People Before Profit blog

International notes

Fri, 25 Jul 2003 03:52:00 +0000

Cuba: Charges of interference refuted

In a July 19 statement, Cuba’s Foreign Ministry sharply rejected charges in U.S. media that Cuba is interfering in U.S. satellite transmissions to Iran. Granma said some of the allegations quote Kenneth Tomlinson, director of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which supervises U.S. international radio and TV transmissions.

“With every right, Cuba has interfered, is interfering and will continue to interfere solely with the illegal radio and television transmissions that the U.S. government is sending to our country,” the ministry’s statement said.

The statement said the U.S. government currently violates international law and rules regulating international telecommunications with its 2,200 hours of radio and TV broadcasting to Cuba each week. It noted that Tomlinson had gone before a House of Representatives subcommittee last month to urge the transmissions be increased.

The Foreign Ministry said the Cuban government would investigate to see if any Cuban broadcasts could be unintentionally interfering with the U.S. transmissions.

China: Gov’t offers economic cooperation to Taiwan

For the first time, the Chinese government has offered Taiwan a free trade pact to boost economic ties with the mainland. Wang Zaixi, deputy director of the State Council’s Taiwan Affairs Office, said such an agreement would ensure healthy, orderly development of bilateral economic ties. The proposal follows conclusion of the landmark free trade agreement, the Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement (CEPA), between the mainland and Hong Kong.

In January 2002, the government proposed talks to set up a mechanism for economic cooperation with Taiwan, but Taiwan’s pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party government did not respond positively. But since the CEPA was concluded with Hong Kong, a growing number of businesspeople and economic researchers have called for a similar arrangement.

Despite the longstanding political stalemate, economic relations between the mainland and Taiwan have grown much stronger over the last 20 years. Wang said any barriers to economic cooperation should be removed, and any political dispute affecting economic exchanges “should be left aside and gradually resolved.”

Afghanistan: U.S. credibility on the line

Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah warned a conference in Washington last week that U.S. credibility would be at risk unless the United States does more to rebuild Afghanistan and to strengthen its government.

If the people of Kabul are still in the dark next year because of lack of electricity, Abdullah told a meeting organized by Radio Free Europe and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, “this government will lose credibility, its friends will lose credibility ... One can understand other engagements of a country like the United States but our case is a situation which would affect the ability and the credibility of the United States in relations with every other state.”

Abdullah added, “The test is in Afghanistan. Can we afford to fail the test in Afghanistan and be hopeful that we will make it somewhere else?”

Britain: Immigrant workers exploited

In a report released last week, Britain’s umbrella union federation, the Trades Union Congress, said thousands of immigrant workers suffer long hours, low pay and appalling housing conditions, while the employers who take advantage of their vulnerability go unpunished. The report, entitled “Overworked, Underpaid and Over Here,” said the working population born outside Britain had risen from 7 percent (1.8 million) of the total workforce in 1995 to 9 percent (2.6 million) in 2002.

The TUC said that migrant workers who complain to an official tribunal about illegal practices risk being fired for complaining, and thus, their right to remain in Britain. The union federation said undocumented migrant workers fare far worse.

The TUC called on Britain to sign the UN Convention on the Rights of Migrant Workers and Their Families.

South Africa: Mine strike looms

The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) said this week it will strike gold and coal companies after talks on wage hikes and benefits reached an impasse July 21. As many as 160,000 employees could stop work, Business Day said.

The last miners’ strike took place in 1987, two years after the formation of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) to which the NUM is affiliated.

The union declared a deadlock with gold producers Harmony, Gold Fields and South Deep, but said AngloGold had made a revised offer. Some coal producers had also made revised proposals, but several were deadlocked.

NUM General Secretary Gwede Mantashe said the union had tried to prevent a strike by agreeing to a protracted mediation process. The union initially sought a 20 percent wage hike, and rejected an offer of 8.5 percent. Also at issue are company contributions to retirement funds, and job grading.

International notes are compiled by Marilyn Bechtel (cpusainternat@mindspring.com).

BBC spotlights Israels WMDs

Fri, 25 Jul 2003 03:33:00 +0000

In a recent 50-minute television documentary entitled, “Israel’s Secret Weapons,” the British Broadcasting Corp.’s World Service points its finger at Israel’s nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons of mass destruction.

The BBC documentary opens with four questions: (1) Which country in the Middle East has undeclared nuclear weapons? (2) Which country in the Middle East has undeclared biological and chemical capabilities? (3) Which country has no outside inspections? (4) Which country jailed its nuclear whistleblower for 18 years?

The program has created a storm of controversy.

The fourth question concerns the fate of the whistle-blower Mordechai Vanunu, who has been imprisoned for 17 years, 11 of them in solitary confinement, for having warned the world about Israel’s production of atomic weapons. Vanunu, a former technician employed at the Dimona atomic research reactor in the early 1980s, told a London Sunday Times reporter about the secret production of nuclear weapons in several subterranean levels of that reactor. The detailed report was published in October 1986.

Vanunu was subsequently kidnapped in Rome by the Israeli secret intelligence agency, Mossad, and shipped to Israel, where he was put on trial for treason and convicted. He’s been in prison ever since.

The documentary gave extensive answers to all four opening questions, solidly documenting Israel’s production and stockpiling of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons.

What was the reaction to this broadcast by the government, by the rulers of this democratic State of Israel?

The Government Press Office (GPO), a department of the Prime Minister’s Office, immediately barred BBC correspondents accredited in Israel from contacts with all government ministers and officials, and banned them from official press conferences (except those of the prime minister).

Daniel Seaman, the head of the GPO, alleges that the broadcast helped demonize Israel and encourages anti-Semitic elements. This is something, he said, that a democratic state like Israel cannot tolerate. The Foreign Press Association in Israel protested this step, seeing in it a dangerous infringement on the freedom of the press, as well as a “slippery slope that can lead to the illegitimate attempts to exert pressure on news organizations or journalists whose reporting is deemed unfavorable to the government’s policy.”

Meanwhile, among the Israeli public at large, the BBC’s television ratings have increased.

While Israel’s ownership of WMDs is a well known matter of record, official Israel still regards the subject as taboo. The government keeps such matters under a seal of secrecy, rejects international inspection, and speaks only of an unnamed “deterrent factor against aspirations by Arab regimes to eliminate Israel and exterminate the Jewish citizens.”

The anger of the Israeli authorities was particularly inflamed by the documentary’s suggestion of a parallel between Israel’s WMDs and the (to date unfound) WMDs of Iraq. Former Prime Minister Shimon Peres, when asked why the U.S. administration, so up in arms and waging a war because of the alleged existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, keeps mum on such weapons in the hands of Israel, Peres, obviously furious, answered, “How dare you compare the dictatorial regime of the mass killer Saddam Hussein with the democratic regime in Israel?”

Other persons interviewed in the BBC documentary include leading Israeli activists of the Committee for Freedom for Vanunu and the Committee for a Nuclear Free Zone in the Middle East.

The program’s host also interviewed some of the more than 100 former workers at the Dimona nuclear weapon production line who have contracted cancerous diseases from having been exposed to radioactivity, and who are fighting to receive compensation for it, so far without success.

There is also some very impressive footage showing Arab Knesset deputy Issam Mahoul of the (communist-led) HADASH Front, raising three years ago for the first time (and, so it happens, the last time) in the history of the parliament the matter of Israel’s weapons of mass destruction.

“Mordechai Vanunu is not the problem or the issue,” Mahoul said. “The problem is the policy of the government that has turned the territory of a relatively small country into a poisonous waste bin which could make us all disappear into a nuclear cloud.”

The author can be reached at pww@pww.org

Dominican impoverishment deepens

Fri, 25 Jul 2003 03:25:00 +0000

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – Dominicans are much poorer today than six months ago. The devastating effects of the financial crisis and the devaluation of the peso in the first half of 2003 have dramatically reduced the purchasing power of all consumers.

This pummeling of purchasing power, felt by all social sectors on the island, has three causes: (1) the exchange rate’s collapse from 18 to about 36 pesos to the dollar, (2) a lack of business and investor confidence, resulting in massive capital flight, and (3) the irresponsible handling of the financial crisis by politicians.

The rich are less rich; the middle class is sinking deeper and deeper into poverty; and the poor and the very poor have only the panorama of hunger, hopelessness and greater suffering before them.

The most dramatic source of impoverishment being felt by all Dominicans is inflation. Officially, according to the Central Bank (which has lost much of its credibility due to the politicization and manipulation of its interventions in this crisis), the consumer price index has increased over 20 percent in the past 12 months. Dominicans have not seen such high inflation since 1990. According to projections of the International Monetary Fund, the inflation level for the year will reach 25 percent, a figure that many say is conservative.

However, what is more dramatic is the collapse of the purchasing power and consumption of all Dominicans as reflected in per capita income. According to the latest information available, the gross domestic product will decline by 27 percent in the course of 2003. The annual income for each islander will decrease to about $1,600.

In one sudden blow, the Dominican Republic will drop to the status of a “low income country,” according to World Bank standards based on per capita income. Before this crisis, that is to say, during the 1990s and the first years of this decade, we were ranked as medium-low income country, with the tendency being to rank us as a country with a medium to medium-high income.

Total public debt has almost been doubled. According to the Wall Street firm of Bear Stearns, total external and internal public debt will grow from 21 percent of the GDP in 2002 to 42 percent in 2003. The fiscal sacrifices required of taxpayers and the state to service that debt will grow every day.

