Milan Rai, peace activist & author speaking in Belfast

international | anti-war / imperialism | event notice Monday March 13, 2006 00:34 by Mark Chapman - Peace People/INNATE +44 773 781 9569

7/7: The London Bombings, Islam and the Iraq War

Milan Rai is a peace activist and the author of four books: Chomsky's Politics, War Plan Iraq: Ten Reasons Why We Shouldn't Launch Another War On Iraq, Regime Unchanged, and now 7/7: The London Bombings, Islam and the Iraq War (published in April 2006 by Pluto Press). War Plan Iraq was translated into eight languages. Milan was a co-recipient of the Transport & General Workers' Union 'Frank Cousins Peace Award' in 1993.

Milan Rai is a peace activist and the author of four books: Chomsky's Politics, War Plan Iraq: Ten Reasons Why We Shouldn't Launch Another War On Iraq, Regime Unchanged, and now 7/7: The London Bombings, Islam and the Iraq War (published in April 2006 by Pluto Press). War Plan Iraq was translated into eight languages. Milan was a co-recipient of the Transport & General Workers' Union 'Frank Cousins Peace Award' in 1993.

Milan's involvement in the Iraq issue began with anti-war efforts in 1990 which led to his co-founding the direct action and information group ARROW (Active Resistance to the Roots Of War), and his founding of the British branch of Voices in the Wilderness in 1998. Milan went on four sanctions-breaking delegations to Iraq with Voices in the Wilderness between 1998 and 2001, and was the first person to be arrested for breaking the economic sanctions on Iraq - for taking children's medicines to Iraq without an export licence.

In the aftermath of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, he co-founded Justice Not Vengeance, an anti-war group dealing with the whole range of issues raised by the 'war on terror'. Thousands of JNV (previously ARROW) anti-war briefings have been given away free at demonstrations and meetings across the UK since 2001.

Milan has been to prison - briefly- three times for his anti-war work. His latest prison experience was two weeks in Lewes Prison in Sussex, for refusing to pay £2100 compensation to the Foreign Office for anti-war statements painted on the FCO building in the run-up to the November 2004 assault on Fallujah.

Milan is also the first person to be charged with organising an unauthorised demonstration in the vicinity of Parliament, and is to be tried on this charge on 16 March 2006. This offence carries a maximum penalty of three months' imprisonment. His 'crime' was to organise and participate in the reading of names of the Iraq war dead with Maya Evans on 25 October 2005, opposite Downing Street. Maya was reading the names of British soldiers who had died in the conflict; Milan was reading the names of some of the Iraqi civilians who have died as a result of the invasion and occupation.

Milan will be speaking at Peace House, 224 Lisburn Road, Belfast on Wednesday, 5 April at 7.30pm. All welcome!