Yesterday the ship made a stop at Hereheretue, a beautiful atoll half way between Tahiti and Moruroa. Ashore, they had prepared the most wonderful welcome feast, with cooked and raw reef fish, local fruit and vegetables. After the meal the mayor sent us on our way with a very warm and heartfelt speech, wishing us the very best for our attempts to stop this testing madness, and saying that the people of Hereheretue might not be with us physically but their spirit went with us. Time to stand up and be counted, as we sail toward the test zone.
Campaign update Nothing to add on the French warship front, all quiet on board.
The Group of 21 non-aligned countries at the Geneva Conference on Disarmament have launched a critique of France and China's testing programmes. They described France's decision to resume testing as a 'serious setback' for the Comprehensive Test Ban negotiations, and urged all nuclear weapon states to observe a moratorium until a CTB enters into force. They argue that, consistent with the CD's negotiating mandate, the CBT should be 'an instrument against both horizontal and vertical nuclear proliferation and should effectively contribute to nuclear disarmament'. They are therefore calling for the scope of the comprehensive test ban treaty to ban all tests in all environments. Reacting to news that the US might look to exempt low-yield tests from the ban, they have called for a test ban that really means zero.