Why Citizens Inspections?

Thousands of innocent people were killed and wounded during the latest Gulf War. The reason? According to the US, and a small "coalition of the willing", the regime of Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction. According to Bush and Blair these biological, chemical and nuclear weapons posed a serious danger to peace in the Middle East and the rest of the world.

However, the UNMOVIC weapons inspectors under the leadership of Hans Blix found no conclusive evidence of the presence of WMDs in Iraq. Their inspections were cut short by the military onslaught of the US and UK. And today we all know that the public was manipulated and lied to. Not one WMD has been found in Iraq. At the same time, all five permanent members of the UN security council (US, UK, France, Russia and China) possess largely secret nuclear weapons equivalent to many thousands of Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs. The blatant hypocrisy of this position has inspired many peace activists to take action. Over the previous years a growing number of citizens have been getting organised to go and have a closer look at the sites where weapons of mass destruction are being researched, developed, tested, manufactured, stockpiled and deployed.

The idea of the "citizens inspection" arose in 1997, while international attention was focussed on the UNSCOM inspections in Iraq. On July 8th 1997 (marking the first anniversary of the historic advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice regarding the illegality of nuclear weapons), an international delegation of peace activists handed over notarised Citizens Summons to all NATO heads of state during a NATO Summit in the Spanish capital Madrid. The summons demanded that the NATO governments fulfil their existing disarmament obligations- specifically under the 1968 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the 1996 advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ). The ICJ ruling stated that the use or threat of nuclear weapons would generally be contrary to the rules of international and humanitarian law, and that all states have an obligation to disarm. The ICJ ruled unanimously that Article VI of the NPT, which calls for the total elimination of nuclear weapons, is a legal obligation for the parties to the treaty, which includes the permanent members of the UN security council.

As there was no satisfactory response to the Citizens Summons, the NATO headquarters in Brussels was closed on August 6th 1997 for a 'war crimes inspection', with activists taking symbolic nonviolent direct action to block the main entrance to the buildings. This was the start of a long series of citizens inspections with teams asking not only for transparency, but also for governments to comply with international and humanitarian law.

Because of the lack of openness about nuclear weapons possessed by the US and her allies, and the absence of UN-inspectors in these countries, many groups started citizens war crimes inspections at nuclear related sites around the world. As far as we know citizens inspections have been organised in Australia, Belgium, Britain, Germany, Israel, Japan, the Netherlands and the US, (which has by far the largest and most modern program of WMD). Many citizens inspectors have been arrested for breaking local laws, for example by entering nuclear bases without permission. However, some have been successful in arguing that the Nuremberg Principles oblige them to take action to prevent war crimes and crimes against humanity.
[ Complete list of citizens inspections ]

Citizens inspections have been a successful tool in building effective political campaigns against nuclear weapons. In some cases they have also been a vital source of information about secretive nuclear establishments, with citizens inspection teams managing to recover documents about the nuclear tasks of supposedly conventionally armed bases.

The recent round of UNMOVIC weapon inspections in Iraq (2002-2003) led to renewed interest in this model of nonviolent direct action. Many groups took action to inspect not only nuclear bases, but also biological and chemical weapons bases, and bases used to deploy conventional weapons to the Gulf. During the latest meeting of the NPT PrepCom in May 2003 in Geneva, peace activists gathered in an attempt to bridge the gap between the locations where the UN inspections were taking place, and those sites involved in the development and deployment of WMDs. One important part of coordinating this work was the formation of the Citizens Inspections Working Group (CIWG), as a working group of the Abolition 2000 network for the abolition of nuclear weapons.

The working group aims to support citizens groups who inspect sites where WMD are being researched, produced, tested or deployed. The CIWG will assist Citizens Inspectors to report their findings to the public, United Nations bodies such as the security council and the International Atomic Energy Authority, national governments and other interested parties. It is currently being co-convened by the Los Alamos Study Group (USA) and Friends of the Earth (Belgium).

A electronic mailer for the Citizens Inspection working group has been set up. If you want to subscribe please send a message to the WG convenors: ciwg@lasg.org

To help in preparations for new inspections, the CIWG has produced an "Authorisation for Citizens Inspections" which is gathering signatures to rally a broader support for the inspectors, and a "Mandate for Citizens Inspections" which gives more details about the composition, the reporting requirements, and the rights of inspection teams. The working group is also developing a template that can be used by Citizens Inspectors, in order to submit details of their inspection actions. These inspection reports will be presented to government delegates as part of the NGO presentations to the NPT conference in New York in April 2004.