The Monk Seal Conspiracy

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15. Bulldozers and Dynamite

On 13 June I received the final cynical blow from IUCN/WWF, in the form of two letters from headquarters which stated that since my involvement in the project was ‘no longer acceptable to the Greek authorities’ I had been ‘terminated’. The letter was signed by Peter Murphy, head of WWF/IUCN project management. The accompanying letter from Pierre Portas was supposed to be informal, designed perhaps to blunt the edge of the official dismissal notice, yet it was still couched in bureaucratic sophistry. It stated: ‘We had to terminate your involvement in the project. This decision has not been easy to reach and I know you will understand it. We very much hope that Ms Emch will be able to continue working in the Aegean and achieve the objectives of the project…’

But the organization had already been informed numerous times that monk seal protection in the eastern Aegean was impossible under prevailing conditions, and YPEA, more than IUCN and WWF apparently, knew that they had succeeded in sabotaging the project. Rita was naturally unwilling to resume work on Samos under such tense and dangerous circumstances – especially since the organization she worked for had just shown how it supported its representatives in times of trouble. What if she had been arrested on Samos on some trumped-up charge? Would they have left her to languish in jail, once again giving Drumpis and YPEA the ‘benefit of the doubt’ and disavowing all knowledge of her obviously genuine crimes? After all, the allegations against me were still secret and, in supporting them, IUCN and WWF had revealed quite lucidly their respect for human rights. I was guilty until proven innocent, and to prove my innocence would be an eternally impossible feat since the allegations would never be revealed. Suddenly, the organization made no mention of Rita facing possible danger on Samos, although they had received no assurances that YPEA would cease its harassment. It would eventually become quite clear, however, that IUCN/WWF merely wanted the project to tick over for the remainder of 1980 and to produce a usable final report that could appear in their Yearbook, at which point, with the same cynicism, they would silently write off the monk seal.

We were disheartened and bitter that many of those who had ardently supported us at the beginning of the year had now withdrawn into silence, once again following the lead of the most eminent among them. Predictably, perhaps, only the powerless stood by us: our Greek friends on Samos who were bewildered and dismayed that Junta-like tactics could still prevail, a distressed Mrs Goulandris of the Natural History Museum who termed the YPEA campaign ‘absurd’ and ‘shocking’, and a lost and bitterly disillusioned Penny Marinos, hardly knowing whether to persevere at the NCPPE or resign in disgust.

With both government ministries and international organizations alike recoiling into silence and pleading ignorance of the YPEA affair, apparently fearful of the undisclosed contents of the top-secret report and for their own reputations, the project inevitably ground to a standstill. Disillusioned, the Greek volunteers went home to Athens to pursue more commercial careers, forgetting their dreams of establishing a World Wildlife Fund in Greece, and Rita resumed to Switzerland, bitter and exhausted.

Even in what was to follow – devastating evidence of the reasons for YPEA’s sabotage of the project – IUCN ‘WWF remained behind their implacable facade. We were now in their blacklist, perhaps unwritten but nevertheless still existing, a stigma that would never cease to haunt us in dealings with numerous environmental organizations throughout Europe. Most had heard of the IUCN/WWF decision to axe the project, and could not believe that the blame for its failure – my ‘lifestyle’ – was unfounded. Few bothered to defend us against this new wave of secret allegations. Only one kind professor from Holland, who visited Samos and talked with the local people, spoke out on our behalf: ‘It looks as though someone is stirring up trouble by telling lies,’ he wrote to a colleague in London. ‘I do not know who that is and I do not want to know the identity, as I detest this kind of person. It is also very bad for the sake of the monk seals.’

His, however, was a voice in the wilderness, and our project to save the seals of Greece had already been consigned to its coffin. In the vacuum that remained, the stage was set perfectly for the commercial or military exploitation of Seitani.

