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WRI homepage > Publications > The Broken Rifle > No.34, March 1996
This year's Council will take place in Liege, Belgium, from Saturday 20 July in the evening until Thursday 25 July in the afternoon. Participants will be expected to arrive on Saturday and the Council will start after dinner with an introductory session. The closing session will end around 3pm on Thursday. People needing to stay an extra night on Thursday can do so, but at their own expense.
The WRI Women's Working Group is planning to organise a women's only meeting just before the start of the Council, on Saturday 20 July from 10am to 5pm at the same venue. Women interested in attending should contact Dominique at the office in order to arrange accommodation, if needed.
The venue is a new Youth Hostel located about 4km from the centre of Liege, with direct bus access. The closest airports are Liege itself or Brussels (about 1hr by train). More practical information will be sent to all participants mid-May. Accommodation will be in rooms of four persons. A list of campgrounds and hotels in Liege will be available from the office for those who wish to secure their own accommodation.
Hoping to encourage participation from our affiliates, the Executive decided to lower substantially the registration fees from last year:
The Youth Hostel will be open to the public during our Council. It is therefore imperative that people register by 15 June at the latest. After that date, we will NOT be able to guarantee accommodation at the venue and in any case participants will be charged an extra £25. So don't be late!
As usual, all Affiliates are asked to send their annual activity reports to the office for distnbi'tion at the Council. The update should be no longer than one page and include information about the group's priorities and potential changes in its work since the last Council. We would greatly appreciate any help with the translation of these reports into our four main languages (English, German, Spanish and French), in which case the deadline for submitting the updates would be extended to the end of June.
By the time you receive this Broken Rifle, we will have blown our 75 candles. The Council will mark this anniversary by devoting some time every evening to an event on WRI history and affiliates are encouraged to think of lively ways to present their own historical connections with the International. Some examples include storytelling sessions about events or specific individuals and re-enacting scenarios or controversies. Use your imagination and let the agenda committee (via the office) know about your plans, so that we can better integrate them into the overall programme.
One such initiative comes from MIR-IRG (Belgium), who is planning to organise a poster exhibit on CO in Belgium, as well as an art exhibit from the regions of ex-Yugoslavia at the Council venue. Any group interested in bringing the latter to their country should contact Thierry Delannoy at MIR-IRG, 35 rue van Elewyck, 1050 Brussels, Belgium (+32 2 6485220; fax 6400774).
The WRI FöGA working group, which had already sponsored Saswati's participation in the 1994 Triennial in Brazil, is now planning a speaking tour for Saswati in Germany from mid-June to mid-July. These dates were chosen to allow her to take part in the next WRI Coundl meeting, in Liege. Saswati has already been invited by several groups to speak on the position of women in India and grassroots relationships between development, environment and women's issues. She is also looking forward to making new contacts with German antimilitarist and women's groups.
Two weekend seminars will be held:
There will be evening meetings also in Köln, Bielefeld, Frankfurt/Main, Heidelberg, Oldenburg.
If you would like more infonnation about these and other possible venues, please contact Andreas Speck at the above address. The FöGA working group needs money to organise all this and would welcome donations (Account Nr. 71258, Förderge Gemeinschaft Friedensarbeit und Gewalttosigkeit, Stadisparkasse Kassel, BLZ 52050 151, mention "Saswati Roy").
The May issue of GWR will be entirely dedicated to presenting WRI's current work and future perspectives for international cooperation. All the articles commissioned are available to other publications in the WRI network. WRI's new affiliate, En pie de Paz, will publish several of these articles in their May issue, as will other magazines in France, Britain, Belgium and Turkey.
If you would like to use any of these articles or would like to help with their translation, please contact Graswurzel revolution as soon as possible.
Contact: Karlstraße 14a- 26123 Oldenburg (+49441 8859735, fax 441 81077, email wri-ag.foega@oln.comlink.apc.org).
The Selbstorganisation der Zivildienstleistenden, in cooperation with the regional and local DFG-VK groups, is organising a party to celebrate the 75th anniversary of WRI, 25 years of SOdZDL and the 15 years of ICOM! The event will start at noon with information stands and workshops. Various actions around CO rights are planned, including the encasing of military papers in a block of resin! Poetry reading, singing, music and more will go until late. The venue is wheelchair accessible.
