Arms trade

1 June 2016News

Judge says 'clear, credible' evidence of 'criminal wrongdoing' at past arms fairs

On 15 April, eight people from Bahrain, Belgium, Chile, Peru and the UK were acquitted at Stratford magistrates’ court of obstructing the highway during the defence & security equipment international (DSEI) arms fair held in East London last September.

The defendants were: Isa Al-Aali from Bahrain; Bram Vranken from Belgium; Javier Garate Neidhart from Chile; Luis Tinoco Torrejon from Peru; and Angela Ditchfield, Lisa Butler, Thomas Franklin and Susannah Mengesha from the UK.…

1 June 2016News

Call for support for three trials

While the real criminals were on 16 March being safely protected and escorted into the building, the six protesters arrested at the DPRTE (defence procurement, research, technology and exportability) arms fair were due to stand trial at the end of May and beginning of June.

Originally held at the University of the West of England (UWE) campus in Bristol, DPRTE was driven out by determined active resistance and moved to the Cardiff Motorpoint Arena (a venue intended for…

1 April 2016News

Arms protestor fined £450

On 16 March, Hammersmith magistrates found Zelda Jeffers guilty of criminal damage to the Lockheed Martin London offices during a protest organised by the Muriel Lesters affinity group of Trident Ploughshares.

This arose from last September’s Defence & Security Equipment International (DSEI) arms fair held at the ExCeL centre in East London. Zelda had sprayed the pillars beside the offices’ front door with a blood-like substance and was charged with ‘criminal damage below £5,…

1 April 2016News

Welsh campaigners target Cardiff Arms Fair

Thousands of sci-fi fans queuing around the block at the Motorpoint Arena, Cardiff, to get into the Film and Comic Convention on 5 March met with a musical protest against the arms trade. The prestigious venue was due to host an arms fair, including exhibitions from BAE Systems, the company that provides logistical support to Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine, sells arms to Turkey’s military to bomb the Kurdish people, and profits from death around the world.

Côr Cochion sang…

1 April 2016Feature

An excerpt from a brilliant new direct action memoir

Andrea Needham, Jo Blackman, Angie Zelter, Lotta Kronlid during action planning, 1995. Photo: Seeds of Hope

Nobody in my early life – myself included – would have suspected that I had a future as a troublemaker ahead of me. Growing up in rural Suffolk in the 1970s, the youngest of four siblings, there didn’t seem to be much wrong with the world. I don’t recall my family discussing politics, and although my father listened to the news every day, I never paid it much attention.

1 February 2016News

He fought the law ...

I was charged with assaulting police officer in the execution of his duty on 12 September in the run-up to the DSEI arms fair in East London.

The officer had grabbed me without warning when I was climbing a pillar to reinforce a banner which I had stuck up there a little earlier, and I had swung my arm out to try and make him let of me. The gaffer tape in my hand had hit his face.

There were two lines of defence: firstly, that the police officer was not acting in the…

1 February 2016News

Campaigners bring legal challenge to UK arms exports

The British government must end arms sales to Saudi Arabia because of the Saudi naval blockade of, and air strikes in, Yemen that are breaching international law, according to Amnesty International and Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT). An arms cut-off is supported by most people in the UK, a recent poll has found.

On 10 January, a law firm acting for CAAT began taking legal action against the government, issuing a ‘pre-action protocol letter for judicial review’. Leigh Day cited…

1 February 2016Feature

I will stand and I will defend my right to fight against violence

You who see injustice all around
But have not the courage or the will to fight or stand your ground
We who see but are too scared
There are not enough of us prepared
To put our lives at risk time and again
And then comes a drop of rain
To the parched lips of a world

That needs to feel hope again
We are dying as a people and a nation
A third of our people have been killed in 21 years
Of illegal occupation
Ten UN resolutions

26 January 2016Blog

New book marks 20th anniversary of land-mark anti-arms trade action

Press release
27 January 2016
Peace News [1]

Contact 07596 483 272 for more info or to arrange an interview with Andrea

WOMAN WHO DISARMED WARPLANE PUBLISHES MEMOIR
New book marks 20th anniversary of land-mark anti-arms trade action

7pm, 29 January 2016, Friends House, London: A woman who disarmed a warplane bound for genocide in South East Asia will be launching her newly published book about the action and subsequent trial at an event in…

1 December 2015Feature

Action against arms fairs in South Korea and New Zealand

I had barely recovered from the marathon of activism against the DSEI arms fair in East London in September (see PN 2586–2587), when I found myself on a plane to Seoul, South Korea, to take action against the ADEX (International Aerospace & Defense Exhibition) arms fair. I joined activists from five continents for a gathering organised by the Korean anti-militarist group ‘World Without War’ and the international network War Resisters International.

The gathering aimed…

1 December 2015Feature

An excerpt from Andrea Needham’s amazing new book, The Hammer Blow – how 10 women disarmed a warplane, to be published by Peace News in January

On 29 January 1996, Jo Blackman, Lotta Kronlid and Andrea Needham broke into a British Aerospace factory in Lancashire and used household hammers to disarm a Hawk warplane bound for Indonesia. They were arrested, charged with £2.4m of criminal damage, and sent to prison to await trial. A week later, Angie Zelter joined them, accused of conspiracy. After six months in prison, all four were acquitted by a Liverpool jury in a court case that effectively put Britain’s arms trade on trial.…

1 October 2015News

Dan Viesnik surveys a week of creative disruption

Activists stop deliveries to the DSEI arms fair on 12 September. PHOTO: DAN VIESNIK

There were huge tailbacks during day-long blockades of both entrances to the ExCeL exhibition centre in East London on 12 September, as a day of mass action capped a week of creative disruption in the run-up to the huge biannual DSEI arms fair.

On Monday 7 September, the week of action was launched with a blockade in solidarity with Palestine. Activists stopped a military vehicle from entering…

1 October 2015Feature

Help PN publish Andrea Needham's account of Britain's most daring anti-arms trade action

'The heroic actions of this small, but determined, group of women is told brilliantly in Andrea Needham’s fascinating account…. You can sense just how much human life matters to each and every one of these women. They spent six months in jail for acting upon their consciences – but were eventually, and rightly, found to be innocent. Anyone interested in social change, or campaigning for peace, should read this book and take inspiration from the brave actions of these amazing women.'…

31 March 2015News in Brief

On 18 March, Yorkshire peace activist Sylvia Boyes, 72, was sentenced to 14 days in New Hall prison for not paying a fine arising from an anti-arms trade protest.

Sylvia had been fined £100 and ordered to pay £340 court costs after being found guilty of obstructing the highway at the defence and security equipment international (DSEI) arms fair in East London in September 2013.

31 March 2015News in Brief

On 3 February, Campaign Against Arms Trade staffer Anne-Marie O’Reilly strode onto the stage of the annual ADS arms industry dinner at the Park Lane Hilton in London. She took the microphone and urged the arms dealers present to consider a career change. (Also present were ministers, over 40 MPs, and many top-ranking civil servants and ministry of defence officials.)

Anne-Marie’s opening words were: ‘I’m here tonight because my child is going to be born in four months’ time.... He…