The available resources to shoulder the costs of public education, health, social security and infrastructure will be reduced more and more. The policies of recovery and stability that will have to be put into practice will reduce the ability of the national and local governments to significantly address social demands and, therefore, political stability could become seriously compromised.

This is where we are. There is where a combination of government incompetence, irresponsibility in handling monetary policies, and fraudulent methods in bank management has led us. Now our torment begins.

Excerpted from the original article published by PerspectivaCiudadana.com

Bush warhawks beg UN for help

Fri, 25 Jul 2003 02:37:00 +0000

The Bush administration, which thumbed its nose at the United Nations before the Iraq war, has now been forced to beg the UN for help with its foundering occupation. France, Russia, India and other countries have turned down U.S. pleas to send troops and contribute funds, saying they will not do so without an explicit UN mandate. But the UN is turning up the heat on the Bush unilateralists.

The UN special representative in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello, told the Security Council this week there is widespread support in Iraq for the UN to play “an energetic, center-stage role” in putting Iraqis “back at the helm of their country.”

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said, “There is a pressing need to set out a clear and specific sequence of events leading to the end of military occupation.”

A three-member delegation of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi “Governing Council” attended this week’s UN Security Council session. The U.S. was forced to appoint the Governing Council to try to put an Iraqi face on the occupation. But some participants say they see it as a possible vehicle for ousting the U.S. The Iraqi Communist Party said in a July 20 statement that the Governing Council’s “effectiveness and prospects” will depend on its “vigor” and the extent to which it “responds to the urgent and immediate demands of the people.” The ICP said it is participating in the Council based on “a careful consideration of the present situation” in Iraq, including “the desire of broad sections of the people to see Communists participate directly and actively in the current political process.”

Annan told the Security Council in a strongly worded report July 22, “Our collective goal remains an early end to the military occupation through the formation of an internationally recognized, representative government. Meanwhile, it is vital that the Iraqi people should be able to see a clear timetable … leading to the full restoration of sovereignty as soon as possible.”

Warning that “democracy cannot be imposed from the outside,” Annan said the UN intends to help the Iraqi people “participate in, and take ownership of, the definition of the policies and priorities that will shape the future of their country.”

Bush administration warhawks are in the humiliating position of having to court the UN as concerns mount over the rising human and financial costs of the Iraq occupation.

The cost of the occupation is now estimated at $4 billion a month, on top of a $450 billion budget deficit. American troops are being killed daily by guerilla attacks, and the U.S. death toll has now exceeded the 147 killed in the 1991 Gulf War.

About 146,000 U.S. troops are serving in Iraq, and their stays are being extended, adding to the plummeting morale of soldiers and their families. The Pentagon may call up as many as 10,000 National Guard soldiers by this winter to bolster forces in Iraq, the Wall Street Journal reports.

U.S. troops are also bogged down in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, President Bush and other administration hawks continue to use their increasingly tarnished “links to terrorism” accusations to threaten military action against other countries, in particular Iran and Syria. A senior defense official, asked by the Journal if he had ever seen the Army stretched so thin, said, “Not in my 31 years” of military service.

But a diplomat on the United Nations Security Council told The New York Times virtually no additional nations – with the exception of some in Eastern Europe – are willing to place their troops under U.S. or British control in Iraq.

An Indian diplomat told the Times that, unless a UN resolution ensures that Indian troops are seen as serving the needs of the Iraqi people – not those of the American and British occupiers – it will be difficult to get popular support for sending in troops.

The Bush administration seems to be scrambling to figure a way out of its Iraq crisis. President Bush and other top administration officials have been meeting with UN diplomats lately, but the administration reportedly remains split on the role of the UN, with the State Department supporting a bigger UN role, and Vice President Dick Cheney opposing it. Administration unilateralists are said to worry that by dealing with the UN they could lose control over Iraq. At the same time, they want to internationalize the heavy costs of occupation and also offload some of the blame for the occupation.

The author can be reached at suewebb@pww.org

400,000 demand probe of Bush lies

Fri, 25 Jul 2003 02:05:00 +0000

While White House officials assert that President George W. Bush “is not a fact checker,” hundreds of thousands of Americans are demanding that the facts be checked on why the Bush administration went to war in Iraq.

In the last three weeks, MoveOn.org, an internet pro-democracy group, gathered 400,000 signatures on a petition to Congress calling for an independent commission to investigate the Bush administration’s reasons for going to war in Iraq. On July 23, the group helped organize events in 12 cities, launching a grassroots campaign to hold the administration accountable for misleading public opinion.

As more U.S. troops die each day, calls for public, bipartisan, and independent hearings are growing.

Kathleen McQuillen, Iowa program director for the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), told the World, “People are more and more confused and uncertain.”

Leading up to the war and once the war started, people wanted to believe Bush, McQuillen said. But confidence in the administration “has been shaken along the way and is all the more shaken right now.”

This week 27 additional members of Congress signed on as co-sponsors of HR-2625, legislation introduced by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) calling for an independent investigation into Bush administration claims about Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction. The bill now has 52 co-sponsors.

On Capitol Hill, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, conceded that broader hearings may be called for after listening to closed-door testimony from CIA Director George Tenet. “We’ll take this where it leads us,” said Roberts. “We’ll let the chips fall where they may.”

Meanwhile, the White House continued to shift blame to the CIA and the National Security Council for alleged intelligence lapses. But growing questions about the administration’s rationale for war and the $4 billion a month price tag for the occupation forced the White House to hold a special briefing July 18, where it revealed newly-declassified materials in an effort to bolster its case. But these have only given rise to more questions.

Hany Khalil, an organizer for United for Peace and Justice, a national coalition of 600-plus groups, told the World, “The CIA, National Security Council, and State Department officials are slowly documenting that Bush lied to get us into war. We need open, public, televised and broad in scope hearings on the lies that were told to deceive the U.S. public to get support for the war.”

While the Bush administration argues that its use of faulty evidence is not important, AFSC’s McQuillen counters, “We can’t talk about what’s next until we understand … how we went down a path of war without clarity.” She said members of Congress “who had questions but went ahead and voted authority for this war” have a particular responsibility to pursue these questions.

The White House, the Republican National Committee (RNC) and the Pentagon have tried to silence any opposition. An ABC News reporter who quoted U.S. troops in Iraq questioning the Bush administration’s policies has become the target of an ultra-right attack using the fact that he is gay and a Canadian citizen to cast doubt on his credibility. ABC spokeswoman Cathie Levine responded, “It’s unfortunate that when people feel wounded by a truthful report they attempt to shoot the messenger.”

The RNC’s legal counsel, Caroline Hunter, sent a threatening letter this week to a Madison, Wis., television station airing a Democratic National Committee (DNC) ad calling for public support for an independent investigation. The letter suggested that the station’s FCC broadcasting license might be revoked. Vowing to fight the intimidation, the DNC announced that it would expand the airing of the ads.

Rep. Waxman and others emphasize the importance of grassroots action, including talking to friends and family, writing letters to the editor, and calling elected officials. “A big part of the problem that Democrats face is that the public is tuning out,” Waxman said. “Outrageous policies are being adopted, but people don’t notice because they aren’t paying attention. Basically, the Bush administration is banking on widespread apathy as a major part of its reelection strategy. Grassroots efforts can make a difference here.”

Congressman Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) has 2,300 letters from constituents about the Bush administration’s manipulated case for war. UFPJ’s Khalil told the World, “People are becoming energized again. Every day people are calling, e-mailing and coming into our office calling for us to take action against the war and to call out the lies that Bush used to manufacture popular support for the invasion of Iraq and to begin to bring an end to the occupation.”

The author can be reached at jleblanc@pww.org

World conference hits war, capitalist crisis

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 04:06:00 +0000

Communist & Workers’ parties meet in Athens

ATHENS, Greece – Meeting in the wake of the U.S. military invasion and occupation of Iraq, but bolstered by the unprecedented global peace upsurge that resisted the war, representatives of some 60 Communist and Workers’ parties gathered here June 19-20 to exchange views and increase international solidarity.

Major themes of the meeting included finding ways to curb the aggressive, warlike actions of the Bush administration and to point the way out of a deepening world economic crisis.

As part of the weekend’s activities, the delegates boarded buses to Thessaloniki where they hit the streets and participated in the huge “People’s Counter EU Summit” demonstration for labor rights, social justice and equality.

Such conferences have been held annually since 1998 at the initiative of the Communist Party of Greece (CPG). This year’s theme was “The movements against war and capitalist globalization, and the role of Communists.”

Circumstances confronting the parties vary. Some are ruling parties, as in socialist Vietnam and Cuba. Others serve in coalition governments, like the Communist Party of Brazil, the Progressive Party of Working People (AKEL) of Cyprus (which is now the leading party there), and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) in the states of Bengal and Tripura. Still others are struggling under exceptionally difficult conditions, including those that remain outlawed under repressive, right-wing regimes.

Some are relatively small, and others are huge. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) and the Communist Party of India have a combined membership of 1.5 million. The CP of the Russian Federation numbers some 530,000. Some, like the CP of Bohemia and Moravia, routinely get 20 percent or more of the vote.

Parties came from every continent, although most came from Europe. A number were unable to attend due to financial difficulties or pressing events at home. Delegates called for setting up a solidarity fund to help fraternal parties attend future meetings.

The global peace upsurge was widely hailed. Despite their inability to stop the war against Iraq, the peace movements are alive and well, and many of them are joining with social movements in response to the capitalist economic crisis. In the U.S., for example, struggles to save health care, education, pensions, and other social programs are overlapping with the peace movement’s demand to cut the military budget and fund human needs. This is true elsewhere, too.

