Day 239 - 23 Apr 96 - Page 04

     
     1        Mr. Monbiot cannot give this evidence or that evidence.  If
     2        I were you, I would put Mr. Monbiot in the witness box and
     3        start with his statement.
     4
     5   MS. STEEL:  I do not think -- I do not particularly want to
     6        argue about this -- but I do not think Mr. Rampton should
     7        be able to cast all these dispersions about our case and
     8        then Mr. Morris not be allowed to answer.
     9
    10   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Please put Mr. Monbiot in the witness box.
    11        There are parts of his statement which have no relevance to
    12        any of the issues in this case, but I am prepared to hear
    13        them all and from it, at the end of the day, I will take
    14        that which is relevant and weigh it and give it full
    15        consideration in my decision.  It is no criticism of
    16        Mr. Monbiot.  It is no criticism of you.  This happens in
    17        the best conducted cases.
    18
    19                     GEORGE JOSHUA MONBIOT, Sworn
    20                      EXAMINED BY THE DEFENDANTS
    21
    22   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   You had better ask Mr. Monbiot his full name
    23        and he can give his current academic address, if he wishes.
    24
    25   MR. MORRIS:  Would you give your full name and current address?
    26        A.   My name is George Richard Monbiot.  I currently reside
    27        in East Oxford, [name removed] in Oxford.  I have a continued
    28        association with Green College though not a formal one.
    29        That is where I am.
    30
    31   Q.   Could you just go through your academic background?
    32        A.   As an undergraduate zoologist at Brasenose College,
    33        Oxford, I had on Open Scholarship there in Zoology.  When I
    34        completed by degree I went to the BBC and worked for their
    35        Natural History Unit for a time.  I then left to start a
    36        Project of Research, which has lasted to this day, really
    37        in attempting to discover the true reasons for
    38        deforestation and environmental change in the tropics and,
    39        in particular, what is happening to villages and to
    40        indigenous people there.
    41
    42        Of direct relevance to this case, I spent 2 years working
    43        in Brazil and some time work on Brazil but not in Brazil,
    44        one of the fruits of which was a book called "Amazon
    45        Watershed" which has become a standard academic text in
    46        faculties here in Britain.  It won the Sir Peter Kent Award
    47        for Conservation Writing and has also been of some
    48        influence in Brazil.  It was cited by President Fernando
    49        Collor as a reason to change Brazilian policy in the Amazon
    50        and was used extensively by the Secretary of State for the 
    51        Environment in Brazil. 
    52 
    53        I made a point over those 2 years in Brazil, 3 years
    54        altogether, of really trying to get to grips with every
    55        issue that could possibly pertain to the rainforest and
    56        other environmental issues in Brazil, to understand the
    57        politics, sociology geography and of course the biology of
    58        Brazil to the best of my responsibility.   Thus, I wrote
    59        very extensively. I immersed myself in the literature and I
    60        think it is fair to say that, certainly at the time, and I