People Before Profit blog

Dollars for Cuban anti-govt groups flow from Miami

Fri, 30 May 2008 08:08:00 +0000

Cuban news media are charging the top U.S. diplomat in Cuba with being a bagman for groups seeking to overthrow Cuba’s government.

Beginning May 19, Cuban news broadcasts have focused on e-mail communications, video and audio recordings, signed receipts and photographs testifying to a Cuban woman’s arrangements over two years with contacts in Miami to send money to Cuba to fund destabilization projects.

Five years ago, Cuban security services documented similar violations of Cuban law by malcontents accepting money and goods handed out by the U.S. Interests Section. Over 70 of them went to jail, convicted at trials enlivened by testimony from agents who posed as dissidents.

This time terrorist Santiago Alvarez, presently jailed in Miami, surfaces as paymaster. And Michael Parmly, head of the U.S. Interests Section, is accused of being a courier.

The Cuban woman, Marta Beatriz Roque, was herself jailed in 2003 and later released for health reasons. The documents show she sent e-mails from computers at the U.S. Interests Section, the embassies of Slovakia and the Czech Republic and the Hotel Commodore, yielding lucrative results. Every month Roque received $1,500 which she kept, $2,400 which she funneled to Laura Pollen for the anti-government “Ladies in White,” and smaller amounts for others including Jorge Garcia and Vladimir Roca, leader with Roque of the “Agenda for the Transition.”

The Ladies in White, mostly wives of those jailed in 2003, conduct regular public protests in Havana. President Bush received one of them, Elsa Morejon, at the White House in January. He joined Roque, Pollen and Garcia for a video conference in early May.

The money arriving in Cuba comes from the Legal Rescue Foundation in Hialeah, Fla., based in the office of Santiago Alvarez. The foundation was set up two years ago to fund legal expenses for terrorist Luis Posada, recently arrived from Mexico on Alvarez’s yacht.

Over decades Alvarez, a wealthy developer and CIA veteran, launched armed attacks inside Cuba. He organized a failed assassination attempt against Cuban President Fidel Castro in Panama.

Detained since 2005 for storing weapons destined for Cuba, Alvarez had jail time added for refusing to testify at Posada’s trial on immigration charges. Alvarez’s father worked for Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, and his grandfather organized the 1929 murder in Mexico of Cuban Communist Party founder Julio Mella.

Marta Beatriz Roque sent cajoling, flattering and complaining e-mails imploring colleagues in Miami to extract money from “our friend,” Alvarez. She helped mobilize couriers, among them U.S. diplomats Robert Blau and Parmly, who transported money on at least three occasions. Cuban news reports displayed one Parmly e-mail to Roque reassuring her that her cell phone costs were covered: “These things can be arranged among friends ... This house is always open to you all.”

In Washington, State Department spokesperson Sean McCormick characterized the payments as nonpolitical humanitarian aid to families of political prisoners, allowable for private donors.

Speaking to reporters, Cuban Foreign Ministry official Josefina Vidal focused on Parmly’s role in solidifying ties between terrorists in Florida and “counterrevolutionaries in Cuba.” In her view, the outrageousness of the U.S. actions signals a possible attempt to provoke Cuba into closing the Interests Section.

Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque contradicted the State Department’s claims. The money goes to mercenaries, not for humanitarian aid, he asserted at a press conference. He denounced U.S. officials in Cuba who “encouraged, financed, organized, directed and monitored counterrevolutionary activity in order to destabilize.”

The foreign minister condemned Bush administration hypocrisy evidenced by money lavished upon counterrevolutionaries while Cuban American remittances to families in Cuba face restrictions.

So far there are no signs of prosecutions on the way. U.S. and European critics of the 2003 trials and sentences are silent. Back then, the imprisoning of dissidents (mercenaries though they may have been) led the European Union to impose sanctions, a decision that will be revisited in June.

