La Via Campesina in the Arab and North Africa Region | Declaration from regional meeting 2024 : Via Campesina

On May 10 and 11, 2024, the regional meeting of the LVC in the Arab and North Africa Region (ARNA) was held in Hammamet, Tunisia, in the presence of the LVC’s member organizations from Palestine, Tunisia, Morocco, Sudan, Mauritania, Egypt and Iraq.

After deliberating on the various points of the meeting’s agenda, which included the conditions of farmers and agricultural workers and their suffering in the region and ways to unify efforts to improve those conditions, they:

1) Salute the struggles of the great Palestinian people and their legendary steadfastness in the face of the Zionist machine of killing and terrorism. We praise their brave resistance against the war of extermination and starvation – a war that is supported by the imperialist powers and the reactionary puppet and normalizing Arab regimes. We salute the popular uprising witnessed in all parts of the world in support of Palestine and a victory for its freedom.

2) Condemn the senseless, reactionary war in Sudan that led to the death of more than twenty thousand, the wounding of more than fifty thousand, and the displacement of eight million Sudanese, with the support and funding of puppet regional powers and global imperialism to control Sudan’s resources, plunder its resources, and divide it again.

3) Call on the revolutionary and liberation forces to launch a broad solidarity campaign with the Sudanese people, especially with their farmers and agricultural workers.

4) Reject the blatant imperialist interventions targeting the Arab and Maghreb region (Libya, Syria, Yemen, Iraq…), causing wars and destruction to the peoples of the region, impoverishment, starvation, and the theft of its resources for the benefit of transnational corporations, in implementation of the dictates and policies of global capital institutions, led by the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Trade Organization.

5) Denounce the agricultural policies adopted by all reactionary governments in the region and subject to imperial dictates, which mortgage the food sovereignty of the peoples of the region and cause famine, thirst, and environmental destruction. It calls for adopting alternative policies based on agricultural reform, food and water sovereignty, and climate justice.

6) Declare its absolute solidarity with all the peasants, farmers, and agricultural workers who are rising in defense of their dignity and their right to access the land, including the farmers of the Limuna Cooperative in Kenitra, Morocco, the farmers of Laqsab in Siliana, the farmers of Djemna in Kebili, and the farmers of Oulad jaballah in Mahdia, Tunisia.

7) Appreciate the comradely atmosphere that prevailed in the work of the regional meeting and the outcomes issued from it, and pledge its commitment to implement the work plan, programs, and decisions it reached in the process of serving the interests and aspirations of farmers, peasants and agricultural workers and embodying the principles of the