Even in European countries that refused to participate in the Iraq war, huge demonstrations and strikes have taken place against cuts in pensions and services, underscoring the systemic nature of capitalism’s crisis and the broadening fightback.

As Raid Fahmi of the Communist Party of Iraq (CPI) said, “The exceptional worldwide mobilization against the war and its convergence with the movement against capitalist globalization has been a remarkable expression of the level of consciousness reached by people all over the world.”

The CPI, at one time the largest Communist party in the Arab world, is once again emerging as a powerful force as its formerly underground and exiled members resume open political activity throughout the country. The CPI is widely respected and has relationships with organizations across the Iraqi political spectrum.

Fahmi summed up the general concerns held by most parties: “The world is going through one of its most critical periods in recent history. The war has far-reaching implications, not only for Iraq and the Middle East, but the whole world.”

There was excitement over the explosive growth of the U.S. peace movement. Because it is based in the most powerful imperialist country, the U.S. movement is watched closely by people worldwide. One participant told me that they constantly watched CNN to see what demonstrations the Americans were organizing. Millions around the world are counting on the U.S. working class and people to defeat Bush in the upcoming elections.

One of the hallmarks of an international Communist gathering is hearing the many different voices that make up the world Communist movement.

Issam Makhoul, general secretary of the Communist Party of Israel, said the peace movement can grow to become an even more powerful force: “We reject the idea that there can only be a unipolar world. Millions are demonstrating and creating a new pole.”

The CP of Israel is one of the few organizations in Israel that unites Jews and Arabs in the same organization and has consistently called for a two-state solution to the conflict.

Makhoul said that a growing number of Israelis are rejecting Ariel Sharon’s policies. “The Israeli government cannot continue to humiliate the Palestinians under Israeli occupation without humiliating the poor, the unemployed and the workers of Israel at the same time,” he said. “The chains of the Palestinians under occupation are the same chains binding the hands of the Israeli working class.”

In her opening address, Aleka Paparigha, general secretary of the Greek Communist Party, said Communist and Workers’ parties everywhere had played a vital role in the peace movement. This activity had given direction on “strategy and tactics in dealing with imperialist aggressiveness and barbarism,” particularly by promoting unity of all peace forces.

The CPG has made impressive gains in recent years. They lead all sorts of movements, including those that put the largest numbers of people in the streets during the recent antiwar and anti-globalization protests. The Communist Youth of Greece is also growing rapidly.

The main focus of the meeting was on the Bush administration, and there was much agreement about the danger posed by the Bush Doctrine. Many delegates stressed the new danger of nuclear war and warned against a new arms race. Most saw U.S. imperialism’s goal as the domination of all energy resources, particularly oil.

But contrary to the belief that all Communists think alike, a wide variety of opinions were expressed. While most urged greater unity of action against the U.S. policy of preemptive war and unilateralism, there were differing opinions on how best to build such unity.

Jorge Castro, representing the Communist Party of Cuba, said that aspects of the Bush policy were “fascist” and called for a global anti-fascist front.

At the same time, Jose Reinaldo Carvalho of the Communist Party of Brazil noted that the “struggle for peace calls for the creation of a broad international front against imperialism … [that would] take on a scale never witnessed in any other historical period.” Carvalho said this front involves a variety of political and social movements, and includes democratic and progressive governments as well.

This writer, representing the Communist Party USA, read a party statement that said in part, “Greater unity of action of all Communist, working-class and democratic forces in a global front for peace, democracy and economic security is essential. This front includes mass movements, entire nations, including socialist and many nonaligned and developing nations.”

Some parties view the Bush Doctrine as an extension of capitalist globalization, the result of the crisis of capitalism and the need to control limited world resources and markets among imperialist powers. Navid Shomali, of the Tudeh Party of Iran, said, “The war against Iraq was an integral part of the U.S. strategy to accelerate the process of globalization and to consolidate the ‘New World Order’ first declared in the early 1990s.”

Many parties, including the CPUSA, see the Bush Doctrine as a radical new set of policies of the most reactionary sections of U.S. monopoly capital, which bases itself on its overwhelming military superiority. Implementation of these policies was made possible by the Sept. 11 tragedy.

Fathi Mohamed of the Sudanese Communist Party (SCP) said the Bush administration used the “war on terror” to force its way back into the Sudanese oil market, which had been opened to China. This is part of a plan by U.S. oil corporations, he said, to dominate African oil resources in Chad and the African Great Lakes Region, including Angola.

The Bush administration has suddenly taken a keen interest in solving the 20-year civil war that has killed two million Sudanese to make the southern region stable for oil exploration. The SCP is part of a broad movement fighting to oust the current dictatorial regime while fighting for national unity.

The Communist Party of Vietnam described the difficulties it faces building socialism in a world dominated by capitalist globalization. CPV representative Ta Minh Chau said, “It is our view that participation in globalization has become a long and complicated process of both cooperation and struggle.”

“The fight against ‘capitalist globalization’ has become an important part of the national and class struggle in the present world,” Chau said. “All countries and nations, on the one hand, cannot help participating in the economic globalization as an objective economic process, which closely is linked to the development of productive forces of human society. On the other hand, they cannot help but struggle against capitalist influence on this process,” he said.

The European parties expressed concern over the consolidation and expansion of the European Union and plans for its militarization. Some parties have concluded that because of EU consolidation, the nation-state will disappear. They projected the creation of a European-wide Communist party. But most parties didn’t share this view.

Robert Giffiths, the general secretary of the Communist Party of Britain said, “We are opposed to the creation of such a United States of Europe. We defend Britain’s parliamentary democracy and sovereignty, however limited and distorted under capitalism.”

“We reject the vision of an imperialist military United States of Europe as a counter-weight to the United States of America. It is a recipe for massive global warfare in the future,” he said. The CPB is a leader of the British peace movement.

But each country, party and working class has its own particulars and alignment of forces. For example, AKEL doesn’t oppose the EU. As part of a governing coalition, it believes the acceptance of Cyprus into the EU will force an end to Turkish occupation of 37 percent of the country, which began in 1974.

Regardless of the differences, there was much to agree on.

There was widespread agreement that U.S. unilateralism could be reigned in by strengthening the UN, international law and treaties. Many parties supported the petition being circulated by nongovernmental organizations, which calls for a special session of the UN General Assembly to remove the U.S. and Britain as occupying powers in Iraq and allow the UN to oversee the transition to Iraqi rule and the distribution of humanitarian assistance.

Many countries, including the new Brazilian government, which is establishing a trade bloc among South American countries and strategic partnerships with China, India, Russia and South Africa, are taking multilateral steps to counter U.S. domination. There are also efforts by the nonaligned movement, led by South Africa, to develop an independent voice.

Solidarity was expressed with the Palestinian people in their struggle to end the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza and for an independent Palestinian state. Specific solidarity campaigns were projected for both socialist Cuba (see “Communists parties pledge Cuba solidarity,” June 28) and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, and for the Iranian people.

Just a few years ago capitalist ideologues were trumpeting the victory of capitalism in the Cold War. But Communists everywhere spoke of the tremendous crises faced by capitalism, including massive joblessness, poverty, instability, disease, racism and repression. Many parties reported membership growth and called for stepping-up the advocacy of socialism as a necessary solution to the crises of capitalism. It seems, to paraphrase Mark Twain when he read his own obituary, the reports of the Communist movement’s death are highly exaggerated. The struggle continues!

John Bachtell, a member of the Communist Party’s national board and its Illinois district organizer, represented the CPUSA in Athens. He can be reached at jbachtell@rednet.org

International notes

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 03:38:00 +0000

Kenya: ‘Bush seriously out of touch’

President Bush’s African visit “dramatizes that Mr. Bush, and perhaps the U.S., is seriously out of touch with what Africa thinks of its problems and how it proposes to solve them,” the Kenyan newspaper The Nation said July 14. The newspaper said the issue of trade most clearly reveals the widening gap. To U.S. ruling circles, it said, “trade means opening up African markets to U.S. goods, allowing U.S. access to African resources, especially oil, while closing the U.S. market to African products.”

But, said The Nation, “Since 70 percent of Africans rely on agriculture, what better way to help the continent fight poverty – and all its other problems – than to give its farmers a chance to trade fairly?”

“If there were any opportunities for Mr. Bush to make a difference in Africa,” The Nation concluded, “no one can accuse him of taking them.”

Korea: Solve nuke issue peacefully

The 11th Inter-Korean Ministerial Meeting held in Seoul July 10-12 reiterated that North Korea’s nuclear issue should be “peacefully solved through appropriate dialogue.” Although the two sides expressed concern over the current situation, with the South urging its counterpart to accept “multilateral dialogue” and the North maintaining that its nuclear issue is only with the U.S., they both said peace and stability should be maintained throughout the peninsula.

The delegations said the eighth round of inter-Korean separated family reunions will be held in Mount Geumgang, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, around Sept. 11 – the traditional Chusok Holiday observed throughout the peninsula. They also agreed to set up a subcommittee to promote culture and social exchanges. The next economic cooperation meeting is slated for late August in Seoul, and the next ministerial meeting for mid-October in Pyongyang.

India: Bhopal victims demand trial

Under pressure from the International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal and survivors organizations, the Indian government has called on Washington to extradite former Union Carbide chair Warren Anderson, Radio Havana Cuba said this week. Anderson is wanted in Bhopal for his primary role in the 1984 gas disaster that has caused over 20,000 deaths to date. The catastrophe, considered the world’s largest industrial disaster, has affected up to half a million people.

