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This webinar, led by Geoff Harris, was the first in a series of webinars by and for the African Nonviolence and Peacebuilding Network. It took place on the 6 March, 2014. 

This series is open to all, and leading up to the July 2014 international conference: Small Actions, Big Movements: The Continuum of Nonviolence, taking place in Cape Town.

Please note: after Geoff starts speaking (3 minutes in), you may need to turn up your volume because there is a volume difference between when Javier and Geoff are speaking!

We republish in English a statement from Bund für Soziale Verteidigung, a WRI affiliated in Germany. Find the original (in German) here: http://www.soziale-verteidigung.de/news/meldungen/pressemitteilung-zur-…

On the Situation in Ukraine

Minden, 5. March 2014

We are observing the developments in the Ukraine with great concern; in particular, the ways

some media outlets and politicians are currently stirring up a revival of the East-West conflict.

Once more the world is divided into 'good' and 'bad'. The 'good guys are the uprising people of Ukraine, who demonstrated for democracy and association to (and membership of) the European Union. The 'bad guys' are once again 'the Russians', who are trying to stop this process through violence and the threat of military intervention in Ukraine. Neither is wrong, but the picture is much more complex. In fact, many protesters demonstrated on the Maidan because they were fed up with the corruption and arbitrary rule of the government of Yanukovych. They see themselves as only partly represented by the opposition parties – a strong element of the protests of recent weeks was the distrust people felt against all parties and all politicians.

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The Turkish-Cypriot conscientious objector Murat Kanatlı was sentenced to ten days in prison for his refusal to participate in the annual compulsory military exercises in the northern part of Cyprus Februar 25, 2014.

On February 28th, organizations of conscientious objectors from several countries demanded his release on an international action day. See photos below, and video above from an action in Istanbul.

The Egyptian group No to Compolsory Military Service also put out a statement: 'Free Murat Kanatli Now'.

Jim Haber

Outside the courthouse in Knoxville, Tenn., where three anti-nuclear activists were severely sentenced on February 18, Michelle Boertje-Obed, the wife of one of the three Transform Now Plowshares members, encouraged everyone to see Judge Amul Thapar’s ruling in a positive light. Despite her husband Greg having just received over 5 years in prison for infiltrating the Y-12 nuclear weapons facility on July 28, 2012 and damaging federal property — along with Michael Walli and 84-year-old Catholic nun Megan Rice – Michelle pointed out that the judge could have easily given them much longer sentences, as recommended by the prosecution.

 This is a repost, with thanks to Global Voices

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As Tajikistan's military faces a struggle to get enough volunteer conscripts, recruitment officers often rely on illegal practices in drafting military-age men into the army. One of the most common among such practices is “oblava” which involves “military press gangs making sweeps of city streets, bazaars and bus stations, rounding up young men who meet the desired criteria [to serve their compulsory two-year-long service]“.

December saw 45 Kurdish men and women in Turkey declaring their conscientious objection 'in order to remember the 34 young men killed in the Roboski massacre two years ago', through the Roboski Conscientious Objection and Amed (Diyarbakir) Conscientious Objection Initiatives. The death of 34 young men occurred at the Turkish-Iraqi border, when two Turkish F16 jets fired at a group of villagers, claiming to act on information that PKK (Kurdish Workers' Party) militants were crossing the border. Faruk Encü, making a statement in the name of the Roboski Conscientious Objection Initiative, said “Here we are calling once again on those village-guards that have been made into a part of this militarist process, to those who are sending those close to them and their children to do military service, and to those people who are part of this war-making machine to make a few cents. Reject taking up arms for a sexist structure that has his turned this region into a graveyard of peoples, and if you have already taken up arms immediately correct this wrong.

Film made on 8 February 2014 during the ‘Reporting a Crime’ event at Reading Police Station. Part of the Action AWE campaign.

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Salvador talking about nonviolence


Salvador, long-time activist with the conscientious objection group “Quinto Mandamiento” in Barrancabermeja, needs emergency medical support.

On 19th and 20th December, European leaders met in Brussels. During the summit, the fortification of the European arms industry was explicitly on the agenda. While it preaches austerity across the board, the EU is poised to increase military expenditure. The goal: to safeguard the 'global competitiveness' of the European arms industry.

In early January, #StopTheShipment – a campaign launched by human rights organisation Bahrain Watch, and supported by many other human rights and anti-arms trade groups to stop the shipment of tear gas used lethally against opposition protesters - announced that the South Korean 'Defence Acquisition Program Administration' had denied two requests to export tear gas to Bahrain due to the “unstable politics in the