France Suits

Four tobacco companies are the targets of an action brought by French regional health insurer CAPM. The decision by the tribune of Saint Nazaire to allow the suit, the first like it in France, follows several legal cases in the United States. The companies are Seita of France, Rothmans Inc. of Canada and American firms Philip Morris Cos. and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., a unit of RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp.

Barrie Taylor's eyes brim, and she clutches a tissue to dab the tears as she tells her story. She wants to talk about spending four years and eight months in a French prison without a trial. She wants to talk about being assaulted by prison inmates and about anti-American prejudice. She wants to talk about her post-traumatic stress disorder. What she doesn't want to talk about are the circumstances that landed her in prison: a dead body, a freshly dug hole and Taylor holding a shovel.

A federal judge on Monday ordered the Amoco Corp. to pay $85.2 million for decade-old damages caused when the crippled supertanker Amoco Cadiz drifted into French Brittany's rocky coast, spilling 68 million gallons of crude oil along 120 miles of picturesque shoreline.

A local branch of the French health insurance program said it is preparing a suit against four tobacco companies for up to $90 million, blaming them for smoking-related diseases. The lawsuit, expected to be filed by the end of March, would be a first in France, where smoking remains widely tolerated and socially acceptable. The social security office in the coastal city of Saint-Nazaire will sue tobacco companies Philip Morris Cos., Canada's Rothmans Inc., R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.

A local branch of the French health insurance program said it is preparing a suit against four tobacco companies for up to $90 million, blaming them for smoking-related diseases. The lawsuit, expected to be filed by the end of March, would be a first in France, where smoking remains widely tolerated and socially acceptable. The social security office in the coastal city of Saint-Nazaire will sue tobacco companies Philip Morris Cos., Canada's Rothmans Inc., R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.

The environmental organization Greenpeace said Friday that an arbitration tribunal ordered France to pay it $8.16 million in damages for the sinking of the Greenpeace vessel Rainbow Warrior two years ago. Greenpeace chairman David McTaggart said the organization will use the award, made Friday by a three-member international tribunal in Geneva, to support its worldwide fleet and its campaigns for a nuclear-free Pacific. The French government had no immediate comment on the award.

Barrie Taylor's eyes brim, and she clutches a tissue to dab the tears as she tells her story. She wants to talk about spending four years and eight months in a French prison without a trial. She wants to talk about being assaulted by prison inmates and about anti-American prejudice. She wants to talk about her post-traumatic stress disorder. What she doesn't want to talk about are the circumstances that landed her in prison: a dead body, a freshly dug hole and Taylor holding a shovel.

What did Charles de Gaulle have in common with the man who had left France four years earlier (as war began), a half-clandestine traveler into the impossible, clinging to the raft of the vanquished, more an actor than a general, more illegal than heroic, more of a scandal than a prophet? From failure to rejection, condemned by Vichy, made game of by the eminent, reviled by his equals, denied by Roosevelt, disowned by Churchill, he had survived and increased in size; he had mastered fate.

Japan is headed toward a bitter dispute over wine with the United States and members of the European Communities. American and European exporters accuse Japan of protecting an inefficient domestic industry by unfair means while keeping out superior foreign products with taxes and duties many times higher than those in the United States and Europe.

The Atlantic trade in slaves and slave produce in the 18th century is sometimes wrongly associated with the state-organized world of colonial mercantilism rather than with the birth of free trade. The Spanish trade in silver did furnish the basis for a well-organized colonial system.

Four tobacco companies are the targets of an action brought by French regional health insurer CAPM. The decision by the tribune of Saint Nazaire to allow the suit, the first like it in France, follows several legal cases in the United States. The companies are Seita of France, Rothmans Inc. of Canada and American firms Philip Morris Cos. and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., a unit of RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp.

What did Charles de Gaulle have in common with the man who had left France four years earlier (as war began), a half-clandestine traveler into the impossible, clinging to the raft of the vanquished, more an actor than a general, more illegal than heroic, more of a scandal than a prophet? From failure to rejection, condemned by Vichy, made game of by the eminent, reviled by his equals, denied by Roosevelt, disowned by Churchill, he had survived and increased in size; he had mastered fate.

A federal judge on Monday ordered the Amoco Corp. to pay $85.2 million for decade-old damages caused when the crippled supertanker Amoco Cadiz drifted into French Brittany's rocky coast, spilling 68 million gallons of crude oil along 120 miles of picturesque shoreline.

The environmental organization Greenpeace said Friday that an arbitration tribunal ordered France to pay it $8.16 million in damages for the sinking of the Greenpeace vessel Rainbow Warrior two years ago. Greenpeace chairman David McTaggart said the organization will use the award, made Friday by a three-member international tribunal in Geneva, to support its worldwide fleet and its campaigns for a nuclear-free Pacific. The French government had no immediate comment on the award.