Nicht-Verleihung der Carl-von-Ossietzky-Medaille 2010 in Berlin an Mordechai Vanunu von der Internationalen LIGA für Menschenrechte
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00:00Meine sehr verehrten Damen und Herren, liebe Freunde, es ist jetzt mein großer Ehre und
00:18Freude, unseren ersten Sprecher Morade Corrigan-Magaya zu begrüßen, der aus Belfast, Nordirland
00:29und Ireland. Welcome Morade Corrigan-Magaya.
00:33Applaus
00:55Morade Corrigan-Magaya ist Friedensnobelpreisträgerin, wie gesagt, 1976, zusammen mit Betty Williams
01:03und Saren McCowen, den beiden anderen Mitbegründerinnen von Peace People Northern Ireland, wurde sie
01:12im selben Jahr 1976 mit der Carl von Osjitzki-Medaille ausgezeichnet. Es war das Jahr 1976, manche
01:21werden sich daran erinnern, drei der sechs Kinder ihrer Schwester Anne waren von einem
01:28Fluchtwagen der IRA erfasst und in Stücke zerrissen worden, dessen Fahrer, der Fahrer
01:36des Fluchtwagens, von einem britischen Soldaten niedergeschossen war. Im Angesicht des Schmerzes
01:46für die gesamte Familie fasste Morade den Entschluss, alles in Bewegung zu setzen, um
01:52der Gewalt in Nordirland ein Ende zu setzen. Es ist nicht möglich, alle Auszeichnungen,
02:01Ehrendoktorate und Ämter von Morade-Magaya aufzuzählen, sie selbst betont aber gerne,
02:06dass die theologische und kirchliche Laienarbeit eine Quelle ihrer Energie ist. Ihr Buch The Vision
02:15of Peace, Faith and Hope in Northern Ireland legt davon Zeugnis ab. Morade-Magaya unterstützte
02:24uns vom ersten Moment der Auszeichnung Mordecai-Vanunu maßgeblich, nicht zuletzt auch als
02:32eine der wenigen Vertrauten von Mordecai-Vanunu. Sie gehörte natürlich sofort zu den Erstunterzeichnerinnen
02:40des offenen Briefes und war federführend an der Initiierung der Peace Nobleman Petition zur
02:50Freilassung von Mordecai-Vanunu in Hiroshima. Morade-Magaya, the floor is yours.
02:56Guten Morgen, I'm very happy to be back here in Berlin, beautiful city and I'm happy to be
03:17here with my good friend Barbara Fiebisch. Thank you for inviting us. And we're here to remember
03:28and be with a great spirit Mordecai-Vanunu. We're sorry that he can't be with us today but we do
03:37look forward to the day when he will be free to leave Israel and come to Berlin to meet all his
03:42great friends here and the many friends that he has around the world. So I'm also happy that
03:48Gideon Spiro is here today, a great friend of Mordecai and he will be speaking to you later.
03:54So I'm very happy to be visiting a very beautiful city of Berlin. I was here in 2009 when I had the
04:06joy of attending the opening of the Berlin Center for Non-Killing. This gave me great hope that
04:13indeed our thinking is changing from the myth that force or the threat of force, violence, nuclear
04:20weapons, militarism and war can solve any problems or bring us human security. Today we are becoming
04:29increasingly aware that human and environmental security does not come from violence but must
04:36be based on the practice of truth and love and the implementation of human rights and international
04:43law. We are increasingly aware too that killing and the threats to kill underlie all other threats
04:51to the survival and well-being of humanity. And it was with this in mind that the Nobel Peace
04:58Laureates charter for a world without violence and its article 13 states, we each have a right
05:06not to be killed and a responsibility not to kill others. Starting from this fundamental principle
05:15I believe we can each do our part to end the greatest threat to human survival, militarism,
05:21nuclear weapons and war and replace them with international laws and human rights. I'm therefore
05:29very happy to be returning to Berlin at the invitation of the International League for Human
05:34Rights to participate in the bestowal of the Carlos Ieske Award to Mordecai Vanunu, the Israeli
05:42nuclear whistleblower. Vanunu, a man who recognized the dangers of nuclear genocidal weapons and
05:51his personal responsibility to do what he could to protect the lives of others against the weapons
05:58of mass destruction. I would like to offer my congratulations to Vanunu on being awarded this
06:16important prize. Carl Ieske was a man of courage who suffered and died in a concentration camp for
06:25his principled opposition to the Nazi regime. Mordecai Vanunu suffered for his principled
06:32opposition to nuclear weapons when he was convicted and spent 18 years in Israeli prison,
06:3812 in solitary confinement for telling the world that Israel has a nuclear weapons program.
06:4624 years later he continues to suffer as he is denied by Israel his basic human rights to freedom
06:54of speech and freedom to leave Israel, which is what he wants to do. It is fitting that Vanunu be
07:01awarded this prize as both men share a passion for human rights and human dignity and were
07:08willing to pay the price of suffering for being truth tellers in order to protect humanity. When
07:15the ILHR decided to award the prize to Vanunu, they also together with the International Association
07:21of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms and the International Physicians for the Prevention of
07:27Nuclear War launched a campaign asking the Israeli government to allow Vanunu to come to Berlin to
07:33accept his prize. It is shameful that the Israeli government has yet again refused to allow Vanunu
07:42to leave Israel and continues to break international law by denying Vanunu his freedom. This behavior
07:49by Israel is not acceptable to the international community.