Contact Kleniens Böhm, Bundeszentrale SO£iZ DL, Vogelsbergstraße 17, 6000 Frankfurt 1, Germany (+49 69 43 14 05).
From time to time, WRI is approached by movements engaged in social struggle to discuss questions of strategy development and the use of nonviolence. To increase WRI's capacity to respond to these approaches, the 1995 Council meeting agreed to hold a study conference on Social Change Strategy.
The February meeting of the WRI Exec proposed a working group to develop a structure for a study conference of up to 100 people. This conference could be held some time between January and May 1997: the Executive would like to hear from groups interested in hosting such an event in their country.
The WRI Executive thinks it would be valuable to have an exchange of experience and information between affiliates on some of the race issues raised by the trend towards professionalising the armed forces. For instance, this was a major theme for the US War Resisters League in the period after the Gulf War when their video "It's Not Just a Job" was designed specifically to reach out to young people in the African- and Hispanic-American communities in the USA.
If your group would be interested, please get in touch with the WRI office saying what your specific interest in, when you would be able to host such an event, and what the costs and fund-raising opportunities would be.
The Balkan Peace Team currently has one project in Croatia, Otvorene Oci with volunteers in Zagreb and Split, and one in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. It is also investigating possible work in Eastern Slavonia.
The project in FR Yugoslavia began in Kosovo, but in April last year the team withdrew from Prishtine as they were bringing unwanted police attention to certain local people. Then began a process of registering as an association in FR Yugoslavia. This process was completed in November, and now BPT is considering how much it can do in Kosovo and what is appropriate in the rest of the federal republic.
Volunteers are asked to make a minimum commitment of six months and to take part in a 10-day training.
Contact: Balkan Peace Team, Marienwall 9, D-32423 Minden, Germany (tel +49 571 20776, fax: +49 571 23019, email balkan-peace-team@bionic.zerberus.de) if you are interested in becoming a volunteer or would like to receive the BPT Newsletter.
Objeción Fiscal in the state of Spain has given I million pesetas (over £5,000) to the Joint Nonviolent Contingency Fund, being managed by WRI. And that is only a third of the surplus they raised in their 1995 appeal. Each year Objeción Fiscal adopts an international project and sets a target for funds to raise. In 1994, the partner was Women in Black in Yugoslavia; in 1995, Conavigua in Guatemala. However, as they raised 5 million pesetas when their target was 2 million pesetas, the group decided to give 1 million pesetas each to the Contingency Fund, Women in Black - Belgrade, and Conavigua.
The Contingency Fund, which was adopted as a common project by the war tax resisters' international meeting in the Basque country in September 1994, has received contributions from the Canadian, Dutch and Swiss war tax funds, and Italian war tax resisters are making a large contribution (about £4,000) towards the first project developed with the Fund - the International Centre for Peace and Human Rights in Grozny.
The renewed fighting in Grozny and the bombing of Sernovodsk is making it more difficult to proceed with the plan to establish an International Centre for Peace and Human Rights in Grozny. Sernovodsk (on the Chechen-Ingush border) had seemed last year as if it might be a safer base for an international observer team, but after a nine-day military bombardment, Sernovodsk itself is badly damaged with dozens of people killed.
Slepsovsk has now become the most likely base for an observer presence, and soon there should be an email connection there.
In Moscow, Civil Peace and the Committee of Solders' Mothers have called for an international delegation to go to Chechnya on &8 April, to coincide with the anniversary of the Samashki massacre (6-8 April). There are some funds to help people take part in this; knowledge of Russian is an advantage but not essential.
In May, WRI is organising a European tour for women from the Union of Chechen Women and from the Russian Soldiers' Mothers Committee. The aims of the tour are to arouse European opinion on this issue, and to provide the kind of network of concerned people necessary to back up any international nonviolent presence that might later be established in the region.
Groups wanting to set up to host these women, organising meetings and other programmes for them, should contact the WRI office as soon as possible.
