Asunción, Paraguay, Sep 22, 2009 / 14:38 pm
In a reference to arms deals recently closed by Venezuela and Bolivia, Bishop Claudio Gimenez of Caacupe in Paraguay said this week President Fernando Lugo must completely reject a growing arms race in region.
The bishop called the buildup “an absolute continental scandal” that is causing a “chain reaction; an arms race, and we know from history that these arms races will end in gigantic cemeteries that end up as a reminder for humanity.”
Bishop Gimenez said Paraguay “must completely reject this arms race tendency as inhumane, and anti-gospel, we Christians would add.”
He went on to warn that an arms buildup would inevitably lead to armed conflict between sister nations with devastating consequences for humanity: with children mutilated, left orphaned and in hunger.
“Wars stem from human passions, from greed. They want what they cannot have and so they kill. And we war against one another at the family level, group level and then later between countries,” the bishop said.