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Animal Rights Activists Terrorize Stock Broker With No Ties to Testing
Focus: He was not a scientist and did not harm animals. But they blew his car up anyway
The latest attack shows that animal rights extremists are now targetting people with little connection to testing labs. Tim Luckhurst reveals who is behind these terrifying tactics
26 June 2005
The black Hyundai car was parked in the garage of Michael Kendall's home when it burst into flames, on the night of 26 May. "We heard the alarm go off and ran out to see what was going on," said a neighbor in Bracknell, Berkshire. "A tyre exploded, making a huge banging noise. You could feel the heat coming off the fire."
Mr Kendall, his wife and two young daughters, who had all been asleep in the house before the blaze, escaped unhurt. The fire was blamed on an electrical fault in the vehicle, and not considered suspicious at the time.
That all changed, dramatically, on Thursday. A website called Bite Back carried claims that the Animal Liberation Front had placed an incendiary device under the car. The attack was, it now seems, part of a campaign of terror being waged in this country against any company with a connection, no matter how remote, to scientific research involving animals.
Michael Kendall has been described as a family man with no personal links to animal testing whatsoever. He is, however, finance director for the small Canadian stockbrokers Canaccord Capital, which has provided services to Phytopharm, a British biotechnology group. Phytopharm has, in the past, been a customer of Huntingdon Life Sciences, the research laboratory based in Cambridgeshire that has received a great deal of threatening attention from animal rights extremists.
When Bite Back suggested that this tenuous link had made Mr Kendall a personal target, his company responded by ending its relationship with Phytopharm. Soon afterwards, the Phytopharm share price tumbled.
That was exactly what the ALF wanted. It claimed responsibility for the fire with an internet posting that announced "a new era" of attacks had dawned. "If you support or raise funds for any company connected with Huntingdon Life Sciences we will track you down, come for you, and destroy your property with fire."
The tactic is called tertiary targeting. Barbara Davies of the Research Defence Society (RDS), which promotes understanding of the use of animals in research, says: "The targets of extremists are getting more and more tenuous because the primary targets are so careful to protect their staff. The militants have taken to intimidating the people who supply services to animal researchers. Their objective is to force organisations to close down by targeting individuals."
A spokesman for the National Extremism Tactical Co-Ordination Unit (Netcu), the police task force dedicated to fighting animal rights terrorism, explains. "They will even take it to the fourth degree of separation and target a supplier to a supplier to a supplier. It is extremely serious, very distressing and alarmingly effective."
The website of one of the most militant groups, Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, declares: "Shac is here to deliver justice to Huntingdon's suppliers." Jim Watkins (not his real name) was a victim of Shac. He believes extremists targeted him because a foreign shareholder in his company had once done business with HLS. At first he received threats by email. One read: "You're fucked. Your company is fucked. I would gladly go to prison for stabbing an animal abuser to death."
Next, a very authentic hoax parcel bomb was delivered to his house. "Then we got a dozen home visits, always at night." His attackers let off fireworks, spray-painted his house and threw paint stripper on cars. Letters were sent to his neighbours alleging that he was a convicted paedophile. Jim says: "As battlefield tacticians they are technically brilliant. It works. You can't stand it. You do what they want to make them stop."
Major police investigations are currently under way. The head of Netcu, Superintendent Steve Pearl, says: "These are extremely serious crimes. They demonstrate that animal rights extremists continue to recognise no boundaries in what they are prepared to do."
Experts identify four main groups whose members include those involved in what the FBI calls terrorism but British authorities prefer to define as extremism or criminal militancy. These groups also include people who do not approve of extremist tactics. Shac was formed in 1999, as was Save the Newchurch Guinea Pigs or SNGP, which campaigns for the closure of Newchurch Farm, near Burton on Trent in Staffordshire, where guinea pigs are bred for laboratory use. Speak is a group originally set up to prevent the building of a primate research centre at Cambridge University. Then there is the ALF itself, a network of groups in Britain and around the world that advocates "rescuing animals and causing financial loss to animal exploiters, usually through the damage and destruction of property".
None of these organisations has formal memberships. They also share members. A Netcu spokesman explains: "There is substantial overlap between all the extremist groups and between legitimate groups and extremists. Overlap between protest and criminal action is a huge problem in the animal rights movement."
Intelligence sources explain that the leading minds behind the broader ALF movement establish local front organisations, on the classic Trotskyite model, to fight specific campaigns. These groups recruit honest, committed animal welfare activists but also provide cover for extremist activity. This is almost always claimed under the ALF banner. The police are currently very concerned about the Gateway to Hell Campaign, an initiative set up to prevent the import of animals for vivisection. It claims to be "an independent collective of animal rights activists". Police sources fear it involves several seasoned ALF extremists.
The campaign against Huntingdon Life Sciences rose to prominence in 2001, when shareholders, banks and investors began to be targeted, causing massive disruption and expense to businesses and individuals. Now builders, hauliers, cleaning companies and caterers are deemed "legitimate targets".