Rashida Bee, president of the Bhopal Gas-Affected Women Stationery Workers Association, said her organization will keep pressuring the Indian and U.S. governments until Anderson and others responsible face trial in the ongoing criminal case.

The Bhopal court declared Anderson a fugitive from justice in 1992, after he ignored a court summons and hurriedly left India. Documents found last year during a class action suit against Anderson and Union Carbide in New York showed that Anderson personally authorized the export of untested and hazardous technology to Bhopal.

Canada: Another court okays same-sex marriages

The British Colombia Court of Appeal on July 8 ordered the provincial government to allow same-sex marriages. Within an hour of the ruling, Tom Graff and Antony Porcino were the first couple to apply and receive a marriage license at the office of Vital Statistics in Vancouver.

British Colombia and Ontario are the only Canadian provinces legally allowing and recognizing gay marriages. The other eight – except for Alberta – say they will recognize a planned federal law recognizing same-sex marriages.

France: AIDS convention urges cheap drugs

The year’s largest AIDS conference, which opened July 13 in Paris, heard pleas from scientists, activists and political leaders for more funds to fight the disease, and greater access to cheap anti-retroviral drugs. Former Brazilian president Fernando Cardoso urged participants to learn from his country’s program of education, expanded basic health care, and provision of drug therapy to all those infected.

“The Brazilian experience confirms that ambiguous and inconsistent messages” advocating abstinence and fidelity to solve AIDS risk generating “a misleading sense of security,” said conference chair Prof. Michel D. Kazatchkine. He said Brazil has cut its AIDS death rate in half and reduced hospitalizations by 75 percent.

Former South African president Nelson Mandela said the number of people killed by AIDS, especially in the developing world, represents a travesty of human rights.

Burundian activist Marie-Jose Mbuzenakamwe said only 1,000 of the 90,000 people in her country needing anti-AIDS drugs are getting them. She called on the G8 industrialized countries to give adequate support to the global fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, which she said is nearly bankrupt.

International notes are compiled by Marilyn Bechtel (cpusainternat@mindspring.com). Tim Pelzer contributed to this week’s notes.

U.S. sets up Iraqi governing council

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 03:33:00 +0000

News Analysis

Reversing its previous refusal to cede any power to Iraqi groups, the U.S. – with its imperial occupation of Iraq going very badly – has now acceded to the formation of an Iraqi “governing council.” The council’s 25 members include representatives of important Shiite parties, the two major Kurdish parties, Sunni, Christian and Assyrian groups, the Iraqi Communist Party, former exiles of varying political colorations, and various individuals.

The council was appointed by the U.S. occupation chief, L. Paul Bremer, who can overrule its decisions and, presumably, remove any member if he so chooses. As a result, much skepticism has been reported within Iraq over the viability of the body.

At the insistence of Iraqi political groups, the council’s powers were set forth in written documents. According to those documents, the council is to have power to appoint and oversee the work of government ministers, with authority to fire them if they lose the council’s confidence, draft and approve a national budget, and name representatives to other countries. The documents also say the council “shall have the right to prepare policies on matters concerning Iraq’s national security,” including the rebuilding of the country’s armed forces and justice system. Further, the council is to have authority to determine the process for drafting of a new Iraqi constitution and for its approval by the Iraqi people.

But Bremer says the council will have no say in the rebuilding and restructuring of the country’s economy. He is moving full-steam ahead on the Bush administration program of grabbing control of Iraq’s vast publicly run oil industry and privatizing other potentially lucrative sections of the economy. And the White House and Pentagon are rushing to hand their corporate cronies fat contracts for rebuilding Iraq’s infrastructure.

Sergio Vieira de Mello, the United Nations special representative in Iraq, mediated between Iraqi political groups and Bremer in the fighting and maneuvering that led to the announcement of the council. Apparently, he advised skeptical Iraqi leaders to seize the opportunity provided by the council and run with it. “I have urged them to take more power once they become a coherent body because Bremer will not be able to stop them,” he said.

It can be expected that this “governing council” will now become a key arena of struggle over the future of Iraq. On one side will be those representing the broad popular movements for a democratic, independent Iraq in which the economy and political structure serve the needs of the Iraqi people. On the other will be the Bush administration’s occupation command in Iraq, and those Iraqis who look to reap riches from a privatized economy beholden to the U.S.-based transnational corporations and empire-builders.

The U.S. is in a tight spot. It has veto power over the new council, but if it chooses to exercise that power, it runs the risk of adding more fuel to the already burning opposition to the U.S. occupation.

Some council members have already said they hope to use the council to put an early end to the hated occupation. “We hope that this council will work for a very short time,” the representative of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution of Iraq, a major Shiite party, said. “We should have a constitutional government and we should get rid of the occupation.”

In a July 13 statement, the Iraqi Communist Party described the “governing council” as a compromise between the general desire of Iraqis to establish “an Iraqi provisional patriotic coalition government” and the reality of the U.S.-British military occupation.

The significance of the council will depend mainly on how close it gets to achieving that “patriotic government,” the ICP said. The council will only acquire significance if it becomes an effective institution with clear and concrete powers and if it is representative of the principal forces in Iraqi society and of the parties that “made precious sacrifices in the struggle against dictatorship and for the democratic alternative,” the Iraqi Communists said.

In the context of the glaring failure of the U.S. occupation to win the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people, the Iraqi Communist Party statement suggests that it sees a potential for the council to increasingly take command of Iraq. The “fundamental test” and success of the council, said the ICP, will lie in achieving speedy restoration of security and stability, rebuilding health and other public services, starting to reactivate production and repair the destruction caused by wars and economic sanctions, and “advancing towards restoring the country’s sovereignty and independence.”

The author can be reached at suewebb@pww.org

Demands for Barghoutis release grows

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 03:27:00 +0000

Demands are growing to release Palestinian legislator Marwan Barghouti, and some 6,500 other Palestinian prisoners, as part of the “road map” peace negotiations. Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas warned that without a large-scale prisoner release, the cease-fire “will collapse.” Some 2,000 Palestinians, including the families of prisoners, marched on July 6 in Gaza City, chanting slogans like, “No peace without the release of all detainees.”

The prisoner issue has gained resonance because the key Palestinian groups that worked for months to bring about a cessation of attacks on Israelis comprises the very people Israel has jailed for “acts of terror.” Barghouti, in particular, was the main player in negotiating a truce. Barghouti’s lawyer Jawad Boulus said he and other attorneys acted as go-betweens, passing messages from Barghouti’s cell to other Palestinian contacts.

Barghouti is a well-respected and popular Palestinian leader, who wrote in a 2002 Washington Post op-ed, “I am not a terrorist, but neither am I a pacifist. I am simply a regular guy from the Palestinian street advocating only what every other oppressed person has advocated – the right to help myself in the absence of help from anywhere else.

“I led delegations of Palestinians in meetings with Israeli parliamentarians to promote mutual understanding and cooperation. I still seek peaceful coexistence between the equal and independent countries of Israel and Palestine based on full withdrawal from Palestinian territories occupied in 1967 and a just resolution to the plight of Palestinian refugees pursuant to UN resolutions. I do not seek to destroy Israel but only to end its occupation of my country.”

Barghouti, who is standing trial in Israel on terrorism charges, said he had no faith that the court could reach an objective verdict. He refuses to conduct a formal defense because he does not recognize the Israeli court’s right to try him.

“This is a political trial – the attorney general has decided, the security services have decided. You can’t decide anything,” he told the court on July 14.

The trial, which opened in April, was adjourned until August, when the prosecution is to sum up its case. Barghouti was arrested 15 months ago.

During the proceedings Barghouti also said comments on his case by Israel’s attorney general were improper, and one of the three Israeli judges agreed.

Barghouti said a letter that Attorney General Elyakim Rubinstein wrote to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in June calling Barghouti a “first-rate architect of terrorism” prejudged the trial’s outcome.

“Not one of the witnesses mentioned me by name,” Barghouti said. “No one said Marwan Barghouti is the architect of these attacks, but Rubinstein said Marwan Barghouti is a mass murderer and architect of terrorism.”

Gush Shalom, an Israeli peace group, demonstrated in solidarity with Barghouti the day of his trial. Holding signs that read, “Barghouti to talks table, not to jail,” the protestors were not allowed in the court’s hall, but got media coverage.

Gush Shalom leader Uri Avnery told journalists, “Release of prisoners would create such an enormous good-will. And Barghouti, who helped the cease-fire come about, could do so much more if he were out.”

For more information check out: www.freebarghouti.org

Coup supporter shuts down community TV

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 03:24:00 +0000

Catia TV – Venezuela’s longest-running community television station – was shut down last week by Caracas Mayor Alfredo Peña. Peña was one of the chief supporters of the failed April 2002 coup d’etat against democratically-elected Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

Catia TV began 25 years ago as a pirate TV station, forced to broadcast “underground.” But with the passage of the Bolivarian Constitution and the expansion of democracy that came with it, Catia TV was legalized in 1999. Support to community-based TV stations, such as Catia, was bolstered when Venezuela passed what some call, the world’s most advanced telecommunications and press freedom law, in 2002.

Reports said Peña’s storm troopers confiscated Catia TV’s transmitter and equipment, “depriving poor communities of Western Caracas of their right to receive independent information.”

