Members and Supporters Newsletter
 

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Members and Supporters Newsletter

Spring 2008

“Be the change you wish to see.”  (Gandhi)

Join us in the campaign for a European Union for Peace

At its March Meeting, the Peace Party Executive Committee completed plans for its campaign to take its ideas and ideals to the people of the South-East.

You are invited to join one or more of our “roadshows” (with our colourful peace flags and sandwich boards) where we invite passers-by to add their names to our “100% for Peace” affirmation, to take a leaflet, buy a badge, give a donation and to talk with us about voting for Peace in June 2009.

We were in Horsham on Saturday, 19th April and expect to be in Brighton on 31st May and Dartford on 14th June (all between 10 and Noon).  Ring 0772 096 5577 for further information.

“Feed the World, Save the Planet”

Voting for peace, being peaceful and non-violent, wanting to see justice being done and showing care for our surroundings applies not only to every inhabitant of the Earth but to all life.

Julie Roxburgh is a dedicated campaigner for the rights of animals and a member of the Peace Party.  Using extracts from a recent report “The Global Benefits of Eating Less Meat”, published by Compassion in World Farming, she has produced a succinct summary for us entitled, “Feed the World, Save the Planet”.

Instinctively, perhaps, we know and almost fear what there is to read in this essential account.  But, of course, we are all creatures of habit and only change when we become convinced that change is vital;  when the alternatives are life-threatening.

The Peace Party is already committed (see its Charter for details) to eradicate global warming, to eradicate poverty, to eradicate pollution, to create greater equality.  This summary report shows how changing some eating habits will assist all these processes.

We invite you to write for a printed copy (please enclose an A4-size envelope with a “LARGE” stamp) OR e-mail john4peace@msn.com for an electronic copy delivered straight to your computer.

Funding the Peace Party’s Work

Just a gentle reminder that we need your help with whatever you can afford to enable the Party to contest future elections more effectively.  Your financial support will help provide the literature that puts over the Peace viewpoint on all issues as well as the deposits that are required for parliamentary elections (European and, probably, General Elections in 2009).

A Membership Subscription and a Supporter Form for 2008 is on our website – or just mail your subscription (choose between £20 and £50 or, for supporters, a minimum of £10) or donation to us.  A regular income enables us to budget more effectively – please ask for a standing order form.

We look forward to hearing from you in the near future.  Please use the FREEPOST PEACE address, if you wish.

PEACE PARTY CONDEMNS GOVERNMENT PROPOSALS TO MILITARISE SCHOOLING

They just don't get it, do they? The latest proposals from the government regarding the compulsory militarisation of schools are another step down the wrong track completely. The public's perception of the armed forces is that they are engaged in illegal, immoral and unnecessary wars, due to the gross incompetence and totally flawed policies of the government.  Horrified at the alarming rise in gun crime at one point, they can at the same time suggest more weapons training for children in schools.  They really don't make the connections, do they?  There are plans afoot to indoctrinate our youngsters into thinking that in certain circumstances (i.e. when you are told so by a 'superior') it is perfectly all right to slaughter fellow human beings. It isn't!

It is admittedly a serious situation if those who are supposed to protect us from harm and support and look after us are at odds with the populace. Quentin Davies M.P. is apparently alarmed at the number of children who have no idea of military life. He wants the militarisation of schools to take place to brainwash children into accepting war and all the utter horrors it entails. The appalling humanitarian disaster of Iraq should be a turning point in the way governments conduct their foreign relations. It won't be because the people who become our leaders are themselves brainwashed into believing that the only way out of conflict situations is by mass murder. Children should learn to recognise the scale of the ecological disasters that are already upon the world and all the non-violent strategies that can be put in place to replace warfare. All their energy needs to be put into finding and helping to implement solutions to the collapse in biodiversity, the peak oil crisis, climate change, energy problems, social dysfunctionality and many other major concerns.

Preparing more and more of our youth to fight their way out of serious problems is madness itself, let alone the signals it sends to grossly disadvantaged youngsters who desperately need new directions in their lives towards healing relationships and life enhancing, constructive and creative activities. Teaching them how to kill people, sanctioned by an amoral government, is not the way to go. What is particularly insidious and sinister is that this proposal to militarise schools is a back door way to try to perk up recruitment into our armed forces which is, not surprisingly, in the doldrums. The General Secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers is also on the wrong track entirely claiming that there are children who need the discipline, which is enforced, and top down, involvement in army life. He claims that if they have fragmented lives at home then this can help them. Only trouble is they might well be further fragmented into pieces by bombs and bullets on a foreign battlefield. A total re-think is needed with respect to this misguided and inappropriate response. The world is crying out for new and imaginative responses to the problems humankind faces.

