Actions occurred on the 5th.anniversary of the first prisoners arriving at the U.S. gulag in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The London vigil and the Washington DC NVDA grew out of the Witness Against Torture www.witnessagainsttorure.org pilgrimage by 30 U.S. based Catholic Workers to Guantanamo Bay (Cuban side) in December 2005. Participants were detained by U.S. officials on return to the U.S. with possible prosecution pending.

The callout for nonviolent direct action in DC was joined by War Resisters League, Code Pink and other nvda groups. Solidarity and anti-Gitmo vigils were held throughout the world at U.S. embassies and sites of significance.

Meanwhile, a delegation including a former British Guantanamo inmate, a mother of a present inmate, relatives of U.S. soldiers lost in Bush's war in Iraq and citizen's who died in the 911 NYC attack travelled to Guantanamo Bay on January 11th.

The London vigil was conducted in silence with violin accompaniment by Karen. It was conducted at a time when folks would be carrying out nonviolent direct action in Washington DC.

Martin and Scott took turns kneeling in full Gitmo sensory deprivation kit. The vigil opened and closed with a circle, we heard from Caoimhe recently returned from living and working in recently bombed Southern Lebanon, Ciaron recently acquitted of nonviolent disarmament of a U.S. war plane in ireland www.peaceontrial.com , Scott formerly of the U.S. Air Force, people with experiences of nonviolent resistance to the "War on Terror", work with refugees fleeing war and incarceration and detention.

Meanwhile in Washington DC a procession of hundreds of orange prison uniformed and hooded figures reached the U.S. Supreme Court and Federal Court. The Federal Court was nonviolently occupied, at time of writing 90 friends were reported arrested for refusing to vacate the building....further DC reporting on......  http://www.witnesstorture.org/node/571