PARIS - French President Jacques Chirac has cut four months off a 10-month prison sentence anti-globalisation leader Jose Bove is serving as part of the head of state's traditional clemency decree for Bastille Day, Chirac's office and the justice ministry said Thursday.

About 2,000 people demonstrate for the release from prison of farmers union leader Jose Bove, in Millau, southern France, Saturday, June 28, 2003. Bove was taken into custody on June 22 to begin a ten-month sentence for destroying genetically modified crops. (AP Photo/Bob Edme)

The shortened sentence will be applied to Bove's term from next Wednesday, two days after the national holiday celebrating the French Revolution of 1789, which falls on July 14 every year.

Bove, the 50-year-old leader of France's farmers' union who gained worldwide notoriety for his actions against McDonald's restaurants, genetically modified crops and multinational corporations, was taken away on June 22 in a spectacular police raid on his home to serve his current sentence.

The prison term was the accumulation of two convictions confirmed after Bove exhausted the appeals process six months ago.

He was put behind bars for four months for destroying a stock of genetically modified seeds at a site in France owned by Swiss company Novartis in 1998, and for another six months for ruining genetically modified rice plants at a laboratory in Montpellier in 1999.

Unionists and anti-globalisation protesters have held frequent demonstrations across France to demand his release.

His supporters and lawyers also pressured Chirac to give him a total pardon for Bastille Day.

Chirac, who every Bastille Day traditionally signs a partial reduction of prison sentences for most of those behind bars in France, decided to lop two months off terms for all prisoners except those convicted of terrorism, paedophilia, crimes against humanity, drug felonies, assaulting police officers, or of fatal driving offences.

Bove will also get an additional two months' reduction as an individual clemency from the president, Chirac's office said.

With good behavior and the possibility of conditional release, Bove - who could now expect to finish his sentence in December - may see his incarceration shortened yet further, depending on the decision of a judge that supervises prison terms.

Copyright 2003 AFP

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