Category: Uncategorized

To All EU Parliamentarians

We started our meeting with a minute’s reflection on the terrible events in Paris last night, and our hopes for a future free from violence and hate.

We met today to discuss the use of wars to address political conflict, the acceleration of climate change and the ongoing environmental degradation which constitute the most profound challenges for our times.

We realize that these issues are inextricably linked. We may perish in the time to come, or we may flourish. Our work for human and planetary security is equally inextricably linked.

We recognised that women’s lack of human rights and the gendered perspective which equates strength and effectiveness with military spending and dominance excludes women and other people from authorative social and political roles in addressing these threats.

We recognise our own value, and the value and diversity of other people and consider that the right to life carries greater validity than that of borders, that peace is a human right, that our shared resources should be committed to meet human needs as a priority.

We are aware that these values are widely held, though not adequately represented in the fora where political decisions are made, and we ask European Parliamentarians to work together to ensure that these inextricably linked issues are responsibly addressed.

We ask you to consider some focus points identified in our discussions and respond.

Focus points

• Because millions of people are forcibly displaced by floods, windstorms, earthquakes or droughts, an intergovernmental process is required for their protection.

• Th control of borders currently involves a militarised response to these movements of people, which creates conflict.

• Military expenditure represents the greatest part of global expenditure and is rising beyond the point at which governments can meet the basic needs of the people they represent. This has a devastating impact on the resources available to tackle climate change.

• Competition within the military industrial complex excacerbates this problem and creates a culture of secrecy and threats which undermines responsible environmental co-operation and diverts resources away from human needs .

• There exists a severe lack of investment in open and accessible education for conflict resolution and resources to ensure human rights are met, which urgently needs to be tackled. This arises through lack of political will in the face of corporate interest.

• All security agenda must focus on the prevention of war and poverty and ensure that a a gender perspective and women’s participation, protection, and rights are included in disarmament conflict resolution and policy making settings. peacekeeping, policy-making, and reconstruction.

• Investment in the nuclear weapons industry, much of it hidden, diverts scarce monetary and skill resource away from human needs. This requires a commitment to immediate governmental action for global nuclear disarmament.
• Nuclear accident or deliberate detonation are likely to cause global famine and irreversible environmental degradation in non-nuclear-weapons states and across the world. It is essential for all governments to recognise that technology for nuclear weapons and power are interlinked and together pose an existential threat for the whole planet.

• Climate change is a major cause of resource shortages and conflict, in addition from tackling the causes, it is increasingly urgent that energy and food can be produced locally to minimise the effect of shortages.

• Corporate and commercial influence over health care, and dependence on fossil fuels prevent governments from applying criteria that are in the best interests of those receiving the care. Commercial data protction laws require a level of secrecy that is not compatable with democracy.

From The Autumn Seminar Participants,

WILPF Autumn Seminar,

Orpington, England 14 November 2015

 

Dear Mr Mundell,

In May’s general election the people of Scotland voted overwhelmingly for candidates whose anti-Trident stance was a key part of their platform. This was as clear a message as you can get. And it was not merely about getting the UK’s nuclear weapon launch-pad out of Scotland – it was underpinned by a realistic grasp of the horrific nature of these weapons and a longing to join the growing surge for a global ban.

The position taken by our representatives at Westminster on not replacing Trident is reflected by the whole of our elected representation. The Scottish Parliament has discussed and voted overwhelmingly to reject the continuation of nuclear weapons being deployed here, and supporting the 121 states who endorse a global ban . Our First Minister has signed a statement supporting this ban, and expressed a willingness for Scotland to be able to participate in the negotiations that will bring it about. Civic Scotland has also spoken through church leaders, the trade union movement local authorities and other highly respected leaders of civic and cultural society. In every arena the message is clear and we should need to do no more.

In response Westminster has shown a complete and cynical disregard. It is determined to develop a new version of the system that for a further generation will retain the UK’s status as a rogue state willing to deploy weapons of mass destruction. Use the current democratic structures to get your views across, we are told. Well, we have done so. Over the years we have painstakingly prepared the case against nuclear weapons and have presented it to a public which has overwhelmingly endorsed our stance through the ballot box. Yet you still pay absolutely no attention.

