16. For Conscience' Sake

Pax International is a monthly journal issued at Geneva, (12 rue de Vieux-College) on behalf of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. I have before me a copy of the November number of this monthly which has the following paragraph:

"In Jugoslavia 72 members of the religious body of Nazarenes have been condemned by the military court of the Save District to ten years' imprisonment for refusing to take up arms. All of the condemned have already served five years' imprisonment for the same offence. All friends of peace in the whole world should protest against these inhuman sentences and demand the revision of the sentence."

It is a remarkable awakening in the Western world, this peace movement. That ten years' servitude for the mere refusal to take up arms is possible under a system in respect of 72 honourable men who follow the law of love rather than the law of hate which the system pro-mulgates, is proof of its barbarity. Whether the world conscience disapproves of these savage sentences or not and whether such disapproval produces an effect on the Jugoslavian Government or not, it is certain that the system must be at its last gasp that needs for its sustenance the infliction of barbarous sentences on innocent and honourable citizens. I tender my respectful congratulations to the brave Nazarenes whom, let me hope, the conscience of Jugoslavia itself will not allow to lie buried in its goals for ten long years.

Young India, 14-2-1929