08:01The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights codified in Article 12 the fundamental
08:09right to be free in leaving any country including one's own. We therefore call upon the Israeli
08:15government to uphold its obligations as a member of the UN and the international community and
08:20free Vanunu. We call upon Germany and all other national governments, the UN, the EU, Human Rights
08:27Commission, the international community to take action to insist the Israeli government behave
08:33according to human rights and international law and free Vanunu immediately.
08:46We the international community are not powerless in the face of Israeli illegality. We will continue to campaign
08:53until Vanunu is free so he can come to Berlin to receive his prize which the ILHR will hold for him.
09:02We can continue to work for what Mordechai Vanunu passionately believes in, a nuclear-free Middle East and a
09:07nuclear-free world. The whole world knows Israel has nuclear weapons. This was conceded by former Israeli Prime
09:14Minister Olmert in 2006 during his visit to Germany and we all know Israel is the third nuclear power in the
09:23world. We therefore call on them to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, open their Dimona plant to
09:30the inspection, move to abolish their nuclear weapons and participate in the UN Secretary General's future
09:37conference on a nuclear-free Middle East. By taking such action Israel would give real leadership to peace in the
09:45Middle East and help end the danger of nuclear proliferation. We've not far to look to see the horror of nuclear
09:53weapons in war. I've just returned from Hiroshima where 65 years ago the nuclear bombing of this city took place.
10:02Here too in Berlin you know the suffering of World War II when your own city was bombed, both war crimes as many
10:11civilians were killed. It is to the credit of the people of Berlin and Hiroshima and Nagasaki and their governments
10:19that they learned the lesson of history and put their energies and resources not into militarism but into
10:26peacemaking and building up their very beautiful cities and taking care of their people's needs. Both people and their
10:34countries did not get stuck in their suffering in the past but went on to build advanced technology and strong
10:43economies and became examples of the great resilience of the human spirit. For young German people it is important you
10:53continue to celebrate the moment and look forward to the future and not get stuck in the past or feel responsible for
11:02what previous generations did which caused so much death and destruction to others. But I would encourage the young
11:10people of Germany to learn from your history and continue to build peace and reject the bomb, the bullet and all the
11:18techniques of violence as ways of solving human problems. I would invite the young people of Germany to continue and
11:26increase their efforts to end militarism, nuclear weapons and war and believe it is possible to do this because peace is
11:37possible and a new way of living together as a human family is not only possible, it is imperative for our very survival and the
11:47survival of our beautiful world. Yet even as we dream of a non-killing, non-violent world and work towards it, we must be
11:57realistic and recognize the reality that we are in grave danger and we face a highly militarized industrial complex pushing for a
12:07fearful agenda of war and more sophisticated weapons of war for land, sea, earth and space. The military mindset will not be
12:19easy to transform into one that accepts violence and killing human beings has had its day and there is a better way to
12:29solve conflict through dialogue and states complying with international law including humanitarian law. How difficult our task of
12:40changing military mindsets will be, can be shown by reading the strategy which NATO adopted in November 2010, just last month in
12:51Portugal and which was signed on to by heads of 28 NATO alliances, that's our political leadership and here's what they signed. While the strategy
13:03affirms the alliance is fairly committed to the purposes and principles of the United Nations, the NATO strategy goes on to say and I quote
13:15Deterrence based on an appropriate mix of nuclear and conventional capabilities remains a core element of our overall strategy. The
13:27circumstances in which any nuclear weapons have to be contemplated are extremely remote, but as long as nuclear weapons exist NATO will
13:39remain a nuclear alliance and NATO will work to sustain the necessary levels of defense spending so that our armed forces are sufficiently
13:52resourced. This means that NATO led by America is fully prepared to use tactical nuclear weapons and indeed technical nuclear weapons have
14:05been fully integrated into the US armed forces and training program. Of course it goes without saying that the counter alliance to NATO, Russia, China and the
14:30so-called Central Asia Collective Security Organization have built nuclear weapons into their security policies and strategic planning. These governments continue to
14:42ignore their legal obligations as under international law the threat or use of nuclear weapons is criminal and therefore every government must move to see these
14:53criminal weapons are dismantled. I know that the German government has asked the US, NATO to take its nuclear weapons out of Germany and I hope the people of Germany and the other
15:05European states which have US, NATO nuclear weapons in them will work to see these weapons are removed and there will be a nuclear weapons free Europe soon.
15:24I believe it is time to dismantle NATO. This should have been done when the Warsaw Pact was dismantled and replace NATO with a non-violent European common security community.
15:40Establish the same in other world regions and move to establish an overall global non-violent common security community.
15:49Surely in an independent interconnected world and in this the 21st century it is time for a new start, fresh thinking regarding our human security and time to stop killing each other.
