SYDNEY
Sunday, May 30, 3:00pm
Tom Mann Theatre
136 Chalmers Street
Surry Hills
(close to Central Station)
Tickets: $5/$3 concession
MELBOURNE
Thursday, June 3, 7:30pm
Conference Room, Hotel Y
489 Elizabeth Street
Melbourne
Tickets: $5/$3 concession
The catastrophic war in Iraq has engulfed the Bush administration in its deepest ever crisis. All the lies used to justify it have collapsed and millions of people in the US and internationally are horrified and repulsed by what is being done to the Iraqi people.
Far from bringing “liberation” and “democracy”, US troops are employing barbaric methods—from the bombing of cities, to indiscriminate killings and mass arrests, to depraved forms of torture—to try to subjugate the Iraqi people and reduce the country to the status of an American puppet-state. Their actions are an expression of the colonial agenda driving the war itself, namely, to secure Washington’s unchallenged dominance over Iraq’s oil reserves and to establish US hegemony throughout the Middle East and Central Asia.
To oppose US imperialism and its allies, such as the Howard government in Australia, requires an alternative socialist and international perspective. While mass opposition exists, in Australia and around the world, to war and imperialism, it cannot find any expression through the official political framework. In the US, the Democratic Party has pledged its support for the occupation of Iraq. In Australia, the Labor Party is likewise silent on the crimes being perpetrated against the Iraqi people.
The World Socialist Web Site and the SEP demand the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all US, Australian and foreign forces from Iraq, and the prosecution of the Bush, Blair and Howard governments before a war crimes tribunal. The Iraqi people must have the right to determine their own future.
We urge all World Socialist Web Site readers and SEP supporters to attend our public meetings in Sydney or Melbourne, which will be addressed by leading members of the WSWS international editorial board.
For further information contact the Socialist Equality Party:
Email: sep@sep.org.au
Phone: 02 9790 3511
Mail: PO Box 367, Bankstown, NSW 1885