GM Watch brings you… THE WORST OF 2006 - PART 3 - THE FINALE!

More on how GMOs are aggressively promoted around the world via lies and disinformation, hype and false promises, corruption and double dealing, stratagems and trade pressure.

Previously in this series:
THE WORST OF 2006 - PART 2: JULY-OCTOBER
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7462
DIE SCHLECHTESTEN NACHRICHTEN DES JAHRES 2006 - TEIL 2
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7465
THE WORST OF 2006 - PART 1: JANUARY-JUNE
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7456
DIE SCHLECHTESTEN NACHRICHTEN DES JAHRES 2006 - TEIL 1
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7459
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THE WORST OF 2006 - PART 3: NOVEMBER-DECEMBER

NOVEMBER

+ November: BILATERAL BIOSAFETY BULLIES
A new report exposed how bilateral trade agreements are being used to prise open markets for GM. A powerful alliance of GM-supporting governments, the agribusiness sector and transnational companies have increasingly been using these trade agreements to side-step worldwide opposition to GMOs and weaken regulatory controls.
http://www.grain.org/briefings/?id=199

+ November: INDIAN BIOTECH INDUSTRY DISINFO
An article by C Kameswara Rao of India's Foundation for Biotech Awareness and Education claimed GM rice trials posed no threat because rice pollen is viable only for a few minutes during which it can only tavel a few meters, after which it "cannot 'contaminate' any other rice variety". Rao's complacent claim came at a time when many of America's rice exports were being returned home because rice across six states had been contaminated as a result of GM rice trials! (See next item)
Rao also made a number of other ludicrous assertions in the article, including a claim that Golden Rice seeds are being stored in a bomb proof shelter because of the alarm created by attacks on laboratories, field trials (there haven't been any! - ed.) and the researchers. Dr Rao failed to explain why no one else had ever heard of any of these terrifying attacks. (More on Golden Rice below)
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7244

+ November: BAYER BLAMED FARMERS AND GOD FOR ITS RICE CONTAMINATION!
The company responsible for the contamination of much of the US long-grain rice supply, contended that rice farmers and an "act of God" were the real culprits. The contamination by an unapproved GMO caused the industry's worst ever crisis with:
*over 40% of US rice exports negatively affected
*multiple federal lawsuits filed
*trade with the 25-nation EU at a standstill
*other countries banning US long-grain rice imports
*many other countries requiring testing
*some markets for medium- and short-grain rice also affected *another Bayer GM rice (LL62) also detected
US rice farmers have also been told they will never again be able to validly describe their crop as "GM-free".
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7306
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7294

+ November: BAYER HONOURED WAR CRIMINAL
On All Saints Day, Bayer had a wreath laid on the grave of the convicted war criminal Fritz ter Meer. Ter Meer, born in 1884, was a board member of Bayer's parent company IG Farben from 1925. During the Second World War he was responsible for the construction of the IG Farben factory in Auschwitz, in which around 30,000 slave labourers went to their deaths. After the war ter Meer was sentenced to seven years in prison for enslavement and looting. Following his release, ter Meer became chairman of the board of Bayer. For decades Bayer refused to pay compensation to surviving slave labourers. Only after international protests did it finally agree to pay damages - more than 50 years after the end of the war.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7272

+ November: LORD SAINSBURY QUIT
Lord Sainsbury quit as Tony Blair's science minister. British Government sources claimed he was tired of being tainted in the cash-for-peerages scandal. Although unelected, Sainsbury had been Science Minister since 1998, in which time he contributed enormously to the corporate take over of UK public science. A GM enthusiast with biotech business interests, he was also a member of the cabinet biotechnology committee, Sci-Bio, responsible for national policy on GM crops and foods, and as such he was a key adviser to Blair on GM technology. Lord Sainsbury has also been the biggest donor to Blair's Party, leading to accusations from within the Party of corruption of the political process.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7256

+ November: NATURE BIOTECHNOLOGY'S "TRUTH" IS A DODGY OPTION
An editorial in the journal Nature Biotechnology told pro-GM scientists that only the constant repetition of "basic truths" will establish "the facts" and counter the "myths" about the hazards of GM food. But, revealingly, the editorial was itself built upon a lie.
The editorial began by contrasting the publicity surrounding the E. coli O157 contamination of spinach in the US with that surrounding the GM contamination of US rice. The latter coverage was full of alarm and misinformation, claimed the editorial. The truth of the E. coli outbreak, on the other hand, was that organic spinach apparently caused significant numbers of people to get sick and some possibly to die. Yet th