Gateway to Hell achieved a notable "success" recently when it celebrated British Airways' promise not to accept the carriage of primates, wild birds or other live animals "for use in any laboratory or for experimentation or exploitation". Earlier activists intimidated Air Mauritius into ending its transport of live macaque monkeys. A spokesman for the airline described that campaign as "commercial terrorism".
Barbara Davies warns: "Secondary and tertiary targeting has had the potential to seriously damage medical research in this country. At the moment all the extremists have to do is say, 'We know where your children go to school' and suppliers will take the route of least resistance and withdraw services to the target companies."
But the RDS believes help is on the way. The Serious Organised Crime and Police Act, which received royal assent in April, gives the police new powers to tackle intimidation of individuals and companies working in the supply chain to animal research facilities. The Government's intention is to end campaigns that the Secretary of State for Health, Patricia Hewitt, believes put "breakthroughs in areas like Aids, cancer and Alzheimer's directly at risk".
But campaigners vow to go on. Keith Mann, 39, a leading member of the ALF now in prison for contempt of court, said yesterday that they have no choice. "We have got Asbos being used against us - we have injunctions to stop us protesting. All that is left now is to turn to extremism."
WHO ARE THEY?
Shac
Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty. Formed in 1999 with main aim of closing down Europe's largest animal testing lab, Huntingdon Life Sciences. Defended its targeting of Jim Watkins by claiming that he worked for a company that had raised millions for another company that was a customer of HLS. Motto: "Words mean nothing. Action is everything."
SNGP
Save the Newchurch Guinea Pigs. Also started in 1999, to campaign for closure of Newchurch Farm in Staffordshire, where guinea pigs are bred for use in scientific tests. Has targeted Calor Gas, which supplies fuel for the central heating at the farm. Motto: "Liberation now".
Gateway to Hell
Just launched, with stated aim of ending vivisection in the UK by targeting the airports, airlines and other means by which animals for laboratory use are imported. Claims to be an "independent collective of animal rights activists". Has already been associated with intimidation of British Airways staff.
The ALF
The Animal Liberation Front, a network of groups committed to direct action against "animal abusers". Tactics include breaking into laboratories, causing damage and destruction to property and making increasingly personal attacks on staff and directors. No central leadership; described by opponents as "the al-Qa'ida of animal rights".
27 June
2005, The Independent
Animal Rights Extremists Target Executive
with Bomb
Animal rights activists forced the broker of drug maker Phytopharm to quit today after targeting one of its top executives.
Canaccord Capital resigned as broker to the company less than a month after an incendiary device exploded under the car of its European finance chief.
Responsibility for the attack was claimed by the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), which urges direct action against firms that have business ties to Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS).
A message on the Bite Back website said: “Phytopharm get out of HLS or see your share price crash and your supporters’ property go up in flames.”
The shock resignation of Canaccord Capital wiped almost a quarter off the value of Phytopharm early on, although shares in the drug maker recovered to stand 10% lower.
Phytopharm was targeted twice last year when militants broke into its offices in Godmanchester, Cambridgeshire, and forced the company to secure an injunction against them.
Although it does not operate its own laboratories, Phytopharm angered animal rights activists by working with Japanese group Yamanouchi Pharmaceuticals on the development of an experimental drug for Alzheimer’s disease.
Yamanouchi is listed on the website of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (Shac) as a global target for its links to Huntingdon Life Sciences. However, the licensing deal between the Japanese firm and Phytopharm collapsed earlier this year.
Phytopharm develops medicines from plants and ancient remedies which are used to treat degenerative brain disorders such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and motor neurone disease as well as obesity, asthma and eczema.
The company
has signed a deal with consumer goods giant Unilever to develop
an appetite suppressant that will generate £6.7 million
during the course of the year.
23 June 2005, The Scotsman
Mail Terrorist Arrested for Sending
Razorblade to Chinese Consulate
A jobless man has been arrested for sending a threatening letter to the Chinese Consulate General here along with a razorblade, prefectural police said.
Mitsuhiro Naito, 38, a resident of Mito, Ibaraki Prefecture, is accused of intimidation. He admitted to the allegations during questioning. Police are grilling him over the motives behind his crime.
The National Police Agency has confirmed that 23 cases where facilities linked to China have been subject to intimidation, but this is the first time that a suspect has been arrested.
On April
13 this year, Naito mailed a letter saying, "Throw yourself
on the ground and apologize for your anti-Japan education,"
to the Chinese Consulate General in Nagasaki, investigators
said. He enclosed a razorblade in the envelope.
23 June 2005, Mainichi News
Biotech and Pharmaceuticals Fight Back Against Animal Rights
Extremists
The biotech and pharmaceutical industries are striking back against animal-rights extremists through the courts, legislatures, and public relations campaigns.
"We thought if we just kept our heads down, the problem of extremism would go away," said John Gallagher, director of corporate communications for Chiron Corp., an international biotech firm. "That was wishful thinking."
Gallagher was part of a panel discussion of the issue yesterday at the Biotechnology Industry Organization's gathering at the Convention Center.
Speakers described violent attacks, harassment and vandalism by the extremist fringe of the animal-rights movement, calling it "a burden of terror to biotech."
