Friends, Peace and Pine Gap

Miss Eagle has to-day received this letter and these photographs from Dale Hess.

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Friends,

I have just received these photos of the Quaker Meeting held at Pine Gap. To learn what is happening at the trial of the Pine Gap 4, click on: http://www.pinegapontrial.blogspot.com/

Best regards,
Dale
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From: Jessica Morrison
Sent: Monday, 11 June 2007 9:32 PM
To: Hess Dale
Subject: Quaker Meeting at the Gates of Pine Gap - was it the first?

Dear Dale

I thought Friends may be interested in this,

Jessica
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On Saturday 9th June, 25 people attended a Quaker meeting for worship 20 kms outside Alice Springs. The venue was the front gates of Pine Gap, a US/Australian Joint Defence Facility (also known as a US spy base), and the site of many protests.

While this was the first meeting for worship, this group of activists were able to grasp the process quickly (apart from sitting still for so long!).

Ministry included:

• Hindu mantras;the query relating to seeds of conflict in ourselves;
• stories of civil disobedience by Quakers;
• that prophets went into the desert to find God and
• that we go into the desert to find the truth about our country;
• the nature of silence; and
• the experience to attend the base in listening, rather than broadcasting of our opinions.

We finished with the laying of a peace sign of flowers and holding hands.

Converging towards Peace

Pine Gap has been an emblem of Australia's involvement in the United States geo-military network since 9 December 1966 when the Australian and US governments signed the Pine Gap treaty. Pine Gap is a CIA-run facility as the ground control and processing station for geosynchronous satellites engaged in signals intelligence collection.

There are four categories of signals collected:

• telemetry from advanced weaponos developmebnt, such as ballistic missiles, used for arms control verification;
• signals from anti-missile and anti-aircraft radars;
• transmissions intended for communicatins satellites; and
• microwave emissions, such as long distance telephone calls.

It is widely beleaved that this facility and facilities like it around the world also benefit the commercial interests of the US government and US corporations, commonly referred to as US Inc. In short, industrial and commercial espionage is part of its brief. Bear this in mind when considering the Australia-US Fair Trade Agreement.

Pine Gap has been the focus, across the years, of numerous demonstrations. In December last year, a group of poeple known as Christians Against ALL Terrorism actually penetrated the Pine Gap perimeter by peaceful means and face trial on October 3, 2006 in Alice Springs in Australia's Northern Territory. Read an account of their experience here.This trial is of particular legal interest because Australia's Attorney-General, that ghost like person Phillip Ruddock, has charged these four people under a never before used Commonowealth law. Please go to the website where you can leave donations and look at other ways in which you might be able to support the Pine Gap 4, Jim Dowling, Adele Goldie, Bryan Law and Donna Mulhearn.