Winnipeg, January 21, 2023: Members of Peace Alliance Winnipeg distributed literature in Winnipeg’s Osborne Village calling for an immediate ceasefire and negotiated peace agreement to end the Ukraine War. Following is the statement they distributed. Please share widely.
More war and weapons are not the way to peace!
Statement of Peace Alliance Winnipeg, January 21, 2023
On January 18 NATO’s secretary general said “Weapons are the way to peace” in Ukraine and this was echoed by Canadian Defence Minister Anita Anand as she announced Canada will send more weapons to Ukraine.
The world has been gripped by the dangers and repercussions of the war in Ukraine for almost one year. There have been disruptions to food and energy supplies and soaring inflation as a result of the war.
The cost of the war is mounting as Canada and NATO countries spend billions of dollars to fuel the war. Canada alone has spent $5 billion on this war, $1 billion of which has been for weapons. With NATO weapons and support for Ukraine there is the ever-present danger the war will escalate into a direct confrontation between NATO and Russia.
As the war has progressed various facts have emerged and none of them support this war or pouring more Canadian supplied weapons into Ukraine.
First, a peaceful, united Ukraine is not the goal of Zelensky and the reactionary Ukrainian nationalist ideology that predominates in the Kyiv government. One year ago, the Kyiv government was engaged in an eight-year civil war with its population in the Donbas that killed 14,000 and forced one million to flee the region. That conflict stemmed from the 2014 Maidan coup organized by the US to ensure Ukraine would be in its sphere of influence.
Second, as recently revealed by Merkel, Poroshenko and Macron, the Minsk Agreements, signed in 2014 to end the civil war in eastern Ukraine were but a diplomatic ruse to prepare Ukraine for war with Russia. This war, though maybe not to the timing of NATO and the West, was long in the works.
Third, the Canadian government is not interested in peace in Ukraine. One year ago, Deputy PM Chrystia Freeland described the lead up to the war as a battle between ‘democracy and autocracy.’ Clearly, this war is motivated by the ideology of the Cold War. Ukraine is the proxy to wage that war. Thus, Canada continues to pour weapons into Ukraine with recent announcements of $400 million for a US missile defence system and $90 million for 200 armoured vehicles.
This war could have been averted. Time to say enough is enough, drop the cold war ideology and end the use of Ukraine as a US/NATO proxy. The urgent need is for a de-escalation of the conflict, a ceasefire and negotiations for peace.
Canadian MPs need to hear this message. We urge you to contact your MP and urge them to support a ceasefire and peace negotiations.
Paul S. Graham 