Rooftop occupation at Heckler & Koch

On May 20th at Nottingham Magistrates’ Court, anti-arms-trade activist Kirk Jackson was found guilty of aggravated trespass for his part in a protest that shut down an arms company for a day. He was given a twelve month conditional discharge and ordered to pay £350 court costs.

The charge arose from a February 18th protest at the Nottingham warehouse of international arms company Heckler & Koch. Before dawn, four activists locked themselves to the gates, preventing employees from entering, while Kirk and another activist climbed onto the roof and displayed banners accusing the company of “arming repressive regimes”.

Heckler & Koch has been the target of demonstrations since 2007 when Nottingham residents discovered its presence on the Lenton Lane industrial estate. The company has a long history of supplying weapons to unstable regions, and using licensed production deals in order to evade arms embargoes. This was the first direct action taken against the company.

The offence of aggravated trespass is committed if a person does something while trespassing that is intended to obstruct or disrupt lawful activity. Kirk argued that his only intention in displaying banners on the roof was to create a photo op for the attending media but the three magistrates accepted the Crown prosecutor’s argument that he was in a “joint enterprise” with the activists locked to the gates.

The other five activists had already pleaded guilty and been sentenced on March 17th.

Heckler & Koch MD Mike Thornton

Mike Thornton, the Managing Director of Heckler & Koch was in court as a witness. He seemed nervous and avoided eye contact with the defendant and his supporters, but his performance was revealing: Having sworn to tell the whole truth, he baulked when cross-examined about his company’s activities.

Most notably, when asked if his company carried out manufacturing at its Lenton Lane industrial unit, he looked very uncomfortable and asked the magistrates “Is it necessary to discuss that?” His response confirmed campaigners’ long-held suspicions that the warehouse is used to assemble automatic weapons.

Mr Thornton was given a copy of the Shut Down H&K campaign’s December 2009 open letter to him and asked if he had seen it before. He admitted to having received the letter, in which serious concerns about H&K were raised, and to having decided to ignore it. He did however concede that citizens have a legitimate right to protest against companies such as his.

Arms dealers love euphemisms and Thornton is no exception. He described his business as “defence sector”, his lethal wares as merely “product”, and when asked about the impact of the protest, he said “we were held back in what we were trying to achieve.” Spectators were struck by the similarities between Mr Thornton and the villainous arms company execs from Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s recent film Micmacs.

The 18th Feb blockade of Heckler & Koch

The prosecution’s police witness was Chief Inspector Stephen Haylett, who characterised the protest as “as good-natured as a demonstration gets”. This left the prosecution struggling to convince the court that Thornton was a victim of intimidation. In his statement, the arms company boss claimed that the protest left him feeling “vulnerable and intimidated”. “It was not known if [the protesters] were armed with any type of missiles,” said the man with the warehouse full of guns. (In fact, the reams of police video footage played in court showed the defendant wielding nothing more threatening than a cheese & pickle sandwich.)

It was Chief Inspector Haylett who told the activists on H&K’s roof that their banners would be returned, but in court he claimed that he couldn’t remember this, and so the bench agreed to the Crown’s request to destroy them. Fortunately, the campaign has already received a replacement banner from fellow anti-militarists in Germany.

Kirk and supporters outside Nottingham Magistrates' Court

Despite the disappointing verdict, Kirk remains positive. “I’m glad I took the case to trial,” he said. “Companies like Heckler & Koch are profiting from war and repression with the support of the UK government. The arms industry must be opposed.”

The six activists have been left with a total of £825 in fines plus costs but this is a fraction of the cost to the company of being closed down for a day. On an average working day, Heckler & Koch’s Nottingham unit exports over £35 000 of arms and makes more than £12 500 profit.

If you would like to help the activists to pay their costs, you can donate via the Shut Down H&K website.

The six activists arrived at H&K’s Nottingham warehouse building before any employees turned up. Using D-locks and arm-tubes, one pair locked themselves to the staff entrance while another pair blockaded the goods gate. Meanwhile the other two gained access to the roof and hung anti-arms-trade banners on the front of the building.

