Two years have passed since the beginning of the Resistance of the Iraqi people against the American and British occupiers and the military forces of the so called «Alliance of the Willing». In these two years this alliance has known breaches and withdrawals due to the heavy pressure of the Resistance. The Resistance of the Iraqi people is the first important proof that also in the 21st century the peoples have the power to confront and defeat imperialism and the warmongering reactionary forces all over the world. Contrary to all those that have predicted a quick Iraqi subjugation, the Resistance is continuously strengthening, grows up on the crimes of the occupiers, gives courage to the Arab peoples and the peoples all over the world, has brought the Bush administration and its allies into a difficult position, has proven that the American imperialist army is not invincible, and has brought back the Vietnam specter to haunt the US.
The Greek anti-imperialist and anti-war movement has risen from the first moment against the US invasion of Iraq. Hundreds of thousand of people were demonstrating all over the country since November 2002 and especially on February and March 2003. But even after the fall of Baghdad there were hundreds of activities, protest and solidarity actions. Over 90% of Greeks were polled against the American aggressiveness. During the invasion days and later the American and NATO bases, and especially the Suda base in Crete, in which the American planes were refueled, were surrounded by demonstrators. We have the honor of organizing three rounds of solidarity activities since November 2003 introducing the Iraqi resistance in over ten large Greek cities with representatives of the Iraqi Patriotic Alliance. On December 2004 we took part in the international day of solidarity to the Iraqi Resistance marching to the American embassy in Athens.
We were always of the impression that the best and most effective solidarity to the anti-imperialist struggles all over the world is by strengthening the anti-imperialist movement of each country; first of all by struggling against the imperialist props in our own country; against the military bases and concessions; against any Greek involvement in imperialist interventions with troops, supplies, etc. Greece did not participate openly in the imperialist invasion of Iraq and this was partly due to the general reaction of the Greek people. Of course this struggle is still in its beginning. Many things must be done until the anti-imperialist and popular movement in Greece manages to completely secede from the American political and military custody, and get out of NATO and all the rest aggressive imperialist apparatuses as is the demand of the broad masses for decades now.
Along and in close contact with these struggles, the internationalist
solidarity and unconditional political support of peoples and
anti-imperialist movements, was always and still is of the utmost importance and a significant criterion for antiwar movements. In recent years under the strong political and ideological pressure of imperialist forces, their propaganda and manipulation by the Media, there is a systematic attempt to cut-off, isolate and slander popular movements especially in the Third World, M. East, Arab countries, Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Under the pretext of terrorism, the use or exploitation of certain cases and actions (not by far expressing the majority of the movements), and the promotion of religious differences and anti-Islamic hysteria, they intend to present the popular resistance movements as terrorist and fanatic, fundamentalist, etc. Several antiwar forces and trends have succumbed to this pressure, in the early stages. But even now some still accept uncritically this Media manipulation and keep their distances from the solidarity movement especially that of the Iraqi Resistance. No politics of «even distances» can stand against imperialist interventions, war and occupation. We are on the side of the anti-occupation mass struggle of the Iraqi people and its vanguard forces to rightfully fight against the occupiers of his country. This is clear for the Greek people and the progressive forces in our country. As legitimate was the armed resistance of our people against the fascist and Nazi occupation of 1941-1944, so legitimate is the Iraqi Resistance against the Americans and their allies.
The struggle of the Iraqi people will be long. The Americans will not leave easily and willingly, because they know that that would be a heavy defeat for their world domination plans. That is why our solidarity must be organized more systematically, must have depth and continuity, must take a protracted character. We must mainly try to reverse the consequences of the dominant propaganda and show to the western public opinion the real situation in Iraq. We must reveal the crimes of the occupying forces and show that the Iraqi resistance is not a «handful of terrorists» but a majority trend. We must denounce the tortures, speak about the thousands of prisoners, and stigmatize the mass crimes of Faluja and Tal-Afar. We must try to inject to the antiwar movement the need to support the Iraqi resistance. For this we need international coordination, more international initiatives, days of action and solidarity, activities and mobilizations. We consider the present international meeting very positive and condemn the Italian government for trying to cancel it. We also think that ILPS and
other unifying movements and initiatives can play an important role in this direction.
The solidarity to theIraqi Resistance is an integral part of the struggle
against American imperialism and especially the most dangerous and aggressive one, American imperialism, which still strives for world
domination. The present stage of relevant lapse of aggressiveness by its part must not fool anyone. This is not an indication of retreat or
rationalization but an involuntary result of the strong popular resistance and the stagnation of American strategy. Soon it will try again to create war crisis and retry to intervene in countries and peoples. Although the main front must be against American imperialism and its close allies, we must not be directed to a stance of accepting the policies of other
imperialist powers and especially that of the European Union. The so-called «peaceful» policies of some European governments, as they were expressed in the Iraq invasion, were mainly the result of their different interests and their contradictions with the American monocratic and unilateral policy. In Afghanistan, for instance, they participate in the NATO occupation military forces and in other cases they promote imperialist interventions.
We must struggle to build a common anti-imperialist popular front of
resistance and liberation against the imperialist aggressiveness. We must strengthen the anti-imperialist line in the antiwar movements. We must take the initiative for common action like Thessaloniki 2003 and Mumbai 2004. On the occasion of the Athens 2006 European Social Forum meeting the anti-imperialist forces in Greece intend to take a similar initiative, part of which will be the solidarity to the Iraqi Resistance. We have done much in the past but not as much as the circumstances demand. The heroic resistance of the Iraqi people creates optimism. The peoples will finally defeat imperialism. This is a historical necessity and a sure conclusion!
We especially salute the struggle of the «Iraqi Patriotic Alliance» for the political unity of the Iraqi people and demand the immediate release of its leader, Abduljabar al-Qubaysi. We condemn the tortures in purgatories like Abu Graib and demand the immediate release of the Iraqi Resistance fighters.
We condemn the criminal genocidal attacks of the occupational forces against the Iraqi free towns and salute the heroic resistance in Tal-Afar and Faluja. We condemn the bans of the European governments and demand the free moves of the legitimate representatives of the Iraqi people, the resistance movements and not the quislings of the «green zone».
LONG LIVE THE RESISTANCE OF THE IRAQI PEOPLE AGAINST THE IMPERIALIST
OCCUPATION!
VICTORY TO THE IRAQI RESISTANCE!
Rome, October 2nd, 2005
