AN appeal has been sent to the Pope to visit Faslane to make a stand against nuclear weapons.
It has been made by veteran peace campaigner Brian Quail whose protests have previously attracted support from comic-book king Mark Millar.
Kick-Ass creator Millar, who was taught Latin and classics by the now retired teacher, offered to pay the legal costs when Quail and a fellow pensioner were locked up for protesting against Trident, based at Faslane on the Clyde.
READ MORE: CND groups opposed to Trident back AUOB's Faslane rally
Millar, below, said he was “horrified” after reading of their plight in this paper.
Despite a recent stroke, 83-year-old Quail has pledged to keep on campaigning against the weapons and wants the Pope to join in when he visits Scotland for the COP26 climate change conference in November.
Six stints in jail for non-payment of fines and 16 convictions for breach of the peace have not deterred Quail from attending the monthly vigil at Faslane, even though he has more difficulty walking since his stroke.
In an open letter to Pope Francis, Quail said: “You have already condemned the possession of nuclear weapons and thereby demolished any attempt to legitimise the policy of deterrence which has dominated political life for many decades now.
“Apart from visiting Glasgow during COP26, I implore you to come to Faslane also, as a fellow pilgrim of peace and as a loving shepherd, to give public support to all those who for so long have shared your detestation of nuclear weapons.”
READ MORE: Trident is of absolutely no benefit to Scotland, so why do we have it?
Quail has just finished a four-day fast observed by nuclear campaigners across the world to mark the anniversary of the obliteration of Hiroshima which he says was the “greatest single-act war crime in history and the origin of our present nuclear nightmare”.
However, although he has been taking part in the fast for many years, he said this time it had been “very taxing”, following his stroke.
Quail aims to keep up the protests, particularly in the run-up to COP26.
He said: “Now the focus is internationally on Scotland which is the only country in world that hosts nuclear weapons imposed on us against our will by another government.
“It is against the will of the Scottish people, the Scottish Government and most political parties in Scotland.”
He pointed out that during Pope Francis’s historic visit to Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 2019, he declared that the use of atomic energy for purposes of war was immoral, just as the possessing of nuclear weapons was immoral.
“The pontiff said the world must never grow weary of working to
support the principal international legal instruments of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation, including the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons,” said Quail.
“Francis’s pronouncement was clear: The very possession of nuclear weapons is immoral. Therefore, if it is wrong for followers of Jesus to possess nuclear weapons, then it is equally wrong to build and modernise them.”
After Millar offered to pay Quail’s legal costs he told the National: “He’s still fondly remembered by my pals because even as kids we knew he was a guy of tremendous convictions.
“I remember his class being filled top to bottom with anti-war posters and he gave me the first CND badge I ever pinned to my school blazer.”
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