Rainbow Warrior: Murder In The Pacific | Preview (BBC Two)

Murder in the Pacific is a gripping three-part series that tells the astonishing story of the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior and the bombing that sank it in Auckland harbour killing a crew member.

Recounted by the Warrior’s crew of Greenpeace activists, the police investigators tasked with solving the crime and the bombers themselves, the story unfolds like a crime thriller.

Piecing together the extraordinary events leading up to that fateful night, the series unravels the astounding twists, turns and bizarre events that led to the indictment of the French Government and their Secret Service and fuelled the debate around nuclear weapons testing.

With environmental activism regularly making headlines and nuclear weapons back in the spotlight, this examination of how far powerful governments will go to protect their interests has never felt more timely.

In July 1985, the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior, a symbol of peace, has just returned from a visit to Rongelap in the Marshall Islands, whose inhabitants are suffering the horrific effects of nuclear fallout following the 1954 testing of the American H-bomb Bravo – a weapon 1,000 times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

The ship travels south to Auckland Harbour, New Zealand, where the crew are to lead a flotilla of boats protesting against French nuclear tests in French Polynesia. But their mission is stopped when two explosions sink the ship, killing a crew member. The hunt for the perpetrators begins.

The series will be released as a box set on BBC iPlayer and will air on BBC Two on Thursday from 9pm on BBC Two.