Tag: Drone protest

US drone campaigner to tour UK

Chris Cole
Brian Terrell
Brian Terrell

Brian Terrell, US anti-drone campaigner and long-time Catholic Worker activist is coming to the UK in October as part of the Week of Action on Drones.

Brian lives and works at Strangers and Guests Catholic Worker Farm in Maloy, Iowa.  Brian also travels around Iowa and beyond, speaking and acting with communities that are working for justice and peace. His travels include Iraq and Afghanistan and he was deported from Bahrain in 2012 after witnessing the violent repression of human rights activists there.

In recent years, he has been active in resistance to remote controlled murders by drones with friends in Nevada, New York and Missouri and on May 24 of this year he was released from a six month federal prison sentence for participating in a peaceable assembly in protest of drones at Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri. Read more →

Drone base invasion steps up pressure on those attempting to maintain secrecy

Chris Cole
The Waddington Six: (from left) Revd Keith Hebden, Chris Cole, Fr Martin Newell, Penny Walker, Susan Clarkson and Henrietta Cullinan.
The Waddington Six: (from left) Revd Keith Hebden, Chris Cole, Fr Martin Newell, Penny Walker, Susan Clarkson and Henrietta Cullinan.

Six anti-drone protesters (myself included) were arrested inside RAF Waddington on Monday (June 3). The protest had three aims; 1) to symbolically breach the secrecy and silence surrounding the British use of armed drones; 2) to bring information about the impact of airstrikes on Afghan civilians  and 3) to symbolically begin conversion of the air base to peaceful purposes.   We did this by creating a peace garden within the base, displaying information on buildings, hangars and sign posts about the impact of airstrikes on Afghan civilians (see bottom of post)  and trying to find out information about the day-to-day use of drones at Waddington. Read more →

Photo essay: Ground the Drones demo

Chris Cole

haead_of_march

“Every Afghan has a name, war is not a video game!”

Six hundred people came from all around the country to take part in a large demonstration against drones at RAF Waddington, the new home of the UK drone warfare.    The demo, organised by the Drone Campaign Network, Stop the War Coalition, CND and War on Want received huge media coverage in the light of the confirmation by the Ministry of Defence that drone operations had started from RAF Waddington. After the march from Lincoln, a rally was held at Helen John’s peace camp at the perimeter of the base, and speaker after speaker emphasised that this was just the beginning of efforts to stop the drone wars. Read more →

Why we need you to join us at Ground the Drones demo

Chris Cole
Join the protest at RAF Waddington on Saturday April 27 – details here

Over the past three years Drone Wars UK  has tried to highlight why the growing use of armed drones and the concept of remote, so-called ‘risk-free’ warfare, is a perilous military escalation which endangers global peace and security.   In the run-up to the Ground the Drones demo at RAF Waddington on April 27 we want to recap these reason and urge you, if you can to please join us at the event. Read more →

Standing against the drones as new British drone squadron ‘stands up’

Chris Cole

A group of protesters gathered at the entrance to RAF Waddington yesterday (Oct 26th) to stand against the growing use of drones.

Inside the RAF were ceremonially ‘standing up’ 13 Squadron, its new drone unit.   13 Squadron has been reformed to operate an additional  five new armed Reaper drones ordered in 2010 by David Cameron.  RAF 39 Squadron will continue to operate RAF Reaper drones from Creech AFB in Nevada for the time being but eventually it is expected that all ten will be controlled from RAF Waddington. Read more →