Monsanto Charged With Crimes Against Nature and Humanity, Set to Stand Trial in 2016

Contributing Writer for Wake Up World

People are fed-up. And angry. We simply no longer accept that corporations have the right to ride roughshod over the environment or destroy the health of its inhabitants. We refuse to remain silent when faced with companies who contribute to poisoned rivers, people and wildlife — where the only concern is for the mighty dollar. No longer will we stand by and watch as beauty and the balance of nature is laid to waste.

Monsanto, in particular, is known as one of the most destructive corporations of all times. In response to the ongoing damage caused by the company, a coalition of food, farming and environmental justice groups — including the Organic Consumers Association (OCA), International Federation of Organic Agricultural Movements (IFOAM), Navdanya, Regeneration International (RI) and Millions Against Monsanto, among others — have taken matters into their own hands. During the COP21 event in Paris, the alliance announced that Monsanto will be put on trial in The Hague, Netherlands for “crimes against nature and humanity” come autumn 2016.

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Corruption, Manipulation and Fraud

Of all the corporations plundering the planet, why focus solely on Monsanto? Widely accepted as one of the most hated companies in the world, Monsanto is known for extreme corruption, exceedingly toxic poisons and domination of the food supply with patented crops.

Says Andre Leu, president of the International Foundation for Organic Agriculture (IFOAM):

“Monsanto is able to ignore the human and environmental damage caused by its products, and maintain its devastating activities through a strategy of systemic concealment:

By lobbying regulatory agencies and governments, by resorting to lying and corruption, by financing fraudulent scientific studies, by pressuring independent scientists, and by manipulating the press and media.

Monsanto’s history reads like a text-book case of impunity, benefiting transnational corporations and their executives, whose activities contribute to climate and biosphere crises and threaten the safety of the planet.”

Not only is Monsanto’s responsible for creating highly toxic chemicals like PCBs and Agent Orange, the corporation also purposely concealed research which showed that the compounds are exceptionally dangerous to humans, wildlife and the environment. But Monsanto didn’t stop at hiding evidence, instead the company took it a step further by directly misinforming regulatory agencies, claiming the chemicals were completely harmless.

Today, Monsanto is still up to its old tricks — this time with Roundup Ready. The company clings to their assertion that the herbicide is safe enough to drink. However, unbiased science has a different view of the chemical. The World Health Organization classifies glyphosate (the main ingredient in Roundup Ready) as a “probable carcinogen,” while a MIT researcher is convinced it’s driving the autism epidemic. And research in PLOS ONE found that food contaminated with the chemical is toxic to neurodevelopment, reproduction and the liver in animal tests. Likewise, a study in Toxicology linked glyphosate-based herbicides with IQ loss/intellectual disability, autism, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, obesity (both child and adult), diabetes, infertility and mortality.

The list could go on forever, but Monsanto insists their chemical brew is benign. Recently, CBS This Morning interviewed Hugh Grant, the CEO of Monsanto. In the face of staggering data to the contrary, Grant said he was “very comfortable” with the safety of Roundup Ready. It’s this kind of rhetoric and “business as usual” attitude that has environmental justice groups up in arms.

Holding Monsanto Accountable

In an effort to expose the damage Monsanto inflicts on the environment and its inhabitants — and to send a strong message to other companies who disregard the well-being of the planet for monetary gain — the corporation will stand trial.

“Monsanto promotes an agroindustrial model that contributes at least one third of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions; it is also largely responsible for the depletion of soil and water resources, species extinction and declining biodiversity, and the displacement of millions of small farmers worldwide. This is a model that threatens peoples’ food sovereignty by patenting seeds and privatizing life.” (source)

The Tribunal is to be held at The Hague on October 16, 2016 (World Food Day) and will review the allegations made against Monsanto, as well as assess the damage caused by the corporation.

“The Tribunal will rely on the “Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights” adopted at the UN in 2011. It will also assess potential criminal liability on the basis of the Rome Statute that created the International Criminal Court in The Hague in 2002, and it will consider whether a reform of international criminal law is warranted to include crimes against the environment, or ecocide, as a prosecutable criminal offense, so that natural persons could incur criminal liability. Recognizing ecocide as a crime is the only way to guarantee the right of humans to a healthy environment and the right of nature to be protected.” (source)

Members of the steering committee for the Tribunal include Vandana Shiva, Corinne Lepage (former environment minister of France), Gilles-Éric Séralini (toxicologist researching toxicities of GMOs and glyphosate), Olivier De Schutter (former UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food), Valerie Cabanes (attorney with expertise in international humanitarian law and human rights law), Andre Leu (president of IFOAM Organics International) and Ronnie Cummins (International Director of the Organic Consumers Association).

In order to finance the trial, €1 million will need to be raised by the Monsanto Tribunal Foundation.

Donations can be made here.