Speech by Socorro Gomes, President of the World Peace Council, at the Secretariat meeting, Brussels, 17-18 October 2011.

Dear comrades, welcome to the Secretariat meeting of the World Peace Council.

It is always a reason for joy, confidence and optimism to take part in the meeting of this important body of the organizational structure of the world Peace council, congregating leaders and organizations with a wealthy record in defense of peace and in solidarity to the peoples against imperialist aggressions.

As we approach our next Assembly, regarding which we will make important decisions in this meeting in Brussels, we remind the last meeting, which took place in April 2008, in the capital of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. On that occasion, more than 500 fighters for peace and against imperialism, representing 126 organizations from 76 countries, took part in the largest assembly of the decade, in a demonstration of the magnitude of that event, as well as of the growth and strengthening of the World Peace Council.

Decisions made in that outstanding event and expressed in the Final Statement constituted clear guidelines regarding the challenges facing the World Peace Council in the period we are living since then.
We underscored that, in face of the increasingly brutal and aggressive escalation of imperialism against peoples and nations, the World Peace Council had to play a leading role, guiding the creation of a broad and significant movement against foreign military bases, military pacts that operate as armed hands of imperialist powers and nuclear arms race.

From its first lines, the Final Statement of the Caracas Assembly emphasized: “The events (…) are creating a crucial situation to humankind, one characterized by the increasing intervention of the aggressiveness of the United States’ global strategy, which strives to impose and consolidate a the new world order of war and oppression. Humankind as a whole is facing the accelerated aggressiveness of imperialist policies. Its aligned effort to ensure its domination is followed by the exacerbation and intensification of disputes for markets, energy and strategic resources, as well as the geopolitical rule.”

That deep understanding of the global stage and the essence of war policies of imperialist powers underpinned important decisions, the formulation of guidelines and the elaboration of platforms and action plans to organizations that are part of the World Peace Council and its leading executive bodies.

Our collective has given an immense contribution to the struggle for peace expressed by means of the leadership in certain struggles and the participation in memorable events that marked the last years.

We dedicate great part of our efforts to the struggle against the aggressive pact of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and foreign military bases in territories of sovereign countries. On the occasion of the anniversary of NATO’s war against former Yugoslavia, in March-April 2009, memorable events took place – one in Argentina, another in Belgrade and also demonstrations in Strasbourg.

In Lisbon, Portugal, tens of thousands of peoples took to the street last November in a massive and energetic protest against NATO’s summit meeting and the adoption of a new strategic concept. On that same occasion, an international seminar took place, bringing significant contributions to the creation of a collective opinion regarding militarism, the causes and consequences of the aggressive policies of the imperialism of the United States and the European Union.

The World Peace Council’s anti-warmongering was made fully evident by means of the presence of our organization in the Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in New York, in solemnities on the occasion of the anniversary of the nuclear attacks in Japan and in the Association of Agent Orange Victims International Conference, in Vietnam.

The World Peace Council has been reasonable in the application of the decisions made by its General Assembly to wage the fight against foreign military bases in sovereign countries.

The continental campaign “Latin America – A region of Peace – Out with Foreign Military Bases” is growing and many seminars and meetings are taking place in countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, Honduras and Paraguay. In that respect, we highlight the International Conference for the Abolition of Foreign Military Bases, in 2010 and 2011, in Guantánamo, Cuba.

The presence of the World Peace Council has also been relevant in events such as the Asia and the Pacific International Peace Conference, which took place in Bangladesh in June this year, in the World Social Forum and in the Congress of the World Federation of Democratic Youth, held in South Africa in December 2010, where the Anti-imperialist Court that vehemently condemned imperialism and its war policies was held.

Comrades,

Despite promises of peace and the empty speeches in defense of international law and the democratization of relations among different countries within multilateral organizations, the international situation deteriorates sharply, peace is threatened and insecurity is generalized.

