September 3rd, 2020
We, as WINPEACE (Women’s Initiative for Peace) members from Turkey, Greece, and Greek and Turkish Cypriot communities, are deeply concerned about the recent developments in the Eastern Mediterranean. Reckless statements and counter-statements and actions by all the stakeholder can thoughtlessly lead our countries to the brink of war.
We have been working for mutual understanding and rapprochement amongst the women and young people of our countries for the last twenty three years. We believe there is no mother on any shore of our shared region who is willing to exchange the life of her child for any part of hydrocarbon gas in the Mediterranean Sea.
We therefore call upon the governments of our countries to put an end to their adversarial daily discourses and to immediately start a dialogue between our countries with the aim of sharing whatever wealth is hidden under the Mediterranean and thus refrain from turning its blue waters into blood red. Our countries should work together in a collaborative and trusting spirit to reach creative solutions in a win-win fashion to benefit our societies.
We would also like to stress that at a time of worldwide economic crisis, the resources to be spent in war efforts should be challenged to meet the basic needs and concerns of our peoples. The COVID-19 pandemic has deepened already existing gender and social inequalities. We believe strongly governments should spend all their efforts to fight the pandemic and these inequalities in a peaceful and cooperative fashion.
At the same time we find it ironical that this entire debacle is caused by the fight for fossil fuels, which scientists have proven to be the main cause of climate change that threatens the entire planet, and urge our governments to direct their energies toward reducing the consumption of such fuels and increasing the efforts to increase renewable energy sources.
WINPEACE GREECE – TURKEY – CYPRUS, NORTH and SOUTH
For Greece kindly contact:
Ifigeneia Georgiadou, e-mail: ifigenia@hcc.edu.gr
Fotini Sianou, e-mail: fotini.sianou@gmail.com fotini.sianou@kede.org