This year’s NATO summit will take place at the Celtic Manor Resort in Newport on 4th-5th September. Earlier this year, local campaigns met to start planning events to coincide with the summit, using the occasion as a platform to publicise alternatives to endless war and austerity through mass meetings and protest.
Events will be organised under the banner of No NATO Newport, the coalition initiated by activists from Cardiff Stop the War Coalition, CND Cymru, Newport People’s Assembly, trade unions, anti-cuts and community groups. We are working in conjunction with Stop the War Coalition, CND, the European peace movement and radical left to co-ordinate mass opposition on the streets before and during the summit.
Welsh organisations committed to social justice and change now have a heavy burden of responsibility to ensure maximum unity of the 99% against the agenda of the 1%.
No NATO Newport call upon everyone to sign a statement of No to NATO, war and austerity: ‘Wales could see its biggest protests in a generation as 60 world leaders meet at the Celtic Manor in Newport for the NATO summit on 4th -5th September to plan their war on the world. Previous summits in Chicago and Strasbourg saw thousands protest war, austerity and global inequality.
‘From August 30th people will flock to South Wales for international actions including a weekend march and Counter Summit, week-long peace camp, and protests on the summit’s opening day.
‘NATO is the nuclear-armed military alliance binding Europe to US foreign policy, a foreign policy post-Iraq increasingly unpopular around the world. It is also the military alliance currently occupying Afghanistan.
‘War is the enemy of the poor. The world’s 85 richest people have as much as poorest 3.5 billion. The annual sum needed to end world hunger is $30 billion while the US Military’s budget is $530 billion per year. Money into war is money out of our communities. In the UK, 500,000 people had to resort to food banks last year. While public services are slashed, one day of war in Afghanistan could fund 100,000 nurses.
‘This autumn the powerful will make their voices heard at the NATO summit. We must make sure that the voice of the millions around the world who need peace and justice is also heard.’