Statement on the War in Ukraine

 

No to Putin’s war in Ukraine!

No to NATO military intervention!

Humanitarian assistance to Ukrainian refugees!

Solidarity with the anti-war protests in Russia!

 

Partido Manggagawa (Workers Party-Philippines) denounces the invasion of Ukraine by the Russian military and the Putin regime. There is no valid reason for Russia to invade and annex Ukraine which is a sovereign country. The alibis asserted by Putin are baseless. It thinly masks its expansionist desires and imperialist aims.

 

We support the anti-war protests in Russia against the invasion of Ukraine. It is through the development of a broad anti-war movement inside and outside Russia that peace can be achieved.

 

In this respect, we oppose the call for military intervention by Western countries under NATO against Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. A military confrontation between NATO and Russia is a recipe for disaster if not another world war. Such a scenario brings the world to the abyss of nuclear war.

 

In fact, NATO’s own expansionist aims to extend its membership eastward to Ukraine and the very borders of Russia gave Putin a convenient pretext for the invasion. Even as we condemn Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, we do not condone NATO’s expansionism. It is entirely hypocritical for Biden to slam Putin when the US has its own bloody history of direct invasion, such as Iraq, Afghanistan and Grenada, and proxy wars in Africa, and Central and Latin America.

 

We call for extending humanitarian assistance to civilian refugees from the war in Ukraine. We too support solidarity actions by trade unions and labor movements to end the war in Ukraine. The refusal of airport workers in Pisa, Italy to load arms destined for Ukraine is an exemplary action that continues the tradition of the proletarian solidarity against Israel’s occupation of Palestine and siege of Gaza.

 

In the Philippines, we work for awareness raising among organized and unorganized workers for an anti-war position on the basis of working-class internationalism.

 

Partido Manggagawa

National Executive Committee