Analyst Nelson Valdes emphasizes that while private donations set off the present storm, U.S. destabilization of Cuba is funded largely through public monies to the tune this year of $45 million. Beneficiaries include right-wing exile groups, Eastern European anti-Cuban politicians and “money oriented ‘civil society’ promoters.” Only a fraction ends up in Cuba, he says. Intelligence agencies secretly send additional monies to the island.

MOVIE REVIEW Before the Rains

Fri, 30 May 2008 04:14:00 +0000

MOVIE REVIEW – Before the Rains Directed by Santosh Sivan Merchant Ivory Products, 2007 98 mins. Rated PG-13

The movie “Before the Rains” should be used as an example to illustrate the main points of Frederick Engels’ work “Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State.” Set in 1930s India during the uprising of Indian nationalists, it clearly shows the effects of capital on love and human relationships. The bottom line is that people who love money, particularly capital, cannot love people.

The main character is an Indian assistant of a British spice trader. The Indian assistant seeks to protect his master, for which he receives meager wages and benefits. He lives in slave-like quarters on a plantation while his master dines on fine cuisine and wine in the main plantation house.

One of the most poignant moments in the film came when the British master asked his Indian collaborator if the workers in the village were calm. The complacency of the workers is of utmost importance to the capitalist.

The British master had embarked on a plan to build a road up a mountain in order to harvest the valuable spices of India. It was clear he needed the full support of the native Indian tribes to make this happen. Along the way, he engaged in an affair with a beautiful Indian servant. He glibly destroys her life when she appears to be an obstacle to capital accumulation and enlists the assistance of the Indian collaborator to eliminate her.

The movie clearly illustrates that under capitalism, and particularly imperialism, love takes a distant second place to profits and when love threatens capital accumulation, love becomes expedient.

Buried in the wonderful imagery of the film, which depicts the amazing Indian countryside, was the fact that labor improved the infrastructure of the community. When the imperialists were expelled, the road endured and the people benefited from their labor. The message seems to be that although the people suffer tremendously during capitalist expansion, they gain the tools and resources to overtake their oppressors.

Nepal's lawmakers abolish the country's monarchy

Thu, 29 May 2008 07:26:00 +0000

KATMANDU, Nepal (AP) — Nepal's lawmakers have abolished the monarchy and declared the country a republic, ending 239 years of royal rule in the Himalayan nation.

The newly elected assembly adopted the resolution at its first meeting Wednesday by an overwhelming majority and has given the king 15 days to leave his palace in central Katmandu.

There was no immediate reaction from the palace, which has rarely commented on political developments in Nepal since King Gyanendra was forced to end his royal dictatorship after widespread protests two years ago.

The country's former rebels, the Maoists, then ended their 10-year insurgency, and in April won the most seats in the assembly, setting the stage for the end of Nepal's monarchy.

Cuba supports press freedom

Wed, 28 May 2008 02:08:00 +0000

“You cannot kill truth by murdering journalists,” said Tubal Páez, president of the Journalists Union of Cuba. One hundred and fifty Cuban and South American journalists, ambassadors, politicians and foreign guests gathered at the Jose Marti International Journalist Institute to honor the 50th anniversary of the death of Carlos Bastidas Arguello — the last journalist killed in Cuba. Carlos Bastidas was only 23 years of age when he was assassinated by Fulgencia Batista’s secret police after having visited Fidel Castro’s forces in the Sierra Maestra Mountains. Edmundo Bastidas, Carlos’ brother, told about how a river of change flowed from the Maestra (Teacher) mountains, symbolized by his brother’s efforts to help secure a new future for Cuba.

The celebration in Havana was held in honor of World Press Freedom Day, which is observed every year in May. World Press Freedom day was proclaimed by the UN in 1993 to honor journalists who have lost their lives reporting the news, and to defend media freedom worldwide.

During my five days in Havana, I met with dozens of journalists, communication studies faculty and students, union representatives and politicians. The underlying theme of my visit was to determine the state of media freedom in Cuba and to build a better understanding between media democracy activists in the U.S. and those in Cuba.