Precisely in the last few days, new tension spots of the international crisis appeared at the provocation of the United States and its allies with explosive potential and unpredictable consequences. Unclear facts related to a supposed plot to assassinate the Saudi Arab ambassador in Washington are being used as a pretext to fabricate another crisis with Iran, accused by the United States of being behind the conspiracy. The chief of the American State Department already proposed sanctions against the Persian nation, which reacted energetically.

As it threatens Iran, American imperialism already lurks in Syria. After failing in the attempt to pass a resolution in the UN Security Council with sanctions against that country, American president Barack Obama declared that the permanence of president Assad as the head of the Syrian government is unacceptable, in a demonstration of what may lay ahead – fostering a coup, stoking a civil war and performing a military intervention.

A few months ago WikiLeaks revealed a secret cable from the Embassy of the United States in Damascus regarding “the next steps in the human rights strategy,” informing that from 2005 to 2010 the United States, with resources from the Middle East Partnership Initiative, secretly destined 12 million dollars to opposition groups in Syria, as well as financed the installation of a satellite TV channel to broadcast into the country programs against the government of Bashar al-Assar.

Comrades,

This meeting takes place when capitalism is mired in one of the deepest crises of its history. It is a structural, systemic and multidimensional crisis affecting the economy, finances, food, energy and the environment. In moments like this the deadlocks of contemporary world are increasingly evident, with inevitable manifestations in the social and political fields.
The economic and social situation in Europe, where there are some of the wealthiest and most exploitative countries of the world, is one of the most eloquent examples of the crisis and decadence of the system, which survives at the expense of the exploitation of man by man and the oppression of nations. It is a situation that reveals the structural crisis engulfing the powers occupying the dominant positions in the world. The phenomena residing in the economic, social and political situation in those countries constitute a record accusing capitalism, the sharpest example of its inability to promote progress and welfare to the peoples.

Governments alternate, but what we see is the prevalence of conservative and ultra­liberal conceptions, expressed by anti-social and retrograde measures that affect the lives of the vast majority, especially workers. Social achievements won along the 20th century by means of the struggle of the people are destroyed and national riches are dilapidated to save banks and ensure the mega-profits of economic and financial monopolies. It is a matter of regressing rights and an unprecedented anti-social offensive that is responsible for increasing poverty and social ills.

The crisis of capitalism and the decadence of great powers intensify a process of important geopolitical changes.

Inter-imperialist contradictions deepen and militarist and warmongering policies are on the agenda, trampling on international law and multilateral institutions as it is carried out, especially on the United Nations, which is being increasingly used as a tool for imperialist interests, mostly of the United States and the European Union.

That policy of force is most clearly manifested today in the criminal war that NATO is waging in Libya with the acceptance of other powers constituting the UN Security Council.

War is waged under the pretext of establishing democracy and imposing human rights. The true reasons, however, are the economic interests of imperialist powers that plunder and loot the wealth of the peoples in the name of the strategic interests of imperialist powers to rule the world.

The military attacks against the Republic of Libya by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) revive conflicts in Middle East and stretch them to the north of Africa.

The UN approved the attacks by decreeing the Libyan territory a “no-fly zone.” The resolution of that international organization, under the pretext of protecting the civilian population of air strikes of governmental forces and performing a “humanitarian intervention,” resulted in a brutal aggression, a clear violation of international law that harms Libya’s self-determination and national sovereignty. Nevertheless, the UN resolution did not authorize the attack, what places once again imperialist nations in illegality and attest to the falsity of its multilateralism.

As on other occasions, NATO forces practiced acts of terrorism by bombing civilian populations, residential neighborhoods, public facilities and even the houses of governmental leaders. The attacks also aim at killing Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

The actions of NATO were added to those of the armed opposition to the Gaddafi government, turning into a military rebellion since February. Latent tribal conflicts that were restrained by the idea of a national unity were revived.