The tension between the biotech industry and animal-rights activists will continue to be on display at the meeting. Today, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) will protest outside the convention, showing what it says are secretly recorded videos of monkeys being choked, taunted and abused at a Virginia laboratory that belongs to Covance, one of the world's largest drug-development service companies. Covance is suing PETA in this matter.
PETA campaign coordinator Christy Griffin stressed that her organization worked within the law. "In every social-justice movement in history, you have people who feel the need to break laws to bring about change. That is something PETA is not involved in."
Nonetheless, two PETA employees were arrested last week in Ahoskie, N.C., after police found 18 dead dogs and cats in a shopping center garbage bin and 13 more in a van registered to PETA. PETA president Ingrid Newkirk told the Associated Press that the workers were supposed to pick up the homeless animals from animal shelters, then bring them to PETA headquarters in Norfolk for euthanization.
PETA was not the focus of the panel's criticism yesterday. Rather, the speakers denounced groups that advocate stopping animal research "at any cost." Those groups include the Animal Liberation Front, the Earth Liberation Front and Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC).
"They will hurt you, harass your families, and threaten your investors," said Frankie Trull, president of the National Association for Biomedical Research, a trade group.
She showed data that indicate the number of extremist groups and attacks on biotech companies is increasing - a view confirmed by John Lewis of the FBI's counter-terrorism unit, who was part of the panel discussion.
The irony, said Tim Morris, an executive from GlaxoSmithKline P.L.C.'s United Kingdom division, is that many big companies are reducing animal use and relying more heavily on cell and computer models. At Glaxo, he said, only 5 percent of research and development involves animals, and 99 percent of those animals are rodents and rabbits.
Chiron became a target of ALF and SHAC in 2003, after the company used Huntingdon Life Sciences, based in Cambridgeshire, U.K., to do some research. Chiron's Emeryville, Calif., campus was pipe-bombed, its executives were harassed at their homes, and employees received threatening calls, e-mails and faxes.
When Chiron got a restraining order against SHAC in the United Kingdom, the group responded with Internet postings of personal information about the judge and lawyers, Gallagher noted.
The Biotechnology Industry Organization and individual companies have stepped up campaigns to inform the public about their animal-treatment policies, and about the human life-saving treatments that have come from animal research. They also have successfully pushed for state and federal laws against extremists' actions.
"But,"
Trull said, "we believe animal-rights activists have
had an impact on young peoples' decisions to reject careers
in research."
21 June 2005, Philadelphia Enquirer
Police Investigate Explosive Device
in Sausalito
The Sausalito Police Department has a lead in its investigation into an explosive device found this week in the Marina Plaza Harbor, police Officer Jason McConnehey said today.
An anonymous source has informed the Sausalito Police Department that one harbor resident has an enemy or enemies "that would want to scare or frighten him,'' McConnehey said.
An explosive device resembling a pipe bomb might have been placed near the resident's boat on the pier to intimidate the resident, according to McConnehey.
A sailor found the device on Wednesday, but he thought it was a firecracker or a toy and threw it in one of the marina's storage containers.
"He thought it was a gag, or a toy. He didn't think much of it,'' McConnehey said.
When a Marina Plaza Harbor office worker heard about the item, which was a 12-inch tube, 1.5 inches in diameter with a fuse coming out of the side and two caps on either end, he reported it to the Police Department.
Officers were called to the marina's B dock at 11:45 a.m. on Friday and they evacuated several docks, McConnehey said.
Officers contacted the University of California, Berkeley Police Department bomb squad, the Sausalito Fire Department, and the U.S. Coast Guard for assistance.
Most of the device was destroyed when the bomb squad safely detonated it, McConnehey reported.
"It
appeared to be a dud,'' and the Police Department is calling
the device and the incident a hoax but detectives are continuing
to investigate who may have placed the device on the pier,
McConnehey said.
19
June 2005 BCN
Hate Mail and Suspected Parcel Bomb
Prompt Evacuation in Texas
Austin Police Department evacuated parts of West Campus Monday because of a "large, suspicious white package" thought to be a bomb. The package was found in the back parking lot of Ely Properties and was reported by Deacon Shields, the company's broker.
Ely Properties, as well as the surrounding buildings on the north block of 24th Street between Seton Avenue and Rio Grande Street, were evacuated by noon. After assessing the threat of the package, police closed off an additional block in each direction, further diverting vehicle and pedestrian traffic.
"We are a little concerned with what we are seeing," said Kevin Buckman, an APD spokesman. "For the public's safety, we are going to take extra precautions and expand our perimeters. Maybe we'll need to push them back further."
According to Ely employees, the 2-foot-by-1-foot package was wrapped in white butcher paper with the name "Kevin Phillips" written across the front in blue ink.
Jeff Tucker, an Ely employee, said that Phillips, an ex-tenant, lived in one of their properties for a year and frequently sent the company hate letters and postcards with threatening messages on them.
Television media were permitted to stand in an alley protected by four emergency vehicles: a bomb squad truck, ambulance and two fire trucks.
Concluding that the contents of the package were "suspicious," according to Detective Jim Neilson, the APD Bomb Squad attempted to reveal what was inside with a disrupter, a tool used to disable handmade bombs by shooting high-powered bursts of water at them. The first shot was not strong enough, but the second opened the package with a loud burst.
