ATOMIC ACQUITTEN

Four Aldermaston blockaders were acquitted last week at Reading magistrates of ‘obstructing the highway’. The trial related to an action that took place last October. In uncanny echoes of a previous case at Sizewell (See SchNEWS 693), the four were acquitted on the grounds that the access road to the facility is not a public highway.

The Atomic Weapons Establishment at Aldermaston, Berkshire is in the process of spending billions of pounds of UK taxpayers’ money building the facilities for a new generation of nuclear warheads. Britain’s submarine-launched Trident nuclear missile system already endangers us all, encourages global proliferation and undermines international law and disarmament negotiations.

Trident Ploughshares are organising another day of mass action, saying “Come and join the blockade at Aldermaston on Monday 15 February, 2010 and help us make it BIG. The action will begin at 7am and continue for as long as possible. You can sit, lie down, lock-on, perch atop a tripod, or just support and entertain blockaders.” 

* See www.tridentploughshares.org