Hannah Kemp-Welch has taken on the role of London CND worker. Hannah was previously a Vice-Chair of London Region, elected to National Council and the Labour CND EC. Hannah has a background in community arts and education, and was recently CND's delegate to the World Conference Against A&H Bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Hannah (left) with Sara Medi Jones of CND (right) at the registration desk of the recent New World Order: No to NATO Counter-Summit.
Japanese and Korean Hibakusha have been campaigning for decades to raise awareness of the devastating effects of nuclear war. They share their stories in print and digital media, through art and education projects in schools, travelling the world to tour this work.
Whilst in Hiroshima this August for the World Conference Against A&H Bombs, I heard Hibakusha share their memories of the 6th and 9th August 1945, and the struggles of the weeks, months and years following. In these accounts I heard of the stigma some faced due to misinformation about radiation sickness as contagious; I heard about living in fear of illnesses developing in later life; I heard of tragic loss and heartbreak. Yet the Hibakusha don’t bury these memories inside themselves, despite the pain remembering must cause. They continue to campaign, and vow to do so until the world has been rid of nuclear weapons.
It is crucial that whilst first generation Hibakusha are still with us, we record and share their stories so that future generations hear, through the powerful voices of survivors, of the damage and after-effects of the atomic bombing.
As many first generation Hibakusha are now of an advanced age, future generations will not have access to the same experience of hearing from survivors directly, and we must push to achieve our aim within the lifetime of those who have been most affected. Weapons like these must never be used again.
In the following recording, Emily Rubino, Director of Peace Action New York State, talks about what the peace movement could do to be more effective in our mission. Next, Jill Truman shares memories of Greenham Women’s Peace Camp, reminding us what citizen activism can achieve. And finally, we hear a song ‘Together, Together’, written during this years Peace March from Tokyo to Hiroshima - a walk that takes three months, by Philipino activist Nitya Lila.
Text and audio recordings by Hannah Kemp-Welch
CND and Stop the War joined forces to protest the NATO summit in December 2019, organizing a demo and counter-summit.
Protesters gathering in Trafalgar Square on Tuesday 4th December, and marched to Buckingham Palace, gaining significant media coverage. Al Jazeera quoted Kate Hudson in their report on the protest:
Kate Hudson, secretary-general of the London-based Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), also spoke out against Trump pressuring member states to plough more funds into defence, describing an "undermining of national sovereignty over public spending decisions".
A few days before, the New World Disorder: No to NATO counter-summit brought together international speakers including writer and broadcaster Tariq Ali, Medea Benjamin of CODEPINK, USA and Reiner Braun of the International Peace Bureau.
Tariq Ali stated ‘NATO is an offensive organisation, for which there is no real need whatsoever’, and recorded this short film for CND:
this is why we're protesting 👇👏#NoToNato pic.twitter.com/UEPZyeCQZI
— CND (@CNDuk) November 30, 2019
Workshops covered a wide variety of topics. Highlights included Conflicts, Climate Change and Militarisation, where panelists discussed how we organise for alternatives. Karl-Heinz Peil of the campaign Stop Air Base Ramstein, Germany, reported:
When we talk about the impact of the military on the environment, it’s not enough to talk about the greenhouse gasses troops emit, but to look at the entire industry - we can estimate that 15% of all industrial greenhouse gases are coming from the military.
Kurdish Activist Elif Sarakan spoke alongside Medea Benjamin of CODEPINK USA in the workshop titled Oil, War and the Middle East, analysing the latest developments. Chris Nineham of Stop the War was also on the panel:
The strategy has changed since the Iraq war - the West has moved towards creating alliances and proxy wars to keep on top of the region.
The closing panel outlined key actions to take forwards: link movements, keep lobbying, show how the money spent on war and weapons could go towards helping people and the environment.
Outside the subway in a Tokyo suburb, I saw a large group distributing flyers about the proposed military base in Henoko. I’d heard many speeches on the subject at the World Conference Against A&H Bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki earlier in August. There, I’d picked up a copy of a publication titled ‘What Okinawa wants you to understand about the U.S. military bases’.
