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Science for Peace Media Release on Bush-NMD By Carolyn Langdon Executive Coordinator |
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Toronto- The election of George W. Bush as U.S. President means the
deeply flawed and globally destabilizing National Missile Defence Scheme
is no longer on hold. "That in itself is bad news for peace", says Mel
Watkins of Science for Peace and Chair of the Committee against the
National Missile Defence (NMD).
"Worse", adds Watkins, who is also a Professor Emeritus at the
University of Toronto, "for Bush the NMD is the revival of the Reagan
Administration's absurd and dangerous Star Wars, and is part of a grand
plan for U.S. dominance of space."
Watkins wants the Canadian government to say an unambiguous No to the
NMD. "It's the first big test of the government's foreign policy since
Mr. Axworthy left the Cabinet. The world will judge us badly if we get this one wrong."
Russian President Vladimir Putin has come to Canada to warn that the NMD
will undermine the global commitment to prevent nuclear proliferation.
Karl Grossman, an award-winning American investigative journalist,
speaking in Toronto in October, hailed Canada as a world leader at the
United Nations in seeking to ban weapons from space. He warned against
U.S. plans for space. "Being an empire, being drunk with power, that is
what I'm sorry to say my country is involved in". Grossman, who is also
Professor of Journalism at the State University of New York, says the
United States "desperately needs guidance and pressure from Canada to do
the right thing".
The Committee Against the NMD includes representatives from Science for
Peace, Greenpeace, Voice of Women, Physicians for Global Survival,
Lawyers for Social Responsibility, Peacefund and other peace organizations.
Carolyn Langdon, Executive Coordinator
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