French saboteurs oppose bid for video of trial

By KEITH PERRY

Two French terrorists who helped to sink the Rainbow Warrior are battling to keep video footage of their historic guilty plea off New Zealand television screens.

Lawyers for Alain Mafart and Dominique Prieur appeared in the High Court at Auckland yesterday in a bid to stop documentary makers gaining access to footage of their original Auckland trial in 1985.

The application for the video came from barrister Colin Amery.

He made an impassioned plea to gain access to the tape made when the terrorists pleaded guilty in the Auckland District Court to the bombing, which killed Greenpeace photographer Fernando Pereira and sank the protest ship in the Waitemata Harbour.

He argued that the "right to ventilate" such a historic moment was both in the public interest and an act of justice.

The application, which has already been turned down twice - once by the Court of Appeal - was opposed by lawyer Keith Catran on behalf of the saboteurs, who argued that the video should enjoy the protection of court rules on evidence and was never filmed for the purposes of broadcasting.

He said that while Mafart and Prieur knew they were being videotaped during their 1985 trial, they had no idea that the tape might later be used in a television programme.

Yesterday's case was further complicated by the fact that no one appeared to know where the tape was, or what the footage contained.

In a sometimes heated exchange, Mr Amery accused the High Court of "leaning over backwards to give kid-glove treatment to the terrorists, who did not even serve a full prison term for their crimes."

Justice Randerson warned him his comments were "inappropriate."

Mr Amery argued that the video was needed for possible use in a documentary which went back to his own involvement and interest as a law student in the Rainbow Warrior bombing, and as a private prosecutor. It was an event at the heart of his decision to become a barrister, he said.

In 1986, a group including Mr Amery tried to legally block Mafart and Prieur's departure for a French-controlled Pacific atoll to serve the remainder of the 10-year sentences imposed on them for manslaughter.

The barrister said that "two public polls indicated 80 per cent support for our action."

At the time, he blamed "French economic blackmail and force majeur" for the saboteurs' release.

Appearing in court yesterday, Mr Amery said: "This is the last attempt I will get in my lifetime to bring this historic video into the public arena. We live in a visual age where court proceedings are now televised. We have video footage of the historic moment when these two terrorists were convicted and I believe the public has a right to see it."

Mr Amery said he could understand the court's anxiety to protect the rights of ordinary "down-trodden citizens" but argued that Mafart in particular had forgone that right because he recently wrote a book about the bombings, The Secret Diaries of a Combat Diver.

"Mafart stated publicly he is making money from the book ... I am questioning whether he is entitled to the protection he is getting now. The High Court is effectively gagging the project."

But Mr Catran argued that the only purpose Mr Amery wanted to make of the footage was "to add visual drama to a popular television documentary."

Justice Randerson reserved his decision.