‘Okinawa Prefecture understands the need for the Japan-U.S. security arrangement’ the publication begins. Yet, they ask, why must 70% of all military bases in Japan used exclusively by the U.S., be on Okinawa? They go on to describe the devastating affects the proposed base will have on an internationally precious subtropical sea area, rich in biodiversity, and the significant economic impact of housing another base on the Prefecture.
Okinawa Prefecture is composed of 150 islands between Taiwan and Japan's mainland. I had an opportunity to visit Naha, the capital of the Prefecture, and some of the nearby Kerama islands. The island of Aka was particularly spectacular – white sands, lush greenery, tropical fish in clear blue water. It was paradise. But a black dot appeared in the sky and the roar of a military airmobile – a huge vessel with two helicopter spinning motors and a body big enough to carry a bus. It flew low overhead, circling round us for an hour, creating a deafening din and large waves beneath.
Back in Naha, travelling through the city, I noticed large fenced off quarters with military vehicles behind the gates, graveyards full of American names and an ‘American Village’ amusement park for workers at the bases.
Okinawa Prefecture’s publication tells of the daily impact of living amongst the bases that Okinawans currently face. Osprey fly low over schools and hospitals at all hours, water has been contaminated from toxic leaks, and there have been over 5,000 arrests of U.S. military affiliated personnel, including horrific cases such as the abduction and rape of an elementary school girl by three U.S. soldiers in 1995 and rape resulting in death of an Okinawan woman by a U.S. military base civilian worker in 2016. After such crimes, as well as military accidents such as plane parts falling from the sky into school playgrounds, there is widespread distrust of the bases and there are frequent protests.
Time is running out to stop the proposed base in Henoko. The final communique of the World Conference Against A&H Bombs calls for international solidarity with the people of Okinawa. We must not let the U.S. turn more of this tropical paradise into a launchpad for their next war.
Article for London Region CND by Hannah Kemp-Welch
Welcome aboard Amber Goneni, who’s joined the London CND team as our Youth & Student rep. Amber’s taking a year’s sabbatical as University of the Arts London’s Campaigns Officer. Amber’s full of ideas for the months ahead, so watch this space for news. Amber joins Nobu Ono who runs the CND Society at SOAS and helps organise London CND’s annual conference in January each year, and both are working with Ben to expand CND’s reach among the capital’s students.
Amber Goneni (UAL)
Nobu Ono (SOAS)
On August 6th London CND joined millions across the world in remembering the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945. Estimates on the number killed range from 100,000 to 180,00 with 63% of the buildings in the city destroyed by the bombing. After a commemoration ceremony in Tavistock square gardens earlier the day, around 50 people attended Friends House, Euston for an evening meeting on the theme 'Hiroshima to Chernobyl: No to Nuclear’.
The event, chaired by Bruce Kent, started with a video report from Hiroshima on commemorations there, as well as clips from HBO’s hit mini-series ‘Chernobyl’. London Region chair Carol Turner spoke on the Chernobyl disaster and the impact the accident had on communities across eastern Europe.
Readings from Nobel Prize winning Svetlana Alexievich’s Voices from Chernobyl by Carol Turner and Jan Woolf, Author and founder of No Glory in War continued this theme. Author and Performer AL Kennedy also spoke on the contemporary dangers of nuclear weapons and power which prompted debate and comment from those in the audience on the subject of mobilizing against nuclear in an age of climate and political crisis.
We will be having more public meetings in the future, so please be sure to keep an eye on our events page for further details.
Our vice-chair Hannah Kemp-Welch has spent the month of August in Hiroshima and has been sending regular reports back from her time there. You can check out her video report on the World Conference Against A&H Bombs here. Below, she speaks of the lantern floating ceremony in Hiroshima to mark the anniversary of the dropping of the bomb.
