The mercurial Prime Minister used the sinking to cement in New Zealand's anti-nuclear policy, and his public statements on the matter -including calling the bombing "an act of terrorism" - endeared him to
the New Zealand public.
Later, when French pressure led to threats of economic embargoes, Lange secretly began negotiations that saw Prieur and Mafart released from Paremoremo Prison. S
Shortly before his death in 2005 Lange wrote regretfully of his handling
of the agents in his memoir My Life.
Alain Mafart
Along with Dominique Prieur, he was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 10 years in prison for his role in the bombing.
Mafart was transferred to serve his sentence on Hao Atoll under a controversial deal struck in the middle of 1986. He was released early after complaining of stomach troubles.
In 1999 he released a book, Diaries of a Combat Diver, in which he said he was only following orders. He was promoted after returning to France.
Dominique Prieur
Prieur was a French intelligence specialist in European peace movements. She did reconnaissance for the Rainbow Warrior bombing.
She pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to 10 years in jail but served only three in French Polynesia.
In her book Secret Agent, she wrote of the death: "We were terrified and appalled ... We hadn't come here to kill anyone
...For me, the death of a man was very hard to take."
Last year, Prieur was hired as the director of human resources
for the Paris Fire Brigade, a unit of the French Army.
Martini Gotje
An accomplished mariner, Netherlands- born Gotje was first mate on the
Rainbow Warrior.
Twice-married (first to original Rainbow Warrior crew member Susi Newborn), he has four children aged 11 to 29. He lives with the three youngest on Waiheke Island and does consultant work for Greenpeace, tracking illegal fishing boats, nuclear transports and whalers and investigating underwater oil drilling.
The bombing made him "an angryman" he says.
Bunny McDiarmid
McDiarmid was a deckhand on the Rainbow Warrior. She and her partner, Henk Haazen, were ashore when the bombs detonated.
They settled in Auckland and had a daughter. McDiarmid now heads Greenpeace New Zealand. She lives in an Auckland apartment over the week but spends her weekends in the eco-village she built with other Waiheke Rainbow Warriors.
Rien Achterberg
Amsterdam-born Achterberg emigrated to New Zealand in his 20s and opened a short-lived coffee shop in Nelson called Middle Earth.
A chance meeting with Gotje led him to join the peace protest ship Fri, and then Greenpeace. He was shore-based for the South Pacific mission, but was on board when the bombs went off.
He settled on Waiheke Island and had two children. He now runs a jam and
relish stall and is active in the local environmental movement.
Hanne Sorensen
A Danish fitter and turner, Sorensen helped convert the Rainbow Warrior
to a sailing boat at a Florida dockyard for its South Pacific voyage.
The bombing left her traumatised and disillusioned.
She settled on Waiheke Island with Kiwi partner Rob and had a daughter.
She now does her bit for the planet in the eco-village she helped build with McDiarmid, Haazen, and Newborn and other families.
