A GROUP of animal rights campaigners gathered outside a factory in Newport to protest against the company's link with a controversial laboratory.

Members of the Welsh branch of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC) waved banners and leafleted visitors outside the BOC premises on Langland Way, Newport, on Wednesday afternoon.

BOC supply gas to Hunting Life Sciences, the animal testing laboratory in Cambridge that has come under a barrage of criticism from animal rights protesters all over the world.

The BOC site was one of many premises SHAC members visited across South Wales to protest at their alleged links to the largest contract testing laboratory in Europe.

Chris, a protester who refused to give his surname, said: "It went really well.

"We were outside BOC for an hour and they tried to move us on but we stood our ground."

A spokesman for BOC said: "We supply gases to a number of businesses in the UK including HLS.

"They operate legally and are fully approved and licensed by the UK government. We operate on that basis."