Vancouver:Activists on Trial for Protecting Canadian Rainforests

["greenbase" <greenbas@gb.greenpeace.org>]

TRIAL OF 18 ENVIRONMENTALISTS ARRESTED IN FOR 
PROTECTING CANADIAN RAINFORESTS BEGINS IN VANCOUVER 

(Amsterdam), Monday, March 30, 1998 --  The trial of 18
environmentalists arrested June 24, last year for blockading the
clearcut logging operations of International Forests Products
(Interfor) on King Island in the Great Bear Rainforest begins
today in Vancouver Supreme Court. in Vancouver Supreme Court.
The defendants represent six countries Belgium, Canada, Denmark,
Ireland, Germany and USA. 

"These people are standing trial, facing potential jail
sentences for standing up to protect some of the last ancient
rainforests. Yet the real criminals are the companies that are
starting to blast roads into some of the last rainforest
valleys", said Karen Mahon, Greenpeace Forests Campaigner. 

Last week a Canadian logging company Western Forest Products
started construction of a logging road which will be used to
access one of the last remaining pristine rainforests valleys at
Ingram Lake area in British Colombia. 

The trial starts as the European markets for Canadian forest
industry is turning down orders of ancient rainforest timber and
pulp in increasing numbers. A number of major British, Austrian
and German companies have said that they will stop purchasing
from this unsustainable source. These include B & Q, Sainsbury's
Homebase, Do It All and BBC Worldwide Publishing in UK, two of
the major paper companies in Germany, and Lenzing in Austria. 

On March 26 Greenpeace held up a shipment of timber and pulp
from Western Forest Products (WFP) for 2 days in Glasgow 
Scotland.  Another simultaneous Greenpeace action continues in
Frankfurt germany  at the site of the clariant plant a buyer of
chemical pulp from WFP. 

The 19-day blockade started last year after Nuxalk First Nations 
hereditary chiefs invited environmentalists from Citizens for
Peoples  Action for Threatened Habitat (PATH), Bear Watch, the
Forest Action  Network (FAN) and Greenpeace to join them in
their efforts to prevent  further clearcutting by Interfor of
the ancient rainforests of Ista,  a place considered sacred to
the Nuxalk. 

The defendants standing trial in Vancouver are charged with
refusing to obey the court injunction issued by the Supreme
Court of British Columbia. The injunction which required
environmentalists to halt their protest and move off the road
they had occupied since June 6, 1997. The six members of the
Nuxalk First Nations that took part in the demonstration with
environmentalists will appear in Vancouver Supreme Court
beginning May 4, 1998. 

Interfor is one of two companies with Western Forest Products
that have plans to log the majority of the remaining intact
rainforest valleys on Canada's west coast. The Great Bear
Rainforest is one of the world's last areas of pristine
temperate rainforest.  80% of the world's ancient forests have
already been destroyed or degraded.


Editor's Note: 

(1)Photos and video footage of the Great Bear Rainforest are 
available on request. 

(2) A new Greenpeace Ancient Forest website has been
launched and contains all the latest news and background
information on the campaign including photos from the 1997
blockade and information on trial. Greenpeace International
website is at http://www.greenpeace.org