Any Scotland office that is fulfilling its stated function of representing the interests of the people of Scotland to Westminster must now address the UK government’s arrogant disregard by the for people in Scotland who carry the highest risk associated with the weapons and have made clear their abhorrence of the possibility of millions of deaths and the disruption of global bio-diversity.

A public and immediate response is required to explain how Trident could possibly be used in accordance with international humanitarian law. If the UK government does not have or will not provide an answer to this question will the Secretary of State agree to represent our demand that the UK disarms and dismantles these weapons.

Most recently the decision to bomb Syria has been taken with a similar a total disregard for the position taken by the Scottish MPs at Westminster. Given the possible consequences of these actions, this reflects badly on our democratic process and we need to know how the Scotland Office will communicate with the UK government on our behalf for an end to attacks on Syria.

We are waiting here until you are prepared to go on the record and discuss the matter in this public space.

Trident Ploughshares

Scotland opposes Trident, and the Scottish First Minister
has signed up to support a global ban on nuclear
weapons. Unfortunately she doesn’t have the powers to
enable Scotland to join the 121 countries who have signed
the Humanitarian Pledge to enter negotiations to fill the
legal gap needed to prohibit and eliminate nuclear
weapons.
Scottish people can still get involved, and work here to
add all nuclear bombs to the list of outlawed weapons, like
chemical and biological warfare. Australian Thomas Nash
has experience and expertise (he was instrumental in the
land mine and cluster bombs ban) for the task. On
Saturday, he’ll be in Scotland offering insights and
opportunities to be part of the campaign to abolish
nuclear weapons at this year’s Scottish CND Annual
Conference. He will be joined there by Scottish MSP and
anti-Trident campaigner Brendan O Hara.
This will be a chance to get answers to questions and
no doubt collect relevant information. Long-standing
CNDers and newbies are all needed to scrap Trident and
ban all nukes.
SCND Annual Conference Saturday 7 November 2015 in St Columba’s
by the Castle Church, 14 Johnston Terrace, Edinburgh, EH1 2PW.
Registration from 10.30 am. Meeting starts 11 am. Close 4 pm.

Womens International League for Peace and Freedom (Scottish Branch)

The Womens International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), Scottish branch (1), is very pleased to announce that the Austrian Disarmament Ambassador will contribute to a special public meeting in the Scottish Parliament to look at how gender issues stand in the way of global nuclear disarmament,

Ambassador Alexander Kmentt is Austria’s Director for Arms Control, Nonproliferation and was elected 2014 “Arms Control Person of the Year”. (2) He initiated the Austrian Pledge to eliminate nuclear weapons which is now signed up to by 117 world states, and will be welcomed to Scotland by the Scottish Government’s Cabinet Secretary for Culture, Europe and External Affairs, Fiona Hyslop MSP.

The meeting is the latest of several annual meetings supported by WILPF or Scottish CND at which civic society and parliamentarians can come together around the UN International Peace Day. It will be chaired by Bill Kidd MSP, and falls on the same day as the MSP will be leading a debate (2) on the UK’s responsibility for the nuclear genetic damage imposed on the people of the Marshall Islands.

Mia Gandenberger, Reaching Critical Will (RCW) (4) Associate Director from Geneva will also speak, along with Claire Duncanson, Lecturer in International Relations at the University of Edinburgh. Claire’s background is in practical human rights NGO work and her research interests “lie at the intersection of international security, IR theory and gender politics, ” and include a recent critique of the Trident Replacement White paper. Mia hopes to “to increase the quality and quantity of civil society preparation and participation in UN disarmament processes” (3). Rebecca Sharkey, from the International Campaign to Abolish nuclear Weapons (ICAN) (4) UK will chair a participative discussion at the end of the meeting. (4)

Ambassador Kmentt said

“I am delighted to have the opportunity to be in Edinburgh to talk about the humanitarian consequences and risks of nuclear weapons and the strong international momentum that has been built in the past few years to engage in a different kind of discourse about this weaponry.

