London, Nov 20, IRNA — Thousands of peace campaigners gathered in central London Saturday to call for the end of the 9-year war in Afghanistan, saying it was “time to go.”
“The war in Afghanistan is now just about saving face,” said Andrew Murray, the national chair of the Stop the War Coalition (SWTC), coordinating the national march.
“There is the absurdity of the £5bn or so being spent (by Britain) every year on a conflict that almost every serious observer in London or Washington now regards as all but hopeless,” Murray said.
“Perhaps this would all seem a price worth paying were it a war that had a purpose commanding support. But few can now credit the argument that the Taliban need to be fought in Helmand,” he said.
Contrary to the British government’s claim, he said that “not a single terrorist plot launched against this country – nor one thwarted or even alleged – has had any roots in Afghanistan.”
The national march comes as the war enters its 10 the year and as Nato leaders were meeting in Lisbon to endorse a new exit strategy based upon ending combat operation in Afghanistan by 2014.
But the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), a main organiser of the London protest, warned of further wasted deaths by the delay in pulling out.
‘That is five years too long. How many more will die by then? Why should countless lives and billions of pounds be poured into an effort which is clearly part of the problems of Afghanistan, not part of their solution?’ said CND general secretary Kate Hudson.
Those attending the march also included several MPs as well as former British soldier Joe Glenton, who returned his Afghan medal back to Prime Minister David Cameron’s office on Friday.
“It’s really important to me to make this protest, this symbolic gesture,” said Glenton, who was sentenced to six month in jail for refusing to return to Afghanistan for a second tour.