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Categories: Lifetime Achievement and Special Recognition – 2020

Deb Haaland was one of the first Native American deputies elected to the US Congress in 2018. Whether it is climate change or Covid 19 – the voice of Democrat Deb Haaland is well heard in Washington. She is currently one of the campaigners for an extension of the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) of 2019: the financial compensation is to include uranium miners after 1971, as well as the Trinity Downwinders. She was awarded a “Special Recognition” for her commitment.

There are people who cannot help themselves. If they see an injustice, they intervene. Writing, shouting, arguing, singing, painting, writing poetry, setting to music, demonstrating, admonishing, getting in the way. Artists and activists are above all, sometimes they make it into politics. Like Deb Haaland, for example.

She is a member of the Laguna Pueblo in the state of New Mexico. Pueblos are the name given to the tribal communities on the Colorado Plateau whose traditional form of housing consists of multi-story clay buildings. Laguna, founded in 1699, is located east of Grants, the city that calls itself “Uranium Capital”, there is a “Uranium Café” there. Right next to the Pueblo, the Anaconda company began prospecting uranium in 1952; the land was leased from the Keres-speaking Laguna people; the residents learned nothing of the dangers. By February 1982 the three open pits of the Jackpile Mine were exhausted; in the 30 years the Anaconda Company had moved 400 million tons of rock, 25 million of which contained enough uranium to produce yellowcake. Radioactive dust has been and continues to be carried by the desert wind in this region, jut like the tumbleweeds typical of the landscape.

Deb Haaland’s father was a naval officer, her Indian mother had met her Norwegian-born husband in the Navy, and after leaving the military she worked in Indian schools under the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA).

In 2018, the Democrat Deb Haaland was one of the first Indian representatives to be elected to the US Congress. On her official website she gives an insight into her early years: As a single mother she lived on food stamps, often lived with friends and managed to get a degree at the University of New Mexico and at UNM Law School. Deb still pays back the loans for her studies – just like her daughter Somah. Before she went into politics, Deb was a raw food cook and sold her homemade pueblo salsa, which many still rave about. Soon she was brought into the tribal council.

Whether it was the global climate (whose crisis the Republican Party ignored) or Covid 19 (Trump had held back 679 million for Indian corona patients), whether it was social exploitation (the cab multinationals Uber and Lyft deny their drivers social and health insurance) or the forced shrinking of the National Monument Bears Ears in Utah (Trump wants to make uranium deposits in the natural park accessible), Deb Haaland’s voice can be heard in Washington. “We can rely on her,” says Anna Rondon, a long-time fighter against uranium mines on the Navajo reservation. Now Deb Haaland is one of the campaigners for an extension of the 2019 Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA): the financial compensation should also include uranium miners after 1971, as well as the Trinity Downwinders. Trinity was the world’s first nuclear test in 1945 – in the land of the Mescalero Apache. To this day, the descendants of the contaminated victims are waiting for compensation.

Their concern for the earth drives her: “We must inhabit the earth as sustainable beings; to do so, we must change the direction of our thinking. If we take something from the earth, we must also give something back to her”.

Category Solution – 2020

Since 2005, Ray Acheson has been involved with intergovernmental disarmament processes, She is one of the most active authors of reporting and gendered analysis on weapons and the international arms trade. An important part of Rays work is empowering civil society organizations through network coordination. One of the most compelling results of her work: the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).

Foto: Tim Wright

Category Education – 2020

There are people who risk everything to protest against nuclear power and nuclear weapons. Many are put on trial and thrown into prison for this. And then there are people who support the anti-nuclear opponents. Two people who have been active in this way for a lifetime are Felice and Jack Cohen Joppa. Until today, through their publishing and charity organization “The Nuclear Resister” they have documented more than 100,000 anti-nuclear and anti-war actions.

Honor Award (Lifetime Achievement) – 2022

“The fact that a woman supports the strugglers against the reprocessing plant with warm socks so that they don’t get cold feet” impressed us very much, emphasizes the NFFF jury. In any case, Irmgard also attributes the fact that the Bavarian state government abandoned the construction of the WAA in 1989 to her “resistance socks” – that is true in any case, but very modestly formulated.

Disobedience was not in the cradle of Irmgard Gietl, who is now 93 years old. Her youth in the Upper Palatinate was marked by poverty and quite a bit of deprivation. Knitting is therefore a necessity in her youth to get warm things. But knitting becomes her passion. For a long time, Irmgard Gietl leads a quiet life as a mother and housewife. But when it becomes known that a supposedly harmless nuclear reprocessing plant is to be built in her neighborhood near Wackersdorf, she becomes suspicious. The harshness with which the government will soon take action against demonstrating citizens drives Irmgard herself to the barricades. Caring for her family now means fighting against the reprocessing plant – with what she learned from an early age: knitting! “The fact that a woman supports the strugglers against the reprocessing plant with warm socks so that they don’t get cold feet” impressed us very much, emphasizes the NFFF jury. In any case, Irmgard also attributes the fact that the Bavarian state government abandoned the construction of the WAA in 1989 to her “resistance socks” – that is true in any case, but very modestly formulated.