During the April coup, community media outlets were invaded and community journalists were arrested and tortured in the hope that the commercial TV channels, who were decisive players in the coup, could fully monopolize the airwaves. This repression, however, didn’t prevent the community media journalists from continuing, at the risk of their lives, to inform their communities and the outside world about what was really happening in Venezuela.

Angry citizens and Catia TV supporters have taken to the streets in Caracas to demand the reopening of Catia TV. Catia TV director Blanca Eekhout and fellow workers assembled outside the Attorney General’s Office to protest the infringement of press freedom. Eekhout said they were able to get back some equipment and announced that the station will introduce a “protection petition” to recover the studio and the rest of equipment, so that it can continue its normal services to the community.

President Chavez has come out in support of Catia TV calling Pena’s decision to close the TV studio “dictatorial.”

During his July 13 radio address, Chavez said he agreed with the analysis of Las Ultimas Noticias editor, Eleazar Diaz Rangel, who asks what would have been the reaction if the government had done the same against a private TV channel? And what would the reaction have been internationally, “would we have seen an Organization of American States (OAS) commission in Venezuela?”

Congratulating Catia TV staff for their work and dedication, Chavez reminded listeners that community and alternative radios have increased during his government and are protected by the new telecommunications law.

Soldier doesnt like Iraq War either

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 03:22:00 +0000

Before he was sent to the Middle East, a young soldier from Texas began corresponding by e-mail with some of us in Dallas. His view of the war and army life was considerably different from what the “embedded” U.S. journalists were reporting. Even though we were thousands of miles apart and only connected by mail, we North Texans became extremely fond and protective toward “Soldier Sal” Here are some excerpts from our correspondence.

Dear Jim,

Thank you for writing back. It means a lot, especially considering how busy you are. I am not very busy out here. It is so hot so I go into the building we work at out here like six hours before my shift starts. It means I am susceptible to more details, but at least I can be in some air conditioning.

I don’t get much contact with the Iraqi locals because there have been a lot of attacks lately. They say that the Iraqis are shooting at us because they want us to go home, which is ironic because that is basically the only thing I want right now! I guess it is just lost in translation.

On the convoy down here, we had a lot of exposure with locals and it was really sad. The convoy commander told us we couldn’t give anything to the locals, and if we did, we would be disciplined.

I didn’t understand why he would say something like that until we got into the situation where we had to stop and a bunch of Iraqis came up to us. They looked absolutely decimated. And the sad thing was that every Humvee was filled with an abundance of food and water. And these people were offering to sell beautiful knives and old currency and other things just for a bottle of water or an MRE [meals ready to eat].

While the guy in my Humvee wasn’t looking, I handed one guy a single peppermint, but I got caught and yelled at. Then the guy started begging for one for his baby and I couldn’t. It was very sad and I was very mad that I couldn’t share my food and water with them.

I will be getting out of the army soon enough. I will be very relieved when I get out. I have felt so restricted for so long that I almost forgot what it was like to be a free person.

Have you ever read Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle? It is a very wonderful book. I get a lot of reading time out here. At first I wanted to just read a lot of theory and stuff, but then that got boring so I split it up. Half theory and half regular fiction.

In solidarity,

Sal of the Sand

White House lies prompt call for inquiry

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 02:22:00 +0000

As President Bush and other administration officials scramble to explain away their use of doctored evidence to launch a preemptive war on Iraq, calls for independent, bipartisan investigations grow. Mounting evidence shows that the administration’s top right-wing hawks manipulated a series of debunked intelligence reports to promote their policy.

Former CIA experts say the evidence trail implicates Vice President Dick Cheney. Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity sent a memorandum to Bush calling for Cheney’s resignation, saying, “This was no case of petty corruption of the kind that forced Vice President Spiro Agnew’s resignation. This was a matter of war and peace. Thousands have died.

There is no end in sight. “The CIA veterans charged that the fraudulent intelligence” was used, also successfully, in the campaign leading up to the mid-term elections – a reality that breeds a cynicism highly corrosive to our political process.”

The White House, CIA, State Department and Pentagon are on overdrive to shift blame away from Bush, Cheney and top advisers like Condoleeza Rice.

Some may be hoping CIA Director George Tenet will be the “fall-guy.” Tenet said he took responsibility for Bush’s use of false intelligence in his State of the Union address. But few are buying that effort to divert attention from the White House.

Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) outlined a series of administration lies before, during and after the war, telling the Senate this week, “There is a significant amount of troubling evidence that it was part of a pattern of exaggeration and misleading statements.” He blasted administration attempts to obscure facts and confuse the public on Sunday TV talk shows, especially assailing Rice’s efforts at obfuscation.

As calls for an independent investigation stir up images of past scandals like Watergate that have cost Republicans reelection, the Republican National Committee and Bush’s re-election committee attacked Democrats for “politicizing” the Iraq war and the media for a “feeding frenzy.” But in this week’s Gallup poll, more than half of those surveyed, 53 percent, say it would matter a great deal to them if they became convinced the Bush administration deliberately misled the public. And CBS reports that 56 percent believe administration officials were hiding important elements of what they knew, or were outright lying about weapons of mass destruction.

In one of the largest online petitions ever, MoveOn.org collected, in less than a week, over 380,000 signers asking Congresspeople to support Rep. Henry Waxman’s (D-Calif.) legislation to establish an independent commission adding 11 new Congressional cosponsors.

Republicans with an ear to public opinion like Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel are voicing concern. On CNN’s “Inside Politics,” Hagel said, “We know, in fact, last fall the CIA was saying, this is bad intelligence. But we need to go a lot wider and deeper. Listen, it wasn’t just the CIA involved here. We had the vice president and his office involved, Secretary Rumsfeld, Condi Rice, Secretary Powell’s people. This wasn’t just a one-man show.”

The New York Times, in a lead editorial, ridiculed the White House’s “the British made us do it defense,” noting mounting evidence that both U.S. and British officials were informed by the CIA that the Iraq-Niger uranium deal alleged by Bush was untrue. The International Atomic Energy Commission also discredited that claim even before the war was launched.

Damning evidence continues to mount that in fact there are no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, nor connections to Al Qaeda and Sept. 11.

Raymond McGovern, a 27-year CIA analyst and steering committee member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, emphasized the need for public scrutiny of the Bush administration’s foreign policy decisions, charging the White House has embarked on a “dangerous policy” of pre-emptive war,

“War should not be condoned with or without the existence of WMD,” McGovern told the World. Citing the dangers of possible new military actions against Iran, Syria, and North Korea, he said, “There are peaceful ways to address” these problems. McGovern also expressed shock at the pressure the administration put on the CIA. “I worked for 27 years at the CIA, never did a Vice President come to the [CIA] building to work or visit analysts …”

Columnist David Broder commented in the Washington Post that the past week’s TV coverage – featuring the Bush administration’s lies and the chaos in Iraq alongside the highest unemployment in 20 years – may signal the beginnings of the defeat of the Bush presidency in 2004. “If President Bush is not reelected, we may look back on last Thursday, July 10, 2003, as the day the shadow of defeat first crossed his political horizon,” Broder wrote.

Peace Action Communications Director Scott Lynch told the World, “The façade of the Bush administration being above board is crumbling. Looking at the economy and the cascading bundle of lies that were the underpinnings for winning the vote in Congress for war on Iraq, this could be their undoing.” But, Lynch added, more congressional pressure for truth is vital.

The author can be reached at jleblanc@pww.org

Hip-hop in Brazil

Fri, 11 Jul 2003 03:53:00 +0000

Hip-hop was born in New York but if you talk to most young people in São Paulo, Brazil, they’ll tell you that they feel like it belongs to them. No one will deny it is an American import, but after more than two decades of hip-hop, pronounced “hippy hoppy” in Portuguese, local hip-hop has developed explicitly Brazilian characteristics.

Hip-hop history is serious business in Brazil; the four elements (DJs, Break Dancers, Graffiti Writers, and MCs) are sacred. Their b-boys and b-girls compete on an international level, DJs can scratch and mix with the best of them, graffiti is so big that Santo Andre – a city on the outskirts of São Paulo – hosted the first world show of graffiti last summer. Rap has developed so much that many don’t even listen to American rap and there are about seven different styles, including gospel, gangster, “futuristic,” underground and rock fusion.

In many ways Brazilian hip-hop started out under the same conditions as it did in the United States. Many in the hip-hop community relate to the social and economic conditions that hip-hop talks about within our own country. Drugs (especially crack) have taken over the favelas – Brazilian shantytowns – and extreme levels of economic inequality and poverty coupled with drug-related violence means that the majority of Brazilian youth live in precarious situations.

Hip-hop has become one of the central tools of social criticism for a marginalized youth with little prospects for employment and extremely limited access to education. Through rap they learn about Zumbi dos Palmares – a hero in the struggle against slavery – and other important Afro-Brazilian leaders; they learn about the history of Brazilian People’s struggle to end the military dictatorship; and for many, it’s where they are introduced to concepts of revolution, socialism and democracy.

While they learned a lot from American hip-hop and followed our lead on many things, there are quite a few lessons we could stand to learn from the Brazilian experience. The b-boys and -girls, DJs, rappers, and graffiti writers have traditionally organized themselves into what they call “crews,” which not only dedicate themselves to their art forms but also perform community service and work to organize the young people in their neighborhoods to pass on both the art and social consciousness.

