Fidelis E. Satriastanti, Jakarta – Greenpeace on Monday rejected allegations of using "false and misleading information to attack a company's credibility," after an independent study questioned the environment watchdog's data.

International Trade Strategies Global, also known as ITS, conducted a peer-review on Greenpeace's report, "How Sinar Mas is Pulping the Planet."

The report was launched in July 2010, highlighting the environmentally devastating actions of one of the world's leading pulp and paper companies, Asia Pulp and Paper, also known as APP, owned by Sinar Mas.

"The evidence shows that Greenpeace provided quotes that don't exist, maps that show concessions that don't exist, and used source material with high margins of error that was cited as absolute fact," said Alan Oxley, chief executive office of the Melbourne-based ITS Global on the press release.

Oxley said the Greenpeace report was highly misleading and indefensible. In addition, the audit stated that a map in the Greenpeace report shows four concessions which don't exist.

"Sadly this is not an isolated incident. Greenpeace has exaggerated claims in the past. When we see reports like this with such obvious factual inaccuracies it makes us call into question the real Greenpeace agenda, risking the greater good to achieve its own political ends."

However, Bustar Maitar, team leader of Greenpeace SouthEast Asia, retaliated saying that the reviews were not independent considering the reviewer was allegedly paid by the company. "If they claim it's an independent report, it's a joke because Alan Oxley is speaking as an APP representative," Bustar said.

Concerning the maps, he said the maps were based on data drawn from the government and the company's internal sources. "So, if they said that those maps don't exist then they should have corrected the government and their own sources," he said.