TWO anti-Trident campaigners have been locked up after refusing to accept special bail conditions in connection with their alleged role in a blockade of the Coulport naval base.
Brian Quail, 79, and 66-year-old Angie Zelter were remanded in custody at Dumbarton Justice of the Peace Court after denying breach of the peace charges.
The pair were among five people arrested after an incident on the Whistlefield-Coulport road, which is on land owned by the Ministry of Defence, on Tuesday morning.
Prosecutors asked that a special bail condition be imposed on all five accused preventing them from going within 100 metres of the bases at Faslane and Coulport.
Three other protesters – Sam Donaldson (29), Almuneda Izquierzo Olmo (age) and Juan Carlos Navarro Diaz (76) – also denied the charges against them and were released after agreeing to adhere to the special condition.
But Quail and Zelter were remanded in custody after they refused to accept the special condition.
They will stand trial on Thursday, August 3.
Tuesday's incident was part of a week of disruptive action by the Trident Ploughshares campaign, which is holding a protest camp at Peaton Wood, near Coulport.
A Trident Ploughshares spokesperson said: “Scottish courts should not be jailing people for protesting peaceful against the active deployment of a hideous weapon system that clearly breaches the Geneva Convention, which no less than 122 countries worldwide want to prohibit and eliminate, and which is rejected by the overwhelming majority of Scottish parliamentarians both at Holyrood and Westminster.
“It just does not make any sense.
“The principled stand of Angie and Brian is a wake-up call to us all to join the majority world.”
The week of Trident Ploughshares disruptive action against the nuclear weapon bases continues until Sunday.
Four more protesters were arrested on Thursday after a similar attempted blockade on the same stretch of road.
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