Support the Raytheon 9 - Resisting War Crimes is Not a Crime!

The trial of Derry Anti War Coalition activists, the Raytheon 9, has begun. It is being held in Belfast. The trial was moved to Belfast after the Prosecution Service applied to have it moved; it argued that the Derry jury pool is likely to know too much about the campaign against Raytheon, including the non-violent direct action taken on 9th August 2006 and that any jury from Derry may be too sympathetic to the action and/or intimidated by the level of support for the Raytheon 9 because of all the protests held outside the court over the almost two years since the nine were arrested.

The Derry Anti War Coalition is confident that, wherever the trial is heard, there will be large demonstrations in support of the Nine and that any jury who hears the truth about what was happening in Lebanon when the action took place cannot but find that the Nine acted to stop war crimes and, therefore, committed no crime.

Rush messages of support to resistderry(at)aol.com

Davy McAuley, travelled to Cardiff recently to speak on behalf of the Derry Anti-War Coalition to speak at a protest rally called by the Stop the St Athan's Military Academy Campaign. He says “The creation of a military super-academy at St Athan, between Cardiff and Swansea, was announced as a done deal in January 2007. Despite the fact this represented the biggest PFI in history, involving £14 billion of taxpayers' money, there had been no debate in either Westminster or the Welsh Assembly (Senedd). DAWC were invited to speak because the winning bidders for the project were the Metrix consortium. This consortium includes Raytheon and the anti-war people of Wales are as unhappy with their taxes pouring profits into the coffers of arms traders as are the anti-war people of Derry. The consortium also includes Qinetiq, the privatised research and development wing of the MoD. Qinetiq was recently the subject of intense criticism by the National Audit Office. Its privatisation was proposed by MoD managers - who then saw their shares rise 10,000% on the day of the sale!"

Davey says that, in any case, “people need to imagine think about what else could be done with £14 billion! With hospitals and schools closing throughout Wales and the North of Ireland, with a desperate need to improve social facilities, create sustainable sources of energy etc, such public money could be invested in socially useful projects rather than the preparation for future wars of occupation like Iraq."

More about the Raytheon 9 can be found here

MESSAGE TO CARDIFF PEACE MOVEMENT:

It is a fact, not an allegation, that Raytheon is complicit in war crimes in Lebanon, Palestine and elsewhere in the world. Human Rights Watch reports have detailed the appalling suffering inflicted by Raytheon munitions on helpless civilians in Lebanon in the summer of 2006. The response of raytheon was to rush replenishments to the region so that slaughter might proceed.

We greet the members of the Stop the St Athan Military Academy Campaign and the Cardiff Stop the War Coalition who have highlighted the role of Raytheon in fuelling war for profit. We send our solidarity to you in your struggle to expose the obscenity of Raytheon involvement in military training in Wales. We thank you for the support you have shown us. We look forward to working in the future with you and with opponents of war and mitlitarism everywhere to cleans the world of the ugliness which Raytheon represents.

Eamonn McCann, Raytheon 9, Derry