Neilson said the content of the package was not explosive but would not give any description of what was held inside because the case is now under investigation.
"From our perspective, we care that we can render it safe," Neilson said. "It is now going into investigation to find who placed it there, why it was placed there and any rationale for placing it there."
Ely employee Mary Costello said the company received a postcard Friday, allegedly from Phillips, reading, "I'm going to hurt you."
While police were on the scene, the mail arrived. According to Denise Peterson, the employee who picked up the mail, 15 to 20 pieces of the mail were from Phillips. Peterson said that in one of the postcards the threat escalated to "I'm going to kill you."
Phillips could not be reached for comment, and APD would not confirm Phillips' involvement.
14 June 2005, The Daily Texan
Suspicious Powder Sent to Coalition Embassies
Five embassies in Canberra, including the British High Commission, were closed temporarily today after receiving packages containing a suspicious white powder.
Envelopes containing the same powder, which police later said was harmless, were also sent to the Australian parliament and the office of the Prime Minister, John Howard.
The American, Italian, South Korean and Japanese embassies, as well as the British High Commission all shut this morning after discovering the packages. Emergency response staff and hazardous material handling teams were sent to each mission to secure and test the envelopes.
Australia's Parliament House remained open while police closed and later reopened the building's delivery entrance. All the envelopes were sent in the post.
Tests showed that the packages were harmless: "We haven’t been told what the powder is, but it appears to be a normal household powder," a police spokesman said.
Similar packages have been sent twice in the last week to the Indonesian Embassy, apparently to protest the imprisonment of an Australian woman in Bali on drug smuggling charges. One of the packages was a hoax, the other contained a harmless bacteria that led to staff at the embassy being quarantined and decontaminated.
"It is a nonsense, it is a waste of resources and it is a silly way for any person to make their point, political or otherwise," said Commander Shane Connelly, a deputy chief police officer.
Although Commander Connelly said that there was no apparent political motive behind the deliveries, all the countries whose embassies were targeted this morning have sent military forces to Iraq.
The American Embassy was closed for several hours after staff found their envelope and called local police, an embassy spokeswoman said.
"At some point in the late morning, Australian Federal Police restricted access to and from the embassy, and it was pretty much the better part of the day until they determined... it was not a bad substance," the spokeswoman said.
The spokeswoman would not say if there was a note in the envelope although the Italian deputy ambassador, Angelo Travaglini, told the Associated Press that the package they received did not come with a note.
10 June 2005, Sunday Times
Another Suspicious Package with Powder at Indonesia Embassy
A suspicious package containing white powder sparked a fresh security alert Tuesday at the Indonesian Embassy in Australia's capital but tests showed that the powder was harmless, police said.
None of the embassy staff had to undergo decontamination, less than a week after the mission was sealed off and its staff decontaminated when an earlier package of white powder was opened there.
That powder also was found to be harmless, and the hoax was linked to supporters of an Australian woman convicted in Indonesia of drug smuggling in a case that sparked anger among many Australians.
On Tuesday, officers in breathing gear sifted through mail at the diplomatic mission after the suspicious package was reported. Its powder was later tested, "and has returned a harmless result,'' police sergeant Steve Cooke told reporters.
Cooke declined to say whether a note was included in the package.
Speaking from India, Indonesian foreign ministry spokesman Marty Natalegawa branded Tuesday's scare another attempt to intimidate Indonesia, but praised security at the embassy.
"We are relieved that the security measure and detection system have obviously worked,'' Natalegawa said, but added: "It shows that the attempts to intimidate our mission (are) still with us.''
Australia's junior foreign minister, Bruce Billson, led a parliamentary delegation to Jakarta this week to smooth over concerns raised by last week's anthrax scare.
He said he did not believe the latest incident would harm bilateral relations.
"We need cool heads when these things occur,'' Billson told reporters in Jakarta, adding that relations "will not be knocked off course by these incidents.''
The Australian government and supporters of Schapelle Corby, a 27-year-old beauty school student sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment last month for smuggling 4.1 kilograms (nine pounds) of marijuana into the Indonesian tourist island of Bali, condemned the embassy attack last week as damaging to her appeal.
Corby, who claims the drugs were planted in her surfboard bag by luggage handlers in Australia is appealing her conviction and sentence while prosecutors also are appealing her sentence, saying it is too lenient.
Negotiations began in Jakarta this week on Australia's push for a prisoner exchange treaty that could enable Corby and 13 other Australians in Indonesian prisons to serve their time at home.
Billson said after discussions with Indonesian officials that such a treaty would take months.
"We discussed the Corby case briefly and recognized that calm heads are what (are) needed now,'' he said.
A poll published Tuesday revealed Australians are divided on whether Corby is guilty or innocent.
The AC Nielsen poll of 1,401 people published in The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper showed 17 percent of people are convinced Corby is innocent and 17 percent believe she was probably or definitely guilty.
A slight majority _ 51 percent _ thought the trial in Bali was unfair.
The poll had a margin of error of 2.6 percentage points.
