Over the past four months, COPEX has threatened a number of peace movement organisations and individuals with libel writs. Peace News has been served a writ and statement of claim for an article published in the July 1995 edition, while eight individuals associated with Campaign Against Arms Trade have received a writ and statement of claim for items in the organisation's April and June newsletters.
Channel 4's broadcast of the Dispatches documentary The Torture Trail which included an extensive segment filmed inside the 1994 COPEX exhibition has received a massive amount of publicity, both for its revelations about the trade in internal security equipment and for its producer's victory in a libel action against the Department of Trade and Industry. The story of COPEX and that of The Torture Trail have been intersecting for some months now. Segments of the programme were shown on German television in the run-up to late June's planned COPEX-Bonn show. A wide range of anti-racist and peace groups stepped up protests against the exhibition, gaining the support of Social Democratic and Green politicians, including the mayor of Bonn.
A week before the fair was to begin, it was revealed that the local show manager, Karl-Heinz Dissberger, had been a member of two extreme-right groups. Dissberger and his company Barett Verlag were immediately suspended by COPEX.
A COPEX press release to the German media (original and translation enclosed) bemoaned "the tendency of the Germans toward paranoia and hysteria" and labelled protesters as "red/green extremists" who "hide their greed for power under the cloak of social consciousness". Nonetheless, the Bonn event was called off a few days later, when the manager of the conference centre citing public safety concerns cancelled COPEX's contract.
Parallel to the Bonn events, solicitors for COPEX had written to the National Peace Council (the umbrella organisation for peace groups in Britain) regarding an item about COPEX in their newsletter. The NPC agreed to publish an apology, which Peace News then commented upon in its July issue. Our short article, in turn, became the subject of letters from COPEX's solicitors. A writ and statement of claim followed in mid- September.
Peace News has not suggested that COPEX is involved in anything illegal or disapproved of by the British Government. However, Covert and Operational Procurement is a controversial area and Peace News has a right to make honest criticisms of the activities of exhibitors at COPEX and to condemn the human rights records of some of the visitors to COPEX. Peace News Limited reliant, like so many movement publishers, on voluntary labour and donations from supporters has chosen to fight this libel action energetically and publicly. As we say on page 4 of our October issue, "Far from apologising to COPEX, we aim to use this libel case to cast more light on the world of covert operations".
* This year's COPEX exhibition is scheduled for 31 October - 2 November at Sandown Exhibition Centre, Sandown racecourse, Esher, Surrey, England.
For further information, please contact Peace News:
Email: peacenews@gn.apc.org
Post: Peace News, 5 Caledonian Road, London N1 9DX, England
Phone: +44 171 278 3344
Fax: +44 171 278 0444
Letters of protest to:
[If you write to the racecourse, you should be aware that COPEX have also threatened legal action against various individuals who have written to Sandown.]
War Resisters' International
5 Caledonian Road
London N1 9DX
England
Email: warresisters@gn.apc.org
Phone: +44 171 278 4040
Fax: +44 171 278 0444
"War is a crime against humanity. I am therefore determined not to support any kind of war and to strive for the removal of all causes of war."