Today in most neighborhoods there are hip-hop-centered community projects and there even exists a community center that was converted into a House of Hip-Hop Culture in Diadema – a city on the outskirts of metropolitan São Paulo. The House of Hip-Hop Culture, which has become a model for many other communities and cities throughout Brazil, is an entire community center dedicated to the four elements of hip-hop that offers workshops, classes, free concerts, and a library to anyone interested in learning about hip-hop. Many Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have also begun to incorporate hip-hop as a way to educate the public on issues of democracy and citizenship, sexuality and STDs, and even as a part of literacy campaigns.

This year for the first time, during the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, the hip-hop heads organized a National Hip-Hop Forum. Taking advantage of the World Social Forum, hip-hoppers from all over Brazil traveled to Porto Alegre to discuss the future of hip-hop in Brazil, the political landscape and situation of young people, and ways to organize themselves to better fight for the interests of their communities. They have vowed to continue to annually hold national hip-hop forums and to organize them in their cities and states to respond to the changing situations facing their communities. In the recent months they have become particularly active in the movement against war in Iraq and participated in the historic day of worldwide protest on Feb. 15.

In Brazil, hip-hop for most isn’t just something you do; it’s something you live and breathe. As the late rapper Sabotagem was often quoted as saying “rap é compromiso” – rap is a commitment. Hip-hop is the way that they express themselves, the way that they communicate with a society that often disregards them and most importantly it’s their way to contribute to the construction of a new Brazil.

This article is excerpted with permission from Dynamic, the magazine of the Young Communist League USA. The author can be reached at ycl@yclusa.org

Liberia in the Bush administrations crosshairs

Fri, 11 Jul 2003 03:31:00 +0000

This week, U.S. President George Bush embarked on his first trip to sub-Saharan Africa. His five-day itinerary included Senegal, South Africa, Botswana, Uganda and Nigeria. Ironically, media attention has largely focused on another African country this week: Liberia.

On the eve of Bush’s African tour, the mainstream media was abuzz with speculation on a possible U.S. military intervention in the West African nation. Bush, the United Nations and others are demanding the resignation of Charles Taylor, Liberia’s president since 1997.

Although the U.S. media has only recently covered the situation in Liberia, the civil war there has raged on and off for nearly 14 years. The humanitarian crisis is immense. An estimated 700,000 Liberians have been killed and about one million are now refugees throughout the world.

The Liberian crisis has also destabilized much of the West African region. War refugees have flooded not only neighboring Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), but also Ghana, Nigeria and countries as far away as Egypt. President Taylor by all accounts supported the bloody coup in neighboring Sierra Leone in 1999 and has aided murderous rebels in Côte d’Ivoire.

The media would have us believe that thousands of Liberians are demanding a U.S. intervention to throw off an unjust dictator. The reality, of course, is much more complex.

Liberia: Land of Liberty?

The deep crisis in Liberia and the possible U.S. military mission there comes after a 180-year relationship between the U.S. and this small country of 3 million inhabitants.

In 1822 freed slaves from the U.S. founded Liberia, which eventually became the continent’s first republic in 1847. Monrovia, the country’s capital, was named after U.S. president James Monroe, who along with other white industrialists and politicians helped found the American Colonization Society in order to repatriate Blacks back to Africa. Some 15,000 freed slaves and freeborn Blacks from the U.S. eventually migrated to Liberia.

But Liberia was rarely the land of liberty its name purported it to be. The Americo-Liberians, as the descendents of the freed slaves are known, soon formed an economic and political oligarchy in the country in which they were a small minority. Never constituting more than 5 percent of the population, Americo-Liberians held every top office and controlled much of the nation’s resources, which include iron ore, timber, diamonds, gold, rubber, coffee and cocoa.

The Americo-Liberians built Liberia in the image of the U.S., imitating its political institutions and even its flag. But Liberia also copied the inequality and class stratification of its brother across the sea. While Liberia remains one of only two African nations never to be openly colonized, it was largely a U.S. protectorate under the domination of U.S. imperialism.

Americo-Liberians had mutually profitable ties with foreign corporations in the U.S. and Europe, and grew rich off the mineral extraction and the rubber and cocoa industries. Rubber was king in Liberia for nearly 100 years, and U.S. tire companies like Firestone had huge holdings in the country.

After World War II, Liberia also became an important country in the international shipping industry by offering the Liberian flag as a “flag of convenience.” Ships from all over the world fly the Liberian flag because of their low fees and lax labor regulations.

Later, Liberia became strategically important because of the U.S. Navy’s Omega radio station based there. The eight Omega stations worldwide were a necessary part of the U.S. naval navigation system until 1997, when the Global Positioning System superseded it. For most of the 1980s and ’90s, Liberia served as the broadcast point for Voice of America on the continent, and Human Rights Watch once stated that “much of United States intelligence for West Africa passes through the Monrovia embassy.”

During the 1960s, Liberian President William V.S. Tubman was an important figure in the Pan-African movement that rose up to end colonial rule in Africa. Monrovia joined Conakry, Accra and Freetown as centers of anticolonial struggle and Pan-Africanism. But the inequalities between the indigenous Liberians and the Americo-Liberians chafed at the country’s ideals.

Doe comes to power

In 1980, a then-unknown military master sergeant named Samuel Kanyon Doe took advantage of food riots to lead a military coup overthrowing the presidency of William R. Tolbert. Doe and his cronies declared the coup a “revolution” on behalf of indigenous Africans against Americo-Liberian oppression. The president, his family and the entire cabinet were brutally slaughtered in a public display of violence that became a signature of the Doe regime.

Instead of condemning the coup against one of their allies, then-U.S. President Ronald Reagan embraced Doe and in 1982 invited him to the White House, where Reagan made his famous blunder of calling Doe “Chairman Moe.” Reagan also heralded the long-term ties between the two countries and pledged to support Liberia in its goal of a “return to democratic institutions and economic stabilization.”

Doe’s sudden rise to power, access to Washington, and his right-wing foreign policies led some African commentators to question whether the U.S. had a role in the 1980 coup. Liberia became a primary U.S. partner in the region, supporting U.S. policy in Palestine and to a lesser degree in South Africa. Doe was elected in a massively fraudulent election in 1985 after a “return to civilian rule,” and was known for his corruption, cronyism and his preferential treatment of his own Krahn tribe.

There were several coups attempts in the 1980s against Doe and a popular resistance to the regime’s brutality. Opposition groups were broken up and their leaders jailed and killed, and many more fled as political and economic refugees. One of these exiles was Charles Taylor, a former Doe aide who studied for many years in the U.S. He fled to the U.S. after falling out with Doe, was arrested and faced extradition back to Liberia where he would almost certainly be executed.

Mysteriously, Taylor escaped from prison and made his way to Côte d’Ivoire to begin an invasion of Liberia in 1989 by his National Patriotic Front of Liberia. Many believed that Taylor was handpicked by the U.S. to oust Doe, who was increasingly a liability. A number of other rebel groups sprouted up in this period and rebel leader Prince Johnson assassinated Doe in 1990.

Doe’s death didn’t bring peace to Liberia. Various rebel factions partitioned the country with Johnson and Taylor both claiming the presidency. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) sent in a peacekeeping force that briefly established a transitional government. Despite cease-fires and a peace accord in 1995 brokered by Nigeria, fighting continued in Liberia.

The entire economic infrastructure of the country had collapsed by the mid-1990s. Much of the country’s railway system, established by mining interests, has been ripped up and sold for scrap metal. Roads and buildings have fallen apart and public services are almost nonexistent.

The fighting continued until 1997 when a cease-fire and then multiparty presidential elections occurred. Taylor received an overwhelming 75 percent of the vote for president in a somewhat contested but generally accepted election.

Taylor, diamond wars and regional conflict

But Taylor’s presidency did not bring prosperity and peace to Liberia or the region. Quite the opposite. The country was plagued by economic crisis, and Taylor soon began destabilizing Sierra Leone and militarily supported the bloody coup there. The mass extraction of diamonds in Sierra Leone financed the Taylor regime. In 2000, the UN banned the sale or exchange of diamonds from Sierra Leone because of its direct link to the fratricidal violence in the region. Then Taylor-supported rebels began seizing territory in Côte d’Ivoire. Both Guinea and Cote D’voire soon launched their own rebel campaigns into Liberia. Today, both rebel factions are at the gates of Monrovia.

The new attention that Liberia is receiving in the world media is a little late. Ghana, Nigeria and other members of ECOWAS had already hosted a number of peace negotiations by the time Bush was contemplating his move. Taylor had reportedly already agreed to leave the country at the Accra peace summit held last month, weeks before Bush demanded that Taylor resign. And what had a been a call for a UN-led peacekeeping mission in the country became a call for a U.S. military mission.

Ghanaian President John Kufuor and Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo have both criticized efforts by the European Union, the UN and the U.S. to nab Taylor in the middle of the peace negotiations. Earlier this year the International Criminal Court secretly indicted Taylor for war crimes in the Sierra Leone war. The indictment was revealed only when Taylor went to the Accra summit and the UN demanded that Ghana arrest him. Ghana refused, saying that doing so would threaten the existing peace process. It was upon Taylor’s return to Liberia late last month that talk of a U.S. intervention surfaced.

A decision on U.S. involvement in Liberia was expected before Bush’s trip to Africa, but instead, a team of military advisors, civil engineers and marines were sent to the U.S. embassy compound in Monrovia to assess the potential threat to a peace-keeping mission. Bush wants to avoid another Somalia debacle, but would love a clean and simple “humanitarian mission” to draw attention from the increasingly sticky situation in Iraq. Liberia may not have the economic, diplomatic and strategic importance it once had, but Liberia could be a big embarrassment if Bush doesn’t act, and a potential boon to Bush’s coming election campaign.

