09/12/2003 (Agence Europe) - The Green/EFA group has welcomed the decision of the EU committee on food safety to reject the marketing of a type of genetically modified sweetcorn Bt11 (EUROPE yesterday p 11). Co-president Monica Frassoni saw this as a victory for consumer protection and considered that the precautionary principle should be applied to this sweetcorn, which is able to produce its own insecticide and is resistant to herbicides. Her colleague, Paul Lannoye from Belgian said that the risk of contamination of traditional and organic crops by cultivation of GMOs should not be ignored and called for the setting up of a civic organisation responsible for this matter (as proposed in the report by Graefe von Baringdorf and adopted on 2 December in the committee: see EUROPE 5 December p 16). Jill Evans from Wales thought the behaviour of the British government "indefensible" for having voted in support of the lifting of the moratorium on GMOs despite the crushing opposition of the British public.