 Peace Party Reflections on the tragic Death of another member of the Bhutto Family

Any violence, be it the murder of an individual, murderous rioting, terrorism or outright war, anywhere in the world is abhorrent.  It reduces us to a level of barbarity unknown elsewhere in the animal kingdom and denies the compassion and reverence for life that the vast majority of us hold to.

The assassination of Benazir Bhutto and the subsequent killings of over a hundred people in Pakistan at the end of 2007 and the beginning of 2008 represent a further dreadful and regrettable loss of so many valued lives, at a time when there are so many inhumanities in the world crying out to be put right.

We in the Peace Party believe that the world will be a far more humane and peaceful place when everyone is involved in making decisions, but the death of Benazir Bhutto has exposed as a myth the idea that the Pakistan People's Party stands for democracy. Rather, it appears to have accepted the rule of the Bhutto dynasty - an "elective feudalism".  This would possibly have been little better than the present military rule, which itself has only created disorder and lawlessness.

Decisions need to be made collectively so that the creation of winners and losers is avoided.  When there are no losers there is no fear, no hatred, no revenge, no terrorism, no war.

Thank you, Benazir, and all other nameless individuals, who have so sadly lost your lives trying to bring about a better world. You have reminded us to re-double our own efforts, and of the need to have clearly stated core values and aims that everyone can embrace.  Only with these accepted, will we be able to have justice and to remove the massive inequalities that continue to scar our world.

Tariq Ali - 'A tragedy born of military despotism and anarchy' - Guardian, 28.12.07.

William Dalrymple - 'Pakistan's flawed and feudal princess' - Observer, Sunday, 29.12.07.

Ian Jack - 'Born to rule' - Guardian, 29.12.07.

"An Open Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury

Dear Dr Williams

We wish to express our dismay at the public reaction to your thoughtful comments on Sharia law and its place in British society. Although this reaction clearly shows how difficult it is to raise sensitive issues for public consideration, it is nevertheless important to raise them if we are to avoid serious divisions in our society.

Your point was well made that there are already many cases where quasi-judicial bodies can voluntarily be given authority to rule on certain civil matters, and that these could serve as models for incorporating aspects of Sharia law. Sadly this seems to have been almost entirely missed by most commentators.

May we urge you not to be deterred in your attempts to bring some sanity into the discussion of the relationship of Muslim beliefs and practices to the wider society, and above all not to heed the calls for your resignation.

Yours, with respect,

John Morris, David Brown, and others of The Peace Party

News from Greece - for The Peace Party-UK

Date: Sunday, 24 Feb 2008

I want to inform you that here we have strong ouburst of nationalism in our region right now.

 Greece and Macedonia are carrying out negotiations with United Nations for the "Macedonia" problem. In Macedonia there have been big protests against the Greek Embassy and also here there have been harsh verbal attacks against our neighbours.

 Of course you know about situation with Kosovo. Here the nationalists say that Albania will ask to take the north of Greece from us....

Also Turkey has started a military attack against the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq, and the Albanian extremist nationalists who live in the Democracy of Macedonia wants it to split away and go to Albania...

 In all that situation, want to inform you that it is strong possibility to receive political attack (from Far Right or and Left) about our positions for peace and solidarity in our region (Already, the most famous Greek reporter has made a report about the "rainbow" party (the party of Macedonian minority of Greece) and says that the party has support from other countries, and that there is not a Macedonian minority in Greece). Here all parties (Right party, Socialist Party, Left, Far Right) support nationalism and militarism. There is the strong possibility that we will receive an attack now.

 We fight to unite Balkans, to stop nationalisms and militarism, to create a Balkan federation, to demilitarize the Balkans, to stop obligatory military service, for an ecological Balkans.

It is very important to have your moral support.  I will keep you informed about our news,

Peaceful Regards,

George Chalkias, Responsible for Oikologiki Paremvasi (Greek eco-pacifist political movement)

Reply from John Morris:

Dear George,

Thank you for your e-mail and for being the voice of reason from your part of Europe and the World.  I sympathise with your feelings about nationalism, a disease that afflicts the British Isles but not with the intensity that affects you today.  The Peace Party's new Charter, just added to our Website (see www.peaceparty.org.uk), does, I hope, set out a vision for a world where nationalism would become just a dark part of history.

I support whole-heartedly your campaign against all aspects of militarism and the evils of nationalism.  Do let me know if I can do any more to help.

Shafaq Iqbal writes from Rotherham

Peace be upon you, John, and the rest of the team.  Sorry I have not been able to get in touch earlier.