But few things are simple in Liberia and any U.S. military involvement is likely to stir up, not solve, the long-standing ethnic and political strife in the country. Only an international peacekeeping effort led by the ECOWAS nations themselves is likely to help Liberia rebuild and turn onto the road to peace.

Liberia and Bush’s African policy

The U.S. government was a staunch supporter of Doe during his dictatorship in Liberia and turned a blind eye to the astronomical bloodletting in the past 14 years. Human rights, peace and democracy in Liberia would seem unimportant to U.S. “national security interests.” So why is the Bush administrations so concerned now about the Taylor regime, just as it is about to be overthrown?

During his election campaign, Bush questioned the role of the U.S. as “nation-builder,” and put Africa at the bottom of the list of U.S. trade and security priorities. Bush now says action in Liberia is mandated because “we hate to see people suffering.”

Why is Africa now front and center today? Why is little Liberia now in the crosshairs?

The daily newspaper the Post of Zambia perhaps summed it up best, writing, “Bush’s visit to Africa is not about promoting democracy, peace and economic well-being of the peoples of this continent. Instead, we know that his visit is aimed at laying the basis for thoroughgoing and enduring United States military and economic hegemony all over the world.”

Libero Della Piana is the national co-coordinator of the Young Communist League, USA. He studied in Monrovia, Liberia, in 1987 during the Doe regime. He can be reached at ldellapiana@pww.org

International notes

Fri, 11 Jul 2003 02:55:00 +0000

Britain: Foreign office concerned re U.S. military trials

British government officials, human rights activists and lawyers for detainees’ families are expressing concern over the situation of two British citizens, detained at Guantanamo as Al Qaeda suspects. They, and Australian David Hicks, are among the six detainees facing possible trial on terrorism charges before U.S. military tribunals.

The Washington Post quoted a British Foreign Office spokesperson, speaking July 4 not for attribution, as saying British officials expressed “serious concerns about the military commission process.

“We have to make clear ... that we want the detainees to have a fair trial. There are internationally accepted rules - such as the presumption of innocence, access to evidence and access to lawyers and an appeals process – and we’ll be looking to discuss these aspects with the United States.”

Human rights activists, and lawyers retained by the detainees’ parents, are also objecting to the prospect of secret trials, with military lawyers defending the suspects, and a possible death penalty.

Colombia: Court orders fumigation suspended

A Colombian court ruled June 26 that the government should suspend its U.S.-sponsored program to spray herbicides on drug crops until more is known about the effects on human health and the environment, the BBC reported.

The ruling was in response to a lawsuit filed by lawyer Claudia Sampedro, who said she was pleased the decision recognized the Colombian people’s right to a “clean environment.”

“These policies were drawn up without first studying effects on health and the environment,” said Sampedro, chosen to represent environmentalists, human rights activists and small farmers staunchly opposed to the fumigation program.

The Colombian government and U.S. officials claim the chemical used – a cousin of “Roundup” – is safe for people and the environment. The government disagrees with the court’s ruling, and will continue fumigating, pending the outcome of its appeal.

Nigeria: General strike continues

Nigeria’s general strike went into its second week, after the national union federation rejected a compromise offered by the government. The strike started June 30 to protest a fuel price hike of over 50 percent, with the Nigeria Labor Congress demanding the price increase be completely rescinded. The NLC rejected the government’s offer to limit the increase to 35 percent.

NLC President Adams Oshiomhole said he would communicate directly with President Olusegun Obasanjo concerning the federation’s decision to continue the strike. He also complained of brutal police tactics after police fired teargas at strikers during the first days of the work stoppage.

Resentment is high among Nigerians over the fuel price hike, which has sent their real incomes plummeting.

United Nations: Workers protest suspension of union

The UN’s shutting down of its Staff Union has aroused the anger and resentment of thousands of its workers.

On June 27, top UN officials told union leaders that effective June 30, workers at UN headquarters in New York would no longer be entitled to their representation until further notice.

UN officials claimed union leaders had not held new elections on time, but union leaders said the administration foiled their efforts by introducing controversy over procedure.

Staff union vice president Guy Candusso told UN employees that such an action “had never happened before in the history of the union.” Union president Rosemary Waters said the UN “is intent on denying its staff their basic human rights to due process.”

The Staff Union represents some 5,000 workers, over half of whom are employed on short term contracts. Many workers believe the union was shut down because it was pressing issues including workplace discrimination, inequalities in the income tax reimbursement system and lack of appropriate child care facilities.

Pakistan: Sugar workers uphold union rights

The international food and agriculture workers federation IUF said this week that the newly-founded Pakistan Sugar Mill Workers’ Federation has won an important victory against union busting. The Federation was founded in mid-May with IUF support, to prepare for a united organizing and bargaining front of sugar workers facing overcapacity, restructuring and repression.

Soon thereafter, the Army Welfare Sugar Mill in Badin, Sindh province, told federation head Abdus Salam Memon that the plant union he also heads was being dissolved. The stated reason: the mill was the only Army Welfare Trust enterprise to have a union. Management then ordered the union, in existence since the plant opened in 1983, to close at once, threatening force if the union didn’t comply.

The union responded with a vigorous campaign including international support, rallies and demonstrations and a June 23 limited hunger strike.

On June 26, management recognized the union, which now has full access to its office in the factory and can meet as needed.

International notes are compiled by Marilyn Bechtel, international secretary of the Communist Party. She can be reached at cpusainternat@mindspring.com

Canadian Communists win key court battle

Fri, 11 Jul 2003 02:41:00 +0000

VANCOUVER, Canada – Communist Party of Canada (CPC) leader Miguel Figueroa can finally breathe a sigh of relief. The Canadian Supreme Court on June 27 struck down parts of the Canada Elections Act, which deny small political parties the right to exist and participate in elections.

The Canadian Supreme Court ruled that Sections of the Canada Elections Act that deny political parties the right to appear on the ballot if they do not nominate at least 50 candidates unconstitutional and in violation of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Similarly, the refusal to grant parties not meeting the 50-candidate threshold the right to issue tax receipts to donors to claim on their income tax or to keep unspent election funds “undermines the right of each citizen to meaningfully participate in the electoral process.” The Court has ordered Parliament to change the legislation within the next 12 months.

An ecstatic Figueroa welcomed the ruling. “We are, of course, elated with this decision. It stands as a vindication of the struggles our party has waged over this past decade, and, more importantly, as an affirmation of the rights of all smaller political parties in this country, and of the right of all Canadian citizens to freely choose their political preferences in elections.”

Since a Conservative Party government first introduced changes to the Elections Act in 1993 through Bill C-114, the CPC has waged a struggle against the federal government not only to retain its legal existence, but to overturn the legislation. The original Bill, among other things, gave the Canadian government the right to de-register parties not running 50 candidates in an election and then seize their assets. In the 1993 elections, the CPC nominated eight candidates and therefore was immediately deregistered and its assets seized. The Party only regained its legal registration in 2000 after running 51 candidates during the federal election.

Party Central Executive member Kimball Cariou told the World that 1993 “was a stressful period for our party.” The party’s leadership immediately formed a committee to defend the CPC and launched a campaign to change the legislation. The Committee challenged the legislation in the courts. However, it was a lonely, uphill battle for Canadian Communists. Other small parties, said Cariou, verbally supported the court challenge and appeared at a few jointly held press conferences, but did not offer to help sponsor or financially back the court action.

Gradually, lower courts struck down the most insidious aspects of Bill C-114: the mandatory seizure of the assets of federal parties that lose their registered status; the loss of the $1,000 deposits that candidates must put up; the inability of non-registered parties to have their name on the ballot.

The June 27 Supreme Court ruling stems from the federal government’s appeal of a previous decision by an Ontario court which reduced from 50 to 2 the number of candidates required to achieve registered party status and related benefits. The CPC appealed this judgement to the Supreme Court.

Figueroa said that the court decision, “is a significant victory for democracy, but it is one battle among many which must be fought to defend and extend democratic rights in Canada.”

The author can be reached at pww@pww.org

U.S. troops morale plummets in Iraq

Fri, 11 Jul 2003 02:12:00 +0000

President Bush shocked many people last week when he responded to the increasing attacks on American troops in Iraq by saying, “My answer is, bring them on.”

A day after his comic-book-style comment, 10 U.S. soldiers were wounded in three incidents.

American soldiers are facing an average of 13 attacks per day, victims of a deepening guerrilla war. “They’re getting tired of us,” Spec. James McNeely told a Washington Post reporter. “Wouldn’t you be mad if they invaded your country?”

At present, 230,000 Americans are serving in or around Iraq, including nearly 150,000 inside Iraq. Their tours of duty are being extended indefinitely.

“The level of morale for most soldiers that I’ve seen has hit rock bottom,” an officer told the Christian Science Monitor. “The way we have been treated and the continuous lies told to our families back home has devastated us all,” a soldier wrote his congressional representative. An Army officer told the Monitor, “We feel like pawns in a game that we have no voice [in].”

More than 30 U.S. troops have been killed by “hostile action” since Bush declared major fighting over in his aircraft carrier photo op May 1. Hundreds more have been wounded.

“It’s not because of Saddam people are doing these things,” an Iraqi man told The New York Times recently. “It is because there’s no government, there’s no electricity, and just false promises.”

As a result of the war, 100 percent of Iraq’s 27 million people now depend entirely on food rations to survive, UNICEF’s chief representative in Iraq said last week.

Calling the crisis unprecedented, the United Nations World Food Program has initiated the largest emergency operation in the program’s 40-year history.

