Sinking of Rainbow Warrior | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|
![]() Rainbow Warrior pictured in Scheveningen in 1979 | ||||
Date | 10 July 1985 | |||
Location | 36°50′32″S 174°46′18″E / 36.84222°S 174.77167°E | |||
Caused by | Retaliation for protests by Greenpeace against French nuclear testing | |||
Goals | To sink Rainbow Warrior | |||
Methods | Bombing | |||
Resulted in | Rainbow Warrior sunk, 1 person killed | |||
Parties | ||||
Lead figures | ||||
Skipper Peter Willcox Prime Minister David Lange | ||||
Units involved | ||||
Casualties and losses | ||||
|
The sinking of Rainbow Warrior, codenamed Opération Satanique,[1] was a covert operation by the "action" branch of the French foreign intelligence agency, the Directorate-General for External Security (DGSE), carried out on 10 July 1985. During the operation, two operatives sank the flagship of the Greenpeace fleet, Rainbow Warrior, at the Port of Auckland on her way to a protest against a planned French nuclear test in Moruroa. Fernando Pereira, a photographer, drowned on the sinking ship.
The sinking was a cause of embarrassment to France and President François Mitterrand. They initially denied responsibility, but two French agents were captured by New Zealand Police and charged with arson, conspiracy to commit arson, willful damage, and murder. It resulted in a scandal that led to the resignation of the French Defence Minister Charles Hernu, while the two agents pleaded guilty to manslaughter and were sentenced to ten years in prison. They spent a little over two years confined to the Polynesian island of Hao before being freed by the French government.[2]
France was also forced to apologise and had to pay reparations to New Zealand, Pereira's family and Greenpeace.
Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha>
tags or {{efn}}
templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}}
template or {{notelist}}
template (see the help page).