Manila, 15 July 2005
As calls for the Philippine President’s resignation gain ground, we at theIraq Solidarity Campaign-Philippines pause to join the world in mourning the tragic deaths of dozens of innocent civilians in London. We offer our sympathies to those who have suffered from last week’s bombings; even as we extend our compassion for all those who continue to suffer under war and domination in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, as well as in Southern Thailand, Aceh, Mindanao, and many other places around the world. Each life lost in London is as precious as any life lost because of war anywhere in the world.
As many of us said after 9-11, after similar incidents of violence in Manila and across the country, and after the Madrid bombings: Our grief is not a cry for war.
We condemn as depraved opportunism efforts to use the attacks to justify vengeful wars and occupations, to foment racism, and to impose repressive security measures. A senior British investigator has said that there is not enough evidence to make “even a sensible guess” as to who was responsible
and yet government officials and the media have put the entire Muslim community under suspicion. We oppose the questioning, arrest, and detention of suspects on the bases of their ethnicity or religion.
We reject any move capitalizing on the London bombings to continue or to intensify the “war against terror,” to purse militarization, and to entrench draconian anti-terror legislation and other measures around the world.
We renounce the racism and hypocrisy of all those who call the attacks in London as “terrorism” but who consider the death of between 20,000 ?100,000 Iraqis as result of the war and occupation as merely “collateral damage.”
While we abhor and condemn any attacks against innocent civilians, we also cannot clear British Prime Minister Tony Blair of any responsibility because of his leading role in the US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq.
We in the Philippines have also suffered from similar cases of violence which could likewise not be dissociated from embattled President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s complicity in US-led wars abroad and at home.
This most recent episode of violence proves that the US,’ the UK’s, and their allied governments’, including the Philippines’ response to terrorism has not stopped bloodshed; on the contrary, they have exacerbated it and they have dragged us all into a cycle of bloodletting. We at the Iraq Solidarity Campaign call for an end to this cycle of violence by calling for a stop to the so-called "war against terror;" an end to the occupations of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Palestine; and an end to a drive for global domination that spawn injustice and suffering.
