Air strikes in Libya a dangerous act of aggression: CPI-M

The CPI(M) on Monday termed as a "dangerous act of aggression" the aerial strikes in Libya by US-led coalition forces and said it was a "calculated intervention" in an internal conflict.

The party asked all democratic and progressive forces in India to strongly protest yet another military aggression by America and its allies on an Arab-African country.

In a statement by CPI(M) Polit Bureau, the party said "The military strikes by the forces comprising France, Britain and the United States is a dangerous act of aggression.

"They are now repeating what they did in Iraq, which led to deaths of millions of people and large scale destruction. Already forty eight people are reported dead in the attacks on the first day," it said.

Despite the rhetoric about protecting the Libyan people, it said this act of aggression is a "gross violation" of Libya's sovereignty and a "calculated intervention" in an internal conflict to bring about a change of regime.

"The hypocrisy of the Western powers can be seen in their connivance with the Saudi military intervention to crush the popular and peaceful revolt in Bahrain. The West has no compunction in resorting to force to secure its interests in oil-rich Libya and the West Asia," it said.

The party said the UN Security Council resolution on Libya has been utilised by these military forces for this attack.

"The five members of the security council, which includes India, who abstained on the resolution should immediately demand a review of the resolution. Till then there has to be a halt to the military action," it said.

The US-led military coalition today hit Libyan defence targets with cruise missiles and launched air attacks as Muammar Gaddafi vowed to open his arms depots to the people to retaliate against the Western "aggression".

French jets fired the first shots in Operation Odyssey Dawn, the biggest international military intervention in the Arab world since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, destroying tanks and armoured vehicles in eastern Libya, Al-Jazeera reported.

They were joined by the US and the UK who fired over 110 Tomahawk missiles from American and British ships and submarines, hitting about 20 Libyan air and missile defence targets in the capital Tripoli and along the Mediterranean coast, US Navy Vice Adm William Gortney said at a Pentagon briefing.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/63556" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: &lt;a&gt; &lt;em&gt; &lt;strong&gt; &lt;cite&gt; &lt;code&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;ol&gt; &lt;li&gt; &lt;dl&gt; &lt;dt&gt; &lt;dd&gt;</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-31d59b9334d30deabb29e2a3ca2aa789" value="form-31d59b9334d30deabb29e2a3ca2aa789" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="80640851" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>

No Articles Found

No Articles Found

No Articles Found

I want to begin with a little story that was told to me by a leading executive at Aptech. He was exercising in a gym with a lot of younger people.

Shekhar Kapur’s Bandit Queen didn’t make the cut. Neither did Shaji Karun’s Piravi, which bagged 31 international awards.