According to latest tallies, 8,000 Iraqi civilians were killed in the war and many more badly wounded, leaving many families with no one able to work, and many children with no one to care for them.

Many stores and businesses remain closed and government employees have not been paid for months.

More than 400,000 former soldiers and civilian government employees are jobless. A former information ministry cartographer told a UN representative, “We thought our life would be easier after the war since we will have the freedom of expression, but now we are stripped of our jobs and have no choice but to go begging.”

A former Iraqi soldier told the UK Mirror: “Our patience has run out. We’ve no money to feed ourselves, we haven’t been paid for six months and we’re fed up with broken promises.”

Meanwhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross and Amnesty International charge that the U.S. and Britain are violating the Geneva Convention by holding more than 2,000 Iraqi detainees in “cruel, inhuman and degrading” conditions with no access to family or lawyers, no system for notification of arrests or where prisoners are held, and no access to judicial review.

“The notorious Abu Ghraib Prison, center of torture and mass executions under Saddam Hussein, is yet again a prison cut off from the outside world. On 13 June there was a protest in this prison against indefinite detention without trial. Troops from the occupying powers killed one person and wounded seven,” an Amnesty International representative reported following a visit to Iraq.

Amnesty International and other groups charged that the U.S. and Britain are denying Iraqis their right to determine the reconstruction of their country.

In a July 6 editorial, the Iraqi Communist Party’s newspaper Tareeq Al-Shaab said, “The country’s economic development is being formulated without consulting any of its many representatives, and without real participation by the Iraqi people in deciding their own destiny … agreements are concluded, contracts are signed, and deals get approved and distributed to big investors … Meanwhile, the Iraqis, who are the people concerned, are not asked for their opinion in all this, as if it is none of their business!”

Facing mounting pressure from Iraqi groups, U.S. occupation chief Paul Bremer has switched gears yet again, saying now that the U.S. will set up a “governing council” within two weeks. A number of Iraqi political parties say they will participate, but insist that they will not be rubber stamps for the U.S. and must have real political authority.

But U.S. commanders have halted planned local elections in cities and towns across Iraq. Instead they are installing handpicked administrators, many of them former Iraqi military and police officers linked to the Baath Party.

This is spurring wide anger and protests. In Najaf two weeks ago, several hundred demonstrators carried banners reading: “Canceled elections are evidence of bad intentions” and “O America, where are promises of freedom, elections, and democracy?”

The author can be reached at suewebb@pww.org

Over 50,000 demonstrate against EU policies

Fri, 04 Jul 2003 04:19:00 +0000

THESSALONIKI, Greece – While governmental ministers were meeting at a European Union (EU) summit in a nearby seaside resort, over 50,000 demonstrators filled the streets of this ancient Greek port city June 21 to protest EU policies.

Called the biggest demonstration ever in Thessaloniki, it came on the heels of massive anti-Iraq war demonstrations that swept the country.

Action-Thessaloniki 2003 was dubbed a “people’s counter-EU summit” to protest economic, political and military policies and the role of European monopoly corporations. There is growing concern about the loss of national sovereignty and the emergence of the EU as a military bloc.

The EU ministers announced a new agricultural policy that will lead to a major restructuring of the industry, bolstering agribusiness corporations at the expense of small farmers.

The demonstration was the last of a series of actions organized by Greek political and social movements during the six-month Greek presidency of the EU. Many activities were held June 20-22 including a youth encampment of over 7,000 that was set up on the outskirts of the city.

The actions brought together trade unionists, farmers, youth and students, peace, anti-globalization and women’s organizations and immigrant workers from all over Greece. Many delegations also were present from other European countries. A contingent of representatives from various Communist and Workers Parties who had attended an international meeting in Athens also marched.

Demonstrators came by the busloads in defiance of a climate of fear promoted by the mass media warnings that there would be violence in the streets. Many shopkeepers shuttered their stores, and tourists stayed away. But the demonstration was peaceful.

In another part of the city, however, clashes took place between a small number of anarchists and police. Not surprisingly, this received the bulk of media attention.

Demonstrators chanted, “EU and NATO – syndicate of war,” “Killers, robbers and hypocrites are the European imperialists,” “Workers, farmers and students – answer monopoly with unity.” They also marched past the U.S. consulate and chanted “solidarity of peoples – end to the new world order.”

Different actions were held under the banner of the various political trends in Greece. Action-Thessaloniki 2003 united mainly the left forces, including a large left caucus in the main trade union federation. Most of these organizations are led by the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and the Communist Youth of Greece (KNE). Contingents from the KKE branches were too numerous to count. A sea of red flags adorned the march. Thousands of KNE members, often marching arm-in-arm, brought up the rear.

Another demonstration of 5,000 took place under the banner of the Greek Social Forum, which was initiated by the Social Democratic Party (PASOK) and included other groups. Although PASOK is the governing party and supported the Iraq war, they were forced to respond to the near universal opposition among Greeks, including in their own ranks, by organizing some show of opposition to EU policies. The Greek Civil Servants Federation, led by PASOK, called for a strike to allow its members to attend.

John Bachtell (jbachtell@rednet.org) represented the Communist Party USA at the Athens meeting.

In Iraq Living conditions remain tragic

Fri, 04 Jul 2003 04:17:00 +0000

In a recent edition of Tareeq Al-Shaab, the living conditions of the Iraqi people were described as horrific. “More than ten weeks have passed since the collapse of the dictatorial regime, however, the situation remains at standstill,” with no progress nor any relief from the extremely tense conditions, the article said.

“The security situation remains poor,” including acts of arson on oil pipelines and electricity networks. “Economic and living conditions remain tragic, with public and municipal services in shambles.”

The report said the Iraqi people and their political parties and organizations “continue to be marginalized, gravely ignoring their right to express their views about the major issues facing the country today.”

The newspaper was very critical of decisions being made “away from the eyes of the Iraqi public opinion, without consultation with their representatives” by the occupation forces.

The problems cannot “be resolved by just increasing military patrols or security control measures,” the article stated.

Tareeq Al-Shaab is the weekly newspaper of the Iraqi Communist Party. The Iraqi Communist Party called for an urgent meeting of all the Iraqi patriotic parties and forces. “They must meet and discuss our homeland’s current ordeal, and seek urgent solutions before it is too late.” Such a national conference has to take up the issue of self-government.

“The overwhelming majority of people do not see a solution for the present problem in our country except by taking their cause and destiny into their own hands, through their own representatives in the political parties and forces, and through setting up the transitional coalition government.”

Students protest in Iran

Fri, 04 Jul 2003 04:13:00 +0000

News Analysis

The student movement in Iran is again at the forefront of the struggle against the ruling dictatorship. While focusing on George Bush’s so-called support for the protesters, conveniently absent from most media reports is the actual reason behind the students’ protests.

The first wave of demonstrations started on June 9 at Tehran University as part of an ongoing campaign opposing the privatization of universities. The regime has been zealously implementing the type of “economic restructuring” which would be admired by the Bush administration.

The protests were brutally attacked by security forces and vigilante groups organized by the regime. Mass arrests, vicious attacks with truncheons and machetes were commonplace. Assaults are not confined solely to the protests; frequently students’ dormitories are ransacked, and students are often abducted and brutalized.

As usual, the regime’s propaganda machine labeled the demonstrations as conspiracies of the U.S. and its agents, the “monarchists.” This is far from the truth. In fact the growing demonstrations are often spontaneous, with grassroots support.

The current protest has not sprung out of a vacuum or arisen because of sudden interest in Iran’s democratic process by the U.S. administration. During the last few years, a popular movement opposing the ruling Islamic government has spread across all sections of society. The vast majority of Iranians are highly contemptuous towards the religious medieval rulers and the popular movement for democracy and freedom has taken shape. A massive student demonstration in Tehran during July 1999, which was violently crushed, and numerous industrial strikes and demonstrations against rampant privatization didn’t capture the attention of the self-appointed “guardian of democracy” in the Middle East. In fact the aggressive presence of the U.S. military on our borders and the so-called support for freedom from the Bush administration would be highly detrimental to the struggle for democracy in our country.

During the Shah’s regime, the student movement in Iran struggled against that dictatorship while actively opposing the intrusive role of U.S. imperialism. In the current situation, as one of the students’ leaders stated, “The monarchists … are fighting for power, not democracy. And this will mean the loss of all intellectual efforts of the last hundred years for establishing a culture of democracy and forming a civic society in Iran.”

While starting on the basis of a student-related issue, the demonstrations spread quickly, gaining popular support and developing a political stance, which directly targeted the regime. This is indicative of the present critical situation, which has engulfed the regime’s power structure. Although the conservative rulers lack any legitimacy and support, the “Reform” process has also reached a deadlock. This is due to the disastrous policies pursued by the Reformist leadership, which in the eyes of the people has rendered them impotent. The Reformists have refused to integrate with the wider popular movement for democracy.

The Tudeh Party of Iran has consistently stated the need for the mobilization of key social forces, including workers, students and women, in the struggle for democracy. In supporting the student protests, the party reiterated its position in a June 15 statement: “Building broad solidarity in support of the students and all those detained … are the essential tasks ahead of all social and political forces opposing despotism. By continuing to build a united mass popular movement of supporters of freedom and opponents of despotism, we must confront the ploys of the reactionaries. Silence and appeasement in response to these oppressive moves will only strengthen the ruling reaction.”

Nima Kamran is a correspondent from the Tudeh Party of Iran and can be reached at pww@pww.org