Founded | 21 September 2001 |
---|---|
Type | Advocacy group |
Focus | Anti-war, Peace |
Location |
|
Area served
|
United Kingdom |
Method | Demonstration |
Key people
|
Andrew Murray, Lindsey German, Tony Benn, George Galloway, Jeremy Corbyn |
Website | stopwar.org.uk/ |
The Stop the War Coalition (StWC; informally Stop the War) is a British group established on 21 September 2001, shortly after the September 11 attacks, to campaign against what it believes are unjust wars.
The coalition has campaigned against the wars that are part of the so-called "War on Terror" of the United States and its allies. It has campaigned against the war in Afghanistan and the Iraq War. The demonstration against the latter on 15 February 2003, organised with Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) and the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB), is claimed to be the largest public demonstration in British history.
The impetus to form the Stop the War Coalition came following the 11 September 2001 attacks in the United States. The Coalition was launched at a public meeting of 2,000 people at Friends House on Euston Road in London, on 21 September which was chaired by Lindsey German, then active in the Socialist Workers Party. "The Stop the War Coalition has been formed to encourage and mobilise the largest possible movement against the war", said the founding statement. "Its aim is simple-to draw together everyone who wants to stop this madness, and to present the anti-war arguments which are squeezed out of the media." Among the sponsors of the coalition were the Labour MPs George Galloway, Tam Dalyell and Jeremy Corbyn, in addition to Tariq Ali, Harold Pinter, Suresh Grover, and Andrew Murray.