[Must our leaders take us to the brink of World War III, with all
our lives on the line in an all-out nuclear war, before they will
permit a ceasefire and a negotiated peace?]
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WHEN WILL US JOIN GLOBAL CALL TO END UKRAINE WAR?  
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Medea Benjamin, Nicolas J.S. Davies
May 30, 2023
Common Dreams
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_ Must our leaders take us to the brink of World War III, with all
our lives on the line in an all-out nuclear war, before they will
permit a ceasefire and a negotiated peace? _

A billboard hanging outside a night club reads: "No War!" on January
18, 2022 in Berlin, Germany. Tensions between Europe, Ukraine and the
U.S. on the one side and Russia on the other remain high , Getty
Images

 

When Japan invited the leaders of Brazil, India and Indonesia to
attend the G7 summit in Hiroshima, there were glimmers
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of hope that it might be a forum for these rising economic powers from
the Global South to discuss their advocacy for peace in Ukraine with
the wealthy Western G7 countries that are militarily allied with
Ukraine and have so far remained deaf to pleas for peace.

But it was not to be. Instead, the Global South leaders were forced to
sit and listen as their hosts announced their latest plans to tighten
sanctions against Russia and further escalate the war by sending
U.S.-built F-16 warplanes to Ukraine.

The G7 summit stands in stark contrast to efforts of leaders from
around the world who are trying to end the conflict. In the past, the
leaders of Turkey, Israel and Italy have stepped up to try to mediate.
Their efforts were bearing fruit back in April 2022, but were blocked
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by the West, particularly the U.S. and U.K., which did not want
Ukraine to make an independent peace agreement with Russia.

Rather than sleepwalking into World War III or silently watching this
senseless loss of lives, we are building a global grassroots movement
to support initiatives by leaders from around the world that will help
to quickly end this war.

Now that the war has dragged on for over a year with no end in sight,
other leaders have stepped forward to try to push both sides to the
negotiating table. In an intriguing new development, Denmark, a NATO
country, has stepped forward to offer to host peace talks. On May 22,
just days after the G-7 meeting, Danish Foreign Minister Lokke
Rasmussen said
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that his country would be ready to host a peace summit in July if
Russia and Ukraine agreed to talk.

“We need to put some effort into creating a global commitment to
organize such a meeting,” said Rasmussen, mentioning that this would
require getting support from China, Brazil, India and other nations
that have expressed interest in mediating peace talks. Having an EU
and NATO member promoting negotiations may well reflect a shift in how
Europeans view the path forward in Ukraine.

Also reflecting this shift is a report
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by Seymour Hersh [[link removed]],
citing U.S. intelligence sources, that the leaders of Poland, Czechia,
Hungary and the three Baltic states, all NATO members, are talking to
President Zelenskyy about the need to end the war and start rebuilding
Ukraine so that the five million refugees now living in their
countries can start to return home. On May 23, right-wing Hungarian
President Viktor Orban said
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“Looking at the fact that NATO is not ready to send troops, it’s
obvious that there is no victory for poor Ukrainians on the
battlefield,” and that the only way to end the conflict was for
Washington to negotiate with Russia.

Meanwhile, China’s peace initiative has been progressing, despite
U.S. trepidation. Li Hui,
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China’s special representative for Eurasian affairs and former
ambassador to Russia, has met with
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Putin, Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and other
European leaders to move the dialogue forward. Given its position as
both Russia’s and Ukraine’s top trading partner, China is in a
good position to engage with both sides.

Another initiative has come from President Lula da Silva of Brazil,
who is creating a “peace club
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of countries from around the world to work together to resolve the
conflict in Ukraine. He appointed renowned diplomat Celso Amorim as
his peace envoy. Amorim was Brazil’s foreign minister from 2003 to
2010, and was named the “world’s best foreign minister” in
_Foreign Affairs_ magazine. He also served as Brazil’s defense
minister from 2011 to 2014, and is now President Lula’s chief
foreign policy advisor. Amorim has already had meetings
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with Putin in Moscow and Zelenskyy in Kyiv, and was well received by
both parties.

On May 16, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and other African
leaders stepped into the fray, reflecting just how seriously this war
is affecting the global economy through rising prices for energy and
food. Ramaphosa announced
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a high-level mission by six African presidents, led by President Macky
Sall of Senegal. He served, until recently, as Chairman of the African
Union and, in that capacity, spoke out forcefully for peace in Ukraine
at the UN General Assembly in September 2022.

The other members of the mission are Presidents Nguesso of Congo,
Al-Sisi of Egypt, Musevini of Uganda and Hichilema of Zambia. The
African leaders are calling for a ceasefire in Ukraine, to be followed
by serious negotiations to arrive at “a framework for lasting
peace.” UN Secretary-General Guterres has been briefed
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on their plans and has “welcomed the initiative.”

