Anti-war campaigners staged a rooftop protest at a weapons factory.

Two protesters used a ladder to climb 40ft on to the roof of EDO MBM Defence Systems in Home Farm Road, Brighton, yesterday.

EDO designs, develops and manufactures weapon carriage and release systems and is an approved supplier to the Ministry of Defence.

But Brighton-based Smash EDO protesters claim the company's products have been used by the Israeli army in the bombardments of Gaza and Lebanon.

One of the protesters, identified only as Martin, 31, said: "They are responsible for creating hightechnology weapons that have killed civilians in Lebanon and have been used on a daily basis in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"EDO is, as far as we are concerned, as complicit in murder as the generals who ordered these killings and the pilots who carried out the bombings. They are a link in the same sorry chain.

"To have weapons made here in Brighton and used in such terrible acts is too much for us to stomach so we felt we had to take a stand."

Yesterday's action was the fourth large protest outside the factory since the beginning of the war in Lebanon.

Shortly after the war began, activists blockaded the factory by chaining themselves to barrels of cement. Soon afterwards, artists brought impressions of the horrors of war to the factory gates and held a "day of rage" outside the factory.

A police spokeswoman said officers were stationed at the scene throughout the protest as a monitoring presence.

No one from EDO was available to comment.