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As Peace News went to press, Campaign Nonviolence (CNV), a US nonviolence study/action initiative, was beginning its first week of action, which had been a year in the making. There were 227 marches, rallies, vigils, festivals, celebrations and other events planned across all 50 states of the continental USA, starting on 21 September.

The purpose of the week of action is to launch a long-term movement to build a culture of peace and nonviolence free from war, poverty,…

UAV factory, Shenstone, 5 August. Photo: London Palestine Action

On 5 September, on the second day of the NATO summit in Newport, Wales, about 40 people entered Barclays High Street branch in the town shouting ‘Stop arming Israel’ and ‘Barclays divest from the arms trade’. Barclays have almost 60,000 shares in Elbit. Four people were arrested and charged with aggravated trespass after glueing-on inside the office.

On 9 August, during an overwhelming Israeli attack on Gaza, an estimated 150,000 people marched from the BBC’s Broadcasting House HQ in central London to a Hyde Park rally in Britain’s biggest-ever demonstration for Gaza. This followed a demonstration on 15 July, when 5,000 protested at the BBC’s one-sided coverage of the Israeli assault, bringing the roads around the Broadcasting House to a standstill.

Some 2,100 inhabitants of Gaza, including over 400 children, were killed by…

On Nagasaki Day, 9 August, many from across Wales joined with others from the UK, Europe and the rest of the world in stretching a colourful 11-mile-long knitted scarf between the Aldermaston and Burghfield nuclear bomb factories.

It was a beautiful, joyful culmination of months of extraordinary effort by so many people and, coinciding with the big demonstrations for Gaza in London and elsewhere, poignantly showed the need for general disarmament and spending of resources in…

Machynlleth Gaza vigil. Photo: Marian Delyth

The heart-breaking news from Gaza spurned solidarity actions across Wales: vigils, marches and fundraising. Phil Steele of Bangor & Ynys Môn Peace & Justice group said that the ‘group normally take a break in August but, as so often happens, events allowed little respite’. He reported: ‘August was dominated by the terrible news from Gaza. This coincided with the group showing the ‘Silent Lives’ exhibition of children’s photographs of life…

No to NATO march, Newport. Photo: Marian Delyth

On 2 September, the annual meeting of the international network ‘No to War – No to NATO’ called for the abolition of NATO. They rejected the planned opening of further NATO military bases and the deployment of soldiers from NATO member states to Eastern Europe, and stated that the ‘conflict in Ukraine has been substantially escalated by NATO’. The network went on: ‘Currently, NATO views Russia…

On 17 October, 30 Pacific Climate Warriors from 12 different Pacific islands are arriving in Australia to paddle traditional canoes they have built themselves into the harbour of the world’s largest coal port – Newcastle – to stop coal exports for a day.

Newcastle port shipped 150m tonnes of coal in 2013, and is set to expand its capacity by another 70m tonnes a year. The Pacific Climate Warriors, supported by 350.org, describe the carbon emissions of the coal and gas industries…

On 9 July, the UN reported a 24% increase in civilian casualties compared to the same period in 2013, noting that: ‘In 2014, the fight is increasingly taking place in communities, public places and near the homes of ordinary Afghans, with death and injury to women and children in a continued disturbing upward spiral’.

According to the report, these developments were, at least in part, a consequence of the closure of US/NATO bases and command posts, which has led to an increased…

On 9 June, the Trident Ploughshares direct action network blocked all vehicle entrances at the Atomic Weapons Establishment (awe) Burghfield for five hours. The factory cancelled all deliveries for the day.

The action, which was part of the Action AWE campaign, began at 6.45am with blockades of all three vehicle entrances. At the Construction Gate, a trailer was steered across the entrance and four protesters locked-on. A ministry of defence (MoD) road leading to the Main Gate was…

On 3 July, the ministry of defence (MoD) announced that the five Reaper drones – purchased as an ‘Urgent Operational Requirement’ in 2010, at the cost of roughly £100m – had finally begun operations in Afghanistan. According to MoD figures obtained by Drone Wars UK under the Freedom of Information Act (FoI), RAF pilots fired 15 Hellfire missiles from drones in Afghanistan in the first four months of 2014 – 11 from UK drones, and four from US drones.

