It is the peoples who reap what their governments and secret services of Western countries have sowed
Statement of Georgos Loucaides, AKEL C.C. Spokesperson
AKEL C.C. Press Office, 16th November 2015, Nicosia
The terrorist attacks in France, Lebanon and elsewhere, as well as the ongoing deadly civil war in Syria are appalling and stress the urgent need to counteract the murderous inhuman formation, namely the “Islamic State”. They also underline the need for bringing peace in Syria through the termination of the foreign interventions and for a political solution that will be based on the respect for the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
At the same time, humanity is called to point the finger at and denounce those who have contributed to the consolidation of the “Islamic State”. Unfortunately, today it is the peoples who will reap what their governments and secret services of Western countries have sowed. At the same time however, there are also the socio-economic causes of the upsurge in Islamic fundamentalism which represent the fuel that is triggered by foreign powers so as to become the tool for fulfilling their geopolitical plans. Unemployment, poverty, underdevelopment, the authoritarianism of the dictatorial regimes and the blind indignation about the foreign intervention in the Arab world are leading sections of young people to despair, which the fundamentalists subsequently seek to gain from. This is what the international community must address if it is to permanently do away with terrorism’s root causes.
AKEL points out that the fear provoked by the “IS” terrorists must not be allowed to be used for legitimizing a new cycle of terror hysteria such as that unleashed by the Bush administration in the decade of 2000 and which – in various ways – is continuing till today. Humanity cannot withstand a new Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and new global networks of secret prisons; neither can it withstand a new Afghanistan, nor a new Iraq. If European societies accept that their security depends on the implementation of new draconian measures of filing, mass surveillance and the further curtailment of individual rights and freedoms, then this will represent a step backwards and a defeat of democratic values against terrorism.
Finally, the peoples of Europe have the historic duty not to yield to the Islamophobic and racist narrative of the extreme right, which seeks to target foreigners, refugees and Muslims inside and outside of Europe. The overall incrimination of the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims for the crimes committed by “IS” is just as absurd as blaming all Christians or all white people for the crimes committed by the Nazis or the Ku Klux Klan. Let us also not forget that Muslims are the first and biggest victims of “IS” from which they are trying to escape from by any means, resorting and applying for asylum in Europe.
Faced with these dramatic developments humanity is going through, new and determined struggles are needed for peace, freedom, democracy and social justice in Europe and beyond.