Today I just wanted to talk about business and how much this unjustified war is going to cost the UK citizens.  The cost of living in the UK is going to soar as our so-called allies in the USA have “lost the plot”.  The dollar is being squeezed out of the market and, in my view, eventually the USA will have no choice but to go into partnership with the South American countries and create a new currency.  The Americans blame it on a global problem but it is not.  Nations like China, India, Russia and the Arab Emirates are going to prosper.  Under the Blair regime the Labour Government sold the family silver for next to nothing while this government has no idea how to run the country – in a business sense.  I feel that the people of the UK are in for a rough ride with job losses, house re-possessions, domestic violence, divorces, family break-ups - and the list goes on.  

On an international level democracy’s new thing is just concerned with breaking up dictatorships rather than giving people the real chance to run their own affairs.  You have only to look around you to see that, from east to west, the regimes of every country are sucking their people dry in one way or another.

The Peace Party has a way and one day we will show them the way.

Gandhi said

“Non-violence is the greatest force at the disposal of mankind.  It is mightier than the mightiest weapon of destruction devised by the ingenuity of man.”  

“War with its glorification of brute force is essentially a degrading thing.  It de-moralises those who are trained for it.  It brutalises men of naturally gentle character.  It outrages every canon of morality.  Its path of glory is foul with the passion of lust and red with the blood of murder.”

RESPECT AND GRATITUDE?  NO WAY!

Responding to the RAF’s advice to its personnel not to wear uniform outside their base near Peterborough, the PM said that members of the armed forces, “have the respect and gratitude of the British people”.  Clearly not of some people in that City and he certainly did not consult members of the Peace Party for their views.  How can one be grateful for people killing and injuring others for any reason?  That is scarcely the way to earn respect.

WE SAY, DUMP THE WARMONGERS

During the 12 months ending March, 2008, the British Government spent £3,200,000,000 on war in Iraq and Afghanistan.  This was an increase roughly double that of the previous year.  And these are the official figures.  What must the real ones be?  How might that money have really benefited all of us?

And what of the human costs?  The military ones are high (175 British deaths in Iraq and 89 in Afghanistan, 212 very seriously or seriously injured in Iraq, 114 in Afghanistan) but the civilian ones are appalling, with Iraqi deaths since the UK/US invasion estimated to be well over a million plus unknown millions of wounded and millions of refugees from Iraq now in Jordan, Syria and further afield.

The Peace Party says, “End War Now.  Stop the Carnage.  War solves nothing.  It debases the aggressors to the level of the terrorist.  Take the earliest opportunity to Vote Peace Party for a real change.  Dump the warmongering politicians.”

Concerned about your carbon footprint?

Take the train!  The Government has recently revealed the average figures for carbon dioxide emissions per passenger mile when travelling by

National rail       100 grammes

Long haul flights   190 grammes

Diesel car      200 grammes

Petrol car      210 grammes

Short-haul flights  230 grammes

Domestic flights    280 grammes

TEACHERS VOTE TO KEEP THE MILITARY OUT OF SCHOOLS

Congratulations to the National Union of Teachers - the country's largest teacher union -- in voting at its national conference to keep the military out of our schools.  The resolution passed states:

"Military intervention in schools customarily presents a partisan view of war, largely by ignoring its fatal

 realities in favour of promises of travel, skill training and further or higher education course sponsorships otherwise often unavailable to young people, especially in areas of high unemployment. Conference believes that teachers and schools should not be conduits for either the dissemination of Ministry of Defence propaganda or the recruitment of military personnel.  Conference therefore agrees to actively oppose military recruitment activities in schools."

Don’t burn food:

bio-fuels must not compromise the needs of our children and grandchildren to meet their needs for food.

All forecourts are now required by law to sell only fuel which is blended with 2.5% bio-fuel.  European Union targets are set to increase to 10% by 2020.  This law has been introduced despite research which shows that producing bio-fuels causes greater global warming emissions than the equivalent for fossil fuels.

Food prices are rising rapidly due to bio-fuels, causing the poor to suffer more malnutrition.  This has been called a crime against humanity by the United Nations Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Jean Ziegler.  Furthermore, the UN has warned that 60 million people may soon become “bio-fuel refugees” – people forced off their land to made way for huge areas of bio-fuel crops.

“The expansion of bio-fuels is going to have the same impact as climate chaos: increase in poverty, hunger and refugees.  Yet the Government is promoting this as yet another technical fix for climate change, despite its own Chief Scientist’s doubts about their sustainability.”

In March, the “G20 Gleneagles Dialogue”, in Chiba, Japan, was urged to support the adoption of global sustainability standards for bio-fuels.  Such standards must ensure that bio-fuels do not undermine food security or