TWEEDDALE residents took part in this week’s blockade of Faslane Naval Base, on the River Clyde, where Britain’s nuclear-armed Trident submarines are based.

The Scrap Trident Coalition’s Bairns Not Bombs demonstration aimed to shut down the base, which is home to the UK’s Trident nuclear weapons system.

With an election looming, the blockade was aimed at focusing attention on the UK’s nuclear deterrent in the run up to next month’s general election.

Anti-nuclear campaigner Liz Findlay, from Innerleithen, said: “It is good to have the freedom to demonstrate against Trident. We have an opportunity next month to begin the journey towards disarmament.” Moira Lindsay, 70, from Peebles added: “There was singing, chanting, laughter and good humour from the protesters. Many of them, like me, had never done anything like this before. “I am horrified that the biggest political parties in the UK are intending to renew Trident, Britain’s own Weapons of Mass Destruction.” Police used cutting equipment to release protestors who blocked the road by chaining themselves together.

A retired teacher from Innerleithen, who only gave her name as Joan, said: “Allowing Weapons of Mass Destruction to be housed in Scotland does not protect us but diverts resources and attention from tackling austerity and climate change.

“As a nation we owe it to our young people to make sure Trident is not renewed and that the obscene amount of money set aside for that is used to build schools, hospitals and create employment.

“You can bomb the world to pieces but you cannot bomb it into peace.”