Dominique Prieur (born 1949) is a French military officer who was convicted of manslaughter over her part in the

sinking of the Rainbow Warrior The sinking of ''Rainbow Warrior'', codenamed Opération Satanique, was a bombing operation by the "action" branch of the French foreign intelligence agency, the Directorate-General for External Security (DGSE), carried out on 10 July 1985. Du ...

.
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Biography

Prieur joined the military in 1974 and was recruited as a secret agent in August 1977.

Sinking of the ''Rainbow Warrior''

Prieur worked in the intelligence-gathering and evaluation wing of the French Secret Service, the Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (

DGSE The General Directorate for External Security (french: link=no, Direction générale de la Sécurité extérieure, DGSE) is France's foreign intelligence agency, equivalent to the British MI6 and the American CIA, established on 2 April 1982. ...

). She was an expert in European peace organisations and was the controller for Christine Cabon. Cabon was posted to

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

in April 1985, where she infiltrated the

Greenpeace Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning network, founded in Canada in 1971 by Irving Stowe and Dorothy Stowe, immigrant environmental activists from the United States. Greenpeace states its goal is to "ensure the ability of the Earth t ...

office and gathered information for Prieur and her fellow agent

Alain Mafart Alain Mafart (born 1951) is a French military officer best known for his part in the Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior, bombing of the Rainbow Warrior. Mafart was a DGSE agent and deputy commander of the DGSE Training Centre in Corsica. He supporte ...

. In July 1985, Prieur and Mafart entered New Zealand from Corsica on Swiss passports issued to their aliases Sophie and Alain Turenge, a newlywed couple on honeymoon. Their instructions were to sink the ''Rainbow Warrior'' as the French government suspected that it would be used to protest the upcoming nuclear tests at

Mururoa atoll Moruroa (Mururoa, Mururura), also historically known as Aopuni, is an atoll which forms part of the Tuamotu Archipelago in French Polynesia in the southern Pacific Ocean. It is located about southeast of Tahiti. Administratively Moruroa Atoll i ...

in the South Pacific. Prieur's responsibilities were the logistics of the operation, and the evacuation of the agents from the country after the bombing had taken place. Prieur and Mafart delivered

limpet mine A limpet mine is a type of naval mine attached to a target by magnets. It is so named because of its superficial similarity to the shape of the limpet, a type of sea snail that clings tightly to rocks or other hard surfaces. A swimmer or diver m ...

s to two

frogmen A frogman is someone who is trained in scuba diving or swimming underwater in a tactical capacity that includes military, and in some European countries, police work. Such personnel are also known by the more formal names of combat diver, comb ...

to plant on the ship's hull on the night of 10 July 1985. The explosions sank the vessel and killed photographer

Fernando Pereira Fernando Pereira (10 May 1950 – 10 July 1985) was a freelance Portuguese-Dutch photographer, who drowned when French intelligence (DGSE) Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior, detonated a bomb and sank the ''Rainbow Warrior'', owned by the environme ...

. They were arrested by

New Zealand police The New Zealand Police ( mi, Ngā Pirihimana o Aotearoa) is the national police service and principal law enforcement agency of New Zealand, responsible for preventing crime, enhancing public safety, bringing offenders to justice, and maintai ...

within 30 hours of the bombing, and originally charged with Pereira's murder. Prieur was transferred to

Christchurch Christchurch ( ; mi, Ōtautahi) is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Canterbury Region. Christchurch lies on the South Island's east coast, just north of Banks Peninsula on Pegasus Bay. The Avon River / ...

Women's Prison and held there awaiting trial. Prieur pleaded guilty to charges of manslaughter and wilful damage in the Auckland District Court, and was sentenced to ten years imprisonment on 22 November 1985. After serious political pressure from France and her allies, the New Zealand government agreed to a

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be ...

arbitration ruling in July 1986 that saw the pair transferred to French custody on the island of

Hao Hao or HAO may refer to: People * Hao (surname) (Chinese: ) * Hao (video gamer), Chinese professional ''Dota 2'' player * Leo Hao, Russian artist *Heather O'Reilly, Professional soccer player Places * Hao (city), or Haojing (), capital of the ...

in French Polynesia. Prieur's husband, Joel Prieur, an employee of the Defense Department, was posted to Hao shortly after she was exiled there. On 6 May 1988 she was returned to France because she was pregnant, and was heralded as a national hero. She never returned to Hao. Although a UN Arbitration panel found that France had breached its obligation to New Zealand several times by removing the agents from Hao, and failing to return them, it rejected the claim by New Zealand to have Mafart and Prieur returned because the term they should have spent there had already lapsed.

Later career

In 1989, Prieur was promoted to Major, and by 2002 she had been promoted to the rank of

Commandant Commandant ( or ) is a title often given to the officer in charge of a military (or other uniformed service) training establishment or academy. This usage is common in English-speaking nations. In some countries it may be a military or police ran ...

. Prieur published a book ''"Agent secrète"'' (''Secret Agent'') in 1995 concerning her role in the bombing. With regards to the death of Pereira, she wrote "We were terrified and appalled ... We hadn't come here to kill anyone." In 2005, Prieur and Marfart appealed to the

New Zealand Supreme Court The Supreme Court of New Zealand ( mi, Te Kōti Mana Nui, lit=Court of Great Mana) is the highest court and the court of last resort of New Zealand. It formally came into being on 1 January 2004 and sat for the first time on 1 July 2004. It re ...

to stop footage of their guilty pleas being shown on television. The supreme court allowed the footage to go on the air. In 2009, Prieur was hired as the director of human resources for the

Paris Fire Brigade The Paris Fire Brigade (french: Brigade des sapeurs-pompiers de Paris, BSPP) is a French Army unit which serves as the primary fire and rescue service for Paris, the city's inner suburbs and certain sites of national strategic importance. The ...

, a unit of the

French Army The French Army, officially known as the Land Army (french: Armée de Terre, ), is the land-based and largest component of the French Armed Forces. It is responsible to the Government of France, along with the other components of the Armed For ...

.Staff (4 January 2009) "Fresh Start for Saboteur" ''Sunday Mail'' (South Australia) p. 29

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Prieur, Dominique Living people French spies 1949 births Directorate-General for External Security Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior Human resource management people Women in firefighting Terrorism committed by France Paris Fire Brigade French Army officers