Urgent Appeal to Support the Kings Bay Plowshares 7
Anti-Nuclear Activists Face Decades in Jail for Non-Violent Act of ‘Symbolic Disarmament’
Peace Quest Cape Breton is urging all friends and supporters to sign a ‘Global Petition to Dismiss Charges Against Anti-Nuclear Plowshare Activists Facing 25 Years’ (https://www.kingsbayplowshares7.org/global-petition). The Petition makes an “urgent request” to peace-loving people everywhere to “join distinguished citizens of the world including Archbishop Desmond Tutu, other Nobel laureates and many others by signing our global petition to dismiss all charges against the Kings Bay Plowshares 7 (KBP7).” The seven veteran Catholic Plowshares campaigners “face 25 years in prison for exposing illegal and immoral nuclear weapons that threaten all life on Earth,” after they “nonviolently and symbolically disarmed the Trident nuclear submarine base at Kings Bay, GA on April 4, 2018, the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.”
The Petition was launched on April 4, 2019, the first anniversary of the non-violent action by the Seven: Carmen Trotta (56), Mark Colville (56), Clare Grady (60), Patrick O’Neill (62), Martha Hennessy (63), Fr. Steve Kelly (70), Liz McAlister (80). Three of the Seven – Mark Colville, Fr. Steve Kelly, and Liz McAlister – have been remanded in custody for the last 14 months. All seven are expected to go on trial this summer; they will next appear in Court on August 7 (between the 74th anniversaries of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki) to challenge a decision by a Georgia Magistrate Judge that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) – designed to protect and mitigate the consequences of acts of non-violent civil disobedience motivated by sincere religious conviction – does not apply to their case.
For further details and background, please see two Cape Breton Spectator articles by Peace Quest Cape Breton Campaign Coordinator Sean Howard:
Profiles in Non-Violent Courage, September 2018, https://capebretonspectator.com/2018/09/05/kings-bay-plowshares-7-howard/;
Kings Bay Plowshares Seven Update, November 2018, https://capebretonspectator.com/2018/11/28/kings-bay-plowshares-seven-update/.
