Rochdale has a 'Mayor for Peace'

Mayors for Peace

Rochdale Councillors have agreed that the town should join almost 3,000 cities and towns in 134 countries worldwide who support the 'Mayors for Peace' campaign.

The move has been supported by the Rochdale and Littleborough Peace Group who gave a vote of thanks to the outgoing mayor, Councillor Robin Parker, and to the Leader of the Council Councillor Alan Taylor and deputy leader Councillor Irene Davidson, at their monthly meeting this week.

Rae Street, on behalf of the Peace Group, said: “Mayors for Peace connects millions of people throughout the world whose local representatives back the Hiroshima-Nagasaki Protocol and its main objective of achieving a nuclear weapons free world by 2020.

"It is good to see that our borough is now linked to thousands of others calling on the nuclear weapon states to cease all activities linked to the acquisition of nuclear weapons or incorporating nuclear weapons into their military doctrines, and calling on them to place all nuclear weapons and weapon-usable fissile materials in secure storage at the earliest possible date.”

Councillor Alan Taylor said “I am delighted that the Council has agreed to this proposal. I came into politics through the peace movement in the early 1960s and although the Cold War has ended the dangers are greater than ever.”

Councillor Robin Parker said: “I was very pleased to be asked to be part of the ‘Mayors for Peace’ movement. The decision to join is particularly important at a time when the world needs to show fragile regimes like North Korea that there is no threat from nuclear attack and to enable them to reallocate recourses to the needs of their economies.”