The media at the service of imperialism presented events in that country as the continuity of the so-called Arab Spring. But the rebellion in Libya had nothing similar to the democratic struggles of popular masses that defeated the Tunisian and Egyptian dictatorships. In Libya, from the beginning, a military and coup-oriented action was configured with the support of the agents of imperialism. The events in Bengasi constituted in fact a coup prepared and led by elite troops of the United Kingdom and agents of British and French secret services, the CIA and Israeli Mossad.

There has also been a methodic preparation of the public opinion by the media, which specialized in the art of fabricating “fair wars” in the name of the “defense of human rights” and “democracy.” It is part of preparing, making up and broadcasting lies and the demonization of leaders who do not accept the guidelines of imperialist powers.

That is a macabre script that is repeated since 1999 when Slobodan Milosevic was presented as a “bloodthirsty dictator.” In 2003 Saddam Hussein was labeled as the president of a “rogue State.” In other regions and in different circumstances, the same tune is played. Campaigns are constantly organized against Cuban leaders, the revolutionary Bolivarian leader Hugo Chávez, Iran’s president Ahmadinejad, and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.

The rebellion in Libya against the Gaddafi government revealed the tactics of American imperialism and its European allies of instrumentalizing the Arab Spring in their favor.

Those are false pretexts used to disguise the geopolitical and economic strategic interests of the United States and its allies in the European Union. They have an eye on the natural resources, especially oil and gas, which are abundant in all Middle East regions and want to control strategic geopolitical positions. In order to take hold of those resources, they need to divide to conquer and rely on docile governments, junior partners of neocolonialism.

The taking of Tripoli by armed groups of the self-nominated National Transitional Council was greeted by imperialist governments and the media at their service, which soon presented the fact as the victory of the “democratic revolution.”

Chancelleries hastily acknowledged the government and granted Libya a seat in the United Nations. The leaders of France and the United Kingdom visited the country to show the support of European imperialism to those who perpetrated the coup and at that same time take hold of the loot: oil and gas, reconstruction works and financial assets of the country. In New York, at the opening of the 66th Assembly of the United Nations, the president of the United States, Barack Obama, met the self-appointed new Libyan leadership and reiterated his support.

President Barack Obama alleged that the USA is acting in Libya in defense of civilians, but the fact is that that country and others are being completely destroyed and thousands upon thousands of civilians are being killed. It is taking place in Middle East and many other parts of the globe while the genocidal Zionist State of Israel are being supported to the detriment of the Palestinian people.

The discourse of Obama is only an attempt to disguise an imperialist action of domination and looting that increases every day. The physical control of territories with heavy weaponry, spreading death, destruction and permanent psychological pressure cannot be tolerated.

The Obama doctrine was made clear in two recent speeches. On Mach 28 2011, speaking at the George Washington University, president Obama declared that even though the security of Americans are not directly threatened, military action can be justified in case a “genocide” is taking place in some country and the United States does not act singlehandedly, but in accord with allies.

Two months later, at the British Parliament on a visit made to the United Kingdom on May 24-26 2011, he declared that the United States does not simply believe in the right of nations, but in the “right of citizens,” adding that the argument according to which national sovereignty is more important than the “killing of civilians within one country’s borders” is false. He reaffirmed that the United States believes that the “international community “must take action when a leader threatens to massacre the people.

According to that concept, the United States, along with United Kingdom and France, will no longer respect the norms of international law based on the principles of the sovereignty of the Nation State and may intervene in any country under the pretext of “humanitarian” reasons or the “defense of the civilian population.” In fact, it is a matter of defending their economic and strategic interests. The issue of human rights is only a pretext used by the United States, France and Great Britain to violate human rights with rigorous commercial embargoes and to massacre civilian populations.

The war in Libya, as happened in former Yugoslavia and is happening in Iraq and Afghanistan, represents the fulfillment of NATO’s new strategic concept, which starts to act a force of global intervention, a tool to perpetrate wars of aggression, with or without UN approval, wherever determined by the geopolitical preying interests of the United States and its allies in the European Union.

