Risk

A peaceful protest on a US missile-testing base in the Pacific turned into a week-long journey through the dark side of American military colonialism for two Greenpeace activists.

The Marshall Islands is theoretically an independent nation and the legal system supposedly handled by the Marshallese, but all of the officials in the courtroom were American except the stenographer. The Americans treat the islands like a colony. We were sentenced to a week in jail by a Texan judge in a white ten-gallon hat.

In May 2001, Mike Townsley and Anne Marie Rasmussen were handed 7-day jail sentences with a further 14 days suspended following their arrest on the US base at Kwajelein, part of the Marshall Islands archipelago.

They were just two of the activists on board the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior which was in the Pacific to protest against the testing of America's Star Wars national missile defence system. The stated aim of Star Wars is to deliver security, but in reality this destabilising initiative threatens to ignite a new nuclear arms race and undermines the international agreements which are the foundations of global disarmament. It is a threat to world peace.

The Marshall Islands has been subjected to US military activity since the 1950s - and has paid the price; 66 nuclear bombs have been exploded in the region, entire islands have been vapourised, whole populations resettled and their cultures destroyed. The cost of the US military presence is radiation sickness and death.

"Our aim was to plant a banner saying "Just say no, stop Star Wars" close to the X-band radar station which is central to testing Star Wars missiles. We hoped to use it to send a message to George Bush's army of diplomats who - that very day - were descending on Europe to peddle the Star Wars programme.

But the US military police were waiting for us.

We had barely leaped ashore from the small inflatable when we were handcuffed and dropped on our backs. I probably got a day in jail for every second I spent on that beach.

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