Irish Glaxo shareholders threatened by activists

The British "animal rights activists" who are sending threatening letters to Irish shareholders in pharmaceutical group, GlaxoSmithKline, are known to English police according to the company.

An unnamed English group has been writing to Irish shareholders in the company warning that unless they sell their stake within 14 days, their details will be published on a website.

The people behind the anonymous letters say they are targeting GlaxoSmithKline because it has a partnership with Huntingdon Life Sciences in England, which uses animals for drug tests. The letter, a copy of which has been seen by The Irish Times, states: "Should you choose not to sell your shares within 14 days your details will be publicised and within a weeks a website will be hosted with all remaining shareholders listed."

It also claims that similar tactics have in the past been successfully used against Huntingdon itself and other companies connected with drug testing on animals. A GlaxoSmithKline spokeswoman said yesterday that the company understands that the people behind the letters are already known to the English police. "They are a very small group of people and it is very unlikely that the people involved are a new group," she said.

At least some of the letters are known to have originated from Southampton on the south coast of England. British shareholders have also received the letters. A specialist division of the British police, the National Extremist Tactical Co-ordinating Unit (NECTU) is investigating the matter. The spokeswoman said that Irish people who receive the letters should report the matter to the Garda and give them a copy of the letter.

A Garda spokeswoman said that Irish people who received the letters should report it if they felt that they were being threatened or harassed in any way.

GlaxoSmithKline has obtained an English high court ruling banning "animal rights" groups from writing to its shareholders or publishing their details on the web. However, this cannot be enforced in the Republic.

One of Europe's biggest pharmaceutical producers, GlaxoSmithKline has a manufacturing and research and development facility in Cork, and a sales and marketing business in the Republic.

"Animal rights activists" have regularly staged violent protests at the Huntingdon Life Sciences' facility in the south of England. A spokesman for the Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC) group said it was not behind the letters. He added that it endorsed the motives behind the campaign, but said that it was "tactically" the wrong time to target shareholders, because of proposed changes in English company law that would give greater protection to their identities.