Sept 21, 2006 - Emergency Picket
Emergency Picket Action Against the Canadian War Drive in Afghanistan
Organized by: Mobilization Against War & Occupation
Press Release >>
VANCOUVER BC: September 21, 2006
FOUR CANADIAN SOLDIERS DIE IN AFGHANISTAN ONE DAY AFTER NEW DEPLOYMENT!
VANCOUVER ANTIWAR PROTEST DEMANDS: “BRING ALL TROOPS HOME NOW!”
On the morning of Monday September 18th four more
Canadian
soldiers died. The attack on these soldiers just
outside of
Kandahar was called ‘the worst’ suicide bombing that
Canadian
soldiers have faced since the landing in Afghanistan.
Just one week after first admitting that Canada is at
“war” in
Afghanistan, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said of
Monday’s
deaths, "I think nothing more than this incident
illustrates the
evil that they are fighting and the goodwill and the
nobleness
of the cause that they are taking to the Afghan
people.”
MAWO Co-Chair Shannon Bundock said, “Stephen Harper’s
statement
that the Afghan people are ‘evil’ and the occupying
armies are
‘good’ and ‘noble’ is pretty hard to swallow when you
consider
that the Canadian occupation operation ‘Medusa’ has
killed more
than 500 Afghan people in the last 2 weeks and the
government
has just sent in 15 tanks to kill Afghans more
effectively.”
The 4 Canadian soldier deaths on Monday bring the
deaths of
Canadian soldiers to a total of 36 – and have further
proven the
findings of a new report that a Canadian soldier in
Kandahar is
more about 6 times more likely to die than a US
soldier in Iraq.
Facing the calls from coast to coast to bring the
troops home,
Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay stated the
conditions that
Canada would withdraw “when Afghans are able to
control their
borders, when they are able to exert their own
democratic
principles.”
PM Stephen Harper added to these conditions later in
an
interview, “The exit strategy is success. There will
be no other
conditions under which this government leaves
Afghanistan. We
will succeed in our security mission and we will see
that
country moving in irreversible progress to being an
economically
prosperous and peaceful society. That is the only way
this
government will leave."
Shannon Bundock continued, “The debate in parliament
over the
‘current mission’ in Afghanistan is a sign of the
strength of
the opposition to the occupation amongst people in
Canada.
People in Afghanistan know, and people in Canada are
starting to
understand, that the occupation forces are not
building
‘democracy’ in Afghanistan or bringing ‘economic
prosperity’ or
‘peace’ to Afghanistan. Quite the opposite. The
occupation
forces are the opponents of the self determination of
the Afghan
people. Harper and MacKay’s ‘goals’ will never be
realized
through war and occupation.”
As another sign of the widespread opposition of people
in Canada
to the occupation, MAWO has collected, in the Lower
Mainland
alone, nearly 12,000 signatures against Canada’s
occupation of
Afghanistan. Amongst the demands of Thursday’s picket
is for an
Independent Public Inquiry into Canada’s occupation of
Afghanistan to further raise the issue for debate and
investigation amongst people in Canada.
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