The conclusions are clear: the broad range of humanitarian and developmental consequences of nuclear weapons is significantly graver than previously understood, and so are the risks of accidents and technical or human errors. These conclusions should lead to an urgent reappraisal and change in the discourse about these weapons of mass destruction.More than three quarters of the international community have expressed their deep concern about the humanitarian consequences in cross-regional declarations in the United Nations. The “Humanitarian Pledge” to fill the legal gap for the prohibition and elimination of nuclear weapons, initiated by Austrian last year, has also been formally endorsed by 117 States to date. I am aware, of course, that nuclear weapons are an issue that is intensely discussed in Scotland and I look forward to the opportunity to present the humanitarian initiative to a wider audience here in Scotland”

Contacts: Janet Fenton 07795594573

Notes:

1. WILPF is the world’s oldest women’s peace organisation and has been campaigning locally and globally against nuclear weapons since their inception. Reaching Critical Will (RCW) is the disarmament project at the WILPF United Nations offices in New York and Geneva, which has promoted and enabled NGO and civic participation at international high level diplomatic efforts. http://www.wilpf.org.uk/get-involved/scottish-branch/

2.SEE http://www.bmeia.gv.at/en/european-foreign-policy/disarmament/weapons-of-mass-destruction/nuclear-weapons-and-nuclear-terrorism/vienna-conference-on-the-humanitarian-impact-of-nuclear-weapons/

AND

https://www.armscontrol.org/pressroom/press-release/2014-Arms-Control-Person-of-the-Year-Announced

3.SEE Motion S4M-13558: Bill Kidd, Glasgow Anniesland, Scottish National Party, Date Lodged: 17/06/2015

4. SEE http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/

The ambassador from Austria who initiated the Humanitarian Pledge to ban all nuclear weapons is coming to Scotland

TOWARDS A NUCLEAR WEAPONS BAN

Bill Kidd MSP, as co chair of the nuclear disarmament cross party group will  host guests on Wednesday 23^rd September from 6.30 – 8.30pm at the Scottish Parliament, marking UN International Day of Peace and UN International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons. Earlier in the day he will be debating in the Parliament in support of the Marshall Island nuclear victims. The early evening discussion will highlight and support the Humanitarian Pledge, initiated by the Austrian Government, which aims to fill the legal gap in the prohibition and elimination of nuclear weapons.

The event is organised by the Scottish Branch of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (S WILPF) with support from SCND and other members of the Scrap Trident Coalition.

The meeting will address humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons, including the particular relevance for women and girls, and examine the ways in which gender structures stand in the way of disarmament.

Fiona Hyslop MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Culture, Europe and External Affairs will contribute  introductory remarks.

Austrian Ambassador, Alexander Kmentt who was instrumental in initiating the Humanitarian Pledge which has now been signed by 116 states will speak at the event.

The panel will also include Dr Claire Duncanson Lecturer in International Relations University of Edinburgh, Mia Gandenberger  WILPF project Programme Manager with Reaching Critical Will in Geneva, Rebecca Sharkey UK Coordinator International Campaign for Abolition of Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), to offer academic, polititcal and activist perspectives.

Light refreshments will be served. All are welcome, although places are limited, and to comply with parliamentary security, details of all attendees will be submitted in advance.  If you would like to be added to the list of invitees, please email janetscotlands4peace@yahoo.co.uk directly.

Scottish branch,

Womens International League for Peace and Freedom

janetscotlands4peace@yahoo.co.uk

#ON THE WIRE

There is a tradition of decorating the barriers that represent oppression – the Berlin Wall, the Peace Wall in Belfast and separation walls and fences from Israel/Palestine to US/Mexico have all been subjected to people power and creativity. It is usually done by small groups of ordinary people, and it is usually a form of civil disobedience. As well as decorating, these acts have been known to bring walls down.

Maybe those Faslane and Coulport fences needs some symbols of the real human security the weapons can never provide.

At Coulport, one of our Scottish mountains is hollowed out to contain 160 warheads, each capable of delivering eight times the thermonuclear devastation of Hiroshima. The perimeter fence is very long, and very ugly, but the catastrophic consequences of any accident, let alone military action, could be a lot longer. The mind that contemplates the annihilation of millions of people as a way of resolving political conflict is far uglier. At Faslane, the perimeter fence contains a much smaller area, although it is better known and much more accessible.

