We don't need another war

Statement by Latin American antimilitarists

We don't need another war. We, conscientious objectors and antimilitarists from Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, and all Latin America and the Caribbean, united, emphatically refuse a military escalation leading to a war that, once more, will try to divide us. With hunger, corruption, extreme militarism, shameless military spending, civil insecurity, the continual assault on human rights by our governments, we already have enough without being given another armed conflict.

A war will only strengthen the various nationalism of the countries in conflict, augmenting the xenophobia already implanted. It will strengthen Armed Forces who will find another reason to increase their budgets, and will serve to obscure the problems that afflict the peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean: the unchecked exploitation of our resources, the high levels of unemployment, gender violence and discrimination, the corruption and the mafias of power, the communities displaced by armed conflict or by single crop agriculture and forestry, racism and class discrimination. War is not the solution to any of this. On the contrary, it means these conflicts will grow as they have grown during every dictatorship and civil war.

A war between Latin American states is at the same time an internecine conflagration between sister peoples, led to the slaughter by militarist governments, both of the right and the left. The only winners of a fratricidal confrontation are the global arms dealers who, from the USA to Russia, build laboratories of war and oppression under euphemisms such as "Plan Colombia".

We say no to war and to preparations for war. No to the reinforcement of any form of militarism, be it right or left. Yes to the autonomous action of the peoples and their struggles. Yes to Latin American brother- and sisterhood.

We call for a joint action against militarism and war, arising from our commitment to continue working together far from the barracks for the promotion of justice and solidarity in each of our countries.

Organisations:

• War Resisters' International / Internacional de Resistentes a la Guerra - IRG/WRI
• Grupo de Afinidad Antimilitarista de Asunción GAAA (Asunción-Paraguay)
• Pelao Carvallo, WRI council member
• Yeidy Luz Rosa Ortiz, Casa Feminista de Rosa - Quito, Ecuador
• Periódico El Libertario - Venezuela
• Xavier León, Grupo de Objeción de Conciencia del Ecuador - GOCE
• Movimiento Antimilitarista y de Objeción de Conciencia MAOC Chile
• Adriana Castaño Román, Red Juvenil de Medellín, WRI council member
• Accciòn Colectiva de Objetoras y Objetores de Conciencia (ACOOC) Bogotá
• Colectivo Antimilitarista de Carabanchel, españa
• Movimiento de Objeción de Conciencia de Paraguay Moc Py
• Alicia Zárate-artista visual-SOS Tierra. Arte acción. Arg.
• Claudia Ruiz Herrera- artista visual
• Osmar Arturo Duran
• KOLECTIVO UTOPIA ACRATA LIBERTARIO (K.U.A.L.)
• Ateneo Autonomo de Contracultura y Estudios Acratas
• Elda Munch Comini, Rosario, Santa Fe, Argentina.
• Laura Fernández, Argentina
• Rafael Cuesta
• Colectivo "Libertarixs-Guayaquil", Ecuador
• Violeta Franco, feminista antimilitarista
• María Luisa Rojas Bolaños, mujer, madre y abuela. Médica, profesora de la Facultad de Medicina de la UADY e integrante de UNASSE una ONG feminista y defensora de los Derechos Humanos, en Mérida Yucatán. México.
• Banda "Grito Libertario"
• Ernesto Soltero Resistencia Civil, Caracas, Venezuela