Drones appeal

On 22…

Since the end of the Cold War, NATO has become a vehicle for US-led use of force in the interests of the rich and powerful. It bypasses the United Nations and the system of international law, accelerates and promotes militarisation and escalates spending on armaments, with NATO countries accounting for 75% of global military expenditure.

Preparations are under way for a range of anti-NATO activities in late August and September as NATO holds its next summit meeting in Newport, 4…

Early on 11 July, a military convoy carrying nuclear warheads was stopped for one hour near Loch Lomond by protesters from Faslane Peace Camp. One person climbed on top of a nuclear transporter; four were arrested.

The 20-vehicle convoy, with four special transporter lorries to carry 100-kiloton nuclear warheads, had driven through the centre of Glasgow shortly after midnight.

The convoy, from AWE Burghfield to the Coulport nuclear store, was tracked by Nukewatch and Scottish…

Co-ordinated by Friends of the Earth Cymru, 5 July was a ‘Wales Against Fracking’ day of action.

Across Wales, groups mounted events to gather signatures on a petition to the Welsh government for a moratorium on extreme energy. Many communities in Wales are threatened by fracking, underground coal-gasification or coal-bed methane extraction.

Extreme energy keeps us hooked on the fossil fuels that drive climate change, risks contaminating water, and diverts investment…

On 5 July, a 120-metre-long pink scarf, knitted by opponents of nuclear weapons, was unfurled through the centre of Knighton (Tref-y-clawdd).

The unfurling procession was led by a town crier, joined by the Teme Valley Ceilidh Band, hand-bell ringers, the Pales Peace Choir and a huge Welsh red dragon.

Many local residents offered their support to the knitters. Knighton resident Karen Plant said: ‘This protest has been fun but it has a serious message, namely the…

As PN went to press, the Metropolitan police were only days away from having to confirm or deny that senior management had allowed male undercover officers to deceive women activists into long-term intimate relationships.

On 2 July, after three years of legal action, five of the women involved won a significant legal victory in London’s high court.

Mr justice Bean ruled that the Metropolitan police could not use a policy of ‘neither confirm nor deny’ [NCND] as…

At 3pm on 12 July, British peace activists Maria Gallastegui and Simon Moore set out from Gabriel’s Wharf on London’s South Bank, in Rumi, a 16-foot-long ‘Wayfarer’ sailing boat. They are aiming to sail to Beirut, Lebanon.

In their statement, Maria and Simon said: ‘We are going to Lebanon in order to raise awareness and support for the Syrian refugee community and to call for peaceful change within Syria for a just society. We support groups and individuals who are working…

At 2.30pm on 30 June, 15 people arrived to report the Trident nuclear weapons system as a crime at Llandrindod police station as part of the Action AWE week of ‘Reportings of Trident Crime’ all around the country.

A Llandrindod police sergeant said that a rural police force could not deal with these kinds of crimes as they had no knowledge of international law. I asked that they deal with it in the same way as they would deal with a report of a threat to murder, because when the…

Inside Israel-Palestine, nonviolent campaigning is increasingly repressed, even as the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign wins victories abroad.

The recent mass hunger-strike of Palestinian detainees ended on 24 June, when 80 of the prisoners reached a deal with prison authorities, winning only minor concessions. The main demand of the strike, an end to detention without trial, was not met.

The strike had lasted 63 days and it had been reported that as…

A memorial to Welsh soldiers killed in Flanders will be unveiled there in August.

MEP Jill Evans has congratulated the ‘Welsh memorial in Flanders’ campaign for raising awareness of the tens of thousands of Welsh soldiers who were killed in action in Flanders, including the poet Hedd Wyn.

Jill Evans, who is working closely with the Flemish Peace Institute to establish a similar Institute in Wales, said: ‘As we reach the centenary of the start of World War One, it is…

PHOTO: ALEX GERRARD/PAX CHRISTI

Watched by Valerie Flessati (left) of the First World War Peace Forum, at the 15 May Conscientious Objectors (CO) Day ceremony in Tavistock Square in central London, Cindy Sharkey (right) remembers her CO grandfather who refused to fight in the First World War.

A socialist member of the Independent Labour Party, Eleazor ‘Dil’ Thomas refused to participate in what he saw as a capitalist war, waged to preserve the empire. As well as remembering women war…