Monsanto Kept 'watch Lists' In Seven EU Countries: Bayer

Bayer's public relations headaches over its mammoth takeover of Monsanto intensified Tuesday, as a scandal about "watch lists" of pro- or anti-pesticides figures kept by the US group snowballed across Europe

Frankfurt am Main, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 21st May, 2019 ) :Bayer's public relations headaches over its mammoth takeover of Monsanto intensified Tuesday, as a scandal about "watch lists" of pro- or anti-pesticides figures kept by the US group snowballed across Europe.

The German group said the lists covered politicians, journalists and others across seven European countries and in Brussels.

Bayer's admission adds to the company's woes that have piled up since it acquired Monsanto for $63 billion in 2018 -- one of the largest in German corporate history -- which has also lumbered it with a massive burden of health-related lawsuits.

The Leverkusen-based group said Tuesday that PR agency FleishmanHillard "drew up lists of stakeholders in France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Spain and United Kingdom, as well as regarding stakeholders related to EU institutions" on Monsanto's behalf.

Bayer promised transparency over the lists earlier this month,after a French television channel revealed the existence in France of files on prominent backers and opponents of pesticides and genetically modifiedcrops.