Activism

Wait and see... and act

One of the worst aspects of the election of Donald Trump is the feeling of helplessness which it engenders in the general public and also in members of peace and environmental groups. When Trump’s policies and proposed actions become clearer, I hope that there will be an opportunity for discussion, debate, and increasing membership of groups in order to take action, raise money, and argue the case against whatever happens to make the world less safe.
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The Women’s Boat to Gaza campaign (see PN 2598–2599) has announced that it will continue to sail until Palestine is free, despite the seizure of its first vessel. On 5 October, two Israeli warships and four or five smaller boats surrounded the Zaytouna-Oliva in international waters and ordered it to stop sailing towards the Palestinian coast.

When the women-only boat continued its siege-breaking journey, the Israeli defence forces (IDF) boarded and commandeered the…

The Oxford branch of the Seeds for Change training network has struck out on its own, under the name ‘Navigate’. The name ‘Seeds for Change’ now refers only to the Lancaster collective.

More on this next issue.

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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Linda Stout starts her book with a successful mobilisation that dwindled rapidly and is now almost forgotten – the US ‘Nuclear Freeze’ campaign of the early 1980s. She points out: ‘Supported by 70 percent or more of the [US] population, the freeze was endorsed by 275 city governments, 12 state legislatures, and the voters in nine out of ten states where it was placed on the ballot in the fall of 1982.’

The Freeze campaigners demanded an end to the testing, production and…

Ever since 2007, I have been writing in Peace News about opencast coalmining in Wales, climate change and local injustice.

My particular target has always been the 11-million-tonne Ffos-y-Frân mine near Merthyr Tydfil. At a rough count, I have written and/or edited 12 articles about Ffos-y-Frân for Peace News over the last nine years. Over the same period of time, I have also campaigned and taken direct action against opencast coalmining in Wales.

Alerted to the travesty of…

Imagine a foreign army were about to invade your town, what would you do? Would you take up arms, run away, surrender – or undertake some form of civil resistance? My unimaginative but honest response is that I would probably run to the hills. This question was posed to us by Dr Maciej…

In July of last year, 13 climate activists occupied Heathrow airport’s northern runway for six hours, causing around 25 flights to be cancelled. On 24 February, the Heathrow 13, who were found guilty of aggravated trespass and being unlawfully airside, were given suspended sentences of six weeks in prison. This means that if they commit another ‘offence’ in the next 12 months, they will be sent to prison for six weeks for the runway occupation, as well as being sentenced for any new ‘crime…

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 my computer at home, I have dozens of photos of Hollington Valley on the edge of Hastings in East Sussex. Taken through the seasons, they show a small, tucked-away site, a green lung bounded by roads and warehouses. A stream runs down the middle of the valley; tall oaks stand at the eastern edge; a copse of younger trees surround a large holm oak on the west. There are meadows and willow beds, bramble scrub much loved by dormice, a spring rising at the top of the site. One photo is taken…

It’s that time of year to embrace highlights and bury the out-of-date. As activists, this can be a critical time to evaluate our strategies and alight on alternate paths if needed.

In December, in Paris, activists with the Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination and others launched the Climate Games to counterbalance the UN climate talks – yet another international convention full of hot…

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.…