Anti-war protesters lose appeals
March 29th, 2006Law lords have ruled against 20 anti-war campaigners who claimed they were right to take action aimed at preventing the Iraq war.The group had asked if a valid defence was available to peace activists who allegedly broke the law to prevent an even greater “crime of aggression”.
The case centres on action taken near Southampton docks, and at RAF Fairford in the run up to the war in 2003.
The five law lords unanimously dismissed the appeals.
‘Not a crime in domestic law’
Fourteen of the group, known as the Marchwood 14, are Greenpeace volunteers who say they should not have been convicted of aggravated trespass near Southampton docks because they were trying to stop an “illegal war”.
The same argument was also offered by five people who entered RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire and allegedly tried to immobilise American B52 bombers which were later involved in “shock and awe” attacks on Baghdad.
A charge of aggression against an individual in a British court “would involve determination of his responsibility as a leader but would presuppose commission of the crime by his own state or a foreign state”, he said.
This would in turn call for a decision on the “culpability in going to war” of the UK government or a foreign government, or both if they had gone to war as allies.
He argued that the courts would be “very slow” to review the exercise of the government’s prerogative powers in relation to the deployment of the armed services.
He said it was “very relevant” that Parliament had not considered whether the international law crime of aggression should be adopted into British law.
‘Dangerous precedent’
Taking that step “would draw the courts into an area which, in the past, they have entered, if at all, with reluctance”.
Lord Hoffmann said that to allow “the use of force in such cases would be to set a most dangerous precedent”. […]
Greenpeace have got it totally wrong. You cannot use force against the army to stop them going to war. Its like a mosquito biting an elephant in the hopes that it will stop it trampling a village.
There is no way that they could have imagined that their actions would have stopped the war. If they belived that, they are completely delusional and need to pack up and go home.
Did they really imagine the courts, which are an aparatus of the state, would side with them, when these very same courts are unwilling or unable to prosecute the mass murderer Bliar and the Cabal? Are these people really that naïve?
I have said this before; what Greenpeace, StopWar† and all those other 70’s style protest groups need to do is understand the problem, and then deal with it appropriately. Kicking the tyres of a B52 is innapropriate. Gathering togerther 7 million taxpayers and getting them to withdraw their services in a co-ordinated economic attack, now THAT is appropriate.
The astonishing lack of imagination, dearth of oblique thinking, these are the true problems with Greenpeace and all organizations like it. When they have in the palm of their hands, literally millions of people who are willing to work with them to prevent an illegal war, the only thing they can think of is to march away the soles of their shoes on a Saturday, waste paper by sending out pointless status reports instead of doing what they need to do; dismantle the war machine at source; the taxpayer.
†Those idiots at StopWar are at it again:
Protests outside BBC studios nationwide
Tuesday 4th April at lunchtime
The Stop the War Coalition is calling for protests outside BBC studios and offices accross the country, at lunchtime on Tuesday 4th April.
This is to respond to the BBC’s failure to cover the huge troops home demonstration on March 18 on national news and also to protest the general pro-government bias of much of their reporting on the war.
We are asking groups to organise protests at every BBC office. We will be leafletting the offices with a copy of a letter addressed to Mark Thompson. […]
I have some words for StopWar.
- BBQ is a wholley owned arm of the state. Get used to it.
- No matter what BBQ says or transmits, the venal government of mass murderers will not pay it any heed, even if it shows exactly what you desire.
- It’s the internet STUPID. You can reach all the people of this country by using the internet; forget BBQ as a way to reach into the minds of the people – we have a new, frinctionless tool to use that works brilliantly, if you are creative, honest, and have somehting worthwhile to offer to people in the first place.
- For the nth time; DEMONSTRATING IS TEH STUPID
- GO AWAY AND THINK ABOUT IT YOU MORONS.