Grillo proposes the Costa Rica model for Ukraine

“War is no longer a choice.” After weeks of silence on Putin’s war against Ukraine, Beppe Grillo addresses the issue on his blog. With a post “pacifist” in which he gives the example of the choices made by Costa Rica. «In 1948 José Figueres, president of Costa Rica dismantled the army. The defense funds were assigned to education and health care »reports Grillo, quoting an excerpt from the book” Save the Earth “by James Bruges. “Banks, insurance companies, all public utilities and railways were nationalized. A wealth tax and a social security system were introduced. The right to vote was granted to women and immigrants from the Caribbean. But it was not an easy path. The United States tried to oust Figueres in 1950 and twice attempted to assassinate him. A hundred-year-old dispute with Nicaragua over the exploitation of the San Juan River flared up in 1998, but was quelled after two years of patient negotiations without resorting to weapons. And, significantly, Costa Rica is the only state in the region not to have been invaded or used as a base by the United States. Now the country is democratic, relatively wealthy and consistently in the top 50 positions on the United Nations Human Development Index. Educated people make it an attractive investment nation. But ‘economic violence’ could destroy his dream. Privatizations following pressure from the IMF have recently caused widespread riots. According to the former president, Costa Ricans have cultivated a spirit of civilization, antithetical to militarization and violence, capable of finding peaceful solutions to conflicts and respectful of the rights of others. In the absence of weapons by which to impose an idea, the only remaining weapon is reason. Today people like me are fully convinced of the fact that a state that organizes an army becomes a tormentor of itself… »reads the chosen passage.