Action Camp

International action camp against NEAT

July 22nd-29th 2011, the antimilitaristic network Ofog organised an international peace action camp against the military training area NEAT in Northern Sweden. NEAT in Europe's largest overland military test range used by militaries from all over the world for testing missiles, combat aircrafts and unmanned aerial vehicles.

Below you find a summary of outreaching activities taking place during the action camp in Luleå. Of course, thousands of other things such as informal discussions and meetings, evaluations, cooking, dancing, solidarity outside the police station, laughter and seriousness also took place during the camp but those are not documented....

Weekend of international seminars, July 23rd-24th

The camp started with a whole weekend of seminars with speakers from 21 countries and five continents at high school “Lärkan” in central Luleå. The different workshops, discussions and lectures were attended by about 300 people in total and affected many different aspects of anti-militarist resistance and work.

International seminars
Seminar program

Mass action against the military airport at NEAT, July 26th

July 26th, 170 international peace activists from 17 countries entered the North European Aerospace Test range in a massive act of nonviolent civil disobedience. About 28 activists were arrested or detained, among them activist from Venezuela, Spain, Germany, Germany, UK, Finland, and Sweden. A total of 201 persons took part in the action, which aimed to expose the massive test range NEAT. The action started at midday with a pink carnival which involved people marking the test range and the road leading to it with pink arrows and the slogan ”War starts here, let’s stop it here!”. The airspace was marked by a release of pink balloons after a die-in outside the area.

Press release: 170 international peace activists enter secret Swedish military test site
Photos of action

Theme day: Migration, July 27th

During the day street actions connecting anti-militarism and the struggle for a world without borders took place in form of a "checkpoint" to highlight Fortress Europe and the militarism that maintains and protects it. Action was followed by a discussion in the evening on how to connect these struggles even more.

Theme day: Climate, July 28th

During this day an action was done against SSAB, large steel factory selling a lot of steel to among others Israel and United Arab Emirates. In the evening links between climate struggle and anti-militarism were discussed.

Four people at radar station in NEAT test area, July 28th

In the early morning of July 28th four Ofog activists went into the NEAT military area and to the radar station Palja, where they marked where war starts with a banner saying "War starts here". The four were arrested by security guards and dropped of outside the area.

Photo of action

More news and press releases: read more about the mass action, about the solidarity actions outside Luleå police station where ten international activists were taken into custody and about their release, and about other things that took place during the camp.