Pope Francis and the Vatican are also seeking
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to mediate the conflict. “Let us not get used to conflict and
violence. Let us not get used to war,” the Pope preached
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The Vatican has already helped facilitate successful prisoner
exchanges between Russia and Ukraine, and Ukraine has asked for the
Pope’s help in reuniting families that have been separated by the
conflict. A sign of the Pope’s commitment is his appointment of
veteran negotiator Cardinal Matteo Zuppi as his peace envoy. Zuppi was
instrumental in mediating talks that ended civil wars in Guatemala and
Mozambique.

Will any of these initiatives bear fruit? The possibility of getting
Russia and Ukraine to talk depends on many factors, including their
perceptions of potential gains from continued combat, their ability to
maintain adequate supplies of weapons, and the growth of internal
opposition. But it also depends on international pressure, and that is
why these outside efforts are so critical and why U.S. and NATO
countries’ opposition to talks must somehow be reversed.

The U.S. rejection or dismissal of peace initiatives illustrates the
disconnect between two diametrically opposed approaches to resolving
international disputes: diplomacy vs. war. It also illustrates the
disconnect between rising public sentiment
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against the war and the determination of U.S. policymakers to prolong
it, including most Democrats and Republicans.

A growing grassroots movement in the U.S. is working to change that:

* In May, foreign policy experts and grassroots activists put out
paid advertisements in The New York Times
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Hill
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to urge the U.S. government to be a force for peace. The Hill ad was
endorsed by 100 organizations around the country, and community
leaders organized in dozens
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congressional districts to deliver the ad to their representatives.

* Faith-based leaders, over 1,000 of whom signed
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a letter to President Biden in December calling for a Christmas Truce,
are showing their support for the Vatican’s peace initiative.

* The U.S. Conference of Mayors, an organization that represents
about 1,400 cities throughout the country, unanimously adopted
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a resolution calling on the President and Congress to “maximize
diplomatic efforts to end the war as soon as possible by working with
Ukraine and Russia to reach an immediate ceasefire and negotiate with
mutual concessions in conformity with the United Nations Charter,
knowing that the risks of wider war grow the longer the war
continues.”

* Key U.S. environmental leaders have recognized how disastrous this
war is for the environment, including the possibility of a
catastrophic nuclear war or an explosion in a nuclear power plant, and
have sent a letter
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President Biden and Congress urging a negotiated settlement.
* On June 10-11, U.S. activists will join peacemakers from all over
the world in Vienna, Austria, for an International Summit for Peace in
Ukraine [[link removed]].
* Some of the contenders running for president, on both the
Democratic and Republican tickets, support a negotiated peace in
Ukraine, including Robert F. Kennedy [[link removed]]
and Donald Trump
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The initial decision of the United States and NATO member countries to
try to help Ukraine resist the Russian invasion had broad public
support
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However, blocking
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promising peace negotiations and deliberately choosing to prolong the
war as a chance to “press”
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“weaken”
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Russia changed the nature of the war and the U.S. role in it, making
Western leaders active parties to a war in which they will not even
put their own forces on the line.

Must our leaders wait until a murderous war of attrition has killed an
entire generation of Ukrainians, and left Ukraine in a weaker
negotiating position than it was in April 2022, before they respond to
the international call for a return to the negotiating table?

Or must our leaders take us to the brink of World War III, with all
our lives on the line in an all-out nuclear war
[[link removed]],
before they will permit a ceasefire and a negotiated peace?

Rather than sleepwalking into World War III or silently watching this
senseless loss of lives, we are building a global grassroots movement
to support initiatives by leaders from around the world that will help
to quickly end this war and usher in a stable and lasting peace. Join
us [[link removed]].

===

Medea Benjamin is co-founder of Global Exchange and CODEPINK: Women
for Peace. She is the co-author, with Nicolas J.S. Davies, of War in
Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict, available from OR Books
in November 2022. Other books include, "Inside Iran: The Real History
and Politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran" (2018); "Kingdom of the
Unjust: Behind the U.S.-Saudi Connection" (2016); "Drone Warfare:
Killing by Remote Control" (2013); "Don't Be Afraid Gringo: A Honduran
Woman Speaks from the Heart" (1989), and (with Jodie Evans) "Stop the
Next War Now" (2005).
 

Nicolas J. S. Davies is an independent journalist and a researcher
with CODEPINK. He is the co-author, with Medea Benjamin, of War in
Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict, available from OR Books
in November 2022, and the author of Blood On Our Hands: the American
Invasion and Destruction of Iraq.
 

* Russia; Ukraine; Peace talks;
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