Our letter to be handed in at 10 Downing Street today
Dear Prime Minister,
The threat of war with Iran is terrifying and the behaviour of the US government risks making the danger real. Its categoric claim that Iran was responsible for the attacks on the two tankers in the Straits of Hormuz has been challenged by the Japanese and the German governments. It has only served to make a dangerous situation more serious.
The context to this is Donald Trump’s scrapping of the nuclear deal with Iran last year which blocked the way to normalising relations and immediately escalated tension. The accompanying sanctions have caused real economic damage and human suffering. In May the Trump administration turned the screw tighter by dropping exemptions for oil exports. These measures are part of the policy of regime change advocated by John Bolton and Mike Pompeo, Trump’s two senior foreign policy officials, both of whom have called for military attacks on Iran.
Rather than falling in line with the Trump administration’s dangerous brinkmanship, the British government should be calling for restraint and de-escalation and explicitly ruling out military options.
Yours sincerely,
Sir Mark Rylance, Actor; Brian Eno, Musician; Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury; Miriam Margolyes, Actor; Francesca Martinez, Comedian and Writer; Lindsey German, Convenor, Stop the War Coalition; Murad Qureshi, Chair, Stop the War Coalition; Kate Hudson, General Secretary, CND; Bruce Kent, Vice President, CND; Marsha de Cordova MP; Emma Dent Coad MP; Imran Hussain MP; Grahame Morris MP; Ian Mearns MP; Kate Osamor MP; Laura Pidcock MP; Laura Smith MP; Mark Serwotka, General Secretary, PCS; Kevin Courtney, General Secretary, NEU; Andrew Murray, Chief of Staff, Unite the Union; Abbas Edalat, Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran; Mohammed Kozbar, Senior Member, Muslim Association of Britain; Aaron Bastani, Senior Editor, Novara Media; Salma Yaqoob, Campaigner; Yusuf / Cat Stevens, Musician; David Edgar, Playwright; Ken Livingstone, former London Mayor; Sami Ramadani, Writer and academic; Peter Oborne, Journalist; Steve Ashley, Singer; Matthew Willgress, Stand Up to Trump