French agent’s action

Press, 15 February 1986, Page 18

French agent’s action

Sir,—l do not see the difference between State-backed violence and unrecognised groups using violence to further their aims. To me both are terrorism. Joel Prieur’s excuse that his wife was acting under orders is irrelevant. The same excuse was not accepted at Nuremburg, the same excuse could also be used by the I.R.A. or other organisations that are regularly branded as terrorist. If you work for a Government you are a soldier, a hero, or a secret agent. If not, even if your group is fighting for the very life and liberty of your people, you are a terrorist. It seems there is one rule for some, another for the rest. Why, when killing is equally sick, equally wrong no matter who carries it out? —Yours, etc., C. O’DONOGHUE. February 13, 1986.

Sir,—Joel Prieur says he cannot understand why his wife is called an international terrorist. He says that in his work as a Paris fireman he has seen the results of bombings. Then he should be well aware that any bomb is indiscriminate. It is the weapon of a coward, the sneak who is not too fussy who gets killed. Pereira is just as dead as if the bomb had killed him, and if one of the frogmen had died in the subsequent salvage work, would the bomb not have killed him too? To say his wife was acting under orders is the oldest excuse in the book. The Nazis used it at Nuremburg. It was not accepted then and should not be

accepted now. It might be timely to remind Joel Prieur that many New Zealanders died fighting in two world wars for and on behalf of La Belle France.—Yours, etc., H. D. A. COX, Oxford. February 13, 1986.

Sir,—The excuses offered by Joel Prieur for his wife’s role in the Rainbow Warrior bombing are vacuous and an outrage. She is guilty of complicity in a lethal terrorist act. She is responsible for her own actions. Joel Prieur says France has a gun at her head. I would remind him that the nuclear gun is pointed at us all, with a hair trigger. France continues to violate the nuclearfree declaration of South Pacific nations. Her cowardly act of terrorism toward Greenpeace and New Zealand can in no way be explained away.—Yours, etc., ROBERT L. LEONARD. February 13, 1986.