Weapons dealers to be confronted tomorrow

Peace Action Wellington
16 November

"Representatives from Serco, Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics and other major weapons manufacturers will be confronted with a non-violent community blockade of their annual weapons conference tomorrow morning," said Peace Action Wellington member Valerie Morse

Peace Action Wellington is organising a community blockade to shut down the 2015 international Weapons Conference being held at TSB arena, Tuesday 17 and Wednesday 18 November. People are invited to meet at Frank Kitts Park at 8am Tuesday.

“Companies that profit from war and murder have no place in a civilised society. We don’t want the companies responsible for the murder of thousands of innocent people around the world to feel comfortable holding a large arms fair to showcase their wares. Theirs is the business of death and destruction for profit.”

Lockheed Martin, the major conference sponsor and world’s largest weapons manufacturer, operates nuclear weapons systems. “This is a company that recently justified the widespread horrific bombing of civilians in Yemen by the Saudi Air Force, using F-16 fighter jets and Hellfire missiles."

"These companies are not simply neutral bystanders selling a product - they actively lobby governments to go to war. Lockheed Martin is the seventh largest individual spender on political lobbying in the United States."*

"Serco has been in the headlines here for its role in running the detention centre on Christmas Island and the private prison in Auckland. What many people don't know is that it is also intimately involved in the management of the UK nuclear arsenal and ranks as number 32 on the list of world's largest arms companies."**

Wellington has played host to the Weapons Conference for the past 18 years, and each year it brings 200 of the world’s largest weapons and arms manufacturers here, under the ‘Defence Industry Conference’ euphemism.

“We believe that war profiteers must be confronted, and their activities impeded through community non-violent direct action. War profiteering is not legitimate business, and cannot be allowed to be conducted as if it is.”

*https://theintercept.com/2015/11/13/pogo-contractors-study/

**Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. http://www.sipri.org

ENDS

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