Trident Ploughshares:
UK Citizen to be Deported after Action at Netherlands Nuclear Base
UK Citizen to be Deported after Action at Netherlands Nuclear Weapon
Base. Activists Arrested at Volkel Airbase
A UK citizen is to be deported from the Netherlands next Wednesday
after
taking part in a crime prevention action at the Volkel airbase near
Eindhoven, which is used by US aircraft armed with nuclear weapons.
David Heller (24), a university lecturer from Hull who is currently
working
in Belgium with the For Mother Earth campaign, was one of ten
activists who
cut their way into the base on Wednesday 27th December. They were able
to
take photographs of the section of the base used by the US nuclear
weapons
personnel before being arrested. Also arrested was Mark Akkerman (20),
a
student from the Netherlands who is, like David Heller, a member of
the
Trident Ploughshares campaign. Mark has had a number of arrests in the
UK
for actions against the Trident bases on the Clyde.
Earlier the activists had gone to the local police to report a breach
of
the law by Netherlands government leaders - their involvement in a
criminal
conspiracy to commit genocide through the use of nuclear weapons. The
police refused to take immediate action and the activists then saw it
as
their duty to undertake the crime prevention themselves. It is an open
secret in the Netherlands that there are US nuclear weapons in the
Volkel
base. Over the years activists have collected documentary and visual
evidence of this covert deployment.
David Heller said:
"They have accused the wrong people. They should have arrested the
Prime
Minister and Foreign minister of the Netherlands. I'm being deported
because I am a threat to public order when the real threat is the
nuclear
weapons at Volkel."
Ironically, a Trident Ploughshares activist from the Netherlands is
due to
face trial at Dumbarton Sheriff Court next Thursday (4th January) for
taking part in a blockade of Faslane naval base last February. In the
papers calling her to court Marjan Willemsen (23), currently at
Faslane
Peace Camp, has been advised that if she is found guilty the court may
recommend to the Home Secretary that she be deported.
www.tridentploughshares.org