A previous poll linked to a television show aired before Corby's May 27 verdict had suggested more than 90 percent of Australians believed she was innocent.
In a possible blow to the tourism industry in Bali, which draws thousands of Australians each year, 48 percent of the people in the latest poll said the Corby case would make them less likely to visit the tropical island
10 June
2005, AP
Bomb Explodes in College President’s
Mailbox
The US Postal Service and the Seminole County Sheriff are investigating the explosion of a home-made bomb in the mailbox of a college president.
Sheriff Joe Craig says Seminole State College President James Utterback found the bomb Saturday morning after it had exploded in his mailbox.
The device was made of an unidentified chemical that was placed inside a two-liter soda bottle. Utterback touched it, then went inside to wash his hands and call police.
Craig said yesterday that no one was hurt and the mailbox was left intact.
He says the device was designed to explode off of heat, and it probably didn't get quite hot enough to do the damage it should have.
Utterback told police he had an idea who might have left the bomb, and Craig said that person will be interviewed.
9 June
2005, AP
Embassy Powder Attacks Spark Warnings
of Retaliation Against Australians
Australian Prime Minister John Howard has warned of possible retaliation against Australians in Indonesia in response to the Indonesian Embassy scare.
"This was a reckless, evil act," Mr Howard said yesterday. "In so far as possible retaliatory action is concerned in Indonesia, there is always a danger of that."
The letter posted with the white powder to the Indonesian Embassy on Wednesday did not refer to Schapelle Corby, but was full of threats and racial abuse.
The Advertiser has been told the Indonesian language used in the brief hate statement was of a very poor standard.
Despite the lack of direct reference to Corby or her 20-year jail sentence, Mr Howard yesterday insisted the two were linked.
Preliminary tests carried out on the powder showed it was definitely not anthrax, ACT police said. However, the incident has already caused damage.
An Indonesian MP yesterday demanded a travel warning be issued for Indonesians traveling to Australia.
The attack on Indonesia's Canberra embassy, and the Government's linking of it to the Corby case, has received widespread media coverage in Indonesia.
The Department of Foreign Affairs, meanwhile, has been upgrading security at diplomatic posts around the world. On September 9 last year, a bombing outside the Australian Embassy in Jakarta killed 10 and injured more than 200.
"Just as we cannot guarantee a random act of stupidity with an evil intent . . . equally I cannot expect a guarantee from the Indonesian Government that some evil act of retaliation won't occur in that country," Mr Howard said. "Attacks could occur at any time, anywhere in Indonesia and could be directed against any locations known to be frequented by foreigners.
"The recommendation that Australians defer non-essential travel applies to Indonesia as a whole, including Bali."
The Australian Embassy in Jakarta has remained closed to the public since the September suicide bomb attack.
Three Indonesian police officers and an agriculture official will travel to Canberra to assist with the investigation of Wednesday's incident in Canberra.
The hate mail, delivered just after 10.30am on Wednesday, was addressed to the Indonesian ambassador, Imron Cotan – who was not there at the time – and was opened by a secretary. The building remained closed and under tight security last night.
Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander Downer revealed the letter was mailed from a post office close to Melbourne.
3 June 2005, AP
Mystery Powder Mailed to UK Car Firm
Three people were taken to hospital today after a mystery white powder was posted to a firm, police said.
Paramedics used decontamination procedures on seven employees at HPI in Salisbury, Wiltshire, after one mistakenly opened an envelope containing the unknown substance.
A police spokesman said: “Seven people underwent an ambulance decontamination procedure, while the fire brigade decontaminated the wider area.”
Three of the employees were then taken to hospital for precautionary check ups, he said.
The firm was shut by police for two hours. It reopened at around 1.30pm, he said.
It is understood the firm targeted has received hoax packages before.
The powder has been sent for analysis and detectives are working to confirm who sent the package.
Martin Wright, marketing director of the company, which provides information to people buying second-hand cars, said: “We were sent a package which, when opened in the post room was found to contain a white powder.
“Immediately we locked it in a room and called 999.”
He said that no one was injured but the three employees who were closest to the package when it was opened were taken to hospital for checks.
Mr Wright said he had no idea who was behind it, adding: “We have had some events like this before.
“Fortunately it has never come to anything.”
1 June 2005, AP
Mail Threats and Bomb Scare at TV’s Big Brother House
Army bomb disposal experts were called to the Big Brother house today after a suspicious package was found.
A specialist team was sent to the house in Elstree, Hertfordshire, after the alarm was raised at 12.30pm.
A spokeswoman for Hertfordshire Police said they rushed to the scene after being called by studio staff from the Channel 4 show.
"The package was X-rayed but it was found not to be suspicious."
An Army source said one of the housemates had been receiving threatening mail, and the show's bosses originally thought the package was connected to the death threats.
The source added: "They have been very concerned about the post they have been receiving for one of the people from a particular group."
Manchester
Evening News, June 6 2005
Suspicious Package With Powder Shuts
Down Mailroom at Australian Mine
The administration centre of Australia's largest underground mine has been shut down due to a security scare.
Workers in the mail room at the Olympic Dam mine at Roxby Downs in South Australia's north raised the alarm when they received a package with white powder on it.
