[Pressrelease] NATO: Open Letter to the police in Strasbourg

[Gipfelsoli Presse]

Coalition NATO-ZU

Open Letter to the police in Strasbourg:
Actions of civil disobedience on 4 April

The international coalition Shut down NATO (NATO-ZU) sent a letter to
Strasbourg police commissioner Hartmann on 17 March, to inform him about
the „actions of civil disobedience  in relation to the NATO summit,
planned on 4 April“.

NATO-ZU/Shut down NATO is an international coalition of organisations
and individuals from the peace movement and part of the coalition
„Block-NATO“ and the international protest movement "No-to-war –
No-to-NATO" (www.no-to-nato.org).

In the open letter also says that the coalition wants to show that NATO
goes over corpses, and that we will confront this policy. With our
action, we want to remember the past and future victims of NATOs wars
and of military armament, and want to express very clearly, which
interests are being pursued with NATOs strategies.

The action will be provocative but nonviolent. „In the case of legal
charges, we will put forward our legal view also in court and in doing
so will enrich the public debate. According to our legal view, civil
disobedience in most cases cannot only be justified morally/ethically,
but also legally“, the authors of the letter continue.
It is important to the coaltion to stress that „the groups which
participate in NATO-ZU/Shut down NATO have a long tradition of actions
of civil disobedience“. The „nonviolent character of our action“ is to
be communicated to the police, together with a request for a meeting
with the interest „to avoid a violent escalation“.

The Open Letter
http://wri-irg.org/node/6968

Coalition NATO-ZU:
http://www.natozu.de/

Media contacts:

Deutsch - presse at nato-zu.de
English - Andreas Speck (WRI) – andreas at wri-irg.org
francais - Hans Lammerant: hans at vredesactie.be
19th March 2009