Media Release
Cairns Peace Pilgrim crosses the line to pray at Pine Gap Defence Facility early Monday as Peace Convergence ends.
UPDATE: Paul Christie has been arrested and is being held at the Alice Watchhouse.
Peace Pilgrim Paul Christie has been arrested after praying on the mountain at Pine Gap Defence Facility and is being held by police in the Alice Springs watchhouse.
It is not clear what charges he is facing given the challenge to the Defence (Special Undertakings) Act 1952 by Supreme Court Judge Trigg last Thursday.

The police prosecution last Thursday were directed to drop charges against 5 Peace Pilgrims after Judge Trigg announced that the legislation was “a nonsense”.

Judge Daynor Trigg, said  the legislation requires an ‘authority to prosecute’ from the Attorney General BEFORE prosecution proceeds. He added that the law states that ‘prosecution’ starts with charging.

All pilgrims who were lamenting the preparation of illegal war at Pine Gap were immediately released last Thursday.

It is understood the police prosecutor intends to appeal later this month in the Darwin High Court.
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Paul Christie is expected to appear in court at the 2pm sitting Monday afternoon in Alice Springs.
PHOTO and VIDEO opportunity outside the court following proceedings.

Margaret Pestorius 0410273604
More information at www.closepinegap.org/media
PINE GAP PEACE CONVERGENCE
Cairns Peace Pilgrim crosses the line to pray at Pine Gap Defence Facility early Monday as Peace Convergence ends.
The Peace Pilgrims continued last night building a culture of peace with lamentations, ceremony and prayer on the hills overlooking the secret US Spy base that is Pine Gap.
Paul Christie of Cairns, and a member of the Australian Peace Pilgrims, has come all this way to answer the call from the Arrernte elders, past and present, to begin the process of closing down Pine Gap.
“Before we can begin to imagine the end of our war culture and the closing of terror bases like Pine Gap we must sit and mourn, we must sit and accept, we must sit and recognize the horrors that our collective denial has allowed” says Paul Christie.
“I have been called to carry out a healing ceremony for the land and for its people, the Arrernte people, for the water that runs under the base and through us all, for the families destroyed by the US war machine and to pay respect to the ancestors who walked this land for thousands of years”
Pauli Christie Peace Pilgrim from Gimuy (Cairns)
“All honest people are converging, all cultures are converging, all faiths are converging in the dream of an end to this war culture, of a rebirth of sovereignty, of a resurrection of truth and justice for all. It is time to end the rule of the Psychopaths”
“I am one humble man that will walk the land with the permissions of the elders past and present. I do not do this as a protest but as the right thing to do, I do not disobey the state for the sake of disobedience but because what I do I feel we all must do. Face the horror, face the denial and expose it”
As the convergence of Peace Makers from across the country and the world come to a close there is a stronger sense of empowerment, inspiration and encouragement to continue together to raise awareness, build community and strengthen the network of peace makers across the world.
“The war culture will end, it is up to each of us, in our own way, to help that happen sooner” says Paul Christie.
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For more information about the Peace Convergence or any of the actions carried out ask for contact with the Media collective via
Facebook Close Pine Gap community page
Twitter: @ClosePineGap.
For specific information regarding Paul Christie’s action and for interviews contact
Margaret Pestorius 0410273604.
Margaret Pestorius after 4th October 0403214422
Graeme Dunstan 0407951688

Additional Material
 
Google drive pertaining to Peace Pilgrims attending the Pine Gap Peace Convergence
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B49kj-kAC_bKT2YxNkJGZVdvN2c
 
Background
Paul Christie is attends the convergence with the Peace Pilgrims who earlier this week entered the base to pray and play a song of lament on the hill overlooking. Their charges were thrown out of court on Thursday by Alice Springs Supreme Court Judge Mr Trigg.
See ABC online article at
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-29/pine-gap-protesters-freed-after-military-facility-break-in/7890734
 
See also additional media releases and media exposure from the Close Pine Gap Peace Convergence at
https://closepinegap.org.au/media/

