French activist facing new inquiry

Bove speaks to reporters outside the court on Monday

PARIS, France -- French farmers' leader Jose Bove is facing an investigation for allegedly defaming animal feed manufacturers by saying they brought mad cow disease into France.

A judge ordered the inquiry on Monday following a complaint by the National Union for Animal Nutrition, Bove's lawyer, Francois Roux, told The Associated Press.

The complaint was prompted by comments Bove made in the press in November 2000, in which he accused the industry of importing tainted feed from Britain. Scientists believe the disease was spread by recycling meat and bone meal from infected animals back into cattle feed.

The case is the latest facing Bove, a sheep farmer from southwestern France, who received a three-month jail sentence for ransacking a McDonald's restaurant in 1999 in protest against U.S. tariffs on French delicacies such as foie gras.

He also has a 10-month suspended jail term hanging over him for destroying genetically-altered plants.

The human form of mad cow disease has killed 102 people in Britain, three in France, one in Ireland and one in Hong Kong. Scientists believe it is caused by eating beef infected with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease.

Bove repeated the allegations when he was summoned to court on Monday, saying: "One can clearly say that our cows were poisoned without the knowledge of farmers by feed makers who imported animal-based feed from Great Britain."

There was a scuffle between police and Bove supporters ahead of his meeting with magistrates. Activists tried to hang a banner on the gates of the Palace of Justice in Paris.

The investigation launched on Monday is one step short of charging Bove.

Yves Montecot, president of the French animal feed makers union SNIA, told Reuters: "He said all animal feed makers had illegally imported meat-based meals from Britain. We consider that's not the case. There might be one firm or two which did it, but not all the makers.

"He has harmed the profession...we are doing this mainly to save our image."

Reuters said Bove was among protesters attending anti-globalisation demonstrations at the G8 summit in Genoa earlier this month, while he was arrested in the West Bank in June after campaigning against Jewish settlements.