March 8, 2003
BAYAN MUNA pays tribute today, International Women's Day, to the
Filipino women and all women who struggle in various ways to bring
hope, peace, and justice during these perilous and uncertain times.
Bayan Muna salutes especially all women who have taken a stand against
the United States' drive to justify its pre-emptive military action
against Iraq, which is but part of its all-consuming ambition to achieve
military ascendancy throughout the world.
We need only to look at the reverberating results of the first US
invasion on Iraq to oppose the impending war. More than 300,000 Iraqis
were killed in the 43-day military campaign that the US launched in
1991. But the war did not end after this "brief sortie."
The continuing economic blockade of Iraq has resulted in the deaths
of millions of women and children, far beyond the damage caused by
the 142,000 tons of bombs and 350 tons of uranium shells during the
military campaign itself.
Four million people in Iraq, or one-fifth of its population, are
currently starving to death. Up to 95% of all pregnant women in Iraq
are suffering from anemia and will give birth to weak, malnourished
infants. There has been a dramatic increase in childhood cancers—particularly
leukemia, Hodgkin's disease, and lymphomas—and congenital diseases
and deformities in the fetuses brought about by depleted uranium shells
of American forces.
In the Philippines, the Macapagal-Arroyo government has dragged the
country directly into the international theater of war by making the
Philippines the "second front" in the US' misdirected campaign
against global terrorism. The Arroyo government's signing of bilateral
security agreements with the US under false mutuality has sealed the
country's appointment with disaster.
The ongoing military offensives against the Moro Islamic Liberation
Front (MILF) are part of the US-backed all-out war in Mindanao, which
can only bring further suffering to Moro and Christian residents alike
in that island. Of the hundreds of people killed and close to 200,000
civilians displaced, women and children compose most of the nameless
statistics of casualties. War has extended women's traditional nurturing
roles as they perpetually tend to their sick and grieve for their
loved ones who have been killed.
Even as the Arroyo government has been recently placed on the defensive
to stave off public dissent against the fielding of US troops in actual
combat operations in the next Balikatan, a bomb was propitiously exploded
at the Davao City International airport early this week. The MILF
has been routinely blamed for the incident.
Although the identities of the real perpetrators are still undetermined,
it remains clear that the bombing was intended to create a scenario
of widespread terror in Mindanao. We may recall that such semblance
of "persisting terrorism," conveniently supplied by the
Abu Sayyaf threat, was used to warrant the entry of US forces in Basilan
last year. Already, the passage of the dreaded anti-terrorism bill,
erstwhile sidelined, is being pressed. The law will not curb terrorism
but will in fact promote further curtailment of civil liberties under
the sponsorship of the state.
In today's international celebration of women's day, opposition to
war reasonably stems from the sector that comprises half of the world's
population. Women's great value for life—in abject contrast
to war's inhumanity—already cultivates this opposition.
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