The workers called the police just after 1:00pm ACST and a hazardous materials team from the Western Mining Company was sent to isolate the package and decontaminate the room.
Three workers went through decontamination and a health check but are not suffering any ill effects.
The Western Mining Company (WMC) says it advised all its employees of the scare by email, but the incident has not affected its mining operations.
The administration centre will remain closed until police give the all clear, which is expected to take 48 hours.
Police are investigating the incident.
ABC News 6 June 2005
Suspicious Letter Sent to Court in Bali
Indonesian police are checking a letter containing a "strong smell" sent to the head of a Bali court that recently jailed Schapelle Corby on drugs charges.
"Members of the police forensic laboratory, including officers from Jakarta, are investigating the smell and the letter has been taken for laboratory tests," Bali police spokesman A.S. Reniban said today.
The investigation follows an incident last week in which Indonesia's embassy in Canberra was sealed off in a biological agent scare triggered by an envelope containing a white powder.
Although it later proved to be harmless, authorities believed the letter was the work of supporters of Corby, a 27-year-old Australian woman jailed for 20 years last month for attempting to smuggling marijuana onto Bali.
Mr Reniban said judge Nengah Suriada had a dizzy spell on opening the noxious letter last Friday.
However, the judge had not reported the incident until today, when he returned to work and found his office still contained the odour, he said.
The letter was made to look as though it had been sent by the Australian consulate in Bali but did not carry the mission's letterhead, Mr Reniban said.
A second unopened letter also sent to the Bali prosecutor's office had been collected for investigation.
The results of the tests were not known.
Australian outrage against the Corby verdict has threatened to upset improving relations between the two countries, despite renewed pledges of friendship by Canberra and Jakarta
Many Australians have threatened to boycott Bali as a holiday destination and have demanded a return of cash donated to aid victims of last year's tsunami.
Courier News 6 June 2005
Use of Explosives on Rise in Ecoterror Cases
The trial of seven animal rights activists under domestic terrorism laws focuses attention on a threat which law enforcement officials say has become greater than that of the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis, and right-wing militias.Defendants in the federal trial in New Jersey, which has just begun and is expected to last into August, are charged with conspiracy and interstate stalking involving the vandalism and harassment of employees of labs that use animals to test drugs and chemicals.
Officials say this is part of a growing trend that in recent years has included more than 1,200 incidents of arson, bombings, theft, animal releases, vandalism, and office takeovers. Targets of what activists call "direct actions" have included laboratories, mink ranches, SUV dealerships, fast-food outlets, and new housing developments. Damages have totaled hundreds of millions of dollars.
"We have seen an escalation in violent rhetoric and tactics," John Lewis, the FBI's deputy assistant director for counterterrorism, told a Senate hearing recently. "Attacks are also growing in frequency and size. Harassing phone calls and vandalism now coexist with improvised explosive devices and personal threats to employees."
The FBI currently has 150 pending investigations involving 35 agency field offices working with other law enforcement agencies on such cases. "The FBI and its partners have made a number of high-profile arrests of individuals involved with animal rights extremism or ecoterrorism," Mr. Lewis told lawmakers.
A federal judge in California recently ruled that William Jensen Cottrell, a graduate student in physics at the California Institute of Technology, should serve at least seven years in federal prison and pay more than $3.5 million in restitution for firebombing more than 100 sport utility vehicles at dealerships and homes near Los Angeles.
Activists reject the "ecoterrorist" label, a controversial phrase coined by those who tend to be critical of anything (or anybody) involved with environmental activism.
Likening their activity to that of the anti-Nazi resistance in Europe or the underground railroad helping slaves escape the South, activists say that those carrying out the attacks take "all necessary precautions against harming any animal, human and non-human."
It may be true that, unlike such right-wing domestic terrorists as Timothy McVeigh and Eric Rudolph, they have not been responsible for any loss of life - other than the odd mink that's been "liberated" into the tooth-and-claw world of nature and would have been killed for its fur anyway.
Still, some animal rights and environmental extremists are ratcheting up their threats. One is quoted as saying, "If someone is killing, on a regular basis, thousands of animals, and if that person can only be stopped in one way by the use of violence, then it is certainly a justifiable solution."
While no one has been killed in any "direct action," there have been several close calls, officials say.
"The most worrisome trend to law enforcement and private industry alike has been the increase in willingness by these movements to resort to the use of incendiary and explosive devices," says Carson Carroll, of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives.
For their part, mainstream environmentalists and animal rights advocates are working to separate themselves from groups and individuals that break the law on behalf of their cause. All of the major environmental groups sent to the Senate Committee a letter which "strongly condemns all acts of violence, including those committed in the name of environmental causes."
Among the most radical organizations apparently involved are the Earth Liberation Front (ELF), the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), and Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC). They tend to operate in small, autonomous cells, using simple techniques and leaving few clues other than warning signs.
Earlier this year, houses under construction in Sammamish, Wash., were firebombed by individuals who left messages signed "ELF."
In the New Jersey case now at trial, the seven defendants (most in their 20s) are charged with inciting others to commit vandalism and harass employees of Huntingdon Life Sciences, a company in England that has research labs in the United States.
