Down the Drones Conference

bristol | peace | feature Saturday March 31, 2012 16:56 by John Lennon bristolagainstarmstrade at gmail dot com

Over the last few years the use of unmanned drones has grown and grown. Offering the controllers the ability to project force anywhere in the world without the risk of loosing any personnel, the attractions for the military are clear. Yet there is growing evidence that the drones are far from the surgical strikers the military claims they are, for example the operators often make mistakes which result in the killing of civilians.

The huge rise in their use has meant lots of dead bodies yet with little to no due-process or control of the assassinations. It has also meant rising anger in the regions blighted by their use. For example the US military admits that it targets people who simply pass by the results of an attack, claiming they must be linked to the original target, yet more often, they are not. The use of drones has gone from a rare military technology to commonplace in both military and policing circles. Questions need to be asked!

Bristol Against The Arms Trade Present – Down the Drones Conference – Sunday April 1st 2012 1pm - 6pm at the ARC bar/cafe Broad St Bristol

Maya Evans – She has just returned from Afghanistan on a peace delegation with Voices for Creative Nonviolence and the Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers.  Maya amongst other things won “a partial victory” in the High Court, when it ruled that Afghans detained by British forces could no longer be transferred to a detention centre in Kabul run by Afghanistan’s intelligence agency (NDS), because of the risk of torture.

Joanne Baker - Co-author of Uranium in Iraq: The Poisonous Legacy of the Iraq wars. From the charity Child Victims Of War Joanne will be talking about the weapons of modern warfare and their deadly legacy on civilians.

Chris Cole – Possibly the most educated activist on the growing usage of drones in modern warfare, co-author of Convenient Killing: Armed Drones and the Playstation Mentality. Chris from Drone Wars UK  is going to speak about the growing use of drones in conflict around the world.

Smash EDO -  Is a Brighton-based grassroots campaign against EDO MBM/ITT – a company that makes bomb racks, release clips and arming mechanisms for warplanes and drones. Smash EDO activists have carried out numerous direct actions and demonstrations against EDO’s Brighton arms factory. Someone  from the campaign will be speaking about war, arms manufacture and direct action.

Bristol Down The Drone Conference is part of a build up towards the Bristol UAV conference on April 2nd 2012. We will be resisting the drone conference with a noise demo