Sweet news from Ireland: Cyprus refuses to grant asylum to Israeli vegetables

Every Monday should have a positive story. Here's this week's. The supermarket chain, Aldi had been selling Israeli fruit and vegetables marked ‘Product of Cyprus’. We in the IPSC raised it in the media and to the Cypriot ambassador. The Cypriots went ballistic and Aldi backed down.

I think the victory lies less in the fact that Aldi is no longer able to sell mislabelled Israeli stuff, but that they were trying to do so in the first place. It shows the boycott is starting to work. Hopefully Aldi will start looking for new suppliers now.

Here’s the Cypriot newspaper report:

Shunned Israeli fruit being sold as Cypriot
By Nathan Morley
(Cyprus Mail - Thursday, March 19, 2009)
ALDI ‘apologises unreservedly for this error to its customers and producers’

Aldi, the supermarket chain, yesterday admitted to misleading European consumers by selling re-labelled Israeli Grapefruit as a product of Cyprus before passing it on to the public.

It has been claimed the decision to pass off the Israeli fruit by the German ALDI chain came after a widespread boycott of Israeli goods in the aftermath of the Israel’s invasion into Gaza in December.

Since then, shoppers across Ireland especially, have been turning their backs on Israeli goods such as fruit, vegetables and electronics and it is thought that stockpiles of Israeli produce are rotting at supply depots…
more here: http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=106599