"Pitstop" Ploughshares

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We come to Shannon Airport to carry out an act of life-affirming
disarmament in a place of preparations for slaughter.

Like the railway tracks that ran to the town of Auschwitz, the runway at
Shannon has been militarized for service on an assembly line of death.
The train tracks at Auschwitz brought people to their deaths, the runway
at Shannon brings death to the people. The Irish Government acts in
contravention of the Irish Constitution, International Law and divine
mandate to service U.S. military aircraft, troop and munition
deployments.

The U.S./British war on the Iraqi people, and for Iraqi resources, has
been long and varied.The U.S./U.K. military has claimed over 2 million
Iraqi lives
* in their financial and military support for the Saddam Hussein
regime in the '70's and '80's
* in their hi tech bombing campaign of 1991
* in the 12 years of crippling sanctions imposed on the Iraqi people
* and now their plans to conquer and occupy Iraq

US/UK weapons manufacturers also continue to fuel the daily grind of
death and destruction inflicted on the Palestinian people.

SWORDS INTO PLOUGHSHARES
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We come to Shannon Airport around the Feast of St. Brigid, to disarm and
disable the war machine. We hope to begin to take up the runway and
ground military aircraft. We hope to be joined in this act of
disarmament by those who encounter us. Citizens, police and soldiers
wielding hammers brought down the Berlin Wall; we hope all will pitch in
to take up this runway and ground planes servicing the war machine. We
find this easier to envision than the further slaughter of Iraqi
children that U.S. British and Irish governments wish us to consider.

We act inspired by Brigid and Irish traditions of healing and
peacemaking. We carry out Christ's commandment to "love our enemies" by
nonviolently resisting the slaughter of their children. We attempt to
enflesh the prophesy of Isaiah Ch 2 and Micah Ch 4 "to beat swords into
ploughshares".

We respond to the call of the prophets of Modern America. Catholic
Worker founder Dorothy Day, who encourages us "to fill the jails with
nonviolent resistance to war"; Martin Luther King, who warns us that we
are confronted by "a choice between nonviolence and nonexistence". Fr.
Daniel Berrigan, who observes: "We have assumed the name of peacemakers,
but we have been, by and large, unwilling to pay any significant price.
And because we want peace with half a heart and half a life and will,
the war, of course continues, because the waging of war, by its nature
is total - but the waging of peace, by our cowardice is partial."

WHO WE ARE
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* Deirdre Clancy (32) is an editor, writer and feminist activist with an
interest in faith-based resistance to various structures of social
control. She regards war as part of parcel of the system which demeans
women; legalizes corruption of many different forms; discriminates
against, locks up and labels the so-called "mentally ill", without
questioning the sanity of the military-industrial system in which we are
all complicit.

* Karen Fallon (30) is a Glaswegian-Irish peace activist. She is a
scientist and a Trident Ploughshares pledger. She has lived at the
Faslane Peace Camp for the past two years.

* Damien Moran (22) is from the Irish midlands. He spent three months in
Haiti recently doing voluntary development work. A qualified geography
and English teacher, he is currently studying theology and anthropology
as a seminarian in Dublin.

* Nuin Dunlop (31) is an American of Irish-Scots-East Band
Cherokee-Dutch descent. She has been working for several years in
community service; in the Catholic Worker, hospital chaplaincy, and with
the marginalised. She is a Catholic anarchist. Her activism stems from
the belief that the Creator breaths life through everyone: War is the
most serious violation of life. Born in the nation with the more weapons
of mass destruction than any other, she is moved to respond to the
current US-led assaults on life.

* Ciaron O'Reilly (42) is an Irish Australian. He is presently working
at a homeless shelter in Dublin and is long time Catholic Worker and
nonviolent resister. He was a member of the "ANZUS Ploughshares" which
disarmed a B-52 Bomber in upstate New York during the 1991 Gulf War. He was also a member of the "Jabiluka Ploughshares" that disabled uranium mining equipment in the Northern Territory of Australia in 1998.

* (Co-conspirator) Caoimhe Butterly (24) was born in Ireland but spent
most of her childhood in Canada and Africa. After finishing school, she
moved to the New York Catholic Worker to work with the homeless. She has since spent three years working in refugee communities in Chiapas and
Guatemala. For the past year, she has lived and worked as a solidarity
activist in Palestine. In November she was shot by the Israeli military.

THINGS TO DO
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* Write to the above prisoners c/- Shannon Peace House - 19 Inis Ealga,
Shannon, County Clare, Ireland.
* Donate to the Ploughshares Defense Fund by making cheques payable to
"Peace and Reconciliation" c/o Ploughshares, 134 Phibsborough Rd. Dublin
7 Ireland.
* Join the Catholic Worker activists in their prison fast and prayers
for peace. (Celebrations of Hope in England - March)
* Vigil publicly at Shannon Airport, U.S./British Embassies, Aer Rianta,
Irish Government offices involved in war preparations.
* Gather with friends in communities of nonviolent resistance . sit in,
speak out, blockade.
* Offer solidarity to those travelling into the war zones of Iraq and
Palestine to bear nonviolent witness.
* Offer solidarity to those in front of the courts and in jail for
bearing nonviolent resistance to the war machine at home. See
www.nonviolence.org/nukeresister/ and www.gn.apc.org/peacenews

MEDIA CONTACTS
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click here for "Pitstop" Ploughshares Celebrations of Hope

Petria Malone - (Ireland 00353) (0) 509 51321 (immediate)
Dave Donnellan - (Ireland 00353) (0) 87 9184552 (upon release)
Email - pitstop_ploughshares@hotmail.com

web:http://www.oocities.org/pwdyson/pitstop.html

Photos available from Press 22 - 061 204 222