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24-Jan-2007

Campaigner gets 28 days prison for anti-war action

by: PN/Virginia

London: A Christian peace activist from Oxford was today jailed for 28 days by Magistrates at Horseferry Road Court in London, for refusing to pay a fine of £661 in connection with an anti-Iraq war protest in December 2004.

Chris Cole (43), a father of three, was part of a small group of Christian anti-war protesters who dug symbolic graves in the lawn of the Ministry of Defence in Whitehall and sprayed ‘Remember the Innocent – Stop the War’ on 28 December 2004 (the Christian feast of Holy Innocents).

Cole told Magistrates at Horseferry Road Court that he refused to pay the fine as it had been right for the group to protest the war. Cole said “Thousands of innocent people have lost their lives in the illegal invasion and on-going war in Iraq. Ordinary people have a duty to resist war-making on innocent civilians by their government.”

In July 2006, court appointed bailiffs seized the Cole family car in connection with the fine and sold it at auction for a mere £52.

Chris is due or release on 5 February. Please send him yuor messages of support (though remember that prison officers can read all incoming mail).

The London Catholic Worker community are organising a vigil outside the prison on Saturday 27 January. If anyone would like to join them, please meet at the Visitor’s Centre at 12noon(see http://www.hmprisonservice.gov.uk/prisoninformation/locateaprison/prison.asp for details about how to get there). Please bring banners of support for Chris and against the war in Iraq. For further details, contact Scott on +44 1923 77720

Send Chris your messages of support: Chris Cole XA7269, HMP Wandsworth, PO Box 757, Heathfield Road, London SW18 3HS