A family of guinea pig farm-ers, plagued almost daily by attacks from animal rights extremists because they supply the controversial Huntingdon Life Sciences, has refused to bow to protesters. Speaking for the first time, brothers John and Chris Hall, owners of Darley Oaks Farm, in Newchurch, Stafford-shire, said some protesters had crossed the line into terrorism in their five-year pursuit to close the farm down. Animal rights activists, who have cut off electricity supplies, dug up a nearby golf course and carried out several raids on the farm. John Hall, aged 56, said: "We are not going to buckle because we are engaged in a legal business and we take the greatest possible care to make sure these animals have the best possible conditions. "I respect the right to legal protest, but there are people who have crossed the line into terrorism. We are licensed by the Home Office to provide animals for use in medical research and are subject to regular inspection. We only breed guinea pigs. "If you get ill and you refuse to take drugs to cure you, then you can criticise us, but until there is an alternative, there must be animal testing or we will have no new medicines. The research needs us to go on." He accused some of the protesters of sheer hypocrisy and said that one activist who regularly protested out-side the farm was being treated for cancer with drugs that were tested on animals. The five-year campaign began with peaceful protests by an organisation called Close Down Newchurch Guinea Pig Farm, but extremists in balaclavas organised raids on the Hall's home, smashing windows, sending threatening letters and stealing guinea pigs. They cut off electricity supplies in the area and caused £10,000 of damage to Branston Golf Course because John Hall was a member. He later quit the club. Then extremists turned to the farm's suppliers. They harassed the company that collected the milk from their cows, fuel suppliers and even their solicitors. Mr Hall said: "Ironically, because they hit our sup-pliers, we couldn't operate our traditional farming, so we have concentrated on the guinea pigs because the suppliers and customers there are already used to the threats." The Halls suffered in silence for five years, but the actions of the extremists, who Mr Hall brands terrorists, persuaded them to co-operate with the BBC Radio 4 programme Face the Facts in the hope of gaining public support. Nick Saunders, who helped run the Halls' herd of cows, which has now been sold, had his life threatened and his car covered with paint stripper. He said: "They leafleted our village to say I was a convicted paedophile and my partner Jackie had a sexually transmitted disease. "We had neighbours outside our house demanding that we be run out of the area and eventually we decided to move. But three weeks after we left, the extremists found us, poured paint-stripper on the car again and flung bricks through our window. "I am not going to be dictated to as to where I can and cannot work." Mr Saunders now has motion sensors in his garden, metal shutters on his windows and CCTV. Keith and Kate Marklew, who ran the Hall's local pub, the Red Lion at Newborough, ignored threats from extremists. Mrs Marklew, 58, said: "They sent letters to our customers, telling them we were serving scum and urging them to stop coming here, but we didn't think John had done anything wrong and wouldn't stop serving him." Then the Union Pub chain, which owned the Red Lion, started to receive threats and told the Marklews to ban Mr Hall. The couple refused and subsequently had to give up their tenancy. Stephen Oliver, managing director of Union Pubs, said: "You don't want to feel that you have given in to this sort of intimidation, but I have got a wider duty of care to my other pubs and suppliers and staff. "Because the Marklews would not take our advice and exclude the Halls, we then asked the Marklews to consider whether they could continue working in the pub when we had withdrawn our support." Mr Hall said: "I am very grateful to Keith and Kate, who made a great sacrifice on a point of principle. There are not many people prepared to do that, we have found out." New pub manager Ian Terrell, who has had to comply with the ban, said: "I personally don't think they should have been banned at all. But I have been given a brief and I must stick to it." Inspector David Bird, from the Environmental Protest Unit at Staffordshire Police, said 15 protesters were due to stand trial for public order offences in the next six weeks. | 
