Beale, Albert

Questions about corruption dominated the questions to directors at the recent annual shareholders' meeting of Britain's biggest weapons merchants, BAE Systems.

In addition to some nominal shareholders organised by Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT), several “real” shareholders also embarrassed the board with related questions.
Outside the meeting too, street theatre (see picture) by CAAT activists featured in the financial pages of most serious papers the next day.
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The Campaign Against Arms Trade, with Corner House Research, has now lodged its full application for a High Court judicial review of the Serious Fraud Office's dropping of a corruption case against BAE Systems, Britain's biggest weapons producer. The corruption relates to a massive arms deal with Saudi Arabia.
The application was on hold pending other legal proceedings to stop BAE's access to CAAT's internal documents relating to the High Court case -- see the February and March PNs…

On 21 April, over 2000 authorised demonstrations (mostly consisting of just one person) were held in the area around London's Parliament Square, all having been applied for -- and granted permission -- under the SOCPA regulations.
This world record was achieved thanks to a mobilisation (including a fine half-hour programme on Radio 4) by comedian-activist Mark Thomas. In one day, the total number of such authorisations since the law was enacted in July 2005 was more than doubled.…

For the third time, a trial stemming from direct action at “RAF” Fairford, Gloucestershire, in 2003 - when activists tried to impede US bombing of Iraqis at the start of the attacks in March that year - has ended with a hung jury.

Josh Richards was charged with attempted arson, having being arrested while breaking into the base. He said he wanted to set fire to the tyres of planes so they could not be used to drop cluster bombs on Iraqi civilians, which would be a war crime. He also…

The Serious Fraud Office's dropping of one of its corruption cases against BAE Systems on government “advice” had led to widespread national and international condemnation, the threat of legal action against the government by the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) and Corner House ... and more BAE dirty tricks.

BAE Systems - British Aerospace as was - is Britain's largest armaments manufacturer, and faces accusations of bribery and corruption in connection with a whole string of…

According to press reports, the MoD is refusing to comply with the Information Commissioner's ruling that they should release details of the 500 civil servants employed to promote British arms exports because “they could be harassed by pacifists”.

Well, it's no wonder really. Everyone must have noticed those marauding hordes of militant pacifists, flaunting their white poppies, giving out leaflets about Gandhi, even trying to sell copies of Peace News - they're so…

There was a mood of celebration - and also relief - on the well attended Critical Mass cycle ride in central London on 30 June, following a High Court ruling a few days earlier that a police attempt to declare the event “unlawful” should have “had the benefit of sounder legal advice”.
Participants in the Central London ride last September - when they met on the South Bank at 6pm on the last Friday of the month as usual - were handed letters by the police saying that the event was not…

As reported in last month's PN, `twas the season for AGM-related protests. Here's a quick roundup of protest at three of the worst companies' annual junkets:

Albert Beale writes... The AGM of Britain's biggest purveyor of armaments - BAE Systems - was as usual a target for anti-arms trade activists, both inside and outside the meeting on 4 May.

The Campaign Against Arms Trade's street theatre outside, showing members of the government as poodles…

It's spring - and a young activist's thoughts naturally turn towards... company AGMs. Yes, it's that time of year again, when most of the major corporations hold their shareholders' meetings, and when the most probing questions at these events always seem to come from the smallest shareholders.

This year's Rio Tinto AGM, at the high-security Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre in Westminster on 12 April, saw a group of nominal shareholders challenging the company about…

Norman Kember, the British pacifist released after being imprisoned in Iraq for almost four months, has returned home to face a predictable lack of understanding of his pacifist stance - just as his captors in Iraq themselves showed little sympathy towards his pacifism.

He had been one of four activists from the Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) network who were abducted in Iraq on 26 November (see the cover story in December/January's PN), whilst there to support human rights for…

Candle-lit vigils for the four peace activists abducted in Iraq were held around the country on the evening of Friday 2 December - including ones in Oxford, Bradford, Evesham, Derby and on the steps of St Martin-in-the-Fields church in Trafalgar Square, London.

The four - including Briton Norman Kember - are all genuinely long-time peace campaigners, who were in Iraq in connection with the work of Christian Peacemaker Teams, an international religious peace network active in anti-war…

Five hundred people - a mixture of anti-militarists, anarchists and nationalists - demonstrated in Sofia on 12 November in protest at plans to build US military bases in Bulgaria. They called for a national referendum on whether Bulgaria should compromise its sovereignty and host the bases.

Following an initial agreement by the government - as long ago as 1999 - to host US forces, there have been recent reports that the US wants to send several thousand troops to the country, and is…

On 24 November, six members of Military Families Against the War applied at the High Court in London for permission for a full judicial review of the government's refusal, last May, to order an investigation into the legality of the 2003 attack on Iraq and the subsequent UK military action there.

At the hearing - for which they had had to appeal for donations because they were refused legal aid (see the front page story in the November PN) - Judge Collins reserved judgement…

Inspired by “Camp Casey” in Crawford, Texas - the protest camp initiated by Cindy Sheehan whose son Casey was killed in Iraq last year - on 18 and 19 October relatives of British soldiers killed in Iraq set up camp outside the Ministry of Defence, opposite Downing Street.

Sheehan had met Rose Gentle at the end of September in the US during three days of anti-war protests - attended by Gentle and other members of bereaved British families. Cindy Sheehan is expected to return the visit…

After more than a decade of informal, monthly, collective assertions of the delight of cycling around a city in the company of lots of other cyclists, the Critical Mass bike rides in central London have suddenly been targeted by the police.

Critical Mass rides, which take place in many parts of the world, are a traditional way to show that if bikes outnumber cars for a change, rather than vice versa - hence the name Critical Mass - then the safety and pleasure of public spaces can…