Here are some news items compiled by the Canadian Peace Alliance. To get on the CPA mailing list, go to http://www.acp-cpa.ca/en/index.html.
After 2011 – Why Canada Needs to Leave Afghanistan
Canadian Peace Alliance
March 31, 2010
At the G8 Foreign Ministers meeting, held at Gatineau, March 29-30, Prime Minister Stephen Harper told the assembled media and delegates that Canada will end its combat role in Afghanistan in 2011, despite Hillary Clinton’s appeal for Canada to stay.
By talking about the end of the combat role Harper has, however, kept the door open for a continued presence of Canadian Forces in Afghanistan, to train the Afghan army and police, to provide other logistical support for NATO forces, etc.
This is a sleight of hand, designed to mislead the Canadian people, the majority of whom want to end Canada’s combat role now. We have heard this argument from Harper before. In 2008, the Conservatives said that we would not stay until 2011, unless there was a change in the nature of the mission. The mission didn’t change and the troops stayed.
Foreign troops are considered as occupation forces by the Afghan population. No matter what the role post-2011, Canada will still be working to support an occupation that has created poverty and misery for the vast majority of the Afghan people. How Canada supports that occupation is not the question. Simply by being there, Canada helps legitimize both the NATO mission and the corrupt Afghan Government.
Read more at: http://www.acp-cpa.ca/en/After2011.html
Karzai “May Join the Taliban”
One more Reason to Bring the Troops Home Now
Media Release from the Canadian Peace Alliance
Toronto, April 6, 2010 – The Canadian Peace Alliance (CPA), Canada’s largest peace network, renewed calls for Canadian Forces to be brought home from Afghanistan after Afghan President Hamid Karzai threatened to join the Taliban in a meeting with Afghan parliamentarians. Karzai also criticized the heavy handed approach of NATO, including their repeated killing of civilians, and even implied that he would attempt to stop NATO’s planned June offensive in Kandahar from happening.
Read more at: http://www.acp-cpa.ca/en/KarzaiJoininTaliban.html
Video shows ‘US attack’ on Iraqis
Al-Jazeera
April 6, 2010
One of the internet’s biggest sources of classified government information has released video of what it says is a US helicopter firing at civilians in Iraq.
Read more and see the video at: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/04201045123449200569.html
Afghan Investigators Say U.S. Troops Tried to Cover Up Evidence in Botched Raid
New York Times
April 5, 2010
KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghan officials investigating the deaths of five Afghan civilians gunned down in February during a bungled raid by American Special Operations forces believe that troops tampered with evidence at the scene, the lead investigator said Monday. NATO officials disclosed that they were looking into the allegations.
Read more at: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/world/asia/06afghan.html