In intermittent rain, about a thousand people gathere in barkers rool in une centre of Sheffield on Saturday 23rd November at noon to demonstrate under the banner 'Don't Attack Iraq, Freedom for Palestine. The organisers, Sheffield Stop the War Coalition, were pleased with the tumout. You can see how strongly people in Sheffield oppose this war by the number who were determined to ignore the weather and participate in one demonsuauon As people assembled the march was addressed by Musheir el Farra of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, and Boo Blackbum from the Fire Brigades Unior. and a statement by Ron Kovic author of Bom on the Fourth of July) was read out. Then, with the FBu banner at the
and paved on its way by the Sheffed Samoa Band. demonstrators marched around the town centre, before returning to Barkers Pool for a rally.
The final rally was addressed by a broad range of speakers from local poet (and ex-serviceman) Tim Nice But Nice, to representatives of CND, the Socialist Alliance and Green Party, to local antiwar activists and young people who had participated in International Solidarity Movement peace trips to Palestine. One thing that emerged over and over again was the number and variety of antiwar actions being planned in Sheffield in the run up to Christmas. It is clear that as a war against Iraq seems a more imminent prospect and Israel's brutal occupation of Palestine continues, people's determination to fight against these is being strengthened Kathy Lowe Claims by jailed whistleblower David Shayler that British intelligence hired al-Qaeda militants to try to assassinate Libyan leader Colonel Gaddafi are supported in a book by French intelligence experts just published in the US. The revelations - reported in the Observer newspaper - from the book Forbidden Truth, appear to confirm Shayler's disclosures that MI5 and MId enlisted the help of the Libyabased Islamic Fighting Group in the • 1996 failed coup plot. The book's authors, joumalist Guillaume Dasquie and Jean-Charles Brisard, an adviser to French President Jacques Chirac, also claim this is why Britsh and US intelligence agencies later buned an interpol arrest warrant attempt. to his revelations. New revelations support Shayler claims for Osama bin Laden issued by Libya. In 1998, five months after the warrant, more than 200 people died in the truck bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania thought to have been carried out by al-Qaeda
David Shayler, the former MI5 officer jailed for 6 months in November for breaking the Official Secrets Act, has always claimed MI6 passed 100,000 pounds to al-Qaeda operatives involved in the Gaddafi assassination At his trial Shayler was prevented from calling two MI6 agents as witnesses. Neither was he allowed to defend himself by telling the jury about the disclosures he had made to the press and why. In fact, no reference was made on the charge sheet
Such was the secrecy that after Home Secretary David Blunkett and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw signed gagging orders, the judge not only prevented the media from reporting large parts of the trial but also from reporting the gagging orders themselves.
In the run-up to the court case Shayler spoke at meetings around the country telling his story of Gaddafi and how the secret state spied on antiapartheid activists, anti-racist campaigners, trade unionists, left groups and left wing MPs He has been punished for exposing how the intelligence services subvert democracy. But jailing him has failed to hide how the British and US authorities once colluded with the very people now on their hit list in the so-called 'war against terrorism'.
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