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Pacific Life Community Peace Activists Cross the Line at Nevada Test Site
by treehugger
Sunday March 04, 2007 at 06:37 PM
Over 40 people bore witness as 34 activists crossed the line in civil disobedience at the Nevada Test Site at around 10 AM this morning protesting the Nevada Test Site’s nuclear testing on Western Shoshone land.The action wrapped up a weekend retreat of the newly rebirthed Pacific Life Community.
Pacific Life Community Peace Activists Cross the Line at Nevada Test Site
Over 40 activists bore witness as 17 women and 17 men crossed the line in civil disobedience at the Nevada Test Site at around 10 AM this morning. This action was protesting the Nevada Test Site’s nuclear testing on Western Shoshone land. While the “Divine Strake” was cancelled after citizen protest, sub-critical underground nuclear testing there continues. The action wrapped up a weekend retreat of the newly rebirthed Pacific Life Community—a coalition of groups and individuals who have a spiritual basis to their non-violent resistance to war and nuclear proliferation.
The police stated that the line-crossers would not be processed until the rally retreated to the Peace Camp, where there had been a morning liturgy led by notable long-time peace activist and priest Dan Berrigan. The police told one younger appearing activist that if she crossed the line without an ID to prove she was over 18, then she would be taken to jail until her parents came. She walked back to Peace Camp, procured her ID, and crossed the line with two male activists. The line-crossers were all directed by guards towards the holding pens just inside the Nevada Test Site, where they were processed and released by 11:30 AM.
Nevada Desert Experience, who hosted the Pacific Life Community weekend retreat, will return to the site for Sacred Week Peace Walk beginning on March 26th. The Peace Walk will transverse by foot the 64 miles from the Atomic Testing Museum in Las Vegas to the Nevada Test Site. The Peace Walk, an interfaith action including Shabbat services, Buddha’s birthday celebration, and a nuclear version of the Catholic Stations of the Cross, will culminate in a rally and direct action at the Test Site on April 1st. Emma’s Revolution and Martin Sheen will be there. Ming San Lai, a Board Member for Nevada Desert Experience, encourages people to attend both the Peace Walk and the rally. When asked why people who might not see the Nevada Test Site as central to the issues close to their hearts and attention, he stated “The test site is a focal point for a lot of interconnected issues of oppression, nuclearism and consumerisim”.
www.nevadadesertexperience.org
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