Nature.com
Animal-rights activists invade Europe
Experts fear extremists may be travelling from Britain.
Geoff Brumfiel
27 February 2008


http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080227/full/4511034a.html

A rash of vandalism, intimidation and arson across continental Europe
in 2008 is evidence of a worrying new wave of animal-rights extremism
being exported from Britain, experts say.

In early January, threats led to a Dutch developer withdrawing from a
new, €60 million (about US$89 million) biomedical research park in
Venray, the Netherlands. A month later, Hasselt University's
Biomedical Research Institute in Diepenbeek, Belgium, was set on fire.
And in Barcelona in Spain, vandals targeted the offices of
biomedical-research firm Novartis.

The pattern "is quite clear-cut", according to Simon Festing, director
of the Research Defence Society, a London-based group representing
medical researchers. Festing says that he believes new, more stringent
enforcement in the United Kingdom has led many extremists to move
their activities overseas. "Activists are not finding it easy here,"
he says. "So they're just going across to Europe."

Over the past year, the United Kingdom has cracked down on
animal-rights activists who break the law. Last May, police carried
out Operation Achilles that led to charges against 16 activists. A
trial involving several of them is expected to begin later this year.

Neither Interpol nor Europol, which coordinates European police
activities, have firm statistics on extremist acts, but anecdotal
evidence suggests that Britain's tougher law enforcement has led to a
rise in activities on the continent. "It's been going on for years,
but it's become worse," says Robert Janssen, the managing director of
the Netherlands' biotechnology industry association NIABA in
Leidschendam. Janssen estimates that Dutch researchers and
institutions have received more than 200 threats in the past year.

It has come as a shock to some in the scientific community. "We've
never had problems before," says Piet Stinissen, director of the
Biomedical Research Institute at Hasselt University. On 1 February,
the Institute was set ablaze, causing around €100,000 in damages. The
fire was believed to be caused by the Animal Liberation Front, an
extremist group. Stinissen, who has been at the University since 1994,
says that he cannot remember a single previous incident of extremism.

Andrew Jackson, deputy head of security at Novartis in Basel,
Switzerland, says that industry is also being affected. On 9 February,
Novartis's offices in Barcelona were vandalized during a protest, and
Jackson says that there has been an overall increase in both legal
demonstrations and illegal acts. "We've had to increase the security
of some of our facilities in Europe," he says. Novartis says that
incidents outside the United States and United Kingdom rose by nearly
50% last year to 97. There have been 15 events so far this year.

Jackson believes that the protests and criminal acts are being fuelled
in part by British activists travelling abroad. "There is a perception
that EU law enforcement has something of a soft touch," he says.
Jackson says that he has noticed a correlation between availability of
budget flights to Basel and extremist activity. "It makes for a fun
weekend," he notes wryly.

But not everyone agrees that the British crackdown is behind increased
activity elsewhere in Europe. Activists do occasionally go abroad to
protest, says Amanda Richards, a spokesperson for SPEAK, an
animal-rights group based in Northampton, UK, which has led a campaign
against a primate laboratory at Oxford University (see Nature 438, 716
; 2005). But she believes that the rise in Europe is due primarily to
rising awareness on the continent. "It's mainly people in the
countries themselves," she says. SPEAK has been contacted by several
individuals and groups in Europe who want to organize events against
animal testing, she adds.

Janssen says that in the Netherlands at least, the government now
appears to be taking animal-rights extremism more seriously. On 12
February, the Dutch parliament passed a motion to support the use of
animal testing and condemning extremist acts. Janssen says that he
hopes the motion will be followed by more rigorous law-enforcement.