One of the banners accused H&K of “arming repressive regimes” while the other, a German banner displayed in solidarity with anti-arms-trade campaigners from H&K’s home turf, translated as “arms exports are facilitating murder”.

This action succeeded in shutting the company down for the whole day. Employees and deliveries were turned away; the phones went unanswered; no arms deals were done. H&K Managing Director Mike Thornton arrived to personally ask the blockaders to leave but they remained in place until they were cut free by police specialists.

It took police six and a half hours to remove the blockade and nearly eight hours to get the protesters down from the roof. A supportive employee of the company next door to H&K tried to bring mugs of tea to the blockaders, but was prevented by police, who falsely claimed that they could use Section 14 of the Public Order Act to deny the protesters food and drink.

Heckler & Koch was targeted for this action because of the company’s sales of weapons to armed forces that are known to commit human rights abuses, and because of the company’s licensing of other countries to manufacture H&K weapons – a strategy that allows the company to evade arms embargoes and profit from the sale of weapons to repressive regimes.

These concerns were set out in an open letter from the Shut Down H&K campaign to Heckler & Koch in December 2009. The company has yet to reply to the letter.

After being removed from the arms company’s premises, the six activists were arrested and taken to Nottingham’s Bridewell police station. They have been charged with Aggravated Trespass and subjected to bail conditions that prevent them from associating with each other. Their first court appearance will be on Tuesday 2nd March at 09:45 at Nottingham Magistrates’ Court.

(Video: Watch this video on the post page)

Heckler & Koch failed to reply, so 28 days later, groups of concerned citizens set out to audit the arms company and to pose the question to the people of Nottingham: “What are they hiding?”

Registered Delivery

One group of citizen auditors headed to the arms company’s secret warehouse; the unmarked Unit 3 at Easter Park on Lenton Lane. Going by the name of Artichokes War, they carried with them a letter reiterating the need for H&K to address public concerns, and inviting the company to give any reasons for its failure to be transparent.

Nottinghamshire police usually prevent any suspected campaigners from entering Easter Park on foot, so to avoid being stopped, the auditors simply entered the industrial park in a taxi. Once inside, they auditors approached the gate of Heckler & Koch under the watchful eye of two officers.

The auditors buzzed the intercom and a female employee responded. They explained to her that they were there to personally deliver a letter. The disembodied voice asked them to just leave their letter on the ground by the car park gate, but the auditors stood their ground. This was a registered delivery, they explained. They needed a signature. The intercom spoke again: Someone would be out shortly to collect the letter.

Five minutes passed… ten minutes… No-one emerged from the arms company’s secure warehouse. The police came over to find out what the auditors were up to, then went away again.

Finally, after half an hour of waiting, one of the auditors climbed over the barbed fence into the employees car park and walked up to the front door and rang the bell. No-one responded, so he pushed the letter through the letterbox and returned to the car park gate… only to find that he had now become a prisoner of Heckler & Koch!

It seems that the arms company were so afraid of the citizens’ audit that they dared not even buzz open the car park gate. Unable to climb back out the way he had got in, the auditor remained trapped until the police intervened.

Sadly, due to H&K’s reticence, the auditors failed, not only to review H&K’s sales records, but even to get a signature for their delivery. Fortunately there’s more than one way to record a delivery, and the auditors’ video record shows that the arms company has received the letter outlining concerns about its dodgy export deals. As to why the company has failed to reply; in the words of one auditor, “Maybe they have something to hide.”

(Video: Watch this video on the post page)

Street Theatre: What are they hiding?

Meanwhile, in the city centre, a group of activists was creating a curious spectacle for the public. A giant and mysterious object, covered by green tarpaulin and camo netting appeared on Market Square, surrounded by placards asking “What’s going on?” and “What are they hiding?”

When bemused passers by approached, the sound of gunfire was heard from under the tarpaulin, which promptly collapsed. The tarp was then drawn aside, revealing a tangled pile of bodies representing the victims of H&K weapons.

Passers by stopped to chat with the campaigners and were interested to learn about the local arms company and its refusal to answer questions about its dodgy arms exports. This piece of hastily-devised street theatre was replayed at Speakers’ Corner and by St Peter’s Church, where it attracted the most interest.