Australian peace activists attempting to close the Pine Gap US intelligence base declare their solidarity with imprisoned whistleblower Chelsea Manning.
Chelsea Manning was a US soldier, arrested in 2010 after leaking thousands of classified documents related to the war in Iraq. In 2013 she was sentenced to 35 years in military prison for the leaks.
Chelsea attempted suicide in July and was hospitalised. Last Friday she was found guilty of charges related to the suicide attempt and sentenced to 14 days solitary confinement.
The Pine Gap intelligence base and the imprisonment of Chelsea Manning are both symbols of the US military’s war on the truth. On one side of the world you have this intelligence base, hidden away in the desert, unaccountable even to the Australian government, which drops bombs with impunity on places where the US has never declared war. On the other side of the world is a person locked up for most of her life for daring to tell what she saw with her own eyes in a US warzone.
Peace will never come from a military superpower spying on the world, killing people in their homes, unaccountable to anyone and willing to go to any lengths to suppress the truth about its actions. Peace can only come from openness, transparency and a willingness to take responsibility for our own actions. Courageous truth-tellers like Chelsea Manning are not criminals – they are our only hope of a better world.

Early on Thursday morning, five “peace pilgrims” walked on to the Pine Gap US military base at Alice Springs, in Arrernte country, to lament the death caused by the base and to resist the violence that is perpetrated there.
Jim Dowling, Margaret Pestorius, Andy Paine, Tim Webb and Franz Dowling were the pilgrims. Christians committed to non-violence, most of us had undertaken “peace pilgrimages” before on this and other military facilities.
We had already had several thwarted attempts at actions at Pine Gap this week, and this one involved a long late night walk through pretty tough country. When we eventually arrived at the perimeter fence we discovered police patrolling with spotlights. If we were going to get to the base it was going to be a race.
The actual Pine Gap facility is tucked away behind hills. With police at the top, our only hope of lamenting in eyesight of the base was to do it on the run. Musical instruments and a photo of an Iraqi father holding his dead child had been packed to aid the lament. They were unpacked halfway up the hill. Miraculously, the instruments were in tune. Playing guitar and viola while running up a mountain is not easy. Neither is filming the whole thing in the dark. Nevertheless, the feeling was there.

https://closepinegap.org.au/wp-content/uploads/Facebook-Live-Feed-Pilgrims-Lament-Overlooking-Pine-gap-No-1-the-good-one.mp4
The musicians made it to the top of the hill performing their elegy. The cameraman was tackled by two cops and handcuffed. There in front of us sat Pine Gap – the place that spies on the world, identifying targets for bombs and drone strikes. The place that has been responsible for so much death. The place that is central to the myth of nuclear weapons being a “defence”. All around us, invisible satellite signals were being sent and received; part of the never-ending and all-encompassing War On Terror, aiding the reign of the world’s military superpower. Prayers were uttered. Tears were shed. The defiance in our hearts was strengthened. And then we were frisked, locked in police vans and transported out of there.
We were charged with trespass under the Defence (Special Undertakings) Act. The law exists specifically to protect Pine Gap and carries a maximum penalty of seven years imprisonment. Only one group of people have ever been charged with it before – the “Pine Gap Four”, who in 2005 entered the base to conduct a “citizen’s inspection”. One of the Four, Jim Dowling, was with us again this time.
In 2007, the Pine Gap Four had their charges overturned on appeal. The High Court ruled that to use the act, the government had to prove that Pine Gap was used for the defence of Australia. A subsequent law change means that is no longer the case – it is now written into the law that Pine Gap is a “defence facility”.
Another complication to the law arose though. For a charge of this magnitude, the expressed consent of the federal Attorney-General is required to charge someone. The prosecution admitted that Attorney-General George Brandis had not got back to them yet. They expected this meant the case would adjourned. Judge Daynor Trigg disagreed. The charges, he said, should be dismissed.
After much discussion in the cell of what we should do regarding bail conditions, to our surprise we were called into court to be told we could go free.
A big crowd of supporters at the court cheered, and we walked out to hugs and smiles. Another lament, this one stationary and free of police interruption, was performed. Our expectation though is that the charges will be re-laid shortly, and facing the serious penalties of this act in court will be very interesting and challenging.
A big thankyou to everybody who helped us in the action, and all who have supported and encouraged us. Let’s continue together to resist the war machine and create a more peaceful world. Close Pine Gap!