Letter from Afghan MP Malalai Joya to Ottawa City Council
The letter to Ottawa City Council
(appended below) comes from an
Afghan woman Member of Parliament who expresses her clear opposition to the use
of Ottawa facilities for any military trade shows.
Malalai Joya is an elected Afghan Member of Parliament.
However, in May 2007 she was barred from Parliament for three years because she
had denounced the many foreign-backed warlords and drug barons who dominate her
government. While the Afghan Parliament passed a law giving immunity to all
Afghan's who have committed war crimes over the previous 25 years, it also
passed a law saying that Afghan MPs could not criticise each other.
So it is permissible to have MPs in Afghanistan's parliament who are war
criminals, but it is not permissible to have MPs in that Parliament who dare to
risk death threats for merely criticising the presence of war criminals. This is
the democracy that Canada helped to install and is now protecting. Canada helped
the US replace the Taliban warlords with the "Northern Alliance" warlords who
killed tens of thousands of innocent civilians in Kabul alone in the 1990s.
For more about MP Malalai Joya and her ongoing struggle to hold
to account those Afghans and their foreign backers who are complicit in mass
murder, please view COAT's slide show on CANSEC.
The CANSEC slide show
starts here
The section of the slide show
on Malalai starts here
Malalai's website is here
Excerpts from Malalai's letter were read to Councillors at the
Corporate Services Committee meeting on June 15, 2009. Her struggle to expose
Afghan warlords in her government and her removal from Parliament was described.
However, several Councillors expressed their outright opposition to the display
of graphic photographs -- provided by Malalai Joya -- that showed civilian
victims of allied bombing attacks. These attacks were carried out by warplanes
thoroughly embedded with numerous essential Canadian components manufactured by
CANSEC 2009 exhibitors.
One Councillor even stated in his closing remarks that Malalai
Joya should (instead of being so critical) be thankful that Canadian troops
allow her to have a voice in the Afghan Parliament. (The Councillor apparently
did not absorb the fact that Malalai has banned from attending the
warlord-dominated parliament that Canada helped to install and that Canadian
troops are now protecting.)
Here is the letter received from Malalai Joya on June 12, 2009.
-------------------------------------------
As a member of a generation of war and conflict from Afghanistan, and as a
representative of a country which has been torn apart by decades of war,
occupation and bombs, I join the inspiring protest of peace-loving people of
Ottawa against hosting
the weapons shows. I strongly support the initiative of
Coalition to Oppose the
Arms Trade (COAT) against arms and for a peaceful world.
Being from a country devastated by war, we know very well the awful consequences
of arms and ammunition produced by countries like Canada. For over 30 years,
Afghan people have been bombed, killed, tortured and brutalized by world powers
and the armed groups supported by them. Around 2.5 million Afghans have been
killed during these years. Today there are over 800,000 disabled people, 25% of
them children; there are over 700,000 war widows and millions of orphans.
Afghanistan’s soil is still full of over 9 million land mines which take
innocent lives on a daily basis.
The Afghan terrorist bands have made life a torture for our nation; they are
imposing their extremism and acts of terror with the help of the weapons that
are being sent to them from abroad. None of them are able to produce any weapon
to kill innocent people.
I think the people of Canada and especially citizens of Ottawa should not allow
their soil to be used for displaying any hated weapons used against the poor
people of Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries.
In the past eight years, under the so-called “war on terror” imposed by the US
and allies against Afghan people, thousands of innocent Afghan people have
fallen victim to the dreaded war machine of occupation forces. But still the
terrorists are getting stronger day by day and Afghanistan is being changed into
the world capital of the drug mafia. The coalitions forces are not only killing
our people with weapons, some of which are produced in Canada, but they are
giving arms and support to warlords who are now policy makers in the puppet
government of Hamid Karzai, They misuse their power to suppress Afghan people,
especially women.
You may have heard of the USA bombardments of civilians in Afghanistan and the
tragedies caused by it. The most recent example is the massacre in Bala Baluk
district in Western Afghanistan, where US B-1 bombers dropped a series of
2000-pound bombs on two small villages and over 143 civilians, mostly women and
children, where torn into pieces. Many mournful families never found the dead
bodies of their loved ones as they were burnt in the flames of the bombs. In a
similar incident, a wedding party was targeted in Nengrhar province
of Afghanistan and 47 women and children, including the bride, were killed. Such
tragedies are daily realities of life for Afghan people.
Dropping thousands of cluster bombs and the depleted-uranium (DU) and white
phosphorus bombs used in Afghanistan have caused terrible health problems. It
has also ruined our environment and in the past few years the number of
congenital abnormalities and disorders in newborn babes have raised to high
levels. The use of DU weapons not only put our people in danger, it will also
have bad effect on soldiers fighting in that environment. Canadian soldiers in
Afghanistan may not be safe from its impact.
The bomblets of cluster bombs, scattered in Afghan villages are like dead gifts
to Afghan children and they routinely kill or disable our kids. It is so sad to
know that many components in the war planes used to distribute such deadly
weapons used against our people are produced in Canada and that they are put on
display at Ottawa weapons show.
Canada is seen as a peaceful country by many Afghans. The image of Canada and
its people will be badly destroyed in the mind of Afghan people if they know
about such shows of weapons, because they are deeply fed up with the years of
war and being killed by such weapons.
I call on peace and justice-loving people in Ottawa to raise their voice and
stop using of their city for displaying the death machines which are killing
poor people in my country. Please express your solidarity with my suffering and
crying people, by saying NO to the show of weapons, which drive billions of
dollars into the pockets of a few people, at the expense of blood, tears and
suffering of the unfortunate people of Afghanistan and other conflict zones.
I pay tribute to all people of Ottawa who raise their voice against the display
of weapons and express the thanks of my people to them for caring about their
life and miseries.
With due respect,
Malalai Joya
http://www.malalaijoya.com