In Hamburg last November Gernot Lennert, the anti-militarist answer to Jørgen Klinsman, scored the most marvelous goal for WRI in Germany since the Berlin Coundl meeting of 1990. The goal followed an incisive tactical build-up and delicate interpassing with WRI's French star Dominique Saillard.
Lennert began the move with a shrewd agenda-change resolution, a manoeuvre rarely seen outside Germany, opening the way for Saillard to face the assembled ranks of the DFG-VK. She took the ball down the left bye-line and sent back a perfectly angled cross. Lennert rose like a dolphin, brushing aside a belated tackle from the IPB's floundering defender, and forced it home. The crowd went mad; their roar echoed from Hamburg to London and on to the Treasurer in New York.
This season the veteran activist Lennert has been playing with more consistency than ever, allying his characteristic commitment with a new strategic awareness and sense of timing. Great things are predicted for the Frankfurter. Well done, Gernot!
What a nice way to start the year! A phone call from SPAS in Sweden, ordering 5,000 badges from the office to give one free badge to each of its members. Everybody was happy: SPAS, who received a special discount on the price, and the WRI staff and treasurer, who are trying to increase the sales of the famous pacifist symbol. Although we are unlikely to reach the sale level of 1982, when the badges brought in about half of WRI's total income, our 75th anniversary might be the ideal opportunity to get more broken rifles out onto shirts, sweaters, coats, hats, backpacks, and onto the streets. We will soon have to re-order from our manufacturers, so why not contacting us now and making a special deal? Badges cost £1 each or £65 per 100 (including postage), but we will be glad to negotiate better prices for orders above 1,000.
The Mouvement des Objecteurs de Conscience has decided to mark 15 May - International CO Day -with a series of actions in support of the nonviolent resistance in Kosovo, in co-operation with local groups of the Mouvement pour tine Action Non-violente (MAN). Activities would be organised regionally and include such elenients as public meetings, street theatre, support of the "Rugova: Nobel Peace Prize" campaign and the lobbying of the French government in favour of Kosovar refugees and deserters.
Contact: Mario Pedretli, 10 rue Royer, 59140 Dunkerque (+33 28 66 60 45).
Note. The report from the MAN delegation to Kosovo and Serbia (101 pages, FF 69 + FF16 postage) is available from the MAN secretariat, 21ter rue Voltaire, 75011 Paris (+33 1 43 79 79 85; fax: 43 7901 30).
On 22 February, President Chirac announced the end of conscription in France by the year 2001. Arguing that the French armed forces were oversized, too unwieldy and expensive for use in modern warfare, he said he favoured the creation of a smaller, highly mobile British-style professional army, which would be more suitable, in his words, "for projection overseas in significant numbers --50 to 60,000 -- in rapid and organised conditions". The total number of soldiers in the armed forces should decrease from 500,000 to 350,000.
While military service in its present form would be abolished, Chirac envisaged two means of retaining the "great Republican tradition" of service to the nation. Young men could be called up to do a compulsory, mainly civilian service (in 90% of the cases) for a period of six months. Or the State could institute an entirely civilian service, open to both men and women on a voluntary basis.
We have asked our French affiliates to send us their initial reactions.
On 22 February 1996, (...) Jacques Chirac, commander in chief of the French armed forces, announced the dissolution of a third of the regiments, the restructuring of the arms industry, the closure of a land missile site (Plateau d'Albion), and -- the "icing on the cake" for young voters -- the abolition of military service by 2001.
(...) Real pacifists believe both the professional army and conscription should be abolished. Significantly, the professionalisation of the army is aimed at reinforcing a rapid reaction force better able to commit aggression, terrorise and torture people at home or abroad.
The abandonment of the nuclear land-based deterrence (but not the Mirage 2000F or nuclear submarines) and the closure of the Moruroa Attol testing site prove -- if that were necessary -- that the pacifists were once again right, too soon.
How many more billions of francs must be squandered, in order to satisfy the military paranoia, before reforming amateur and professional criminals? Why wait for the complete ecoilomic collapse of a state before eliminating all of France's armed forces? (...)
Is it not absurd to seek to impose on women and men six months' civilian service -- a poor substitute for the courageous, voluntary and generous conscientious objection of our world without war pioneers?
