The organizations NEDA – New Internationalist Left, Path to Independence – Bağımsızlık Yolu, and Diem25 in Cyprus, jointly sign the following statement. Read the statement in Greek and Turkish here
Stop the US – Israel attack on Iran!
No to the imperialist war! No to the participation of Cyprus!
Yes to peoples’ solidarity!
Today, as the war escalates in the Middle East and military confrontation with Iran intensifies, we raise our voices together, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, living on an island that knows too well the cost of division, foreign intervention, and militarism.
We declare that no foreign power –neither US imperialism, nor Israel, nor any other – has any concern other than its own economic and geopolitical interests. Historical experience has shown that imperialists’ interventions have brought neither freedom nor prosperity; on the contrary they have brought millions of deaths, civil wars, destruction, instability and new forms of colonialism. The experiences of the last decades in the Middle East are sufficient proof..
In this context, no excuse can justify the bombings in Iran. The US was claiming, only last summer, that it had destroyed once and for all the nuclear capabilities of Iran. Now they use the same pretence, the danger of Iran acquiring in some distant future nuclear weapons, to attack again. The cost will be paid by the Iranian people, not only in economic terms but also in blood. Already there are huge casualties in the civilian population, as is shown by the attack on a girls school, with 171 children dead, a hospital and a playgarden!
Our opposition to the war and the imperialist front does not in any way mean supporting the oligarchic capitalist regime. The “Islamic Republic” has shown itself during its decades of rule to be the enemy of workers, women, national minorities, youth and all the exploited and oppressed masses.
Democracy and freedom in Iran can only come through the struggles of its workers , women, youth and all the oppressed layers, and in these struggles we will be in solidarity as we have been in all previous mass uprisings in Iran.
In this war the Republic of Cyprus is taking part with the side of the aggressors, by supporting Israel and the US and by allowing the use of the “British” bases on the island by the US army. Because of this role in the conflict Cyprus has become a target.
The existence of the British Bases and the stance taken by the government of the Republic of Cyprus alongside the US and Israel are putting all peoples living in Cyprus in danger. Greece, France and Britain are sending warships and arms, while Türkiye is sending warplanes to the island, supposedly to defend the peoples of Cyprus. In reality, however, through such initiatives Cyprus is being drawn even more deeply into the war on the side of the imperialist aggressors.
We demand:
- Immediate end to all US and Israeli attacks on Iran.
- Immediate end of Cyprus’s participation in the war – Cyprus should not be a launchpad or a facilitator to the bloodshed.
- Closure of the British Bases and cancellation of all the military agreements that give “land and water” to foreign armies.
We need to build:
- An international anti-war movement with demonstrations, strikes, blockades to put pressure on the aggressors.
- Solidarity with workers and oppressed people across the region, against racism, Islamophobia, antisemitism, – against nationalist hysteria that states use to discipline dissent at home.
- Class solidarity with the struggle of the Iranian masses for their democratic, gender and national rights.
We call on the people on both sides of the island to stand together on the above demands.
Our security lies not in alliances with powerful military forces, but in solidarity between the peoples of this island and the peoples of the region. Our strength lies in cooperation and in demilitarisation, in class solidarity of the workers and the oppressed, and in the struggle for a reunited socialist federal Cyprus free from foreign troops, foreign bases, and foreign interference.
