Plaid Cymru environmental and justice campaigner Jill Evans was re-elected to Brussels, while Labour slumped in the vote, losing their second seat to UKIP. It was a good night for the Tories in Wales too, topping the poll for the first time since 1859, a time before universal suffrage for men or a secret ballot.
Labour’s vote in Wales is fragmenting, doubtlessly aided by courting free-market policies that alienated the traditional “working class” vote – as evidenced in…
Across the UK, companies are planning to cash in on a subsidy bonanza for electricity from burning biofuels. Producing one megawatt from biofuels such as palm oil attracts up to twice as many “green energy” subsidies (Renewable Obligation Certificates or ROCs) as gaining the same energy from onshore wind.
One company, Vogen Energy, applied for permission to build a vegetable oil power station in Newport, Pembrokeshire. Some 10,000 hectares of oil palm plantations would be required…
Wales is now investigating setting up a Peace Institute, along the lines of the Belgian Peace Institute first proposed in 1973, set in motion by the Flemish parliament in 2004, and operational since 2006.
The idea was to provide MPs with information about the arms trade, violence in society, and international peace.
The board of the Belgian institute comprises nineteen members. Each political party can nominate members and peace organisations can nominate six, while the…
In an interview with the British Institute of International and Comparative Law, Lord Bingham compared drones with cluster bombs and landmines.
Yet here in Wales the taxpayer is supporting research into the use of drones for military purposes. An “unmanned aerial vehicle” (UAV) consultation has been carried out by the Welsh Assembly government (WAG) in preparation for setting up a testing zone above 500 square miles of west Wales. Although the emphasis is laid on future civilian…
Low Impact Development (LID) is an approach to creating homes and livelihoods that works with nature, using natural construction materials, renewable energy, and Permaculture design principles. Since its formation in August 2005, Lammas has sought to create an exemplary LID in Wales to demonstrate what the approach has to offer: building affordable homes, boosting rural economies and increasing biodiversity. As well as nine smallholdings and a community hub building, the Lammas Eco-hamlet…
On 10 January 100,000 people from all over Britain joined a march in London to protest at the Israeli embassy against the continuing relentless attacks on Gaza’s civilian population.
Ray Davies, 79-year-old vice-chair of CND Cymru, sustained head injuries, concussion and cuts when he was trapped with hundreds of others against the embassy gates by the Metropolitan Police.
The march had gone peacefully until it reached the embassy. Many shoes were thrown over the fence in a…
After withholding 10% of my income tax for the last five years because I refuse to pay for war, I received a letter from Caernarfon County Court, saying there would be a case to decide whether £2,333.52 should be taken from my bank account, at 11.20am on the 7 October (the anniversary of the invasion of Afghanistan).
Along with 20 supporters, including Robin Brookes, another member of the Peace Tax Seven, who’d travelled all the way from Devizes, I stood around outside the court for…
On Saturday 21 June, a toddler in a child-seat and twenty cyclists from the Welsh Youth Forum on Sustainable Development, Gwerin Y Coed (Woodcraft Folk) and Grwp Beic Aberystwyth completed the 157 miles from Machynlleth to Cardiff to publicise the need for cycle-lanes and provision for bikes on public transport.
At the Senedd, where they delivered a petition, cyclists were welcomed by Leanne Wood AM and Gordon James of FoE Cymru. Although cyclists endured some hostile motorists, they…
We don’t usually mark Memorial Day in Britain. Previously known as Decoration Day, the last Monday in May is a US holiday which originally remembered American men and women who have died in military service in the American Civil War. Following World War I, the memorial was expanded to include military casualties of any war. More recently, US peace and anti-war groups have reclaimed Memorial Day, holding ceremonies to remember all victims of war, military and civilian, and to call for an end…
Ffos-y-fran is the biggest open-cast mine in the UK. Situated on the outskirts of Merthyr Tydfil, it is just 36 metres from some homes and near a nursery school. Legislation requiring a buffer zone of at least 500 metres for such schemes is pending but not set to be made retrospective.
Dust, smoke and noise from Ffos-y-fra will exacerbate health problems in a town that already has the lowest life expectancy in Wales. Mining is set to continue, 7am to 11pm, for 17 years.
“…As part of the international day of World Against War demonstrations, Aberystwyth Peace and Justice Network invited Wales to continue to protest. Five years on, the occupation of Iraq remains an unmitigated catastrophe.
In Aberystwyth, Cor Gobaith sang stirringly and a number of AP&JN supporters engaged with the public. Plaid Cymru president Dafydd Iwan sent a strong message of party support for the campaigns: Troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, Don't attack Iran, End the siege…
How wonderful to be part of this vibrant and vital International Women's Day march in London for something we all demand: the unconditional, non-negotiable end to violence against women.
As so well expressed by the speakers, such violence takes many forms: the direct violence of beatings, rape, mutilation; the fear of what may follow; governments denying equal status; withholding the right to an existence as an individual woman; war, poverty, trafficking, slavery, threats,…
On 5 February, I was one of ten Members of the European Parliament who broke through the Israeli siege and travelled to Gaza to see the situation for ourselves.
The anger I feel following the visit could drive me to write several books. Here, I have focussed on what the occupation means for the children.
In the Al-Shifa Hospital I visited the ward where thirty premature babies lay in incubators. These tiny children are completely dependent on the electricity supply.
…On 12 February, Rob Hopkinsm the “co-parent of the Transition Town movement”, spoke in Machynlleth about peak oil and climate change.
Although climate change gets press attention, if not meaningful political action, it's peak oil that will hit us soonest.
The age of plentiful oil and cheap transport is drawing to a close. Implications for our communities are enormous, especially with respect to food supply dependent on road haulage.
Rob noted that (west) “Wales is a…
Following the success of last summer's Victor Jara festival in Machynlleth, El Sueno Existe (“the dream lives on”) staged a winter festival entitled “Nicaragua: New Time, New Hope”, inspired by the visit to Machynlleth of veteran activist and visionary Paul Baker Hernandez.
Paul is a former Trappist monk who has lived and worked in Nicaragua for a number of years and is active in local and international campaigns against war, exploitation and the plunder of Nicaragua's natural wealth…