Surely the eventual recognition that our country does not need 201,523 conscripts in 1996, (...) and the reduction of the sacrosanct 1996 defence budget by just ten percent (at 185 billions francs, it is still one of the major items in the national budget) (...) demonstrates the timeliness of bill No.271, on French unilateral disarmament, proposed in the Senate on 23 April 1993 on the initiative of Union Pacifiste. Union Pacifiste is waiting impatiently for the release of all those total objectors and deserters who are imprisoned before acknowledging these timid first steps toward disarmament."
In a press release titled "For a Civilian Peace Service, the Mouvement pour une Alternative Non-violente (MAN) welcomes some of the decisions made by the head of state, but regrets that he "has not questioned the existence of major armaments programmes, or the central role of the nuclear deterrent in our system of armed defence, a deterrent which has become obsolete with the disappearance of the Soviet menace". (...)
"The abolition of compulsory military service within 6 years signals the end of the service performed by conscientious objectors", whose "discriminatory character (...)-- twice as long a period as that for military service -- was often a negative experience for young people wanting to help build a more equitable society." MAN notes that "the struggle to get civilian service for peace established, based on a corps of volunteers, is (...)very timely. Anyone, regardless of age or gender, should be able to engage in a peace service for the benefit of the community, in their own country, for instance in efforts to reduce social dislocation or in conflict zones, such as Kosovo, where MAN has backed Albaniancivilian resistance for three years.
(...)In proposing such a peace service - following the example of German NGOs working for peace and disarmament -- MAN hopes to show that its notion of collective security, based on the exercise of citizenship, should not be reduced to the purely military aspects of defence". (...) "Defence is an essentially civilian activity which should to be the business of every dtizen."
The Mouvement des Objecteurs de Conscience (MOC) "denounces the president's two proposals to establish a "civilian service."
We declare that we are against compulsory service which, having forced military training on conscripts, now seeks to make them perform compulsory labour service.
We are equally opposed to the notion of voluntary civilian service, which, while having nothing to do with defence, threatens to fragilise the situation of wage earners.
In the light of the announced increase in the number of conscripts in the police and gendarmerie, we oppose efforts to deal with social problems by fostering a security-mentality which contributes to the militarisation of society.
In coming months we will re-dedicate ourselves to the campaign for recognition of the right of all to conscientious objection, even if they are professional military personnel.
With the growing professionalisation of armies, defence questions should not remain the exclusive concern of the military hierarchy and a few self-proclaimed specialists. We stress that there should be the widest possible public debate on the main aspects of French defence policy."
(...) "Despite of the absence of dialogue and democratic debate before reaching this decision, the French branch of the Mouvement International de Ia R&onciliation (MIR: International Fellowship of Reconciliation) is pleased about the abolition of conssription. It recalls the long, hard years of struggle since its foundation in 1923, and the imprisonment of some of its members out to achieve the right not to perform such military service.
The standing army, both entirely and partially professional, is still an instrument of war, an unacceptable means of settling conflicts. Today, more than ever before, preventive diplomacy needs to be employed, training in conflict mediation developed and non-violent civilian defence evolved. Within these framework MIR can promote the notion of voluntary, international civilian service.
The right to conscientious objection for professional troops at all times, and for conscripts whcn partial or general conscription is liable to be reinstated in time of war, should be legally safeguarded or even enshrined in the constitution."
