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As Invasion Becomes Occupation, Greens Call for Sustained Effort to Ensure Peace. |
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THE GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Leaders of the Green Party of the United States urged Americans who oppose the war on Iraq to begin planning for electoral action and new steps to ensure global peace and democracy. "With the imminent fall of the Saddam regime, we need to turn our attentions towards ensuring peace and democracy in Iraq and throughout the world," said Badili Jones, Georgia Green and co-chair of the national party. "For the Green Party, that means democratizing the U.S. political system, electing Greens to public office, and replacing our military economy with one based on peace, social justice, and ecology." The Green Party supports the International Criminal Court (ICC) with the power to try Saddam Hussein (if captured instead of killed) for atrocities against his own people -- and also the power to investigate the Bush Administration for launching an illegal, unprovoked attack on another nation on fabricated evidence of a threat. "An effective ICC would be able to scrutinize the Pentagon's use of cluster bombs, depleted uranium, and other weapons that kill and maim civilians and damage the health of U.S. veterans; and investigate the slaughter of civilians and the apparent targeting of independent media, such as al-Jazeera and Reuters," said Mark Dunlea, co-chair of the Green Party of New York State. "Such a court must be fair and impartial, whether it targets murderous dictators like Saddam or acts done in the cause of global empire, as in the case of President Bush." Greens acknowledge that prosecuting the victors would be enormously difficult. "Saddam's defeat won't mean the end of the Pentagon's war schemes," said J. Roy Cannon, Peace Committee chair in the Green Party of Delaware. "The White House intends to topple other governments, beginning with Syria and Iran. In the 90s, the Project for a New American Century drafted the Bush doctrine of preemptive invasion in the cause of global empire. Its participants include Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and other Bush officials." "Their plan is consistent with the treatment of Iraq as a feeding trough for Halliburton, Bechtel, and other favored corporations, and the postwar installment of American corporate honchos and generals, murderous Iraqi military strongmen, and corrupt stooges like Ahmed Chalabi in Baghdad," Cannon added. Greens assert that it will require serious, sustained political organizing to resist these plans and policies, but warn that the Democratic Party has already capitulated. Most of the major Democratic presidential hopefuls have supported the war; Sen. Bob Graham is urging Bush to consider missile attacks on Syria. "Without the Greens in 2004, the peace movement will find itself marooned with Democrats who favor war and swim in corporate money," said Starlene Rankin, Lavender Green Caucus delegate to the party's national committee. "The Green Party will lead the opposition in this new era of American empire and corporate dominance." MORE INFORMATION search: fplcy, irq, intrel, pce
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