Citizen Weapons Inspectors visit Manchester Factory
Article published: Wednesday, October 7th 2009
At 8am on Monday morning, several ‘citizen weapons inspectors’ from the Target Brimar campaign visited the Chadderton premises of arms manufacturer Brimar, seeking information on possible connections between Brimar’s products and human rights abuses committed in Gaza and the West Bank, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
One of the campaigners, Sam Woodward, explained the action:
“We visited the Brimar factory on Monday because we believed their display systems may have been used to commit war crimes. We wanted to ask the management to clarify who they have supplied equipment to, and to speak to the workers to find out if they are aware of how the products they have made have been used.”
In a research dossier released today, campaigners have raised concerns that the company’s products may have been used in the perpetration human rights abuses including attacks on civilians during the ‘Operation Cast Lead’ invasion of Gaza by the Israeli Defence Forces in December 2008/January 2009. Brimar directors admitted in 2006, during the war in Lebanon, that the company supplied components used in Apache attack helicopters sold to the Israeli military.
The dossier also contains evidence that products developed during a research collaboration between Brimar and the US Marine Corps were deployed with Marine tank battalions in Iraq in 2004-5, including with forces directly involved in the Second Battle of Fallujah in November 2004, where hundreds of civilians were killed. There is additional concern that Brimar products may be incorporated into helicopters currently being used to fire thermobaric missiles in Afghanistan.
The Target Brimar campaign is calling on the company, which is owned by private investors and has a significant financial relationship with the Bank of Scotland/Lloyds Banking Group and therefore with the British taxpayer, to return to its historically peaceful manufacture of specialist screens and viewing equipment. They are also demanding the British government reviews its arms export policy and to cease its immoral and economically distorted subsidising of the arms industry.
There will be a public demonstration on 17 October 2009 calling on Brimar to rethink its military manufacture operations. Full details are available here.
Copies of the dossier can be downloaded here.
More: Manchester, News
Comments
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it’s good there’s something like this in Manchester – the military industrial complex is so big in the UK that virtually every town has its own death merchant. I’ve always admired the Smash EDO campaign in Brighton
The one thing I’d criticise with that particular campaign is that it never seems really to have attempted to constructively engage with the workers at the plant – a sympathetic and organised workforce (most of whom would no doubt rather be using their technical skills to make socially useful products) can be a crucial lever for change. No doubt the management will be trying to drive a wedge between the workers and the campaigners as quickly as possible at Brimar, so it would be good to see efforts to prevent this happening.
Comment by lou on October 8, 2009 at 12:00 am -
Perfect work!,
Comment by Edalelle on October 10, 2009 at 10:04 pm -
[…] MULE reported on Target Brimar’s Citizen Weapons Inspectors visiting the factory, the allegations of its links to human rights abuses in the Middle East, and previewed ‘22 […]
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