The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has asserted this Sunday the "no to war" as a hallmark of Spain, linked to "memory, dignity and commitment," in a letter addressed to the PSOE militancy in which he warns about the military escalation in the Middle East and defends a "coherent and firm" position in favor of peace.
“Spain can say something that not everyone can say: that it speaks clearly, that it acts with coherence and that it does not renounce its principles. Today there are many people who feel proud of our country. And that pride is also yours. Because when Spain says ‘no to war’, it’s not just a Government speaking. A society speaks. A history speaks. You speak”, he states in the letter.
In the text, Sánchez recalls that last February 28, the United States and Israel bombed Iran, which triggered a response from the Iranian regime against countries in its vicinity, “in a spiral of instability that has only grown and threatened the entire region, and the planet as a whole.”
“We have had a month of open war in the Middle East: more than 2,000 lives lost, four million people forced to abandon their homes, broken supply chains, oil and gas prices skyrocketing and a food crisis looming on the horizon”, laments.
Veiled message to Feijóo and Abascal
The head of the Executive maintains that Spain has held from the beginning a “clear” position against the conflict, recovering the slogan “no to war”, which —as he explains— marked an entire generation. “But, above all, I learned what happens when an entire people rises up with courage and decorum. When millions of people fill the streets to say ‘not in my name’. I was there. And many of you too. In those streets we forged something that accompanies us to this day: the certainty that peace is not a slogan, but a conviction. It is not a luxury, but a necessity. It is not a plea, but a demand,” he adds.
Sánchez contrasts this stance with that of other parties, in clear allusion to PP and Vox, whom he accuses of “doubting when one must be firm” or of “hiding in ambiguity when one must take a stand”, and emphasizes that the socialists “know which side they are on”.
“When we socialists are in government, we act accordingly. We mobilized with Ukraine against Russian aggression. We demanded that the Palestinian genocide in Gaza stop. And now we shout, loud and clear, that this illegal war has to end now. And it's also worth saying very clearly: not everyone is in that place,” he concludes.