Kampagne gegen Wehrpflicht, Germany: http://www.snafu.de/campaign/kampagne.html
Kampanjen Mot Verneplikt, Norway: http://pluto.wit.no/doogie/ga/huset/kmv/
MOC_Barcelona, state of Spain: http://www.pangea.org/mocbcn/index.html
MOC-Valencia, state of Spain: http://www.uv.es/~alminyan/
Vereniging Dienstweigeraars, Netherlands: http:IIhuizen.dds.nl/veedee/
War Resisters League, USA: http://www.netaxs.com/nvweb/wrl/
Tarek El Husseini of Action for Civil Alternative, Lebanon, was pleased to meet the WRI Executive during a brief visit to London. APAC has about 60 active members and has already met nonviolence trainers from francophone groups (Jean-Marie Muller and Hervé Ott from France; Michel Megard, Switzerland, and Françoise Bazier, Belgium). An APAC leaflet declares "Our style of work is based on cooperation, auto-direction, and nonviolence, to attain full participation in civil society. All our activities are aimed at contributing to creating a civil trend among youth which would be the nucleus for development and change." APAC now has three main projects:
Conscription was abandoned during the Civil War. As the army was divided into various factions, conscription and rnllitary training would simply have increased the number of militiamen. It was reintroduced three years ago. Many avoid rnilitary service by registering with a university or leaving the country until they are forty. Tarek did not know anyone who had been imprisoned for conscientious objection, and APAC does not advocate this or disobedience as they want to create an alternative rather than send youth to jail to be beaten up, or expose APAC to problems with the authorities and accusations that it is pro-lsrael. APAC trainers would be interested in working in other countries, too.
Action for Civil Alternative (APAC), do Hassan Meneimneh, P0 Box 13-5353, Beirut, Lebanon, (+961 3 607889 / 814332 or fax via +1 212 478 2777 attn: Tarek El Husseini.). Copies of the APAC leaflet are available on request from the WRI office.
This two-week international training on nonviolence is a co-operative effort of the DFG-VK Bildungswek NRW, the Kurve Wustrow training centre, FöGA, and the Izmir War Resisters Association (ISKD). The seminar will comprise of two parts: a nonviolence training in the small town of Foça, near Izmir, dealing with basic techniques of nonviolence and direct action; and a study trip to Izmir itself, looking at the political situation of Turkey and the opportunities for solidarity work between war resisters and pacifists.
The organisers hope to have about 20 participants, half from Europe and half from Turkey. Fees for Europeans will be about DM 1,000 to 1,500 (including travel, accommodation and food) or between DM 300 and 800, travel not included.
Contact: DFG-VK Bildungswerk NRW, Braunschweiger Str. 22, 44145 Dortmund, Germany (+49 231 818032; fax: 818031). Please note: the deadline for registration was 1 March, but space might still be available.
The European Bureau for Conscientious Objection is inviting 10 participants from 10 different Eastern European countries to participate in a seminar aiming at "starting a common eastern European campaign for conscientious objection." Participants will discuss their own situations and meet representatives from western European CO organisations and deputies of the European Parliament, and hear about funding possibilities. Applicants.m.ust be between 18 and 30 years old and have a good command of English. There is a DM 50 participation fee, but all other costs (travel, room and board) are paid by EBCO. Deadline for application: 5 April 1996.
Contact: Florian Gommel, European Bureau for Conscientious Objection, 35 rue Van EIewyck, 1050 Brussels, Belgium (+32 2 64852 20; fax: 640 07 74; email: ebco@gn.apc.org).
The exact dates of the week-long ICOM will be announced, as soon as practical details regarding flights and accommodation are arranged.
To register and order an information packet about Chad, contact Rudi Friedrich or Franz Nadler, Working Group CO in War, Brader-Grimm-Str. 63, 63069 Offenbach, Germany (Ph/fax: +49 69 84 50 16; email: connection@link-f.rhein.main.de).
IPOR will hold an international youth gathering entitled "Moving Forward" from 7-23 August in lAelsing?borg, Sweden, bringing together 40 young activists between the ages of 16 to 26. They will participate in a two and a half day nonviolence training and in the IPOR Council, an event held every four years. Young people from established IFOR branches or with other connection to IFOR are welcome to apply. Several partial scholarships should be available.
For more details and fees information, contact Staci Toback, IFOR, Spoorstraat 38, 1815 BK Alkmaar, Netherlands (+31 72-5123014; fax 5151102; email ifor@gn.apc.org).
This course is organised by the International University of People's Institutions for Peace in Rovereto, Italy.
Travel and accommodation costs are covered by IUPIP. Application deadline: 30 April 1996.
lUPIP, Secretary's Office, CIO Fondazione 'Opera Campana dei Caduti', Colle di Mirava lIe, 38068 Rovereto, Trento, Italy (+39 464434412; fax: 434084).
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