In a similar case earlier this year, a credit card belonging to the wife of a pharmaceutical company executive was stolen when her car was broken into. The card was used to buy $20,000 in traveler's checks, which was donated to charity, then followed by a warning that seemed to include a physical threat.
Such acts as these, together with vandalism directed at individual scientists and business executives, can be annoying. But the posting of personal addresses and phone numbers, together with threats of physical attacks of the type that have occurred in England, can be very frightening. And they can have a chilling effect on business decisions, or (as in the case at several universities) set back biomedical research for years.
In Pennsylvania last week, the owner of a flower business decided not to build a kennel for monkeys (intended for use at private and government labs) after vandals destroyed plants, damaged vehicles, and spray-painted such threats as "ALF is watching."
While such acts can be prosecuted under existing law, some lawmakers want to make it a federal crime to support such groups - by giving donations, for example.
Several states now are considering separate laws aimed at "ecoterrorism," stiffening the penalty for attacks on such things as university labs, dog food makers, farms where animals are caged, and hunting businesses.
Christian Science Monitor June 6 2005
Australia Post Reports Numerous Acts
of Potential Terrorism in the Mail
Australia Post has negotiated about 1000 potential acts of terrorism since 2001, similar to those that this week sent chills through Australia and Indonesia.
Envelopes containing suspicious white powder sent to the Indonesian embassy in Canberra and Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander Downer this week were like hundreds more that had passed through the postal system, said Australia Post spokesman Matt Pollard.
"Since the anthrax scares in the US, there's been a number of these sort of events," he said. "Every one of them, without exception, has proven to be harmless. But every time the emergency procedures have to be activated. You have to assume the worst."
White powder incidents, as they are known, divert resources as emergency services and health authorities could become involved in incidents in which no threat is posed.
But Keith Adamson, deputy chief fire officer with the Metropolitan Fire Brigade, said such response did not pose a serious problem for emergency services.
"There's a bit of a cost for petrol, I guess, but to us it's just another call," he said.
Australian Federal Police spokesman Sandy Logan said there were three white powder incidents in Canberra on one day last month, - at the National Library, the Department of Immigration and a science centre.
Investigations revealed the powder was only sand, sent by Canberra's Emergency Services Authority as part of invitations to its South Pacific Ball fund-raiser.
The scare disrupted a morning concert of Mozart for infants when the National Library building was closed.
"It tied up an enormous amount of resources," Mr Logan said.
Mr Logan added that the media coverage surrounding this week's white powder incidents stoked public hysteria about a relative non-event.
He said the possibility of a weaponised form of anthrax being engineered in Australia and sent in the mail was highly unlikely.
"That doesn't mean you don't take every one of these seriously - you do," he said.
The Age 5 June 2005
White Powder Scare at Virginia Bank
It might be a misunderstanding. It might be a prank. Or, it might be anthrax.
The Staunton Police and Fire Departments were called out to Community Bank in downtown Staunton Friday for reports of a suspicious white powder. The powder came in the mail. A bank Vice President told TV-3 that a loan clerk, opening mail, came across an envelope with white power inside. Police confirm they removed an envelope with traces of an unknown white powder substance. Samples of the substance have been sent to the lab for analysis.
Senior Vice President of Retail Banking, Benny Warner, noted, "The majority of those cases have been proven not to be any serious threat or problem. But you've got to take it seriously and follow the proper procedures to protect everyone just in case."
Throughout the entire ordeal, the bank stayed open for business. Bank staff expect the results of the powder tests back on Monday or Tuesday.
WHSV News 5 June 2005
Police Investigate 60-Year-Old Woman Delivering Suspicious Packages
A 60-year-old Haverstraw village woman accused of causing a bomb scare in the Ramapo government and police building remained an enigma to police yesterday.
Detectives said they had yet to learn why Betty L. Lange left a sealed package marked "top secret" inside the department lobby and then left, leading police to evacuate the police station and Town Hall offices Thursday morning.
Police continued to investigate Lange's background through the Rockland Intelligence Center and from other law enforcement agencies in Rockland and outside the county. She has not cooperated with investigators, police said.
Lange remained in the county jail yesterday on $1,000 bail on a felony charge of second-degree placing a false bomb and a misdemeanor count of third-degree falsely reporting an incident. She is scheduled to appear June 16 in Airmont Justice Court.
According to the charge Lange faces, even though the box did not contain an explosive device, the circumstances under which she left it reasonably gave the impression there could be a bomb in it.
"We're trying to get information from any other agencies that may have had contact with her," Detective Lt. Brad Weidel said yesterday.
Nearly 150 people were evacuated after the package was left near the police desk at 8:48 a.m. A tour of police headquarters by 125 Grandview Elementary School students was canceled.
The package, investigated by the Sheriff's Office bomb squad, turned out to contain several undeveloped disposable cameras. Ramapo employees returned to work about an hour later.
Surveillance videotapes showed Lange carrying the package into the station and driving off soon afterward, police said.
After she was arrested outside her apartment building, police said, Lange told detectives that a man had given her the package on Route 202 and asked her to deliver it to the police station.
