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Arms trade - Unnecessary, unwanted, unaffordable

No more suffering | 20.12.2010 12:22

While UK Uncut target the high Streets around the country anti arms campaigners continue to call for BAE to answer for their crimes that have cost the UK BILLIONS.
As regular readers will know BAE have offices in north Bristol and have been the target for protestors in the past.

BAE Systems, New Filton House, PO Box 5, Filton, Bristol, BS34 7QW,
BAE happy to deal arms for profit when what the world really needs is their expertise, know how and machinery to develop equipment that can generate local, renewable electricity. Electricity that does not require the burning of fossil fuels or nuclear power to generate.
The following is an extract from their website:
Corporate Responsibility
BAE Systems recognises its responsibilities to the people it employs, its customers and suppliers, its shareholders, the wider community and to the environment.
We are a well-managed, responsible and ethical company and are determined to be widely recognised for our world-class technology, the skills of our people and the seriousness with which we take our corporate responsibilities.
We are proud of the role we play as one of the leaders in the defence sector and as part of this we recognise our specific responsibility to understand the concerns of others. We aim through this website and our corporate reporting to provide information and demonstrate through our performance that BAE Systems is both a responsible corporate citizen and a responsible defence company.
(At this point take a pause while people stop themselves from laughing and in some cases pick themselves off of the floor.)

Arms giant BAE will appear at Southwark Crown Court today to seal a controversial plea bargain with the Serious Fraud Office.
The firm has long been dogged by allegations of corruption, bribery and fraud.
In 2006 then-prime minister Tony Blair ordered the plug to be pulled on an SFO investigation into the multibillion pound Saudi Al-Yamamah fighter jet deal, ostensibly following pressure from the Saudi regime.
This most recent case centres on a deal struck by the company's representatives with the SFO over BAE dealings with Tanzania, the Czech Republic, Romania and South Africa where it was alleged that ministers and regimes had been bribed by the firm to secure lucrative contracts.
Under the deal BAE pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of having made "accounting errors" and agreed to be fined £30 million in exchange for bribery and corruption charges being dropped.
Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) and the Cornerhouse unsuccessfully sought a judicial review of the SFO deal, arguing that it let BAE off the hook and limited the potential for further prosecutions.
CAAT supporters are to stage a demonstration outside the courthouse in protest at the signing off of the deal.
CAAT spokeswoman Kaye Stearman said: "Some people will see the BAE guilty plea and fine as a punishment, but that's far from the truth. BAE is admitting only to accounting errors, not to corruption charges.
"Even if BAE is ordered to pay the full £30 million fine, it is still peanuts in their reckoning and far less than the real costs paid by the people of Tanzania, one of the world's poorest countries."


No more suffering
- Original article on IMC Bristol: http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/702579