2023-05-19 15:45:00
INTERVIEW. Michel Parigot, of the Jussieu Anti-Asbestos Committee, denounces the rejection by the Paris court of the request for a criminal trial. Without feeling defeated.
Interview by Lou Roméo
© JEAN AYISSI / AFP
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TStill no criminal trial for asbestos victims. The Paris Criminal Court invalidated this Friday, May 19 the request for direct citation filed in November 2021 by 1,800 victims and beneficiaries in order to obtain the holding of a criminal trial once morest fourteen “national actors”. Industrialists, public decision-makers, scientists and doctors, linked to the “permanent asbestos committee”, which the plaintiffs wanted to see appear for having voluntarily worked to delay the ban on asbestos, whose carcinogenic effects had been known since the 1970s. The court pronounced the nullity of this procedure because of its “vagueness”, explaining that the defendants were “not in a condition to be able to link what is alleged once morest each” to specific victims. Plaintiffs now have the option of either resubmitting a citation or appealing the court’s decision.
The use of asbestos was only banned in 1997 in France, where 70,000 to 100,000 deaths might be attributable to it by 2050, according to the High Council for Public Health. This is the biggest public health affair in France. Three thousand people die each year as a result of their exposure to this toxic insulator. Although many victims have been compensated, most of the legal proceedings have been closed by the courts, which are struggling to prove the link between the illnesses of employees exposed to asbestos and the responsibility of companies, and fails to identify the culprits.
Michel Parigot, mathematician and president of the Jussieu anti-asbestos committee, meeting with the regional association of victims of asbestos Nord-Pas-de-Calais within the AVA, has made this health scandal his fight for nearly thirty years. He answered questions from Point leaving the hearing.
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Point : How do you live this decision?
Michel Parigot : Again, it is clear and demonstrable that the prosecution seeks to prevent the holding of a criminal trial on asbestos. The notion of imprecision used today is itself imprecise and left to discretion, and it is clear that the standards applied in the asbestos case are not those that justice usually applies.
This case must absolutely have a judicial treatment, it is the largest lobbying operation that has taken place in France.
The prosecution has been in the way for 20 years, which coincides with the time when national investigations implicated certain senior officials in the asbestos affair.
This case must absolutely have a legal treatment, it is the largest lobbying operation to have taken place in France. Some of the senior officials who managed the asbestos file were members of a lobby structure, which met ten to twenty times a year to make decisions. They decided, outside the ministries, to continue the use of asbestos in full knowledge of the facts, when the risks were known, and when they knew that it would produce tens of thousands of deaths. We can prove it.
What do you plan for the future?
This decision does not end anything. It simply says that the citation we filed is imprecise and inadmissible as such, but that does not prevent us from filing a new, more precise one. That’s what we’re gonna do first.
We might appeal, but that might waste too much time, so we’ll move on to a new citation. This decision only delays things for a year. The problem is that the people targeted by the citation are in their great majority very old, and that some may die before we can redo a citation. The prosecution is playing on this, it is trying to delay things.
This matter cannot escape Justice, it is not acceptable
What message do you want to send to asbestos victims?
I want to tell them that this decision does not change anything: it should not be seen as a defeat, it simply confirms that the judicial institution is not in favor of holding a trial, but that, we already knew. The decision does not condemn the quote, but says to make it more specific, which we will do. It is not at all a judgment that puts an end to the procedure. It’s not regarding giving up. This matter cannot escape justice, it is not acceptable. It is a fight for each of the victims who wants this trial, but also for society. It is therefore obvious that we will continue, and that we will use all the possibilities offered to us. We can do it.
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