It was not until 11 October that, quite by accident, we received word from Samos that two concrete buildings were being constructed above Megalo Seitani’s magnificent beach, an embarrassing prospect for the Athens authorities who were still preparing with the Council of Europe to proclaim it the ‘first biogenetic reserve of Europe’. We immediately informed IUCN/WWF and Marinos Yeroulanos, but a few weeks later, four buildings were nearing completion. Penny Marinos then contacted the nomarchia several times by telephone, but came face to face with deliberate obstruction by petty officials. She was brusquely informed that the prefecture was only prepared to investigate ‘when the weather is better’, and they implied that it was none of the NCPPE’s business. Angered by this reaction, and fearing the worst, on 14 April 1981 Penny and a colleague at NCPPE took the personal initiative to visit Seitani and discovered that four bungalows had already been completed in the ‘strictly protected’ area. They also found surveying posts marking the foundations for a much larger structure – perhaps a villa, hotel, restaurant or some other tourist amenity. As we were to discover later, this was on land owned by the London-based shipping magnate Michael Peratikos. There could be no doubt that the Seitani seals were in danger. Local fishermen were already receiving substantial amounts for ferrying tourists into the area by boat during the summer months.

The bungalow development at Seitani.

On 2 June, the Minister of Co-ordination, Constantine Mitsotakis, delivered a stinging rebuke to the Samos authorities, ordering that the buildings be demolished immediately, and the area rehabilitated. But the impending national elections were slowing down government activities to the point of complete inertia – something that could not be said for illegal construction projects all over Greece, with speculators taking advantage of the pre-election chaos. Despite the direct orders of the minister, the prefecture took no subsequent action and even refused to cooperate with the NCPPE. Could it have been that there were more powerful military considerations involved?

At IUCN/WWF headquarters in Gland, there was stunned and embarrassed silence. Although the light may have dawned upon them that the YPEA harassment campaign could have had corrupt and ulterior motives, they had neatly painted themselves into a comer with their obsequiousness. It was not until 24 April 1981, more than six months after we had informed the organization of the Seitani development, that it finally moved by requesting its Commission on National Parks and Protected Areas to write a letter of enquiry to the Ministry of Agriculture. Its obsession with protocol was all too obvious: ‘I would be most grateful if you could let me know if there is any reason for concern in this regard and if so, would you feel it necessary for IUCN to intervene in any way…’ A copy of the letter and various internal memos were sent to us as if to pacify and reassure us that the organization was acting responsibly. Scrawled over them, in the hope that I would respect the need for secrecy, were words such as ‘Utmost Confidence’ and ‘Highly Confidential’. On one, someone had pencilled an urgent note, asking yet another anonymous bureaucrat whether ‘we should keep Johnson posted’, as though secrecy itself had become the primary concern. At the same time, unknown to us, the forest at Seitani was being razed by bulldozers to make a road to Megalo Seitani. Perhaps the thought of this stunningly beautiful landscape becoming a sanctuary was just too much for some entrepreneur in the tourist industry. Or were other, more powerful forces at play, capable of crushing a minister’s protests with impunity? It was surely significant that although the police knew of the illegal development, they did not lift a finger to halt it. Ironically, as the destruction was creeping on, enlightenment on the whole affair was also being imparted by intriguing threads of circumstantial evidence, though the truth apparently was just too embarrassing to admit.

Yet ours was not the only skeleton in the IUCN WWF cupboard. WWF International also had the dubious distinction of being hauled before the United Nations Commission on Human Rights on 6 August 1980. Investigating violations of human rights in South Africa, the Commission heard allegations of complicity involving WWF International and the South Africa Nature Foundation (SANF) in a project code-named Operation Genesis. SANF was apparently an alias for WWF South Africa.

Operation Genesis, supported by the WWF, was a scheme to establish a game reserve in the Pilanesberg ‘black homeland’ of Bophuthatswana. The site of the intended reserve was located near a large leisure complex called Sun City, a magnet for white South African tourists, and was to serve as an added attraction for the Sun City pleasure-seekers. The only problem confronting the implementation of the plan was a hundred black families who, according to the Commission, had been living on the land since 1898. The developers, Southern Sun Hotels, with official sanction, decided to remove them, forcibly if necessary, to an over-grazed area already occupied by another tribe. After deliberations, the Commission dispatched a telegram to WWF headquarters, requesting clarification of their role in the affair. ‘In a letter dated 14 August 1980,’ the Commission’s report read, ‘the Fund had provided a certain amount of information which it considered adequate… but that information did not suffice to dispel doubts as to the truth of the facts alleged.’

Then there is the 1001 Club, which was founded by Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands to help establish WWF’s lucrative financial base in 1961. Prince Bernhard discreetly resigned the WWF presidency when the Lockheed bribes scandal broke in 1976, in which it was revealed that he had accepted payments from the weapons and aerospace corporation to help it secure government orders in Holland. And yet despite the scandal, Bernhard is still active in WWF affairs and retains the presidency of WWF Netherlands and the honorary chairmanship of WWF Canada.

