North Atlantic Treaty Organization NATO

In my country, there is a saying: "a hornless ram does not fight with a horned one", which is advice to avoid a fight when your opponent has a significant advantage over you. We have something similar in the biblical story of David and Goliath, which portrays adversaries of unequal strength.

War Resisters’ International condemns the preparations for war by NATO and Russia, who are currently considering military responses to the current political crisis in Ukraine. If war does start it will bring death, destruction, suffering, mass displacement, economic crisis, and many other consequences.

The resistance to a new NATO radar base on Sornfelli mountain, on the Faroe Islands, is growing.

WRI's Nonviolence Programme has published a new interview with a representative from the Save Sinjajevina campaign, who managed to stop NATO soldiers from using a unique pasturelands in the highlands of Montenegro for training and target practice.

In September 2019 the government in Montenegro passed a decree inaugurating an artillery training ground on the grasslands of the Sinjajevina highlands...

Icelanders have opposed military activities and NATO since the time that the country was occupied in 1940, first by the UK and then by the US. One of the demands at a huge demonstration against Iceland’s forcible incorporation into NATO in 1949 was a referendum about Iceland’s entry into NATO. Read here about the antimilitarist work of our affiliate Samtök hernaðarandstæðinga in Iceland and their ongoing campaigning against militarism.

In Belgium, WRI affiliates took repeated direct action against the NATO summit, held at the NATO headquarters on the 11th and 12th July. Agir Pour la Paix, Vredesactie, and groups from Spain targeted arms company HQs with a bloody die-in, joined marches carrying model missiles, and hung banners from bridges.

WRI affiliates and friends are calling for direct actions against Eurosatory – the Paris arms fair – and the NATO summit that will take place in Brussels in July. Eurosatory is one of the world's biggest arms fairs, and takes place every two years in Paris. It features over 1500 arms companies displaying all the weapons, equipment and technology needed for waging war.

Throughout September, the Swedish military is taking part in the largest war games held in the country in decades. Thousands of Swedish troops and NATO countries including United States, Finland, France, Estonia, Lithuania, Norway and Denmark will participate.

Actions are taking place in Brussels this week against in the run up to the NATO summit. Yesterday (23rd May), a group of peace activists occupied the offices of the European Commission. With their action they denounced the steps the European Union is taking to start a military research programme carried out by the arms industry. They set up tents, and were in place in all morning.

See a video of yesterday's occupation of the European Commission here.

 

REPRESSIVE RESPONSE AGAINST ANTI-MILITARIST MOC ACTIVISTS FOR CIVIL DISOBEDIENCEUP TO 12.000 EUROS  FINE AND THE POSSIBILITY OF SEVERAL YEARS JAIL SENTENCE FOR  BLOCKADE IN THE PORT OF SAGUNTO AGAINST NATO MANEUVERS. 

The group of antimilitarists that paralyzed the transport of armoured vehicles to the NATO “Trident Juncture“ manoeuvres last October face accusations of “serious disobedience”, “breach of the peace”, and fines for “intrusion". 

During the NATO exercise Trident Juncture 2015 the alliance will practice military interventions in North Africa

Marines from the US train in la Sierra del Retin, Barbate

The NATO exercise Trident Juncture 2015 will take place during October 2015 and until early November in Italy, Portugal, and the State of Spain. According to a variety of sources, this will be the “largest exercise of NATO since the end of the Cold War”1, “largest exercise conducted by the Alliance since 2002” (…) and “the Alliance’s most important exercise in 2015”2, or “the largest deployment of the Alliance in the last decade”3. The exercise consists of two clearly distinguished phases, a command post exercise (CPX, 3-16 October) and a phase of real action (Live Exercise, LIVEX, 21 October-6 November).