Features

1 January 2001 Robert Sautter

Small-scale peace teams have played an important role in supporting local groups and facilitating dialogue between divided communities. Robert Sautter reports on the work of the Balkan Peace Team in Kosov@.

I can speak both Serbian and Albanian, but which one I use sets me on one side against the other. There is no place for me here, I do not belong. As she finished speaking these words, Mersiha, a young Slavic Muslim from Prishtina, looked at me intently and demanded to know what the Balkan Peace Team was doing to address the tenuous situation in which she and individuals from other minority communities throughout Kosova are existing.

Kosova may have faded from the headlines, but…

3 July 1984 Howard Clark

From 3 July 1984

You may have noticed how terms “real defence” and “credible defence” have become popular in CND circles in the past year. They have a hard-nosed ring to them, indicating that the user isn’t a woolly-minded idealist or a wishy-washy pacifist. The Labour leadership’s failure to present a coherent defence policy in the general election seems to have prompted some people…

7 December 1979 Howard Clark

From 7 December 1979

On November 24, some 400 people sat in rows facing a platform in central London and most of them raised their hands. So was the Anti-Nuclear Campaign launched.

There was little joy about the occasion. The platlorm sat firmly in control of the proceedings throughout the morning session, despite anarchist protests about the set-up and a heap at leaflels about why this was all wrong.…

12 January 1979 Howard Clark

From 12 January 1979

Many anti-nuclear campaigners in Britain are developing, albeit haphazardly, a direct action strategy against nuclear power. Our co-ordination is higgledy-piggledy but, while the general outlines have not been explicitly agreed, some sort of strategy seems to be emerging. It involves direct intervention and obstruction at sites, at installations or on fuel routes: calling on…

15 December 1978 Howard Clark

From 15 December 1978

Writing in the afterglow of a beautiful day of guerilla nonviolence at Torness, I’m no longer daunted by the question with which I’ve been shadow-boxing these past few weeks: “exactly how do we intend to reverse the nuclear power programme?”

On that site, I saw for myself the achievement of the people who occupied Half Moon Cottage in creating a symbol for us to rally around…