The 1001 Club’s members also have rather dubious credentials from an ecological point of view. The confidential membership list includes mining and chemical corporation chieftains, industrial farmers, arms merchants, shipowners, property developers and oil magnates. It has even been alleged that two Norwegian members of the 1001 Club made their fortunes from whaling, and an American associate by bulldozing the Brazilian rain forest. Each paid US $10,000 for life membership of the 1001 Club, bringing WWF’s financial base to more than $10 million.

What were the motivations of these businessmen who have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo? Some were undoubtedly attracted by WWF’s much touted strategy of ‘sustainable development’, while others use their membership to launder their consciences, polish up their famished public images, and glean tax relief on their massive personal fortunes. Still others had become genuinely concerned that they were returning from their hunting safaris with no trophies to mount on their mansion walls. Some were perhaps not even above utilizing the organization’s altruistic facade and its top-level network of political and industrial contacts to promote their own business dealings.

Executive committee members of WWF International include Dr Anton Rupert of Rothmans Tobacco, and Dr Luc Hoffmann whose grandfather founded Hoffmann-La Roche, the giant chemical and pharmaceutical corporation. Reputed to be one of the wealthiest men in Europe, Hoffmann still retains his seat on the board of directors of the Basel-based multinational. Furthermore, even Hoffmann-La Roche’s responsibility for the Seveso dioxin disaster in 1976 did not prevent Luc Hoffmann from being elected to the vice-presidency of WWF International.

Vast infusions of cash from the 1001 Club enabled the constantly expanding bureaucracy of the international secretariat to move to the town of Gland, near Geneva, in 1980, to occupy its new headquarters. Christened the ‘World Conservation Centre’, and equipped with its own nuclear shelter and paper shredders, its $2 million price-tag was covered by a single ‘anonymous’ donation.

Even at the World Conservation Centre, bureaucracy rarely equals efficiency. This may be one of the reasons why a glossy WWF Review brochure had to be scrapped at a cost of almost £10,000 because of failure to correct printer’s proofs. It would be quite wrong, however, to infer from all of this that the majority of WWF projects are worthless, despite an inordinate emphasis on research and conferences. Many projects are undoubtedly superb, even if this is in spite of the governing bureaucracy, not because of it. Even the organization’s philosophy of persuading industry to work for the environment seems profound and progressive at face value, a plea to forget our differences, forget confrontation, and realize that humanity is all in the same boat and sinking fast. And yet if such a conviction ever did exist in that way, it was not resilient enough to dissuade their new-found mentors from indulging in their usual destructive practices.

Not wanting to bite the hand that feeds them, the vast injections of cash inexorably began to compromise WWF International’s already conservative ecological philosophy, and they have become increasingly incapable of taking any stand which might conceivably offend their all-powerful benefactors. Their consistent refusal to denounce the abuses of the weapons, chemicals and nuclear-power industries have angered many of the WWF national organizations, who are often more progressive in their ideals, and resent having to provide two-thirds of their income to Gland.

WWF Switzerland is a case in point. During 1980, they had remonstrated repeatedly to Gland over the latter’s role in the monk seal affair. This had prompted the newly appointed director of IUCN, Lee Talbot, to send an urgent memo to WWF International’s damage-control officer, Richard Herring. The confidential memo stated that WWF Switzerland ‘are convinced that the problem is not with Johnson but the Greek authorities, and feel that Johnson has been badly treated in all of this.’ Two days later, Herring answered by declaring that ‘everything is under control and no further action is required.’ The case was then closed, since IUCN, fully dependent on WWF’s financial support, is also reluctant to bite the hand that feeds them.

Launched in more than thirty countries in March 1980, the World Conservation Strategy of WWF and IUCN presented a 20-year deadline to conserve the most vital constituents of Earth’s ecosystem. On face value it is a bold and imaginative document, but its many critics have claimed that its worth has been irrevocably diminished because of omissions. The human population explosion and the role of international development aid receive only scant attention even though they are two of the greatest culprits in global ecological destruction. Predictably, the document is also careful not to direct criticism against the weapons, chemicals, pharmaceutical and nuclear industries. And whilst the World Conservation Strategy officially advocates a more equitable redistribution of wealth and the sharing of natural resources with the poor of the Third World, it is ironic that WWF still entertains hundreds of guests to sumptuous banquets, and their top officials, travelling around the globe to conferences and government meetings, still stay in the plushest of hotels.

