Sasol fingered in espionage case
South African chemical giant Sasol became embroiled in allegations of industrial espionage and sabotage against environmental activists, when Greenpeace took an American subsidiary to the Federal Court in Washington, DC.
Other respondents in the case include The Dow Chemical Company and two public relations firms.
Greenpeace accuses Sasol North America and Dow of hiring private investigators to steal its documents, tap its phones and hack into its computers between 1998 and 2000.
It is suing for damages, which it says should be established by a jury. Central to the complaint is a community’s battle against the pollution of Lake Charles, in Louisiana, near the Sasol plant.
Greenpeace claims that local residents suffer high rates of cancer and respiratory problems linked to the company’s production processes.
It claims that the two chemical companies, though their PR agencies, hired a security firm to keep tabs on it and the campaigns it was conducting.
At issue is whether Sasol can be held liable for the alleged sins of a company in which it invested. The Louisiana plant became part of the Sasol stable only in 2001, after the alleged espionage took place.
The chemicals
According to Sasol’s website the Lake Charles plant produces commodity and speciality chemicals for soaps, detergents and personal care products.
At the time of the Greenpeace complaint, it was manufacturing ethylene dichloride, a suspected carcinogen, and vinyl chloride.
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Sasol North America operates as part of Sasol Olefins Surfactants, headquartered in Germany, which is, in turn, part of the chemicals division of Sasol Limited.
“At the time referred to in the Greenpeace complaint the company in question was named Condea Vista Inc and was not owned by Sasol,” said Sasol Group communications chief Jacqui O’Sullivan this week.
O’Sullivan said Sasol acquired Condea Vista in March 2001. “The alleged … espionage relates to a time period more than 10 years ago,” she said.
Condea Vista allegedly leaked up to 21 000 metric tonnes of ethylene dichloride into the Calcasieu River in Louisiana in 1994, sparking an intensive environmental campaign. The area was the subject of an environmental investigation in 2001.
Evidence that Greenpeace plans to use in the lawsuit includes files from security firm Beckett Brown International, consisting of daily logs, emails, reports and phone records.
The 56-page lawsuit alleges that Beckett agents infiltrated a Louisiana community group concerned about the plant’s activities and conducted “surveillance and intrusion” against employees at the plant, as well as community members.
Greenpeace’s claims
The security firm’s agents also allegedly obtained Greenpeace activists’ phone records and sorted through their rubbish.
Greenpeace claims off-duty police officers and former American National Security Agency computer security experts stole thousands of confidential documents from the activists, including campaign plans.
Greenpeace claims Beckett’s billing records show that it spent hundreds of hours spying on it.
“Beckett Brown International identifies Greenpeace as a ‘target’ and, in a 1998 memorandum describing its activities to monitor ‘environmental activist groups’, stated that the information being obtained by Beckett ‘provides insight into the scheduling of environmental protests and actions of the group, corporate targets, the tracking of maritime cargo by the group and internal political issues of the group’,” court papers say.
Philip Radford, executive director of Greenpeace, wrote in his blog that the first purpose of the lawsuit was “to put a dent in the arrogance of these corporate renegades who have for too long believed that ethics do not apply to their pursuit of ever-higher profits”.
“Second, we believe it is every citizen’s right to stand up for the health of their children and community without fearing retribution, an invasion of privacy, conspiracy against them or theft of their belongings.
“We believe Dow and Sasol conspired to do this to Greenpeace; we aim to stop this before it happens to you.”
Greenpeace claims that the public relations firms involved — including Nichols-Dezenhall and Ketchum — acted as middlemen between the chemical companies and Beckett.
Greenpeace apparently smelled a rat when an investigative piece in American magazine Mother Jones in 2008 hinted that Beckett was spying on activists in Louisiana.
The article lifted the lid on the company’s far-flung activities, including work for Walmart, Halliburton and Monsanto. Beckett has since been disbanded.