There is no future in war

THE EDITOR, Madam:

Reading Tuesday an excellent counterpunch article urging the formation of a new Non Aligned Movement (NAM), I was moved to share the idea. Not to change the mind of the Holness administration – this has long committed itself to the US/NATO position – but to win over Jamaicans.

A basis is given us by seven CARICOM countries, joined by Cuba and the Dominican Republic, abstaining on April 7 from the vote of the UN General Assembly to eject Russia from the Human Rights Council, while seven, including Jamaica, voted in favour. This division reflects the scene worldwide.

South Africa, India, China and numerous smaller developing countries condemn or, like China, remain silent on imperial Russia’s atrocious civilian Ukraine killings. They are no less concerned, however, about even greater US imperialism both in Europe – NATO expanding to the boundary with Russia – and worldwide.

Non-alignment today would revive the spirit of the movement initiated in 1955 in Bandung, Indonesia, by 29 countries of Africa and Asia representing 54 per cent of the world’s population. Today, it is specifically against acceptance of another Cold War, of polarisation between East and West, of the armed encirclement of Russia and China that US imperialism appears bent on executing.

There is no future for humanity in war and its weapons. The horrors of the Holocaust, of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, of Iraq and Yemen, of the war in Ukraine and of its current destabilising consequences for the rest of the world – all these make plain the absolute necessity of non-violence, not merely for individuals, but between nations globally.

The weapons industry around the world has to be shut down. The Stockholm call of 1950, signed by 300 million, for the banning of nuclear weapons of war has to be renewed. Peace is the NAM objective; a just peace, respectful of the rights of all sides.

HORACE LEVY