News

On 16 July, the government published its international strategy in the lead-up to the NPT Review Conference next May. Called “Road to 2010”, the document was overshadowed in the media by an informal briefing given by cabinet office officials later that afternoon suggesting the government was to delay the next development step for the new Trident nuclear missile submarines until after the NPT review conference.

There had always been a suspicion that the rush into this project was…

Waves of anti-war protests hit major and minor cities across the US throughout October. About 180 demonstrators marched to the White House on 5 October, carrying signs like: “Yes we can: US out of Afghanistan.”

After 15 activists chained themselves to the fence, police officers and secret service agents began clearing the sidewalk and yelling warnings. Some 61 people were arrested. The organisers from 27 states wished this pre-protest to inspire others for the 7 October…

Okay, so there were two of them rather than one, but with just a little cargo netting and rope borrowed from friends, campaigners closed Ffos-y-Frân, Wales’ largest opencast coal mine on 23 September.

“Coal is the biggest cause of climate change, which according to the UN is already killing four hundred thousand people a year,” said David Jones, when he came down from his day-long vigil suspended above the mine’s only access road.

“And the real crime is that all this is…

Hicham Yezza, a Nottingham university peace activist, was convicted in February on immigration charges - which he is appealing. (See PN 2499-500 for the original smears against him.) Hich spoke to PN after being released from prison in mid-August.

PN What happened after you were given your sentence of nine months in prison?
HY I was led away to a cell downstairs where my details were taken and I had a few minutes to thank my solicitors for the work they did.
I was then…

Between 3-10 August the first Camp for Climate Action was successfully held in Scotland. Climate Camp Scotland occupied Mainshill Wood, the site of a proposed new opencast coal mine. The location was chosen in solidarity with local residents who are outraged at the proposed development, and to support a tree-sit already set up in the area to resist the mine.

Why were we there?

Scottish Coal, the UK’s largest opencast producer, has been given permission to mine 1.7 million…

Peace News asked participants in the Trident Ploughshares Summer Camp in Coulport to reflect on the Second World War, and to give their suggestions for what they would have done in 1939. Here is a collection of answers that they gave (over the phone) after a long discussion of the topic:

After the First World War, we would have started campaigning against future wars and concentrated on arms companies. We would have lobbied churches, other groups and individuals to disinvest from…

On 17 August, five citizen inspectors from Trident Ploughshares entered Britain’s most important military site, the nuclear submarine base at Faslane, north of Glasgow, by walking in through the main gate.

Sylvia Boyes, Mary Millington, Brian Larkin, Penny Stone, and Angie Zelter reminded the Faslane workers of the commitment by the UK government, as a signatory to the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, to nuclear disarmament. They warned that the failure of the Scottish government…

At the Drax Camp for Climate Action in 2006 a few Wales participants formed a neighbourhood with the West Country and West Midlands, the legendary - out West anyway – ‘Westside Hood’. By 2008 at Kingsnorth, Wales got together our own neighbourhood. This year Wales hosted Climate Camp Cymru (CCC) in Merthyr Tydfil, very near the notorious Ffos-y-Frân opencast coalmine. In tribute to the movement we are building, CCC was actively supported by the Westside Hood. In turn, CCC supported the hard…

Palestinians, Israelis and international activists continue to resist the illegal Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory. On 21 June, Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem, including clerics, held a nonviolent demonstration in a neighbourhood in Silwan scheduled for takeover by the Israeli municipal authority, which plans to destroy 88 Palestinian homes and blocks of flats, which currently house around 1,500 Palestinians.

The Israeli media reported on 23 June that the…

This month, lance corporal Joe Glenton of the Royal Logistic Corps faces court martial for refusing to return to combat in Afghanistan. Glenton joined the army in 2004, and in 2007 went absent without leave after serving his first tour in Afghanistan. He is thought to be the first British soldier to openly resist government policy.

In a speech on 23 July organised by the Stop The War Coalition, lance corporal Glenton described his experience on the ground in the Middle East.

