"French court dismisses landmark Agent Orange complaint", 10 May 2021

A French court on Monday dismissed a complaint from an elderly French-Vietnamese woman against a group of multinationals, including Monsanto, over the harm caused by the US use of Agent Orange during the Vietnam War.

The court in the Paris suburb of Evry ruled that it did not have the jurisdiction to judge a case involving the wartime actions of the US government.

The case was filed by Tran To Nga, a 79-year-old former journalist and activist who worked in Vietnam in her 20s, against 14 chemical giants, including Bayer, Monsanto and Dow Chemicals.

Tran says she has cancer, high iodine levels in her blood, genetic abnormalities, among other illnesses linked to Agent Orange. Her children were born with genetic abnormalities; one died when she was only few months old. She has described the case as "the last fight" of her life.

Dismissing the case, the court said that the companies were acting "on the orders" of the US government, which was engaged in a "sovereign act"...

The multinationals have argued that they could not be held responsible for the use the American military made of their product...

So far, only military veterans – from the US, Australia and Korea – have won compensation for the after-effects of the chemical whose toxic  properties destroyed plants, polluted the soil, poisoned animals and caused cancer and malformations in humans, according to NGOs.