Lately, the United States is making use, as an accessory tactics in its aggressive interventionist policy, of secret operations with drone planes or special forces in clandestine actions to commit murders. The CIA has been converted into a real paramilitary organization. The drones, guided by the CIA have already killed more than 2,000 supposedly members of Al Qaida and Talibans in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Yemen since 2001.

Contrary to what imperialist leaders say and despite the economic crisis of capitalism, military expenditure of the USA has increased year after year with new weapons and new bases, where thousands of nuclear missiles are pointed at us, wherever we are.

Under false pretexts, especially a supposed campaign against terrorism and drug trafficking, the imperialist forces spread their tentacles all over the world. Even in South America, especially in Colombia, at the border with Brazil and Venezuela, American soldiers occupy the Amazon forest.

It is a form to maintain under constant threat Colombia’s neighbor, Venezuela, which has a democratic and brave government defending the interests of the Venezuelan people. The reaction forces lurk and wait for a chance to attempt a new coup against President Hugo Chávez, who is considered inconvenient to imperialism due to his positions in defense of the sovereignty and self-determination of peoples.

In the meantime, the loathsome economic blockade against Cuba is held and that country is also under constant physical threat, not only because of the base maintained by the United States there, but also because it is under a permanent land, sea and air siege.

Some countries suffer stronger pressures, but we must not forget that imperialism keeps more than 850 military bases all over the world, many of which constitute true foreign enclaves in countries fighting for sovereignty. Other than the Guantánamo base in Cuba, Great Britain maintains a base in the Falkland Islands, in our neighbor Argentina.
At this moment, we can perceive the growing presence of the US Navy, joined by ships from France, Great Britain and other members of NATO, in all seas of the world. In the South Atlantic, the US Navy Forth Fleet was revived and constantly patrols all South America. In Africa, the United States is committed to structuring the direct presence of AFRICOM by means of installing military bases.

Comrades,

If, on one hand, the present moment is full of grave threats, there are also, on the other hand, reasons for hope and optimism. Everywhere the fights of the peoples are developing by means of brave acts of resistance, democratic achievements and the action of anti-imperialist governments. In Middle East, Africa, Asia, Europe, United States and Latin America, in many different forms, popular movements are standing to demand justice, social progress, peace and the end of wars and the oppression of nations.

The World Peace Council reiterates its support to struggling peoples, for the withdrawal of all occupation troops in countries that are victims of imperialist wars, for the abolition of nuclear weapons, for dismantling NATO and foreign military bases, for the end of the blockade against Cuba and the liberation of its heroes imprisoned in the jails of the empire.
Due to the particularity of the circumstances we are facing, we mention especially the struggle for the acknowledgment of a State of Palestine. The culminating speech by the president of the Palestinian National Authority at the 66th UN General Assembly, when he presented a formal bid for the acknowledgment of that international organization, is a sign of the times, for it symbolizes the strength of the patriotic, anti­colonialist and anti-imperialist struggle.

The bid of Palestinians is supported by the overwhelming majority of UN members and will not be met due to the veto signaled by the United States, revealing the dimension of the political and diplomatic isolation of imperialism and Zionism.

The Palestinians made a clear, objective and peaceful proposal. They request the acknowledgment of their national state within the borders prior to the Six-Day War, in 1967, having Jerusalem as its capital. All support to the Palestinian cause. We wish them success in the struggle for the State of Palestine.

Comrades,

Humankind cannot live with threats and terrorism against peoples and nations anymore.

However, the global framework will only change and peace will only be a concrete possibility if the peoples stand in a broad, lasting and deep struggle, united and mobilized in defense of their fair causes.

The policies of force of imperialist powers tend to remain as a grave threat to international peace and the self-determination of peoples. A great movement of global scale opposing the plans and actions of warmongers is necessary.

The World Peace Council can give an important contribution in those liberating efforts for humankind. It will demand from us perseverance, firmness, broad vision and the capacity to mobilize and act in a single front with other organizations of the international popular and anti-imperialist movement.

Thank you very much.

Socorro Gomes, President of the World Peace Council