In the WWF philosophy, however, it is essential to court respectability in an effort to attract the support of the powerful and wealthy. In turn, these would be the lever on governments to enact the World Conservation Strategy through legislation. The major premise of the strategy lay in the scientific evidence that the technological revolution was fully dependent upon finite and potentially renewable natural resources, and if these continued to be plundered in a free-for-all, then the revolution would soon meet its demise. The powerful and wealthy would be the first ones to lose out. If this was the stick of the strategy, the carrot was ‘sustainable development’ – the idea that industry, technology and science can expand indefinitely as long as what are called the ‘essential life-support systems’ of the planet are maintained in a healthy condition. In effect it meant that industry could continue to treat the Earth like a prostitute but would at least try to keep her clean for further orgies of exploitation. Indeed, with its cold and technocratic language, it almost conveys the impression that business interests are attempting to save the world so that the conquest of Earth can be sustainable. In layman’s language they called it ‘having your cake and eating it too’, an obvious fallacy to delude the gullible, since it is only the sharing of the cake which will bring ecological peace to this tired and war-stricken planet. Once again, the value of the natural world was measured only in terms of its economic usefulness to man, and IUCN/WWF has never clearly explained how conservation can be harmoniously integrated with the sustainable development of the weapons and chemicals industries. Yet for the chemical mandarins of IUCN/WWF and the 1001 Club, espousing the same mechanistic doctrine that has ruled and persecuted the Earth for centuries, even vivisection is sustainable.

In 1982, WWF and IUCN supported a World Health Organization plan to capture wild primates for captive breeding, thereby establishing a reservoir of the animals for laboratory experiments, some destined no doubt for a miserable death in the WWF vice-president’s laboratories at Hoffmann-La Roche. In Britain in 1986, WWF provided funds for research in which healthy badgers were taken from the wild and infected with tuberculosis; forty badgers were to die in the experiments. And in 1983, the Slimbridge Bird Sanctuary, headed by WWF’s council chairman Sir Peter Scott, sold a number of tufted ducks to Birmingham University for research purposes. The experiments, supposedly designed to compare heart rates with oxygen intake during swimming and diving, involved forcing each duck’s head under water for prolonged periods. All of the ducks died during the experiments, illustrating just how ‘sustainable’ suffering can be.

There was also the demise of WWF Peru, axed by WWF International for daring to take a stand against ‘sustainable development’ in the international trade in endangered species. In 1979, WWF International collaborated with the Peruvian government in a plan to slaughter part of a carefully conserved herd of vicuna, an endangered llama-like creature threatened with extinction and living in the Pampas Galeras national park. When WWF Peru strongly objected to the plan, believing that the population census had been fabricated, WWF International trustees voted to expel them. The WWF Yearbook in 1980 stated that ‘the collection of essential scientific data may require some vicuna to be harvested’, but by that time 2,100 of the graceful creatures had been slaughtered, causing an international controversy, especially over the cruelty of the culling methods. Speculation was rife about who would profit from the sale of the valuable wool and hides. Because of their rarity it seemed certain that they would be destined for the luxury fashion markets of North America and Europe.

And now there was the Samos spying scandal, and the bulldozers and dynamite ripping into the Seitani seal refuge. At Gland, ‘damage control’ once again became the order of the day. Like all of the other embarrassing and ignominious episodes that had plagued WWF headquarters, this affair too would be suppressed.

We decided that media coverage was now long overdue, but were hardly prepared for our uphill battle against press cynicism and what appeared to be outside interference in attempting to have the story censored. Reuters in Geneva prepared a lengthy feature on the affair, only for it to be rejected at London headquarters for ‘legal reasons’. And Europe’s leading news magazine, Der Spiegel, reporting the story under the title of ‘Espionage’, preferred to portray the entire affair as a satire or farce, deliberately omitting the very heart of the conspiracy, the illegal development of Seitani. Its central theme rested on an interview with Kyrios Drumpis on Samos, with the chief of police quoted as saying that we had been training monk seals to send secret messages to Turkey!

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