We arrived at the Motoyasu River in Hiroshima shortly after dusk. The banks closest to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial were already teeming with people - music floated over to us. Our group walked to a quieter spot, where a stall had been set up with volunteers distributing lanterns. The lanterns were flat packed and paper, in three colours. We wrote our wishes for peace on them with thick markers, then gently pulled the paper over a wooden cross, the stand that held it together. We inserted our candles in the center and struggled against the wind to light the flame.
There were many children, each carrying their lantern carefully over the bumpy ground to the water. Men in Wellington boots stood in the water and helped push the lanterns further out to catch the drift. More volunteers, this time in canoes, collected the burnt out lanterns from the water. It was a mesmerising sight to watch the red and white lights bob down the river. A Buddhist ceremony was taking place, so we listened to chanting whilst watching the lanterns blow downstream.
This ‘Peace Message Lantern Floating Ceremony’ is held on the evening of August 6th every year in Hiroshima, and has been since 1947, just two years after the atomic bombing of the city. An estimated 10,000 lanterns are floated down the river in memory of those who have died, and those who continue to suffer as a result of the bomb.
The Defence and Security Enforcement International (DSEI) arms fair is one of the largest arms fairs in the world and we're co-ordinating with various groups and organisations for a No to Nuclear day on 4th September. We're hoping that as many of our members as possible can get down to help us try and shut down the fair so please do keep the date free and for more information, please visit the CND website.
There'll be lots of different ways to be involved on the day, one of which is to take part in, or support non-violent direct action to ensure the site is shut down. If this is something you'd be interested in, there’ll a training day in collaboration with Mad Hatters on 31st August. Please do get in touch with us via email to find out more.
London Region CND’s Vice-Chair Hannah Kemp-Welch visited Hiroshima in August 2019 for the World Conference Against A&H Bombs, and sent back this touching and powerful video report on the conference, and the city, 74 years after the bomb was dropped.
This year marks the 74th anniversary of the dropping of nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Commemoration events will be taking place across the city, including a peace walk through central London, and ceremonies in Tavistock Square and London’s Peace Pagoda in Battersea Park. Below are a list of all events taking place. If yours is not on this list, please contact info@londoncnd.org.uk and let us know what you’re planning so we can add it!
Hiroshima Commemoration Peace Walk
Join us on Sunday 4th August for a guided peace through London and discover some of the people and places in the city associated with international peacemaking - from the Gandhi Statue in Tavistock square to Victoria Tower Gardens nearby parliament.
London CND Hiroshima Day Ceremony
This year we'll be back for our annual commemoration service in Tavistock Square on 6th August, opened by Cllr Maryam Mayor of Camden, and compered by London CND Vice President Jenny Jones of the Green Party, with the usual mix of performers and speakers.
Kingston Peace Council/ CND Hiroshima Day event
Assemble 8.30 pm, 6th August, in Canbury Gardens on the Kingston river bank. Please bring white flowers to cast onto the water in remembrance of those who died, and candles to illuminate the path beside the river.
Organised by: Kingston Peace Council/CND
Contact: 0208-399-2547
Hiroshima to Chernobyl: No to Nuclear
Hosted by Bruce Kent, with a video link up with Hannah Kemp Welche in Hiroshima, CND's representative at the Japanese Conference Against A&H Bombs. More speakers tbc.
Nagasaki Day Peace Walk and Lantern lighting ceremony
On Friday 9th August, there will be a peace walk from Westminster Cathedral after the service for Franz Jaegerstaetter, to the London Peace Pagoda, followed by a Lantern-Lighting Ceremony. Timings TBC but for more information please contact londonpeacepagoda@gmail.com
Finchley Hiroshima and Nagasaki Commemoration
On Saturday 10th August, Finchley’s annual Hiroshima and Nagasaki commemoration ceremony will take place at VIctoria Park, Ballards Lane, Finchley (nearest postcode N3 1LY). Meeting by the commemorative cherry tree at 11am, a minute of silence will be held, and participants are invited o bring flowers to lay beneath the tree and to share tea and thoughts afterwards at the café. Contact: Charles Wicksteed finchley@traknat.org.uk for more information. (Accessibility: Level access over grass. Nearby parking for blue badge holders.)
