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Aotearoa/New Zealand at the World Court
Kate Dewes and Rob Green
48 pp., $5
The Raven Press, May 1999, Christchurch, New Zealand
Available from LCNP
"This publication is a record of the passion felt by
peaceful people who trusted in the rule of law and the eventual triumph of reason. It is a
tale of commitment by ordinary people who persuaded governments of both major political
parties to pursue the cause before the World Court."
David Lange, former Prime Minister of New Zealand
This book describes how New Zealanders, while strongly allied to both France and the US
throughout the 20th century, became passionately anti-nuclear as a result
of the health effects of French and US nuclear testing in the Pacific and led campaigns to
take first the nuclear testing issue and then the issue of the legality of nuclear weapons
threat and use to the International Court of Justice.
The 1974 nuclear testing case was instrumental in forcing France to abandon atmospheric
testing despite their apoplexy at the case being taken and their distaste for legal
restraint against them. France later bombed an anti-nuclear boat in Auckland, New Zealand
to prevent it from taking further action against French underground testing, but was
eventually forced to abandon such testing as well.
The authors are optimistic that, in the same vein, the 1996 International Court of Justice
opinion on the legality of threat or use of nuclear weapons will be instrumental in moving
the nuclear weapon states to eventually abandon nuclear deterrence policies and move
towards complete nuclear disarmament under a nuclear weapons convention.
Pacific Women Speak Out:
For Independence and Denuclearisation
Edited by Zohl de Ishtar
78 pp., $10 plus $2 shipping
The Raven Press, 1998, Christchurch, New Zealand
Available from LCNP
Since 1945, over two thousand nuclear weapons have been detonated, causing devastation and
suffering worldwide. Pacific Women Speak Out, a book containing the testimonies of
11 Pacific women, was launched at the United Nations on March 1, 1999, the 45th
anniversary of the Bravo nuclear test in the Marshall Islands. The book, relates the
devastating effects of nuclear testing, uranium mining, war, genocide and colonialism
which is still being perpetuated against Pacific peoples by powerful countries including
Indonesia, France, the US and Australia.
"The story of the Marshallese people since the nuclear weapons tests has been sad
and painful. Allow our experience, now, to save others such sadness and pain." Darlene
Keju-Johnson, Pacific Women Speak Out
This Is My Homeland
Stories of the effects of nuclear industries
by the people of Serpent River First
and the north shore of Lake Huron
Edited by Lorraine Rekmans, Keith Lewis, and Anabel Dwyer
Serpent River First Nation, 1999, $15 US, $20 CA
"A lot of the people that worked at the mines, that are my age, are dying of
cancer." Junior
The North American Great Lakes Basin contains thousands of sites
contaminated with radiation. In the Serpent River watershed, 250 million tons of tailings
from 12 uranium and thorium mines and mills and a uranium refinery continue to inflict
grave harm. The Rio Algom and Denison Mining Companies mines and mills produced yellowcake
for U.S. nuclear weapons and Canadian nuclear power plants. The land for the mines and
mills was seized in 1954 from the Serpent River First Nation in violation of the 1850
Robinson Huron Treaty.
In This Is My Homeland, the people of Serpent River talk about the health and
environmental effects of the mining, the deception of the mining companies and
governments, and their campaigns to regain justice against such tremendous odds.
"Many of us have been silent for a long time. We have been told to be quiet because
we do not know all the details of the scientific information possessed by the experts.
What has happened? Why are we listening to lunatics? What good is a nuclear bomb? What
country and what people are we hoping to defend? The poisons that seep into our water
system and the tailings dust in the air around us will kill us slowly and silently. Who
will be left to defend if we all die of radiation poisoning." -
Lorraine Rekmans, This Is My Homeland
Order from Chief Earl Commanda and Council, Serpent River First Nation, P.O. Box 14,
Cutler, Ontario POP 1BO, Canada.
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