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The time is now: take a new path citizen action to call for nuclear disarmament
published Thursday, April 02, 2009  5214 Views :: 1 Comments
The time is now: take a new path citizen action to call for nuclear disarmament.

1 April 2009.  For immediate release.
 
“Abolition grows closer every day,” says Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance
 
The growing global movement for nuclear disarmament comes to Oak Ridge, Tennessee, home of the Y12 National Security Complex, on Saturday, April 4. Three events sponsored by the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance will highlight the increasing pressure on leaders to comply with the requirements of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
 
“Today the President of the United States and the President of the Russian Federation released a joint statement that reads: ‘We committed our two countries to achieving a nuclear free world.’” said Ralph Hutchison, OREPA’s coordinator. “The time is now. Achieving a nuclear weapons free world is possible if the world’s citizens insist on it. The April 4 Nonviolent Action for Peace and Disarmament is an important way for everyone who shares this vision to stand and be counted.”
 
Events in Oak Ridge will begin at 12:30pm on Saturday with a Concert for Disarmament featuring musicians and street theater groups. Singer/songwriter Ash Devine from Asheville; Knoxville’s Larry Osborne, and East Tennessee band GaNaSiTa will perform on the ampitheatre stage at Bissell Park in Oak Ridge; The Eggplant Faeries and the OREPA puppetistas will present theater pieces, and John Kernodle and Dr. Annette Mendola will be among the speakers in a concert focused on achieving the goal of nuclear disarmament.
 
The Concert will be followed by a march to the Y12 National Security Complex gates at East Bear Creek Road and Scarboro Road where an action for peace will take place. “The world has changed,” said Hutchison. “There is a recognition now that nuclear weapons undermine our quest for security, and that achieving nuclear disarmament is the only sustainable path forward.”
 
OREPA’s call for disarmament at Y12 will not only be heard in Oak Ridge on April 4 but at the United Nations a month later, during the NPT Preparatory conference. “We’ve been invited to go to New York as part of an NGO team doing briefings about activities taking place in Oak Ridge and across the US weapons complex,” Hutchison said. “The prospects for nuclear abolition grow greater the more transparency and understanding there is among nations.”
 
Saturday’s events will be preceded by several activities this week. The Buddhist monks of Nipponzan Myohoji are leading a peace pilgrimage from their temple in Cocke County to the gates of Y12 which began Monday, March 30. The OREPA puppetistas are holding a week long puppet build in south Knoxville preparing for the action on Saturday. And OREPA will sponsor a nonviolence workshop on Friday, April 3 from 1:00 – 5:00pm at Church of the Savior on Weisgarber Road.
 
All events are nonviolent in tone as well as action and are free and open to the public.
 
For more information: Ralph Hutchison  865 776 5050 | orep@earthlink.net


 



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