"We were able to determine that story was not true," Detective Sgt. John Lynch said yesterday.
Police believe Lange lives alone in an apartment on Dowd Street and possibly worked at Chromolloy in Orangeburg until a year ago. They don't believe she has any relatives in Rockland.
Her fingerprints, taken digitally, were sent through a law-enforcement database, police said, and the results showed she had not previously been fingerprinted by police.
"She seems to be a loner," Lynch said. "We've gotten a couple of calls about her, but nothing that tells us much about her or why this might have happened."
The film found in the package included dozens of photographs of parking lots, empty cars, and streets from communities such as Haverstraw. The photos included the Memorial Day parade in Tuxedo in Orange County, police said.
"She wouldn't explain any of it," Lynch said. "We are all trying to figure out what this about."
Journal News 4 June 2005
Parcel Bomb Hits Jakarta’s Paris Embassy
A small parcel bomb exploded outside the Indonesian embassy in Paris before dawn on Friday, slightly injuring 10 people and shattering windows, but officials said they had no clues to the motive.
French officials said a group unknown to police and going by the name of the French Armed Islamic Front sent an e-mail in which it claimed responsibility for the blast but they said they doubted the veracity of the somewhat oddly written message.
Investigators who combed the area found gas canister fragments but said they knew little about the device and it was too early to say who was behind the bombing.
Gas canisters were used in mid-1990s bombings in Paris for which the Algerian Armed Islamic Group claimed responsibility. The e-mail message called for the release of two men who were jailed for life in France for those attacks.
The bomb, left on the pavement next to a thick outside wall of the elegant 19th century building, caused only minor damage to the embassy when it went off shortly after 5 a.m. (0300 GMT), but shattered windows in nearby buildings and cars.
Nine of the 10 injured, some of them embassy staff, were taken to hospital, most with slight cuts from flying glass.
French officials saw it as a criminal act while Indonesian president-elect Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono condemned the blast as an act of terrorism.
Indonesia has suffered a number of bomb attacks in recent years, some blamed on separatist groups and others on Jemaah Islamiah, a Southeast Asian group seen as the regional arm of al Qaeda.
Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin, who rushed to the scene in the wealthy west Paris district, said France had no indications of any threat against the embassy, but ordered tighter security for embassies in Paris.
"This is clearly an act with criminal intentions," he said. "As far as we know, there was no specific threat."
In Jakarta, Yudhoyono said: "I strongly condemn the terrorist act done at the Indonesian embassy in Paris. I do hope the government of France will take appropriate action to bring the perpetrator to justice."
A man living opposite the embassy said the blast woke him. "We heard a big boom around 5 a.m.," he told reporters. "There was lots of glass on the ground, but no dead, and that's the important thing."
Jakarta-based security expert Ken Conboy told Reuters that separatist groups such as the Free Aceh Movement had been blamed for some blasts in Indonesia in recent years, but added: "None of these groups have ever shown any ability to operate outside the region."
The second anniversary of the nightclub bombings on the Indonesian island of Bali that killed 202 people falls next week. That attack was blamed on Jemaah Islamiah.
The embassy blast occurred only hours after attacks on Egyptian Red Sea resorts crowded with Israeli tourists. The blasts killed at least 28 people and Israeli officials said they appeared to be the work of al Qaeda.
Indonesia is the world's most populous Muslim country, but Islam is not the state religion and most Indonesians are moderates.
Moneyplans 4 June 2005
Officials Warn Tourists to Expect Bomb Attacks at Jakarta Hotels
Australians in Jakarta have been warned to expect bomb attacks in the lobbies of hotels frequented by Westerners.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) has issued a specific warning about such attacks following information from United States officials.
The US embassy reopened on Tuesday after closing for several days following an unspecified security threat.
Police in Jakarta have called on hotels to beef up security, but most already have tough checks in place following the car bombing in 2003 at the JW Marriott Hotel in Jakarta which killed 12 people.
"New information suggests extremists are planning to conduct bomb attacks targeting the lobbies of hotels frequented by Westerners in Jakarta to occur around noon on an unspecified date," the DFAT update says.
"The Jakarta Metropolitan Police (POLRI) issued a warning on 17 May 2005 about possible further suicide bombings in Jakarta which identifies as potential targets a number of other places frequented by foreigners, in particular embassies, international schools, office buildings and shopping malls.
"While no timeframes are indicated in this information, it reinforces our assessment that terrorists are in the very advanced stages of planning attacks.
"Attacks could occur at any time, anywhere in Indonesia and could be directed at any locations known to be frequented by foreigners."
Non-essential travel to Indonesia should be deferred, the warning says.
AAP, 4 June 2005
Mayor Get Letters With White Powdery Substance
The FBI and the Joint Terrorism Task Force, as well as other state and local agencies, are investigating letters with a mysterious substance inside that have so far targeted the mayor of Sacramento, a Sacramento County supervisor and the publisher of the Sacramento Bee.
For a second straight day, Sacramento City Hall had to be evacuated Friday after a white powdery substance was found inside a letter addressed to Mayor Heather Fargo.