Yachting: Radicals vow to stop nuclear-sponsored French yacht

By BERNARD ORSMAN and JULIE ASH

Radical French environmentalists are threatening to sabotage the French America's Cup entry unless the nuclear firm Areva backs out of a $33.7 million sponsorship deal.

Alain Rivat, who heads an anti-nuclear organisation, told London's Daily Telegraph it was ready to use all means possible to blockade the French boat being built on the Brittany coast at Vannes.

French activists meeting further north at Lorient, where the challenge team have their training base, said that unless Areva dropped its sponsorship, the boat would "never arrive" in Auckland.

Disruption of training at the Defi Areva base was not ruled out.

Areva's support of the French team was bound to raise hackles and act as a reminder of French Government agents sinking the Greenpeace vessel Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour in 1985, also causing the death of a Portuguese photographer who was on board.

Areva was formed in 2000 from France's nuclear fuel and power plant industries, embracing the entire power cycle from uranium mining to power plant decommissioning. It has 50,000 employees and a turnover of about €10 billion ($20.4 billion).

Greenpeace in New Zealand has condemned acts of violence against the French challenge but not ruled out its own non-violent protests against the nuclear giant, including using highly mobile inflatable boats to disrupt races.

Greenpeace campaigner Bunny McDiarmid told the Herald yesterday that it was completely inappropriate for a company like Areva to polish its image in a sporting event like the America's Cup.

She said Areva was 80 per cent indirectly controlled by the French Atomic Energy Commission, which developed France's nuclear arsenal and monitored nuclear testing at Mururoa Atoll in the South Pacific.

The Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron, which will host the America's Cup from October this year, is barred by legislation from only one type of sponsorship - tobacco.

Commodore Peter Taylor said the squadron did not want to get involved in the financial arrangements of the team. "Our role is to be the host."

But Bunny McDiarmid said Greenpeace would like to see sponsorship legislation changed to prohibit the nuclear industry from promoting its business.

America's Cup Minister Trevor Mallard said many New Zealanders would be unimpressed by the nuclear involvement, but the decision was up to the French. He did not favour extending the sponsorship ban to nuclear products.

Tobacco advertising was linked to people starting smoking, but it was unlikely they would start experimenting with nuclear power because of sponsorship.

Asked what he thought of protests against the boat, Mr Mallard said: "I have no problems with legal protest. Illegal actions would be a matter for the police."

Areva vice-chairman Jacques-Emmanuel Saulnier, who is coming to Auckland next week to find a base for his nuclear-sponsored boat, has already tried to stop connections between his company and Mururoa.

Only two weeks ago, the Frenchman pleaded with New Zealanders not to link his company with the Rainbow Warrior bombing, French nuclear testing at Mururoa Atoll and nuclear weapons of mass destruction.

"We should not be held accountable for what happened 20 years ago," he said.

"New Zealanders know very well the difference between civil and military nuclear capabilities. When we explain this to them, then they will understand."

Frenchman Bruno Trouble, spokesman for the Louis Vuitton Cup challenger series, said the Areva-sponsored team did not want to upset New Zealanders.

"I can assure you the French team are not going to come here with an atomic bomb printed on their sails or hull," he said.

The one and only French boat is due to be launched in May and will arrive in New Zealand in mid-August.

Senior Sergeant Martin Paget, head of the maritime police unit and of planning for the America's Cup, said that because of New Zealanders' views on nuclear issues there would probably be protests against the Areva.

He was coy about increased security for the French syndicate.

"It is a fluid environment, where we are constantly assessing what the risks are and making sure we will have in place a reasonable level of resource to deal with what occurs."

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