From Ashkelon Prison in 1987, Vanunu wrote:
"Any country, which manufactures and stocks nuclear weapons, is first of
all endangering its own citizens. This is why the citizens must confront their
government and warn it that it has no right to expose them to this danger.
Because, in effect, the citizens are being held hostage by their own
government, just as if they have been hijacked and deprived of their freedom
and threatened when governments develop nuclear weapons without the
consent of their citizens - and this is true in most cases - they are violating
the basic rights of their citizens, the basic right not to live under constant
threat of annihilation. Is any government qualified and authorized to produce
such weapons?"
In April 1999, thirty-six members of the House of Representatives signed a
letter calling for Vanunu's release from prison because they believed "we
have a duty to stand up for men and women like Mordechai Vanunu who dare to
articulate a brighter vision for humanity."
President Clinton responded with a public statement expressing concern for
Vanunu and the need for Israel and other non-parties to the Non-Proliferation
Treaty to adhere to it and accept IAEA safeguards.
However, ever since the silence had been deafening, until hope resurrected in
Prague:
"We are here today because enough people ignored the voices who told them
that the world could not change. We're here today because of the courage of
those who stood up and took risks to say that freedom is a right for all
people, no matter what side of a wall they live on, and no matter what they
look like. We are here today because the simple and principled pursuit of
liberty and opportunity shamed those who relied on the power of tanks and arms
to put down the will of a people.
"Some argue that the spread of these weapons cannot be stopped, cannot be
checked - that we are destined to live in a world where more nations and more
people possess the ultimate tools of destruction. Such fatalism is a deadly
adversary, for if we believe that the spread of nuclear weapons is inevitable,
then in some way we are admitting to ourselves that the use of nuclear weapons
is inevitable.
"As the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon, the United
States has a moral responsibility to act. It will take patience and
persistence. But now we, too, must ignore the voices who tell us that the world
cannot change. We have to insist, 'Yes, we can.'
"There is violence and injustice in our world that must be confronted. We
must confront it by standing together as free nations, as free people. I know
that a call to arms can stir the souls of men and women more than a call to lay
them down. But that is why the voices for peace and progress must be raised
together.
Together we can do it.
"Words must mean something [and] violence and injustice must be confronted
by standing together as free nations, as free people. Human destiny will be
what we make of it."-President Obama
http://humanrights.change.org/petitions/view/release_mordechai_vanunu
Learn more:
US and Israeli Nuclear Deceptions
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