A SMALL band of women yesterday gathered in front the United States Embassy in Georgetown protesting the bombing of Afghanistan by the U.S. and Britain.

The group, comprising about 20 women, carried placards and chanted disapproval of the bombings, describing the act as a military slaughter.

"Bombing innocent women and children in Afghanistan is not an answer to the bombing that took place in the United States", spokesperson for the group, Ms Andaiye commented.

She said while they are in sympathy with the relatives of the 6,000 odd people killed in the September 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S., the answer is not in the U.S. and Britain bombing Afghanistan.

The U.S. and Britain Sunday launched powerful air and missile strikes against bases, airports and training camps in Afghanistan in retaliation for last month's attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington.

An informal group calling itself Women Opposing Military Action Now (WOMAN) organised yesterday's protest outside the U.S. Embassy here and a main slogan they carried was Mahatma Gandhi's saying, "an eye for an eye makes the whole world go blind".

"We will continue protesting and we hope that women from other organisations will come out", Andaiye said.

She explained that they started off as a women's group deliberately intending to send the message that whether people like it or not, women are raised to care about everyone and everything and that gives them a particular place to look at what happens in the world.

She further noted that many women who have lost loved ones in the attacks have been speaking out against the talk of going to war - that it be not carried out in their husbands' and children's name.

"You don't raise children for them to be killed in wars. We are beginning as a women's group to make the point that women, as carers, say no", she stated.

In a flyer distributed by the group, the women said they do not want bombs dropped on a country where seven million people already face starvation, 60% of them women and children.

They said women are the life-givers, the first caregivers, from breastfeeding and subsistence farming which feeds most of the world, to cleaning, nursing and teaching and asked, "must mothers watch the slaughter of children in whom we have invested our lives to be used as cannon fodder for the military?"

They said while US$80 billion a year would provide the basic needs of everyone in the world, the U.S. has already committed US$40 billion to sending cruise missiles and bombs into Afghanistan "and wherever else they intend to kill and maim".

They said this is on top of the more than $800 billion invested yearly in military budgets worldwide to ensure the world's submission to globalisation and the multinationals that run it.

"We will all pay, either as targets or be deprived of our basic rights and needs, for America's New War", the group stated.

Andaiye said as long as the war continues the group will continue to protest.

She said many Guyanese were killed in the attacks in the U.S. but pointed out that that did not prompt their demonstration.

She added that they are not protesting because they feel they can stop the war, but what they hope to do is to build up the mood which is already spreading worldwide with the hope that eventually it will begin to have some influence.

She said the people in favour of the war are the ones stressed on while those in opposition are hidden.

"...it is important that people protest, including Guyanese and over time, in the connections between Guyana and other countries, we will begin to have some influence. We cannot spend the rest of our lives thinking we are too small or too weak to speak out", Andaiye said.

"Women the carers have been central to every anti-war movement. Now we demand an immediate end to the destruction of life in Afghanistan.

"We demand that the resources being lavished on killing be invested instead in life and caring. We call on all justice movements to stand with carers against war", the women said.