We send you today our warmest militant greetings of solidarity! We are fighting a common struggle, and that is to assert our rights, defend them and secure for ourselves and for all oppressed peoples a humane society.
We fight in the midst of news of the continuing tragedy of refugees drowning as they attempt to cross the Mediterranean Sea to continental Europe to escape the wars and political instability in the Middle East and Africa. We know that these wars and conflicts are instigated by corporate totalitarians and their political representatives who control governments and political institutions in the so-called civilized west.
Today we also take up not only the issue of refugees, but also the victims of climate change – in the Philippines, and in other parts of the globe.
We know that the problems of climate change and the creation of a huge number of refugees are caused by the same greed for profit and power by a few ruling elite. The victims of climate change also become migrants and refugees seeking safe havens, in the same way that the victims of wars and conflicts become refugees to escape death and destruction.
Thus, we fight the same enemies, and our vision is one. We need to end this system of greed in the name of corporate profits – this system pollutes our physical and social environment, necessitates wars and conflicts, and creates victims, migrants and refugees.
Only by understanding this reality would all of us in this struggle be able to give meaningful direction to our initiatives and local battles. Only by linking each other’s struggles and seeing the connection in our particular situations would we be able to gain strength, genuine empowerment and victory!
Long live international solidarity!
International Migrants’ Alliance-Europe section
MIGRANTE Europe (Amsterdam)
People Surge (Philippines)
(Dr. Efleda K. Bautista, chairperson of People Surge, an alliance of victims of supertyphoon Haiyan shows her solidarity with refugees in Amsterdam who are threatened to be thrown out of the streets after being denied recognition as political refugees. The refugees have been forced to leave the regular centers for asylum seekers and are now occupying abandoned buildings in the city. The refugees come mainly from Africa and the Middle East. Representatives of the International Migrants’ Alliance-Europe section, Linangan, Filipino Refugees in the Netherlands, Migrante Europe and the International League of Peoples Struggle-Netherlands, visited the refugees last April 18 and brought them soup and bread).