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Statement Condemning the British Government’s Actions on Iran
The Communist Party of Britain condemns the British government’s decision to send a further warship, HMS Argyle, to join US and French military forces in the Gulf and calls for maximum support for the demonstration in London on Saturday, 28 January organised by Stop the War.
The British government has played a grossly irresponsible and dangerous role in driving through the new EU policy to impose a full embargo on oil exports from Iran from the beginning of July 2012 – in circumstances where this will be seen in Iran as a direct attack on its sovereign interests. A trail is being laid that could lead directly to a major military conflagration from which no country will escape unscathed.
The folly of this policy is underlined by this month’s report by the US Institute for Science and International Security that Iran lacks the resources to build a nuclear bomb, that no decision has yet been taken to do so and that current resource constraints make any immediate move in that direction unlikely. In these circumstances, the constant heightening of tension, together with the direct military challenges from the US, Britain, Israel and their allies, will serve only to push the Middle East further towards the brink of war of devastating proportions.
Current interventions by the US and Britain are clearly motivated by a determination to maintain their own economic dominance over the region and to appease their key regional allies, Saudi Arabia and Israel. Furthermore, threats of external imperialist intervention strengthen the hands of the most reactionary sections of the regime in Iran, enabling it to consolidate its repressive stranglehold.
The Communist Party of Britain
Statement Condemning the British Government’s Actions on Iran
The Communist Party of Britain condemns the British government’s decision to send a further warship, HMS Argyle, to join US and French military forces in the Gulf and calls for maximum support for the demonstration in London on Saturday, 28 January organised by Stop the War.
The British government has played a grossly irresponsible and dangerous role in driving through the new EU policy to impose a full embargo on oil exports from Iran from the beginning of July 2012 – in circumstances where this will be seen in Iran as a direct attack on its sovereign interests. A trail is being laid that could lead directly to a major military conflagration from which no country will escape unscathed.
The folly of this policy is underlined by this month’s report by the US Institute for Science and International Security that Iran lacks the resources to build a nuclear bomb, that no decision has yet been taken to do so and that current resource constraints make any immediate move in that direction unlikely. In these circumstances, the constant heightening of tension, together with the direct military challenges from the US, Britain, Israel and their allies, will serve only to push the Middle East further towards the brink of war of devastating proportions.
Current interventions by the US and Britain are clearly motivated by a determination to maintain their own economic dominance over the region and to appease their key regional allies, Saudi Arabia and Israel. Furthermore, threats of external imperialist intervention strengthen the hands of the most reactionary sections of the regime in Iran, enabling it to consolidate its repressive stranglehold.
The Communist Party of Britain
- Condemns economic sanctions on Iran as penalising the Iranian people as a whole and strengthening the hand of the theocratic regime
- Condemns current military actions as provocative and dangerous in the extreme
- Calls for the UN-sponsored negotiations with the Iranian government to be resumed
- Expresses its solidarity with the Tudeh Party of Iran and all those in Iran struggling to restore democracy and against the repression of trade unions and civil rights.
