Messages to Mordechai from around the world
From Desmond M Tutu
Anglican Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town
26 April 2004
My warmest greetings, I am thrilled that you are released from prison but it
is distressing that you are not yet able to walk free. As South Africa
celebrates a decade of freedom and democracy we remember the dark days of
apartheid from where we have come. Freedom cannot be gained through the
barrel of a gun, nuclear warheads or the oppression of those you fear. In
South Africa we have now shaken off the shackles of fear, hate and
oppression and are learning that none are free unless all are free. Respect
for human rights is the foundation for tolerance and trust and is the way
forward to peace and prosperity.
In South Africa we enjoyed the support and prayers of the International
community in our struggle to overcome apartheid. Many of your Anglican
brothers and sisters are supporting you too with their prayers and good
wishes in the hope that you will indeed enjoy freedom at last. I am pleased
to be among them.
From Jeremy Dear General Secretary NUJ
The NEC is proud to be associated with the brave action of Mordechai Vanunu
a brave and principled man who told the truth about his country's nuclear
weapons of mass destruction. For journalists, he is a symbo0l of the right
to publish and circulate information. That's why at our Annual Conference
this year we made Mordechai an NUJ Member of Honour and hope to present his
membership certificate to him as a free citizen next week.
Like man others I am outraged at the news of the latest restrictions
imposed by theauthorities forbidding Mordechai to speak to or associate
with foreigners. This is a denial of a basic human right the freedom of
association, and I repeat this union's demand that he be released
unconditionally and be given a passport and the freedom to travel wherever
he wishes.
Jeremy Dear General Secretary 16 April 2004
From Jean Lambert
I very much welcome your release, which is long overdue. I deeply regret
not being amongst the crowd that will greet you today due to business in
the European Parliament. However, you will be in the thoughts of my
political group (the Greens/EFA) who have long admired your courage,
integrity and resilience, not least during your long and inhumane period
of solitary confinement.
Nuclear weapons represent a crime against humanity: they threaten our
security and the long-term future of our planet. When I visited Hiroshima
and Nagasaki, I heard from survivors of their terrifying and horrific
experiences in 1945. That only confirmed my conviction that your action in
telling the world about Israel's nuclear capability was right and in the
interest of humanity.
You are being released in to an ever more dangerous world. The risk is
growing from nuclear proliferation and the development of small-scale
nuclear weapons as well as terrorism. We need campaigners for peace and
against such terrible weapons.
I trust you will now be able to follow your conscience in freedom and free
from threat.
Thank you so much for what you have already done and endured.
In peace,
Jean Lambert. Green Party Member of the European Parliament and
Vice-President of the Green/EFA Group.
From Keith Locke MP, Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Green Party of
Aotearoa/New Zealand
Dear Mordechai,
We salute your great courage and welcome your freedom.
We are deeply saddened by the huge sacrifice you have been forced to make
for telling the truth about Israel's bomb. However, by standing true to
your principles, you have made a considerable contribution to the struggle
to free our planet of nuclear weapons.
We would be most honored to be able to host you in nuclear-free New Zealand
sometime in the near future if that proved possible.
In peace.
From Jarle Aarbakke, Rector and Randi Ronning Balsvik, history professor,
Tromsoe University, Norway
Dear Mordechai,
Since May 2001, Mordechai Vanunu is honorary doctor of the University of
Tromsoe, Norway, following a proposal by our department of History. We look
forward to his release on April 21 and hope to receive him in Tromsoe as
soon as suitable.
He has been subjected to inhuman punishment and his release will be a day of
joy for Vanunu himself, for our university and all who have fought for his
freedom.
In the 2001 doctoral ceremony, Meir Vanunu represented his brother. Now we
hope that Mordechai Vanunu will be able to come to Tromsoe to receive our
acclaim and that together we can focus on freedom of expression and the
struggle for peace.
From Arundhati Roy, author
The world owes Mordechai Vanunu. We must welcome him back, honor him,
cherish him, love him and above all, protect him as best we can. Of all of
us who have campaigned and protested against nuclear weapons - he is the
bravest and the best. To him a big Zindabad.
All the best.
From Harold Pinter, playwright and actor
To Mordechai Vanunu -
I wish to tell you of my great admiration for your endurance and your
dignity over all these terrible years. You are a remarkable man, a man of
principle and integrity and I send you my warmest wishes. I trust you will
be left in peace.
