The official site for press releases by the International Raelian Movement (IRM), RaelPress, has scrubbed all news between January 2001 to May 2004 in an apparent attempt to disassociate itself from claims of human clones made by CLONAID during that time. That's the period when the CLONAID hoax was in the limelight.
A search for "clonaid" produces only 6 results from the entire press site. None of the entries make direct references to CLONAID's claim of being the first company to have successfully cloned a human being:
CISION PR Newswire has archived IRM press releases since July 2002.
It's been 20 years since Rael founded CLONAID (initially called Valiant Venture) as a publicity stunt. While it's claimed that the supposed cloning company is completely independent from Rael and the IRM, all of the people involved with the former were indeed all dedicated IRM members.
One such person is Damien M., who had devoted 33 years of his life to Rael. With a background in biotechnology, he was used as a poster boy for CLONAID as part of its scientific team.
However, more than a decade later, in early 2016, he was excommunicated by Rael for finally denouncing Raelian Bishop Brigitte Boisselier, who runs CLONAID, for lying to the media about producing human clones (to date, 13 clones have been claimed) to effectively publicize Raelism to the world. In fact, in 2003, Rael gloated about running a successful media campaign that allowed him to reach one of his 2 main goals: to spread the Raelian Messages worldwide (Susan Palmer, Aliens Adored, p. 191). Rael instead accused Damien of lying and making everything up before expelling him from his cult.
A search for "clonaid" produces only 6 results from the entire press site. None of the entries make direct references to CLONAID's claim of being the first company to have successfully cloned a human being:
CISION PR Newswire has archived IRM press releases since July 2002.
It's been 20 years since Rael founded CLONAID (initially called Valiant Venture) as a publicity stunt. While it's claimed that the supposed cloning company is completely independent from Rael and the IRM, all of the people involved with the former were indeed all dedicated IRM members.
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| This pic of Damien still appears on CLONAID's website |
However, more than a decade later, in early 2016, he was excommunicated by Rael for finally denouncing Raelian Bishop Brigitte Boisselier, who runs CLONAID, for lying to the media about producing human clones (to date, 13 clones have been claimed) to effectively publicize Raelism to the world. In fact, in 2003, Rael gloated about running a successful media campaign that allowed him to reach one of his 2 main goals: to spread the Raelian Messages worldwide (Susan Palmer, Aliens Adored, p. 191). Rael instead accused Damien of lying and making everything up before expelling him from his cult.