Finally, having collected many petition signatures and handed out thousands of leaflets, the campaigners marched single file bearing placards out to Heckler & Koch’s home on Lenton Lane. Despite being denied entry to Easter Park by Nottinghamshire Police, the activists ended their long day of campaigning in high spirits.

National Solidarity

Most of the street theatre group and the citizen auditors were veteran peace activists from around the country (and around the world), who were in Nottingham to attend the Peace News Winter Gathering. It meant a lot to local campaigners to have their support. The campaign against Heckler & Koch will keep pressing for answers in the year to come.

Child posing with police H&K submachine gun at a summer fete in London

Police are giving young children Heckler & Koch guns to handle at community events in England. At a recent summer fete in east London, the Met ran a stall displaying a H&K MP5 submachine gun. Children as young as seven were allowed to pose for photos holding the police weapon, which has a firing rate of 800 rounds per minute.

The stunt has been sharply criticised by MPs and anti-gun campaigners. MP Jim Fitzpatrick said “Giving young children real guns to handle is inappropriate. It could be glamorising the weapons and creating familiarity which is plainly wrong.”

George Galloway MP said “The foolish display at this festival can serve only to normalise firearms or make they appear attractive, even glamorous. We are tragically used to seeing images of primary school aged boys handling assault rifles in Liberia or Mogadishu, but in Limehouse?!”

Police defended the initiative, claiming that it is intended to “divert people away from gun crime”, but Lyn Costello, co-founder of Mothers Against Murder and Aggression, called it “a serious error of judgment.”

And it seems that this event was not a one-off: “We’ve done this kind of thing in other places” said Superintendent Tarrant of the Met’s CO19 firearms unit. “We will continue doing it in future.”

The demo took place on a sunny afternoon outside Heckler & Koch’s office at Easter Park on the Lenton Lane industrial estate. About 35 people turned up, Nottingham residents young and old, including activists from Greenpeace, CND and Stop The War. A variety of colourful banners and placards was displayed, and leaflets were handed out to passers-by, who had been unaware that their employer’s neighbour is a major arms dealer. Sadly, having heard about the demo, Heckler & Koch closed its office for the afternoon!

There were a couple of speeches on the evils of the arms trade and Heckler & Koch in particular. The list of repressive regimes and conflict zones that H&K guns have been exported to was read out over a megaphone. Having noticed that the company had failed to signpost their office, activists decided to help them out by clearly labelling the entrance to the industrial park “Heckler & Koch (arms dealers)”.

There was a large police presence, including officers from the Forward Intelligence Team who had come all the way from London to keep protesters under surveillance with their gigantic cameras. Despite the peaceful nature of the demo, vehicles leaving the demo were photographed and in some cases followed by the police. One protester was pulled over on the pretext of looking “too young”, asked to confirm that he had been at the demo and made to show his driving license (presumably so he could be added to a list of potential troublemakers).

Heckler & Koch tried and failed to keep the demo out of the media. The police, PR and legal response on behalf of the company only succeeded in showing how much the demo rattled its cage. The story was reported in local TV, radio and print news, and you can see pictures on IndyMedia.

The ROF houses the manufacturing facility of BAE’s small arms subsidiary Heckler & Koch. BAE Systems recently won a contract to supply 600 000 Heckler & Koch assault rifles to Turkey – a country with a record of severe repression of the Kurdish people, against whom Turkey has pursued a policy of cultural destruction and ethnic cleansing.

Five campaigners braved the cold and early hour to leaflet the workers as they went in at 06:30 in the morning. The workers were friendly and most took a leaflet. 10 MoD police were present, filming the campaigners.

11 people took part in the afternoon demonstration at 15:30, with some handing out leaflets and others holding a banner for passing vehicles, some of which beeped in support. Radio Trent broadcast an interview, and a local free paper The Topper sent a photographer.

Another five Nottingham activists travelled to the BAE Systems AGM in London to join a peaceful picket outside and a noisy protest inside the meeting.