Pacifists highlight abuse within the army
An inquest has revealed a ‘harrowing culture of abuse and cover-up within the armed forces’
Peace campaigners are calling on the UK government to hold the British armed forces to account for ‘systemic abuse’ within their ranks and to halt planned rises in military spending.
The inquest into the suicide of nineteen-year-old soldier Jaysley Beck last week revealed a ‘harrowing culture of abuse and cover-up within the armed forces’, the Peace Pledge Union (PPU) said. ‘The inquest found that her death was caused by the sexual assault and harassment she suffered at the hands of senior colleagues, as well as the Army’s failure to investigate her allegations or report them to the police.’
The PPU – which includes many Quakers as members – said that the revelations ‘follow a long series of stories of abuse across all branches of the UK armed forces’. These include allegations of widespread sexism and harassment in the RAF’s Red Arrows display team and the Royal Navy’s Submarine Service, and a parliamentary report which found that almost two-thirds of women in the armed forces have experienced bullying, sexual harassment and discrimination.
The PPU criticised Keir Starmer for increasing the UK’s military budget, in spite of the concerns. ‘If any other institution had seen numerous reports of rape and sexual assault within the space of a few years, it would be subject to major investigation and serious repercussions,’ Amy Corcoran, PPU’s operations manager, said. ‘Instead, military chiefs continue to pretend these are isolated incidents, and the government rewards the armed forces with huge increases in public spending.’
The PPU pointed out that the armed forces are the only institutions in the UK that are allowed to run their own criminal courts and judicial system, along with their own police forces.
The inquest into the death of Jaysley Beck comes on the back of a recent report by Child Rights International Network (CRIN) into widespread allegations of sexual offences and rape at the Army Foundation College in Harrogate, where Jaysley Beck initially trained, along with most sixteen- and seventeen-year-old army recruits. CRIN found that, within a three-year period at the college, there were fifteen internal complaints of violent behaviour by staff, thirteen alleged sexual offences, including nine cases of rape, and the conviction of multiple instructors working at the college.
