Mordechai Vanunu is Being Silenced - The Nuclear Danger Just Increases Statement of the International Delegation The State of Israel is investing immense resources in the attempt to silence and restrict nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu - surveillance, arrests, the use of British Mandate State of Emergency regulations, conducting a fabricated trial and a system of incitement and slander against him, all in the name of maintaining security. Who maintains our security from radioactive pollution that contaminates the air, the water and the land? Who maintains our security from a second Chernobyl in the Negev? Who maintains our security from an old and dangerous reactor that has never been inspected by an external authority? Who maintains our security from the nuclear arms race in the Middle East, that endangers us and all peoples in the region? No one. The government of Israel refuses to inform the citizens about Israel's nuclear program and tells us to "trust" anonymous authorities that operate in the dark. The Knesset refuses to discuss the nuclear program, its impact on our lives, on the economy, on the arms race, on the future of the residents of the Negev and the entire country. Mordechai Vanunu, who acted out of concern and responsibility and exposed the truth, was imprisoned for 18 years, including 11 and a half years in solitary confinement, and even after he completed his full sentence, the state refuses to let him go free. How much does it cost to produce and maintain a nuclear arsenal? What dangerous materials are already in the land, the water and the air in the Negev? How many disasters have already taken human lives? How many reactor employees have become ill and died due to exposure to dangerous materials? Where is the radioactive waste buried? Who is authorized to instruct the use of nuclear weapons? The government refuses to answer these questions. Instead, it silences and restricts the only person who challenged the policy of ambiguity. We say: nuclear weapons cannot be hidden from the citizens of this country and from the world. It is our right to know about the existence and the condition of a nuclear installation that endangers our country and the region. It is our right to decide, whether we want weapons of mass destruction, or do we choose life and peace. Peace activists from Israel and from the world are currently acting in Israel, calling for a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction, for peace, for safety from nuclear disaster and for the freedom of Mordechai Vanunu. We say to the citizens of Israel and of the region: we know, that weapons of mass destruction are unsafe for those who possess them and devastating to their victims. The only outcomes from possessing nuclear weapons are: Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the legacy of deadly cancers and the scandal of further impoverishment of the world's poor. This is not peace nor security. Join us in demanding from the government of Israel: - Open all nuclear installations to civilian and international inspection - Close the Dimona reactor - Halt the Israeli nuclear program - Free Mordechai Vanunu -The International Campaign
to Free Mordechai Vanunu and for a Middle East Free of Nuclear Weapons |