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Hague Appeal for Peace Statement
Justice Not War
September 13, 2001
September 11, the UN International Day of Peace, Anniversary of the
Camp David Agreement, mayoral elections in New York City, became
instead the worst day of murder and terror this country has ever
known. To the families and friends of those killed, missing, wounded
or traumatized, we extend our loving sympathy. We urge that those
responsible for these heinous crimes be brought to justice in courts
of law or before an international tribunal.
"The Hague Appeal for Peace urges the US administration to use the
greatest possible restraint. It should give careful consideration to
the response: an eye for an eye only leads to blindness," said Cora
Weiss, president. "Numbers have led to names. We call for a national
day of healing. It is dangerous to call terrorism by non state actors,
no matter how horrendous, an act of war that triggers a war like
reaction," she added.
This past century started with a war and the new century is
starting with war talk. In between, humanity has learned a great deal
about conflict prevention and resolution. We have seen that acts of
violence and terror tend to beget further violence. We fear the
political and military consequences of this murderous terrorism. We
must guard our liberty and not allow fear to restrict our hard-won
freedoms. We must not allow the atmosphere of hatred to justify acts
of war against unidentified enemies. We cherish the force of law, not
the law of force.
While we support and work at healing and holding the mourners in
our thoughts, we must consider the problems that lead to this
madness...issues of the economic gap between north and south; between
the Muslim and the western world ; the gap between people of color and
white people; and caused by the misallocation of resources with its
resulting inequity between funds designated for health and education
and the $1 trillion allocated world wide for the military. Finally, we
must look at the gap between men and women that leaves only men at the
tables of negotiation, and make successful efforts to include women at
every table where the fate of humanity is at stake.
We urge Mr. Peres and Mr. Arafat to sit together immediately; we
urge people of conscience to make every effort to set tables for those
who are in conflict, and to facilitate those meetings; we urge all
teachers and school principals to institute peace education as an
integral part of their primary and secondary curricula; we urge the US
to support the International Criminal Court in prosecuting crimes
against humanity , war crimes and genocide. We urge the US to respect
and work with and through the United Nations, including the anti
terrorism conventions which the US has so far refused to join, as it
works at solutions to this and other problems of violence in the
world.
The Hague Appeal for Peace is a global network
calling for sowing the seeds for the abolition of war and peace as a
human right. It has launched a global campaign for peace education and
is in partnership with the United Nations to introduce disarmament
education into schools where the UN is collecting small arms. It is
also developing an Individual Complaints Procedure to supplement the
International Court of Justice and the proposed International Criminal
Court. The Hague Appeal for Peace held the largest peace conference in
history on the centennial of the world's first peace congress, in The
Hague, The Netherlands in May, l999.
www.haguepeace.org
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