16:06No government has dropped nuclear weapons after Hiroshima and Nagasaki but the threat to do so has often been used. Many governments have built their national security policies on threats of violence and militarism and since 1943 millions of people have been slaughtered in many countries
16:35by both state and non-state actors in the name of progress and democracy. Increasingly governments are using force against unarmed civilians. The US government has committed acts of aggression against Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and has authorized, armed, equipped and supplied Israel to commit acts of aggression, crimes against humanity
17:05ethnic cleansing, apartheid against the Palestinian people.
17:10However I do believe Palestine is the key to peace in the Middle East and Israel by ending the occupation and upholding human rights and democracy for the Palestinian people can help bring peace to the region both for the sake of the Israeli Palestinian people who have suffered too much and too long.
17:38Of concern to Europe and the international community are the US government's threats to attack Iran or allowing Israel to do so on the pretext that they have nuclear weapons program. If indeed they do attack Iran this would set the whole region on fire.
18:03When President Obama says he wants to see a world without nuclear weapons and says in respect of Iran and their alleged weapon ambitions that all options are on the table, this is clearly a threat to use nuclear weapons, clearly a criminal threat against Iran under the world court opinion.
18:33The Nuremberg Charter of August 8, 1945 says that the threat or use of nuclear weapons is criminal. So officials in nine nuclear weapon states who maintain and use nuclear deterrence as a threat are committing crimes and breaking international laws.
18:53In his book, The Criminality of Nuclear Deterrence, Could the US Use Weapons on Terrorism? Could the US War on Terrorism Go Nuclear? International Law Professor Francis Boyle says,
19:08In the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on Nuclear Weapons, the world court ruled that the threat stands or falls on the same legal grounds as the actual use. If mass extermination of human beings is a crime, the threat to commit mass extermination is also a crime.
19:31If any of us threatened to kill another person, we would be prosecuted and yet the leaders of the nuclear weapon states are holding the threat of nuclear extermination above and over us all.
19:50Some governments feel it's prestigious being in the nuclear weapons club as if it were a badge of honor, when in reality it should be a badge of shame and dishonor for any country to have such immoral weapons, breaking not only the Nuremberg principles but wasting their people's precious resources so necessary for their basic needs of food, education, healthcare.
20:19I believe we must delegitimize nuclear weapons, change our military mindsets of fear and violence, abolish force and international relations, replacing this with the alternatives of human and environmental security based on peace, sustainable development, human rights and international laws.
20:43Making arms and the use of force illegal and criminal, dismantling not only nuclear weapons but the entire war machine and this will give hope to humanity.
21:04There is much being done as you all are doing and much we each can do, such as call for the ratification of the United States and Russia of the New START treaty and welcome the consensus nuclear disarmament action plan that was adopted in 2010 by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference.
21:28We also need to strengthen the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty whose obligations are mutual and concern both non-state, non-nuclear states which pledge to renounce nuclear weapons and the nuclear powers which commit themselves to nuclear disarmament.
21:48We can support the initiative by the UN Secretary General to start work on a universal treaty to prohibit the use, development, production, stockpiling and transfer of nuclear weapons.
22:02We can continue to point out the immorality of world governments wasting more than 1.5 trillion annually on its military establishments when just a fraction of this could be spent on meeting the Millennium Development Goals and removing world poverty.
22:24It is to our deepest shame that we allow our governments to spend this money on militarism and children die today of starvation and poverty.
22:35The permanent members of the UN, all nuclear weapon states, instead of upholding the UN mandate to save the world from the scourge of war, are failing to engage in serious negotiation for the elimination of nuclear weapons as required by the NPT.
23:04Because these countries are behaving as though their power and prestige are built on these weapons, other countries now seek to obtain them.
23:15Large corporations are promoting nuclear energy projects as an alternative to fossil fuels and trying to make nuclear power appear to be green.
23:28However, the four major problems with nuclear power are yet to be dealt with.
23:35They are the potential for nuclear weapons proliferation, the failure of any reasonable solution to storing nuclear waste which will threaten the environment and humanity for tens of thousands of years,
23:51vulnerability to terrorism and the propensity to dangerous accidents.
23:59The role of the civil community, especially including those marginalized voices of the past, of minority communities, youth and women, will help bring about an end to nuclear weapons and war.
24:19As increasingly we use non-violence, including acts of civil resistance, to bring about peace and disarmament in our world.
24:31We can build a world of peace. We just have to believe in it.
24:37And like Mordecai van Nuenen and many other whistleblowers we've witnessed even in the last couple of months, our hearts are with them for their great stand.
24:48We must not allow our governments to silence those people who non-violently use civil resistance to tell the truth and get it out there.
25:10And we're all very conscious of a young man, Bradley Manning, the young American who's told what happened in Iraq, which we knew but he helped bring it more to the front.
25:26Julian Assange now being held and WikiLeaks trying to tell the truth and get it out there and being persecuted for doing so.
25:37We pay tribute to them and we thank them together with Mordecai for the sacrifice they are making to help save our world.
26:07Thank you very much.