Raise Your Voices: Demand a Diplomatic Solution to the Conflict in Ukraine

Credit: Image is from taken from the WILPF International Toolkit for their “In Solidarity with Ukraine No More Wars” campaign.

By Cherrill Spencer and Ellen Thomas
DISARM Issue Committee co-chairs

March 2022    

As we write this eNews article on February 25, the invading Russian army is attacking Kyiv, the capital city of Ukraine, with missiles, tanks, and cyber disruptions. We cannot predict the situation by the time this eNews article is published, but, whatever has happened, we are sure WILPF members must continue to speak out against military actions to solve conflicts. 

We urge all members to take nonviolent action to promote peace, disarmament, and diplomacy as solutions to this crisis. We embrace the recent call from WILPF International:  

“The most sensible thing we can do at this juncture is to build international solidarities – to come together and channel all our individual voices into one collective, loud and decisive voice that calls for an end to militarization and war-mongering.” 

Take a look at WILPF International’s “Call to Action,” published on February 14. The campaign toolkit they have prepared for our use includes a brief call for action, key messages, social media posts, stories, and banner designs.

Sunday, March 6, has been identified by an international coalition of peace groups as the day for activists all over the world to get out on their hometown’s streets to protest against war and militarism, using the illegal Russian invasion of the sovereign nation of Ukraine as the common theme. We urge WILPF members to join with your local anti-war  and anti-nuclear weapons groups to hold non-violent demonstrations in visible places where you live.

WILPF is a partner organization with the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), and we join them and many other anti-war and anti-nuclear weapons organizations in condemning the invasion of Ukraine by Russian military forces. The ICAN statement, issued on February 24, can be read here.

Here is an extract from ICAN’s statement: “This is a direct violation of international law and puts civilians at incredible risk. In addition to an illegal invasion, Putin threatened this morning to respond to any interference with ‘consequences that you never have had before in your history,’ which really means that he’s threatening to use nuclear weapons.”

We appreciate these sentiments from “The Campaign for Peace Disarmament and Common Security” as they condemn Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine:

“There are no military solutions to either the Ukraine or European-wide crises, only a political solution based on the common security principle that security cannot be achieved against one’s rival, but only with that rival. Nations must not seek to strengthen their security at the expense of the security of other states.  Work for peace and justice.”

The actions you can personally take to raise your voice against any further escalation of the war that is happening in Ukraine on February 25 were listed in our February 1 eAlert and are still valid actions to take.

We expect that an official WILPF US public statement on the situation in Ukraine will be issued by the time this eNews is distributed; please read it for an analysis of the root causes of this war and how it will disproportionately affect the women and children of Ukraine.

Please submit your questions about this article to disarmchair@wilpfus.org.