Every year people gather to fast together at the start of August. Marc Morgan from Haringey CND has just returned from the 2024 event in Germany. He reports back here.
The International Fast against nuclear weapons has been taking place, almost without exception, every year between Hiroshima and Nagasaki days, since 1983. It currently involves approximately 50 people fasting worldwide, in 6 different countries (not counting individuals and groups in some places who may not be connected to those of us who do fast together, as an informal collective). The International Fast is known as an Action-Fast; it goes hand in hand with other forms of protest, and is definitely seen as a call to public opinion, rather than as an introspective exercise in self-mortification.
I myself have fasted every year since 2013, as often as possible with fasters from other countries. This year I joined several fasters in Germany: Dr. Matthias Engelke, a Lutheran priest who has vowed to fast one extra day each year until all nuclear weapons are removed from German soil (see his blog regarding his fasting campaign) ; Reinhard Bergholz , who fasts with Matthias; and Etienne Godinot from France, Vice President of the Institut de Recherche sur la Résolution non-Violente des Conflits. We fasted in Bremen, Köln, and Büchel, the American airbase at which US nuclear weapons are stationed, in the Eifel in Western Germany.
COMMEMORATION IN BREMEN
We arrived in Bremen on 5th August, and took part in an evening involving the screening of two films, one on the dangers of nuclear weapons in general, one on the lasting effects of Uranium bombs used by NATO in Serbia in 1999.
We then headed to the town’s central Market Square, and held a midnight vigil for one hour:
On 6th August we were back in Bremen central square for a commemoration organised by the “Bremens Frieden Forum”. The square was decorated with a huge CND/peace symbol made of flowers, which flowers the more than 100 participants were encouraged to take home after the commemoration to prolong their tribute to the victims of Hiroshima.
The square was lined with banners including the banner made years ago by Trident Ploughshares using the Fast as a vehicle for calling for Trident to be scrapped:
There were then a number of speeches including one in my rusty German by me:
INTERNATIONAL ZOOM MEETING ON 7th AUGUST
A time-honoured tradition of the International Fast is that we get together in the course of our fast for a zoom meeting bringing together fasters from the different countries. This took place on 7th August, with participants from Tours in France, and from Audrey van Ryn in New Zealand. The Action-Fast in Tours involved many public displays and demonstrations. As for Audrey, she bravely fasts on her own every year, and this year sent us the following wonderful message, illustrated and copied out by her:
VIGIL AND COMMEMORATION AT BUCHEN
On Thursday 8th August we travelled down to Buchel, where we met up with about 10 German Quakers and some other protesters, who had been at the base all week, and most of whom had been fasting like us since the 6th.
We put up our banners outside the base, and held a series of workshops, vigils and commemorative actions to mark our presence, and our horror at the weapons of destruction stored just the other side of the fence:
On Friday 9th we held a commemorative ceremony at the time of the dropping of the bomb on Nagasaki, sitting in a circle outside the base and exchanging our impressions regarding the meaning of our Fast, why we protest, and why and how we intend to continue to act.
It was then time to break our fast – needless to say the healthy, simple foods kindly provided by our German friends tasted unbelievably good.
COMMEMORATION IN KÖLN
On Saturday 10th, we were back in Köln, where a commemorative walk, vigil and ceremony was held at the city’s Hiroshima-Nagasaki park.
The ceremony was attended by well over 100 people, and was led by Japanese citizens of Köln, and involved Japanese rituals and Japanese music:
After this we parted, resolving to meet and fast again next year, and not to let up in our campaigning in the meantime. The International Fast has confirmed its usefulness as a way of creating bonds across seas and borders, particularly when those bonds involve meeting up, but when that is not possible, also by the fellow-spirit it generates.
