Polden, David

On 16 September, 77-year old retired teacher, Brian Quail stopped his second nuclear warhead convoy, this time at Raploch, near Stirling in Scotland. Brian and fellow activist Alasdair Ibbotson flagged the lead truck down, slowing it down. Alasdair lay in front of the second truck, which had stopped, and Brian crawled underneath it. They held the convoy up for 15 minutes…

On 9 August, there was a large waterborne protest, involving 33 activists in two yachts and 13 kayaks, at the only Trident submarine base for the US Pacific fleet, the Kitsap-Bangor naval base near Seattle, Washington state. The activists marked Nagasaki day by sailing and paddling the entire length of the Bangor waterfront where nuclear warheads and Trident missiles are loaded onto submarines, and where submarines are resupplied for ballistic missile patrols in the Pacific Ocean.
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French workers launched a wave of strikes after the French premier, Manuel Valls, announced a decision on 10 May to relax France’s protective labour laws by decree, using a rarely-invoked article of the constitution to bypass parliament. The reforms make it easier for employers to prolong the (currently 35-hour) working week, to disregard unions and to lay off staff more cheaply.

Following the use of CRS riot police to break up blockades of fuel depots, the country’s eight oil…

On a rainy day in June, police estimated that 2,000 people formed a human chain around USAF Ramstein in Germany, the headquarters of the US air force in Europe. The activists were protesting against the base’s critical role in transmitting information between operators in the United States and drones in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Syria.

Former US drone operator Brandon Bryant told Der Spiegel magazine in 2013 that Ramstein co-ordinated Washington’s global…

On 8 May, Mordechai Vanunu was charged with several crimes: talking to two US nationals three years ago; saying things – that were not broadcast – during a TV interview last September, something for which he has already been punished; and moving flats within the same building without informing the police.

Vanunu’s real ‘crime’ is that he revealed Israel’s secret nuclear arsenal in 1986 – something for which he has already served 12 years in prison. After the Israeli authorities…

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.…

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,…

On 26 February, the Israel authorities agreed to release Palestinian journalist Mohammad Al-Qiq on 21 May, a month early, in return for him agreeing to give up his hunger strike and not renew it. Al-Qiq, who works for a Saudi Arabian TV network, was arrested in November at his Ramallah home.

He was placed in administrative detention – without charge, evidence or trial – on suspicion of involvement in terrorism.

Some 700 Palestinians are currently in administrative…

On 9 January, police in Stirling detained two lots of activists monitoring nuclear weapons convoys passing through the Scottish town.

Veronika Tudhope, assistant coordinator of Scottish CND, was approached by two police officers while she parked by Stirling Castle. The officers said her car had been reported for ‘erratic driving’ and asked to see under the bonnet.

They then detained her until 10 minutes after the convoy had passed. Veronika commented that she’d been driving…

On 9 December, Janet, Douglas, David, Brian and Jean, members of the ‘Peaton Pirates’ nuclear disarmament affinity group on arrived at the door of the Scotland Office, Edinburgh, as representing the UK government in Scotland.

Someone calling themselves the ‘deputy policy officer’ agreed to read their letter (which asked the secretary of state for Scotland to explain how Trident could be used in accordance with international humanitarian law) and return to discuss it with them.…

On 22 September, 15 peace activists were arrested at the White House in Washington DC at the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance’s ‘Sowing Seeds of Hope’ event calling for policy changes to bring an end to war, poverty, and the climate crisis. This was one of 360 events in the US as part of the 20–27 September ‘Campaign Nonviolence’ week organised by Pace e Bene. 

On 11 November, Italian pacifist Turi Vaccaro carried out a Ploughshares action at a 400-acre US military base near Niscemi in Sicily.

He climbed to the top of one of the three huge radar dishes in the base that are part of the US navy’s MUOS satellite communications system. Once there, 40 metres in the air, he used a hammer to disarm the dish’s electrical systems, causing, it’s claimed, over £500,000 (nearly €800,000) worth of damage.

Local people in the ‘No MUOS’…

Khader Adnan, a 37-year-old baker and father of six, was released from an Israeli prison on 12 July, after a 55-day hunger strike that left him near death.

Khader launched his hunger strike on 7 May to protest at the renewal of his ‘administrative detention’ (indefinite detention without charge) after six years in and out of administrative detention.

Khader was re-arrested on 13 July. The Israeli political police, the Shin Beit, said he had been arrested for trying to…

On 16 June, the navy gave Trident whistleblower William McNeilly a ‘dishonourable discharge’, one month after he published an 18-page exposé of safety and security faults on nuclear missile submarine HMS Victorious, which he had recently served on. No legal action is being taken against McNeilly by the navy.

The navy rubbished McNeilly’s allegations as ‘subjective and unsubstantiated’, and held an inquiry that concluded that his claims were ‘factually incorrect or the…

At 2am on 29 June, Marianne, one of four boats bound for Gaza in the latest attempt to break the Israeli siege, was surrounded by three Israeli navy boats while in international waters 85 miles from the Gaza coast, according to Freedom Flotilla organisers.

The Swedish ship was boarded and searched by Israeli soldiers who detained all 18 people on board. Organisers described this an ‘act…