuters the report was false.
Reuters, AFP
"You couldn't have a starker contrast between the multiple layers of check and balances [of mainstream media outlets] and a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas writing."
- Jonathan Klein, former executive vice president of CBS News
I thought that Union Carbide was at fault??!!
They are just ska-ta....
Oops. Should have finished reading.
scata... nice Greek word
WOW! Another BOOB at the BEEB! (Did Dan Rather get a new job?)......
Greek?
My Norweigan friends told me it was a nice Norweigan word. Lol.
(It shouldn't either. You can't do much worse as a company than kill 4,000 people, and leave tens of thousands more disabled, in one night's work! Oooops!)
Dow is going to clobber them. Is the BBC owned by the British government, or do they just heavily subsidize them?
The Beeb is an independent corporation that is funded by a license fee on televisions, chartered by the government. Sort of the way that the United States Postal Service is now a separate corporation, but still answers to the US Government.
"You couldn't have a starker contrast between the multiple layers of check and balances [of mainstream media outlets] and a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas writing."
Lots of words have been left out of that sentence.
"You couldn't have a starker contrast between the multiple layers of check and balances [of mainstream media outlets] **all performed by lockstep liberal zombies** and a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas writing **for thousands of knowledgeable people who will jump on him with both feet if he posts something false**."
Yeah, that's quite a contrast. Looks like the lamestream media are still having delusions of adequacy.
Carbine built its plant far away from the population center. A community grew up around the plant over decades...
Okay.
Did you mean to address that to me in particular?
Scata - it's Italian
no.
delusions of adequacy.
That's good!!!
o.k. so I'm easily amused............
Is an example of the layers of fact checking that Jonathan Klein was talking about, that us Internet pajama folks don't do?
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