Davies, Ray

For nearly 20 years (1981-2000), the women of Greenham campaigned relentlessly against land-based Cruise missiles. They put their lives at risk for peace and Helen Thomas, a young Welsh peace activist from Newcastle Emlyn, was killed at Greenham Common in an accident on 5 August 1989.

When the base closed, the women planned a garden on the site of the nuclear nightmare. To honour Greenham’s strong Welsh connections, they decided to use pPennant sandstone from Wales for the…

CND Cymru commemorated the 69th anniversary of Hiroshima’s tragedy, when the US dropped the first atomic bomb on the city in 1945, with a slow peace walk around the Eisteddfod Maes in Llanelli, accompanied by Côr Cochion’s songs of peace, and the unrolling of a portion of the 11-mile-long ‘Wool against Weapons’ knitting. The second bomb, dropped on 9 August 1945, devastated Nagasaki.

In memory of its victims, Côr Cochion sang the poetic ‘Lullaby of Oleander’ by a Japanese A-bomb…

The sun shone down on Cardiff city centre, the day made even more attractive and colourful by the trade union banners of the May Day march.

The main focus of the march was the unrelenting attacks by the Tory/Lib Dem government on the poor, disabled and pensioners.

Over 3,000 homes in South Wales, mainly one-parent families, have been caught up in the Bedroom Tax. Every benefit to the unemployed and disabled has been ruthlessly cut; and even though the financial crisis was…

Ray Davies (centre) and Gerald Williams (right)
at Hedd Wyn’s cottage. PHOTO: WENDY LEWIS

On our way through North Wales, we passed through Trawsfynydd and called on Hedd Wyn’s nephew, Gerald Williams. He led us over the threshold of the poet’s isolated farmhouse amidst the beautiful mountains of Snowdonia. Hedd Wyn’s mother had kept the cottage exactly as it had been – the books with his handwritten notes on the shelves by the fireplace, the photos on the walls, the small parlour…

I wish I could find the words to express my anger and frustration at this Tory government’s headlong rush to establish nuclear power stations. Now they are spending £300m on a study to build a new fleet of nuclear submarines which would eventually cost the taxpayer £10bn. They have declared their intention to build five new nuclear power stations which directly affect Wales: Wylfa poses a threat to North Wales and the Irish Sea, and Hinkley and Oldbury menace the South Wales coastline.…

On 10 January 100,000 people from all over Britain joined a march in London to protest at the Israeli embassy against the continuing relentless attacks on Gaza’s civilian population.

Ray Davies, 79-year-old vice-chair of CND Cymru, sustained head injuries, concussion and cuts when he was trapped with hundreds of others against the embassy gates by the Metropolitan Police.

The march had gone peacefully until it reached the embassy. Many shoes were thrown over the fence in a…