Press Releases & Updates 2004

The ’Burghfield 6’ - six direct action anti-nuclear activists from Leicester, London and Norwich, who this June entered Burghfield, one of Britain’s WMD bases, and put it out of action for over an hour - were in Reading Magistrates’ Court all day this Wednesday (27 October), to contest the charges against them of Criminal Damage. All 6 pleaded not guilty, although the fact of their having cut the fence and entered the base is not in dispute. The defendants were then very pleased by the presiding Magistrate’s willingness to hear full arguments for the defence based on principles of international law, including crucially Britain’s recent accession to the International Criminal Court.

The case will resume at 11 a.m on Thursday morning in Court 1 of Reading Magistrate’s Court, for the completion of final arguments and the presiding Magistrate’s verdict. The proceedings are expected to be finished by lunchtime.

Cllr. Rupert Read, main press contact for the defendants, said, "It is shameful that these six brave citizens are in the dock. Instead, it should be Geoff Hoon and Tony Blair who are prosecuted, for having made no effort whatsoever to disarm Britain of its own illegal WMDs. How shameful, that the British government holds on jealously to its own nuclear arsenal, even after it has been proved beyond any doubt that the alleged threat to us from Iraq was completely non-existent. There is however some ground for optimism in that the magistrates presiding over the court here in Reading, unusually, seem so far to be taking seriously their responsibilities under international law, and may yet choose to uphold the law as our government has already failed to do. The Magistrates’ doing so would send out a powerful signal that Britain may manage to overcome its international image at present as a rogue state, a nuclear bully state, an international outlaw."

[PHOTO: The defendants, along with their press reps., outside Reading Magistrates’ Court today. The banner is to make clear that there are (nuclear) WMDs in Britain -- indeed, in Berkshire.]

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