So, a good place to start. At Faslane today, half a dozen of us started things off with some Tibetan prayer flags, silk scarves and baby clothes and shoes. We lablled our efforts with Bairns not Bombs posters, and accomplished a complete change of appearance in ten minutes, with lots of bemused police interest and no arrests.

Over to others. Come and decorate the fence with your symbols for peace and real security. We ask that your actions are non-violent and respectful to everyone. It may be that the flabbergasted police recover and take more action than they did today, and if you would like information about that or about the base itself, or if you need some support in finding a few pals to act with, please contact Trident Ploughshares tridentploughshares.org.or comment here.

The main thing is to take action, and we can have some fun and deliver Scotland’s message to the UK government. Join the real international powers and ban all nuclear weapons. Trident out!

A referendum can be a victory for democracy, provided everyone knows what they want to happen. Well done the Irish, I am so proud of my Irish connections, (including my half or part or whole Irish children and grandchildren, global citizens that they are.) The UN Human Rights convention can lay down principles, but every country must find a way to allow their citizens access to remedy when the principles fail them. A written constitution, the means of changing it, and access to the courts are all as necessary as parliamentary representation, if not more so, in ensuring this.

It returns me to my daughter’s comment on Facebook on what I like to call Black Friday.(19 September 2014) She wrote ‘I cannot believe we voted no. I actually cannot believe it. Devastated.’
Her post expresses the shame that the Scottish electorate allowed themselves to be so undermined and bamboozled that they couldn’t even take responsibility for what hapens here. When I first lived in Ireland in the 1960’s, I spent many hours in the National Museum in Dublin exploring the memorabilia of the uprising. I also talked with my father in law in Cork about the terrible pain the people went through to become independent. The resistance to that desire and the post traumatic shock for everyone involved has its violent and ugly resonance to this day. And all we had to do was to cast our vote to get a chance for democratic control of ourselves.

We now have the reward of an insane foreign policy that equates endangering the survival of the planet with nuclear weapons with ‘security’ and a social security system that relies on foodbanks and prisons while we only educate the rich.

Maybe we lost the referendum in part because we are like children who are so unused to being offered good food rather than a beating that they run from an outstretched hand. We have forgotten how to answer a question about how we think things should be done collectively, tand hat we are easily panicked into imagining that a bunch of half-educated politicians with little life experience have some sort of expertise and know things we don’t.

Well actually, they do know things we don’t. That’s the rub.

If we had a constitution that included democratic control of foreign policy, and no secret deals between our government and the governments of other countries, (not a new idea; advocated by the Womens International League for Peace and Freedomwhen they formed at the Hague in 2014, one of the 21 resolutions the published with the aim of stopping the carnage then raging across Europe) then we’d live in a nuclear-free Scotland, we would never have gone to war on Iraq and I’d have had time to learn Gaelic.

So UN Conventions can provide the framework, and Westminster cannot repeal the UN Convention on Human Rights or in any way get rid of our legal rights under that convention. But when our (legal) human rights are thwarted in Scotland, it is the UK Human Rights Act that gives us the route through our courts to demand remedy. The UK Act is binding under Scots Law through the Scotland Act that dictates the current devolution agreement.Without the Act, we have the difficult task of going through the European Court or failing that International Court (ICJ) and getting them to tackle our government.

Scotland has a separate legal system, and human rights are a devolved matter. Westminster cannot repeal Scots Law . If this happened, it would constitute a breach of the Scotland Act itself., and deny our legal system’s process. The other option would be for Westminster to revoke the Scotland Act itself and remove devolution and the Scottish Parliament.

This does not mean that everything is under control so that we need not take steps to prevent the unthinkable. Never underestimate the capacity of the British Empire Remainder to thwart its own legislation to achieve the gameplan.

####

I know also that this is all a technical pain in the arse to follow, but really, if they mess with human rights in Scotland I hope that we can remember our reaction to Thatcher’s Poll Tax, be inspired by the Irish people’s common sense response to the religious bigots and be informed and aware and ready to take action compared to which the Poll Tax campaign will be seen as a polite reminder. They may know things we don’t. We can do things they can’t stop.

