UPDATE: A message from MAX re April 25th Migrant Lives Matter demonstration
Yesterday, Saturday 25 April, Syria Solidarity Movement UK joined with other groups at the Migrant Lives Matter protest to call for action on the Mediterranean crisis. Because of objections by Stop the War Coalition, the representative of Syria Solidarity Movement UK was prevented from saying these words at the demonstration:
The Syrian people are suffering terribly.
They’ve had four years of brutal war by the Assad's regime, armed by Russia, bankrolled by Iran, bombing cities and towns every single day for the last three years.
To give you an idea of the scale of the assault, since the start of April there have been 700 air strikes on Idlib province alone, and Aleppo has now got the dubious honour of being the most bombed city since World War Two.
There are 12 million Syrians in need of urgent aid, 8 million are internally displaced, 4.5 million are refugees overseas.
And Britain has only committed to taking 750 refugees per year.
And only 143 have been taken in in the last 18 months.
This is in comparison to 2,500 in Norway, 30,000 in Germany, and nothing compared to the 1.5 million in Turkey and 1 million in Lebanon.
We're campaigning for an expansion of the vulnerable persons relocation scheme, to restart the rescue missions and create safe routes for Refugees from Southern Europe to Northern Europe. The burden for taking refugees shouldn't fall on Greece and Italy, it should be spread across the whole of Europe.
There are practical things we can do to help Syrians. Citizens UK is campaigning for 50 councils to accept 50 refugees each, there is a draft letter on our website, send it to your council, arrange a meeting with them and lobby them to take 50 refugees. There are 4 councils signed up so far. We want to get 200 councils, not just 50, to take refugees, and rescue Syrian refugees from the terrible conditions they are enduring at the moment.
Thank you, and victory to the Syrian Revolution.
Below: Leaflet distributed by Syria Solidarity Movement UK at the protest. PDF file here.
Links:
Syrian Refugee Campaign Briefing
In this UK election, let’s talk about emergency services.
A manifesto for Syria: Syrian refugees welcome here
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UPDATE 15 May 2015: We are very pleased to have received the following positive message from Movement Against Xenophobia, organisers of the Migrant Lives Matter demonstration, and we look forward to continuing our support for their vital work.
Apology from MAX re April 25th Migrant Lives Matter demonstration
Dear colleagues at the Syria Solidarity Movement
I am writing on behalf of the MAX’ steering group to offer our sincere apologies for the inappropriate action by a staff from one of the member organisations, which led to excluding your speaker from contributing at the April 25th's Migrant Lives Matter demonstration.
Our meeting in London last night introduced new measures to prevent such unfortunate situation from arising in the future.
MAX has and will continue to support the work of Syria Solidarity Movement.
Nazek Ramadan
Chair at the MAX meeting May 14th (MAX’s meetings are chaired on a rotational basis)