Honor Award (Special Recognition) – 2022

With her spectacular rappelling actions, especially against nuclear transports, including uranium transports from Gronau to Russia and France, Cecile Lecomte has repeatedly managed to draw the public’s attention to the little-known business of the uranium enrichment company Urenco in Gronau. She also attracts a lot of attention in the fight against the further use of nuclear energy in Germany with actions against the Lingen fuel element factory – also known as “squirrels” due to her extraordinary climbing skills. This also includes raising public awareness of the manifold international interconnections resulting from uranium enrichment in Gronau and fuel element production in Lingen.

Due to her French origin, Cécile Lecomte is in a special position to organize cross-border cooperation and thus also to inform about French nuclear projects in Germany. She also processes information about nuclear projects and anti-nuclear protests as a journalist for various media and her own blog. In earlier years, she was also instrumental in the fight against the Castor transports to Gorleben. “Without Cécile Lecomte’s commitment, the anti-nuclear movement in Germany would be much weaker and the international dimension of uranium reprocessing would be much less known in Germany,” judges the NFFF jury “her work is all the more remarkable because she has been seriously ill for years and is dependent on a wheelchair. Her commitment to a nuclear weapons-free world is exemplary in various ways.”

Category Solutions – 2022

Malte Göttsche advocates for disarmament and the elimination of all nuclear weapons, and is looking for new ways for nuclear-weapon states to build mutual trust to achieve this goal. “This is a service to us all,” the NFFF jury said. “We need the mechanisms to understand what nuclear-weapon states are doing, or not doing, if we are to have any chance of achieving the goals of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Malte Göttsche is among those paving the way for that.”

At a time when Russia and President Putin are openly threatening to use nuclear weapons, the abolition of nuclear weapons has become even more urgent and important. Professor Malte Göttsche of RWTH Aachen University is looking for ways to reach an understanding and advocates for nuclear weapon states to actually disarm. It is true that the U.S. and Russia drastically reduced their nuclear arsenals, mainly in the 1990s. Nevertheless, Russia currently has nearly 6,000 nuclear warheads and the U.S. over 5,400, with about 2,000 warheads on “high alert.” Malte Göttsche advocates for disarmament and the elimination of all nuclear weapons, and is looking for new ways for nuclear-weapon states to build mutual trust to achieve this goal. “This is a service to us all,” the NFFF jury said. “We need the mechanisms to understand what nuclear-weapon states are doing, or not doing, if we are to have any chance of achieving the goals of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Malte Göttsche is among those paving the way for that.”

Category Education – 2022

Libbe HaLevy runs a weekly podcast about all things nuclear, Nuclear Hotseat. It’s a real powerhouse, but she’s able to bring in high-profile guests from around the world.

“Because the Nuclear Hotseat program is available online, many activists around the world can access information not normally available to them through the weekly podcast,” judges the NFFF jury, “this is a very compelling offering.”

Libbe HaLevy runs a weekly podcast about all things nuclear, Nuclear Hotseat. It’s a real powerhouse, but she’s able to bring in high-profile guests from around the world. Although Libbe HaLevy is based in the U.S., she has succeeded in broadening the understanding of the many aspects of nuclear power and nuclear weapons not only in the U.S. but around the world. This is beneficial to both sides. Americans tend to be somewhat insular, so a broader understanding of nuclear issues in the rest of the world is a very important contribution Libbe HaLevy is making. “Because the Nuclear Hotseat program is available online, many activists around the world can access information not normally available to them through the weekly podcast,” judges the NFFF jury, “this is a very compelling offering.”

Category Resistance – 2022

Anthony Lyamunda has been resisting the planned uranium mining and opening of uranium mines in his country for many years. “The Nuclear Free Future Award is intended to draw the attention of the world public to this problem,” the jury said in its statement.

Anthony Lyamunda has been resisting the planned uranium mining and opening of uranium mines in his country for many years. He writes and agitates on this issue knowing that Africa has endured a long history of plunder by colonialists for various minerals and continues to endure it today. From Niger, for example, mining companies have so far exported 154,000 tons of uranium, equivalent to a world market price of $34 billion. Niger is thus the seventh largest uranium producer of all time, and yet it is one of the three poorest countries in the world and has received nothing from uranium mining other than the radioactive contamination of its land.

Anthony Lyamunda is fighting to ensure that Tanzania does not suffer the same fate. “The Nuclear Free Future Award is intended to draw the attention of the world public to this problem,” the jury said in its statement.

Category Resistance – 2020

Extremist and foreign agent – these are the terms with which the Russian state power tries to discredit, criminalize and muzzle Fedor Maryasov and Andrey Talevlin. The journalist Maryasov defends in writing against the Russian nuclear state. The lawyer Talevlin represents the public and Russian NGOs against it.