This October 30–November 1, a historic meeting of the World Peace Council will take place in Montreal—the first of its kind in North America. This is a vital opportunity to build solidarity and strengthen the fight for peace.
We need your help to make it happen. The Canadian Peace Congress must raise $20,000 to support this effort. Please consider contributing.
Dear friends
The importance of a strong world peace movement is becoming more obvious by the day.
The Trump administration kicked off 2026 by brazenly kidnapping the president of a sovereign country, seizing Venezuelan oil shipments and threatening military attacks across the western hemisphere. Since then, the US has sharply escalated its blockade against Cuba and launched an illegal war on Iran.
This is just one facet of the expanding threat of militarism and war, which has potentially catastrophic consequences for the world.
Ignoring the desperate need to reduce carbon emissions, the United States and other NATO powers, including Canada, are instead boosting war budgets.
Eighty years after the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, seventy-five years after the formation of the NATO war machine, the Doomsday Clock of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists stands at 89 seconds to midnight. Humanity is hurtling towards disaster.
Can we build a peace movement strong enough to block new wars and climate change? This is a challenge, but it’s a task we must take up, starting today, before the world is beyond saving.
Fortunately, world public opinion is turning against militarism.
Since 2023, tens of millions of people have mobilized to protest the US-backed Israeli genocide against Palestine. More recently, street protests across North America forced Washington’s warmongering narrative against Venezuela to quickly falter, solidarity action with Cuba is spreading, and opposition to the US-Israeli war on Iran continues to build.
In communities across Canada, local chapters of the Canadian Peace Congress were among those organizing protests. Together with friends and allies, Peace Congress activists launched many such actions in response to the escalating war drive by US imperialism, with the support of the Carney Liberal government. This momentum must continue!
Historic World Peace Council meeting in Canada
This year, from October 30 – November 1, the Canadian Peace Congress, together with the Mouvement québécois pour la paix and the US Peace Council, are co-hosting an historic meeting of the World Peace Council Executive Committee in Montreal. It is the first time this body has met in North America.
But we need your support to make this gathering possible.
Formed in 1950, for three-quarters of a century the World Peace Council and its member movements in countries around the world have acted as a powerful counterweight against imperialist wars.
In the wake of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the WPC launched the famous Stockholm Appeal, the first world-wide petition campaign for nuclear disarmament. When the old colonial empires collapsed in the 1950s and ’60s, the World Peace Council played a pivotal role in building mass support for national liberation movements, and for solidarity with Vietnam, Cuba, the ANC in South Africa, and many others.
As Cold War tensions rose, the WPC and its member movements led mass struggles for comprehensive and lasting nuclear disarmament. This mailing includes a more detailed account of this incredible story of global peace and solidarity activism.
Today, at a time of rising militarism and the growth of fascist ideologies, anti-war and peace movements face unprecedented new challenges.
When the World Peace Council began preparations for the 2026 meeting of its Executive Committee, its North American member organizations agreed to take on the challenge of hosting. It’s an important occasion to expand public awareness of the historic role of the WPC in the struggle against wars and militarism, to strengthen the ties of solidarity among all peoples who are resisting the warmakers, and to build the peace movement in Canada and around the world.
Each of the co-hosting bodies will be responsible for taking on part of the fundraising to make this event a reality. For the Canadian Peace Congress, with over a dozen local groups and several affiliated organizations, this means raising $20,000 by October.
Please consider making a donation toward this effort.
Contributions may be sent by cheque to Toronto Association for Peace and Solidarity, 1547A Dupont St, Toronto, Ontario, M6P 3S5
You can also send contributions via e-Transfers to: info@peaceto.ca or via the link below.
Thank you for your support, and stay tuned for more information about this important event!