[photo: L to R: Rodder, Zeller and Moxley.]
After five days, the hearing in the High Court in Edinburgh of the
Lord Advocate's Reference of the trial and acquittal of three nuclear
disarmers in Greenock last year, has been adjourned until Tuesday
14th November for five days.
Today Gerry Moynihan QC, amicus curiae, continued to apply the 1996
Opinion of the International Court of Justice to the legality of
Trident. Responding to a suggestion from the bench that the ICJ
statement that "nuclear weapons would be generally contrary to the
rules of international law" was considerably weakened by the use of
the term "generally", he argued that that word referred to possible
marginal cases involving low-yield weapons. Trident was not on the
margins - it was in the core - and clearly unlawful.
Advocate John Mayer, appearing for Ulla Roder whom he had
successfully defended at Greenock stated that there was no such thing
as mere possession of a fleet of Trident nuclear submarines, each
armed with live and targeted 100 kiloton warheads. Deploying nuclear
weapons means to have them in a state of readiness for war.
A Trident Ploughshares spokesperson said: "There has been a lot of
encouragement for us so far but we still do not know whether these
judges are up to the challenge before them. We are pleased that
Trident's status before the law is being debated in the court but
there has been a great deal of nit-picking and prevarication. If a
panel of three children were picked at random off the streets of
Edinburgh and asked to consider whether it is right or legal to
threaten to murder innocent people and whether ordinary folk have a
legal right to try and stop such a crime, they would come up with the
right answer in less than five minutes. Children understand that real
law is based on morality.
Today, before an attentive and engaged panel of judges at the High Court in Edinburgh, a peace activist has developed the case against the UK's Trident nuclear weapon system, pointing out its devastating effects and the fact that it is a continuing threat.
Making her submission as part of the hearing of the Lord Advocate's Reference of the 'Trident Three' trial, Angie Zelter illustrated the destructive power of a single warhead by referring to a map of Edinburgh showing military targets overlaid with the damage, death and injury that would be caused. Moving on from this grim exhibit she showed that the International Criminal Court Statute states that the preparation for war crimes is itself a war crime. It is British government policy to have a "credible deterrent". "I come back," she said "once more to the simple underlying purpose of the British nuclear deterrent - to threaten awful destruction. It is that awful destruction, that crime, which we three women were trying to prevent by our action."
Trident's unlawful status meant that members of the British government and the military personnel involved were all "international criminals subject to trial ...". Citizens had time and again attempted to have this criminality addressed through the legal system. No prosecutions had taken place - a "serious indictment of the criminal prosecution service in both England and Scotland."
In dealing with the question of the right of citizens to act to prevent crime she said: "If our action had been one of nonviolently disarming the equipment essential to the mad plans of a local drug dealer who was threatening to blow up a whole street of innocent families where his rival lived, we would probably not have been brought to trial." In concluding she said: "The nuclear crime prevention will continue whatever the outcome of the LAR but if the court is wise and courageous it will also grapple with the underlying problems arising out of the Greenock trial - that of the vital question of the illegality of Trident and how to remove it from Scotland."
Skale Eskeland, a law professor from the University of Oslo, who came to Edinburgh today specifically for the hearing said: If the three women get the Court to come out in agreement with them, the consequences will be immense and will reach far beyond Scotland." The hearing continues.
Three anti-nuclear protesters who escaped a conviction for criminal
damage by arguing that they were justified in trying to destroy
illegal weapons of mass destruction will go back to court today in an
important test case on whether international law can provide a
defence in a UK criminal court.
Angela Zelter, Ellen Moxley and Ulla Roder boarded the floating
laboratory Maytime, part of the Trident nuclear submarine programme,
in June 1999 and threw equipment worth several hundred thousand
pounds into Loch Goil. The lab researches, tests and maintains
Trident's ability to remain undetected underwater.
The three were charged with criminal damage and sent for trial at
Greenock sheriff court in October 1999. They admitted causing damage
but argued they had no criminal intent.
Their defence was that they were acting to prevent a greater crime by
disarming illegal weapons of mass destruction.
Sheriff Margaret Gimblett directed the jury to acquit them. She ruled
that there was no criminal intent in their action because it was
based on a belief that they were acting against a continuing criminal
conspiracy to contravene international humanitarian law.
Now the lord advocate, who heads Scotland's prosecution system, is
challenging the surprise ruling in a five-day hearing which opens in
the high court in Edinburgh today. He will use a device invoked in
only around one case a year - the lord advocate's reference - to seek
a decision that the sheriff's ruling was legally wrong.
In all six cases in which the reference had been used so far, the
high court judges ruled against the trial judge. The outcome of the
case will not affect the women's acquittal, but will establish a
legal precedent for trial judges in future cases.
Ms Zelter is representing herself in the high court proceedings,
while the other two will be represented by lawyers.
In 1996 the international court of justice, asked for an advisory
opinion on the legality of nuclear weapons by the World Health
Organisation, concluded: "The threat or use of nuclear weapons would
generally be contrary to the rules of international law applicable in
armed conflicts, and in particular the principles and rules of
international law."
However, the opinion was limited to times of war.
The high court judges will have to decide the answers to four questions.
These are: whether evidence about international law can be given in a
Scottish criminal prosecution; whether any rule of international law
justifies damaging or destroying property because of an objection to
nuclear weapons; whether defendants' belief that their actions were
justified constitutes a defence; and whether the fact that an offence
was committed to prevent a crime by another person is a general
defence to a criminal charge.
Even if the judges rule that such a defence cannot be used in future
cases, there will be nothing to prevent juries acquitting if they
sympathise with the defendants, even if they have no valid defence in law.
The women belong to Trident Ploughshares, a UK-based campaign whose
members from 14 countries pledge to "prevent nuclear crime by
engaging in peaceful acts of practical disarmament".
Home Page