‘Civilian Drone Strike’ by Banksy raised £205,000 for Campaign Against The Arms Trade. Well done Banksy and Art the Arms Fair. If you missed the exhibition, or want to take another look, there’s an excellent 3D digital version of it here.
I was kept busy during the week of action against DSEI, downloading and editing livestreamed video reports for the recently rebooted Occupy News Network.
Here’s the playlist with all 28 videos:
Solidarity with everybody who took action, particularly the 109+ brave activists who were arrested. Court support is ongoing until October. If you can get along to Thames Magistrates Courts to show solidarity, please do.
Making an unsafe, unstable world less stable and less safe
UK Gov.Plc sell weapons and equipment, including torture equipment to 22/30 countries on their own list of human rights abusers. At least 109 brave activists were arrested last week trying to shut this shameful shit show down. DSEI 2017 is an international terrorist convention profiting from death & misery.
Catch up with Occupy News Network‘s coverage of last week’s #StopDSEI blockade, here:
There are now over 100The Occupied Sun and Daily Wail front pages, offering an alternative to everybody’s least favourite tabloid.
Check out the Alternative Media List for better sources of information than the 1%’s malign media monopoly. 100+ recommendations for more interesting, useful, credible, relevant and reliable sources:
Stop DSEI because the men, women and children who survived the weapons sold at DSEI are starving to death in Yemen, in Gaza and all over the world, so a tiny number of rich people can get richer.
Stop DSEI because the global arms trade maintains an unstable, unsafe and unfair world for profit.
Stop DSEI because those able to seek refuge from the conflicts fuelled by DSEI’s weapons are persecuted and exploited if they’re lucky, or they’re abandoned to rot in detention centres, to drown in the sea and worse.
Stop DSEI because the revolving door between UK Gov. Plc and the arms industry reveals the absolute depth of hypocrisy to which our democracy has sunk.
Stop DSEI because Government ministers brazenly giving keynote speeches at DSEI this year include International Trade Secretary Liam Fox, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon and Security Minister Ben Wallace.
These men will almost certainly pass back through the revolving door to lucrative careers in the euphemistically described ‘defence’ industry.
Stop DSEI because their wars are fuelling the ecological crisis, through the war machines’ insatiable addiction to toxic energy sources and the politicians’ fear of the petrodollar’s inevitable demise.
Stop DSEI because the weapons manufacturers and deep states should be focusing their combined energies on mitigating the unfolding climate collapse, rather than facilitating unnecessary conflicts in an increasingly unstable world.
Stop DSEI because it is simply wrong to make vast profits from the unnecessary and indiscriminate murder, torture, censorship, surveillance and suffering of others.
Stop DSEI because even though London Mayor, Sadiq Khan; incumbent PM and peace activist, Jeremy Corbyn; the only green voice in Parliament, Caroline Lucas and many other decent MPs deplore the arms trade, WE are the ones with the power to actually stop it from taking place.
Stop DSEI because there’s another madman in the whitehouse, talking about thermonuclear armageddon while the world burns and floods.
Stop DSEI because we may not get another chance.
Stop DSEI because another world is possible.
Solidarity with everybody taking action to shut down this grotesque carnival of death and suffering.
One week today, Occupiers will be joining Stop The Arms Fair‘s week long blockade, setting up camp to prevent the world’s largest arms fair from taking place.
DSEI (Defence Security Equipment International) gather once every two years, dripping in blood and oil. Arms dealers and governments buy and sell weapons which kill, maim and torture.
The peace movement have been dancing this dance against the festival of death since wellbefore 2001, when DSEI first moved to the ExCeL Centre, London Docklands.
As comrades in Australia have demonstrated, it is possible to shut down an arms fair, but only with sufficient numbers of people prepared to seriously disrupt their setup.
There definitely seems to be much more momentum building this year. Various groups have been organising for months now all over the country. Unfortunately, I can’t be there. My health and finances are shit and I’m not up for getting arrested again. I’ll be in the back office doing my bit to reflect a truthful account of the spectacle; mirroring, ripping, editing, uploading and sharing livestreamed reports throughout the week of action for Occupy News Network.
Followers of this blog will know that I haz been making things and stuff to help promote this year’s blockade and Occupy the Arms Fair camp.
Here are some memes;
(9000 points go to whoever spots protest stencil‘s excellent subvert in one of these…) 😉
(I pinched the skyline silhouette off the inspirational Stop the Arms Fair memes).
Here are some #StopDSEI videos.
If they speak for you, please like, share, download and mirror this stuff, and all the other wonderful things everybody’s making and doing to help art the arms fair.
If like me, you can’t get to London there’s probably a weapons producer, military supplier or surveillance and security company somewhere near you. Why not pay them a visit?
Also. Let’s own the interwebz. #StopDSEI.
4th-11th September – NETWORK IT!
Please help share the things and stuff leading up to and throughout the blockade, however long it needs to last. Make and do and say the things. Find and sign all the petitions. Write a personal letter to your MP. Write to them again. Meditate. Pray. What ever works for you.
Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, stay safe, stay strong and look after each other.
The world’s largest arms fair, DSEI returns to London’s Excel centre this September. Occupy The Arms Fair will be joining a massive coalition of civil society for a week of action designed to shut it down.
Let’s make 2017 the year we finally turn this brutal industry the way of sustainable peace. Join Occupy The Arms Fair‘s direct action camp to stop the DSEI arms fair.
You can read more about Stop The Arms Fair‘s upcoming week of action, 4th-11th September 2017, here.
Occupy News Network are planning to broadcast LIVE throughout the week of action.
Here’s Tarpaulin Simon‘s video report from London Docklands on Friday:
The world’s largest arms fair, DSEI have set up shop at London’s Excel centre every two years since 2001. Deals are struck at DSEI which destroy the lives of entire civilian populations. The UK Government exports weapons to 22 out of 30 countries on their own human rights watchlist.
Trading arms with Israel makes the UK complicit in Israel’s continuing violations of human rights and international law. The Israeli assault on Gaza in July-August 2014 killed 2,205 Palestinians (including 521 children). This was just one example of Israel’s ongoing acts of violence against the Palestinian people, however UK-made weapons and military technologies continue to be sold to and used by Israeli forces.
The Watchkeeper Surveillance Drone has been developed under a £1 billion joint venture contract, awarded by the Ministry of Defence to Thales UK and Israel’s Elbit Systems. This allows the UK military to benefit from weapons that have been ‘field tested’ on the occupied Palestinian people.
Let’s make 2017 the year we finally turn this brutal industry the way of sustainable peace. Join Occupy The Arms Fair‘s direct action camp to stop the DSEI arms fair.
You can read more about Stop The Arms Fair‘s upcoming week of action, 4th-11th September 2017, here.
More memes:
Occupy News Network are planning to broadcast LIVE throughout the week of action.
Here’s Tarpaulin Simon‘s report from London Docklands, earlier today.
The world’s largest arms fair, DSEI have set up shop at London’s Excel centre every two years since 2001. Deals are struck at DSEI which destroy the lives of entire civilian populations. The UK Government exports weapons to 22 out of 30 countries on their own human rights watchlist.
These weapons are fuelling an unholy global war of error, which is escalating by the hour.