“I don’t think the public are up for it any more. Everything has changed. We as a nation don’t want to send out soldiers anywhere” – former foreign office minister Kim Howells

Though the British government has run a highly successful propaganda campaign, significantly boosting support for the war amongst the British public, the recent media furore over British casualties has been causing concern in Washington.

Some anxiety

A senior US official told the Financial…

The Afghan presidential election on 20 July – the results of which may not be known until mid-September – has already received a fair amount of critical coverage in the British press.

The Times reported that a third or more of those registered to vote (including one “Britney Jamilia Spears” of Kandahar) probably didn’t exist, and that the run-up to the polls had “been characterised by horse-trading between the candidates and an array of warlords and power-brokers who promise[d] to…

Recent media coverage of the deaths of British soldiers in Afghanistan obscures an uncomfortable reality: that US/NATO forces are responsible for much – perhaps most – of the killing in Afghanistan today.

On 9-10 July, eight British soldiers were killed in Afghanistan. In their front-page headline the next day, the Guardian branded it “The bloodiest day”, while the Sunday Telegraph called it “the bloodiest 24 hours in Afghanistan.”

Only, of course, it wasn’t.

…

On 13 July the UK government announced that it had revoked five arms export licences to Israel, reportedly on the grounds that the exports breached “Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing Criteria”.

These criteria state that arms exports should not be used for “internal repression” (although Gaza and the West Bank are not Israeli territory). These and other arms export licensing criteria have generally been ignored in relation to Israel, up till now.

The…

For the first time in Britain’s nuclear history, an opinion poll has found that a majority of people in Britain are in favour of Britain abandoning its nuclear weapons - without regard to considerations of cost.

ICM conducted its poll for the Guardian on 10-11 July, asking: “Do you think Britain should replace the [Trident] nuclear weapons system with a new one or should it no longer have any nuclear deterrent?”

There was no prompting about the high cost of the Trident…

Whilst supporters of the Trident nuclear weapons system continue to claim that 10,000 jobs will go if Trident submarines are not replaced, a different picture is painted by a report which was re-launched at a joint STUC/CND conference held on 6 June in Glasgow.

The report, sponsored by the Scottish Trade Union Congress (TUC) and CND, shows that less than 1,600 civilian jobs are directly or indirectly dependent on Trident and that spending the money on any other area of the Scottish…

On 14 June, Ayrshire Friends of Refugees held a gathering outside the Dungavel Detention Centre. Isolated in the rolling green Lanarkshire countryside, near to the picturesque market town of Strathaven, Dungavel houses people whilst they await deportation. The small crowd had travelled some miles, coming together to demonstrate ongoing solidarity with the inmates.

Several informal contributions were made, touching on the importance of maintaining support for refugee communities,…

In Aberystwyth, on 14 June, activist choir Côr Gobaith joined Billy Bragg on stage in the protest singer’s own version of The Internationale. Bragg’s tour of Wales is to mark the 25th anniversary of the miners’ strike.

The Thatcher government of the 1980s enforced colliery closures that decimated mining communities throughout Britain, not least in Wales. At the time, songs sung by Bragg such as “Which Side Are You On?” and “There is Power in a Union” were rallying calls for…

Bethan Jenkins AM (Plaid Cymru) will meet with Assembly environment minister Jane Davidson to raise concerns on behalf of constituents and campaigners who fear new regulations on opencast mining may not be enough to protect the health and wellbeing of communities in Wales.

On 20 January, the Minister issued the Minerals Technical Advice Notes: Coal (Coal MTAN), which included the implementation of a 500-metre buffer zone for future opencast developments.

Campaigners and…

In May and June, five people were up on charges arising from the April 2008 “Carnival Against the Arms Trade” at the EDO-MBM arms factory in Brighton. At the carnival, 800 people marched through police cordons into the factory car park and smashed windows and the managing director’s car.

Four people were found guilty by Brighton magistrates of aggravated trespass for entering the premises, though the case for this was flimsy: no business was going on as the factory was shut, and…