Saab Bofors disarmers face court in Sweden

March 8, 2009. They hammered on Carl Gustaf bazookas bound for the US, causing damages of over USD 100 000. On Monday, two peace campaigners appear in a local court in Eskilstuna, Sweden, for disrupting the Nordic country's arms exports to wars and human rights abusers.

In the early hours of October 16, 2008, “Avrusta” (Disarm) activists Anna Andersson, 27, and Martin Smedjeback, 35, cut open a fence and entered an assembly workshop at the Saab Bofors Dynamics site in the town of Eskilstuna, some 100 km from the capital Stockholm. They proceeded to scratch and dent 14 Carl Gustaf M3 anti-tank rocket launchers, left letters and a chocolate bar to workers and then alerted police of their presence in the high-security facility.

The peace activists were charged with gross malicious damage and breach of a law protecting installations of national security, offences which may yield up to four years' imprisonment. Acknowledging the action's impact, Saab Bofors Dynamics has penned a letter demanding 1 166 000 crowns (some USD 127 000) in damages, mainly for destroyed barrels, bolts and cartridge slots of the man-held Carl Gustafs, made in Eskilstuna since 1948.

- Swedish arms exports are larger than ever. I cannot quietly watch as arms made in Eskilstuna are used in conflict and war worldwide. The 14 grenade rifles we disarmed this fall will never be used to wound or kill a human being, says Anna Andersson, a web designer from Göteborg.

The Carl Gustaf recoilless rifle is one of the world's most notorious killers, used since the 1950s worldwide including by the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia, and in Israel, Burma, Zambia and Venezuela. In May 2008 the US government placed its latest order, worth USD 48 million, for the multi-purpose weapon. Swedish arms exports have quadrupled from some 3 to 12 billion crowns (USD 1.4 bln) since the year 2000.

- I look forward to the opportunity to defend our peace action in court. I hope we are acquitted since we acted to prevent Sweden's complicity in war crimes, says Martin Smedjeback, a nonviolence trainer from Malmö.

A simultaneous action in the BAE Systems Bofors facility in Karlskoga, Sweden led to a November 12, 2008, sentencing of two other activists from the Avrusta campaign to three months imprisonment and some 220 000 crowns (USD 24 000) in damages. They had dismantled howitzer parts bound for India, an export deal the activists say is another breach of Sweden's export guidelines stressing arms should not go to countries in conflict, with human rights issues or otherwise contradict development priorities.

The campaigners can be reached at +46 702 579 097, smedjeback@gmail.com (Martin Smedjeback) and, +46 737 772 818, kinaya@gmail.com (Anna Andersson).