My daughter ended her Facebook post with a question. What now Scotland?

May 25th

So the pro-Trident Kezia is to stand tor the leadership of  Scottish Labour. Is that the branch office of the leaderless Labour Party that has just taken such a resounding hammering in Scotland that it cannot do better than the Tories in returning MPs to Westminster? Or is she planning a new Scottish Labour Party that reflects the views of Labour supporters in Scotland?

There is room for a Scottish Labour Party that will work with the unions and others who are committed to building a Scotland that has at its heart to a fair society with education, healthcare, and safe and affordable housing as the bedrock of security. Security has little to do with illegal and immoral nuclear weapons (let us see what emerges from the debate next week on Mr M’s insider story) nor through illegal and immoral attempts to repeal the Human Rights Act – which is enshrined under Scots Law within our devolved powers.

There are two problems for Ms Dugdale. One, she has consistently supported all of the convoluted disingenuous and contradictory policies expressed by her unmentionable predecessor and thus ruled herself out of any serious and honest debate on future policy.Two, a real Scottish Labour Party would not be based on nationalism, but it would  inevitably support independence.

I am getting sick of hearing (especially from tired old Laybore Trident supporting hacks) that the SNP position on NATO (embodied by Nicola) is “hypocritical” and represents some kind of “jumping on the bandwagon” which argument does at least acknowledge that the Scottish people are on a roll to shut down Faslane in its present deadly and deranged form.
Scotland has not only been the base from which all of the UK’s nuclear weapons target other countries, but has been opposed to their presence with that opposition stated by trade unions, churches, government and parliament for years now in complete democratic deficit. The people have protested, demonstrated and participated in civil resistance of the most imaginative and constant sort. The case has been argued in public meetings, courtrooms the mainstream and social media. Scotland is ready for nuclear disarmament, and the Labour Party based in London is misguided in ignoring that situation.
Firstly, the NATO policy has never been discussed by the SNP party since the huge influx of new members. It was only adopted by a narrow majority in a party conference ballot a year before the referendum. No motion has been put through Holyrood in support of that policy (unlike the equally ‘reserved’ position of opposition to Trident replacement) which does not surprise. Many antinuclear campaigners inside and outside the party find it deeply abhorrent. The Austrian pledge for a global ban on all nuclear weapons continues to gain traction since this years international summit on the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons, and the ban would preclude the existence of nuclear armed alliances such as NATO.

So for me, an independent Scotland in membership of NATO is a policy on a shoogly nail within the party.
Like many SNP members, Nicola was a member of CND before she joined SNP so no bandwagon jumping going on here. Personally and as a member of the Womens International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) and Trident Ploughshares, I would prefer a completely demilitarised Scotland that focussed on human security and developing a foreign policy that was focussed on participating in the small circles and long dialogues that contribute to global understanding and peace, but I will vote for a candidate/party that is on the sharp end of that spectrum. Trident is the sharp end. Nuclear weapons are the ultimate in indiscriminate state violence in the hands of the few and out of the control of the many. By ensuring that we can get rid of Trident I harbour hopes of creating a space in which demilitarisation and non violent intervention could be options.
Does that make me a hypocrite? There seems no logic whatsoever in suggesting that voting for a party that does support Trident and all the hideous and insane posturing brinksmanship (whoever heard of brinkswomanship?) would be a less hypocritical option. So I’ll not be doing that. And I will be one of the many closing down Faslane on the 13th, that’s Monday coming folks, check out your options. http://scraptrident.org/

PEATON PEACE PIRATES

Article 1

WE be committed to disarming the UK Trident of them dastardly nuclear weapons

Article 2

WE be committed to acting with no fisticuffs, slagging off or any other pesky and violent actions

Article 3

WE will tell any landlubber or sea(wo)man who asks why we are there and what we be a doing of

Article 4

WE will cite the articles from Nuremberg, Geneva and the 1996 ICJ ruling and some other legal doings what we are experts on, to all who ask what we be up to and why.

Signed with their mark:

Jean Oliver

Janet Fenton

David Mackenzie

Douglas Shaw

This day 22 February 2015