From Melvyn Bragg, Broadcaster, writer and critic
I'm sorry not to be with you to celebrate the release of Mordechai Vanunu.
I greatly admire his integrity and have been impressed by the wide support
given to him, including the support of those who, like myself, are friends
of Israel in these most difficult times. I wish I could be there to applaud
his freedom.
Best wishes.
From Michael Mansfield, Q.C. International human rights lawyer, upon Dr. Vanunu's release:
It is a bitter irony that the UK has waged war in Iraq on the pretext of
WMD, and the repeated violation of UN resolutions; when all the while, as
Mordechai has courageously highlighted, Israel has developed a WMD
programme, both nuclear and biochemical, in the absence of UN inspection,
and has fragrantly flouted numerous different UN resolutions.
Dr. Vanunu's abduction and trial also showed Israel's scant regard for the
principles of international justice. The subsequent years of indescribable
incarceration provide the most compelling example of an inhumanity that is
played out on a daily basis in the Occupied Territories. There will be now
peace without justice, and Mordechai's staunch and steadfast stand against
injustice, has provided enduring inspiration in a struggle which now needs
more than ever, the collective strength of all those throughout the world
who have never wavered in their support for him. Light, not might, is
right.
Solidarity
Michael Mansfield QC
London
12 April 2004
From Molly Russell Smith
Yours is the voice that cried aloud, publishing death. Doggedly, in pursuit
of truth. You, the one, snatched from the crowd, languishing in Ashkelon.
Solitary in your cell. We may not have met you. Yet we know you well. The
headlines fade, the years pass. But we shall not forget - Yours the palm
pressed to the glass. We see it yet.
From Sister Ardeth Platte, OP, currently imprisoned in the USA for disarming
weapons of mass destruction, letter from prison
Mordechai, you are in our hearts; please come to our home that we may say
thank you in person for revealing nuclear weapons in Israel and doing 18
years of time for your truthtelling.
From Emma Thompson, film and TV actor
The international actress, Emma Thompson, has sent a delightful photograph
of herself with love and best wishes to Mordechai Vanunu.
From Daniel Ellsberg, USA whistleblower, the Pentagon Papers
Mordechai Vanunu is the preeminent hero and whistleblower of the nuclear
era. He is the one who consciously risked all he had in life to warn his
own country and the world of an existing, ongoing addition to the nuclear
dangers of the era. And he is the one who has actually paid that price, a
burden in many ways worse than death, for his heroic and prophetic act, for
doing exactly what he should have done and what others should be doing. He
is a prophet who deserves honor in all the world.
Vanunu should long since have been released from solitary and from prison,
not because he had "suffered enough" but because what he did was right for
him to do under the circumstances. The cult and culture of secrecy in every
nuclear weapons state has endangered and continues to threaten the survival
of humanity. Vanunu's challenge to that wrongful and dangerous secrecy must
be joined worldwide.
From Julie Christie, film actor
Mordechai Vanunu acted out of honour and principle and he believed, with the
blessing of international law, to reveal to the world his country's secret
plans for the stockpiling of hundreds of nuclear warheads with no debate or
authorization from its citizens. Since then we have seen a country bombed
for not revealing its supposed plans for nuclear weaponry. But, for his
actions, Mordechai Vanunu has been incarcerated for nearly 18 years (12 in
solitary confinement), a horrific punishment for any crime and when applied
to a whistleblower like Vanunu, a barbarity is revealed. The world must not
allow his punishment to continue. He must be freed unconditionally today.
From Fredrik S. Heffermehl, lawyer, International Free Vanunu Committee
Vanunu stands tall, a rare giant, not in nuclear physics and bomb
construction - he was a junior technician - but as a model world citizen and
a pioneer showing the way for increasing numbers of whistleblowers, more and
more also in the fields of weapons, war and national security.
From the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone
Dear Mordechai,
I am sorry I cannot be with your other supporters today as they celebrate
your release from prison. I salute your courage and determination over the
past 17 and half years, sacrificing your freedom for the sake of a nuclear
free Middle East and nuclear free world. I hope at a some point you may
want to come to London to meet the many supporters who have campaigned
tirelessly on your behalf. I look forward to welcoming you.
VANUNU WAS FREED ON 21ST APRIL 2004
YET STILL REMAINS HELD IN ISRAEL AGAINST HIS WILL
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