I toured the two main radio stations in Havana, Radio Rebelde and Radio Havana. Both have Internet access to multiple global news sources including CNN, Reuters, Associated Press and BBC with several newscasters pulling stories for public broadcast. Over 90 municipalities in Cuba have their own locally-run radio stations, and journalists report local news from every province.

During the course of several hours in each station I was interviewed on the air about media consolidation and censorship in the US and was able to ask journalists about censorship in Cuba as well. Of the dozens I interviewed all said that they have complete freedom to write or broadcast any stories they choose. This was a far cry from the Stalinist media system so often depicted by U.S. interests.

Nonetheless it did become clear that Cuban journalists share a common sense of a continuing counter-revolutionary threat by U.S.-financed Cuban-Americans living in Miami. This is not an entirely unwarranted feeling in that many hundreds of terrorist actions against Cuba have occurred with U.S. backing over the past 50 years. In addition to the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, these attacks include the blowing up of a Cuban Airlines plane in 1976 resulting in the deaths of 73 people, the starting in 1981 of an epidemic of dengue fever that killed 158 people, and several hotel bombings in the 1990s, one of which resulted in the death of an Italian tourist.

In the context of this external threat, Cuban journalists quietly acknowledge that some self-censorship will undoubtedly occur regarding news stories that could be used by the “enemy” against the Cuban people. Nonetheless, Cuban journalists strongly value freedom of the press and there was no evidence of overt restriction or government control.

Cuban journalists complain that the U.S. corporate media is biased and refuses to cover the positive aspects of socialism in Cuba. Unknown to most Americans are the facts that Cuba is the number one organic country in the world, has an impressive health care system with a lower infant mortality rate than the U.S., trains doctors from all over the world, and has enjoyed a 43 percent increase in GDP over the past three years.

Ricardo Alarcon, president of the National Assembly, discussed bias in the U.S. media. “How often do you see Gore Vidal interviewed on the U.S. media?” he asked. Vidal has recently said that the U.S. is in its 'worst phase in history.' “Perhaps Cuba uses corporate news to excess,” Alarcon said, “Cuban journalists need to link more to independent news sources in the U.S.” Alarcon went on to say that Cuba allows CNN, AP and the Chicago Tribune to maintain offices in Cuba, but that the U.S. refuses to allow Cuban journalists to work in the United States.

As the Cuban socialist system improves, the U.S. does everything it can to artificially force Cold War conditions by funding terrorist attacks, maintaining an economic boycott, launching a new anti-terrorism Caribbean naval fleet, and increasingly limiting U.S. citizen travel to Cuba. It is time to reverse this Cold War isolationist position, honor the Cuban people's choice of a socialist system and build a positive working relationship between journalists in support of media democracy in both our countries.

Peter Phillips is a professor of sociology at Sonoma State University and director of Project Censored, a media research organization. He traveled to Cuba as an invited guest of the Journalists Union of Cuba, May 10-15, 2008.

Olympic creed: not the triumph but the struggle

Sat, 24 May 2008 08:54:00 +0000

Every four years the Olympic games bring together athletes from all corners of the world to compete in the planet’s biggest international multi-sports tournament. This year’s Summer Olympic games are scheduled to kick off in August in Beijing. The next Winter Olympics will be held in Vancouver, Canada, in 2010. Currently 203 countries participate in the Olympics, more than the 193 countries belonging to the United Nations.

The Olympic program consists of 35 sports categories, 53 specific sport “disciplines” and more than 400 events. The Summer Olympics includes 28 sports with 38 disciplines including athletics (track and field), cycling, fencing, gymnastics, weightlifting, shooting, swimming, tennis and wrestling. The winter games features seven sports with 15 disciplines including cross-country skiing, figure skating, ice hockey, ski jumping and speed skating.

The original Olympic games were first recorded in 776 BC in Olympia, Greece, and were celebrated until AD 393. According to one legend, the Greek god Heracles was the creator of the games and built the Olympic stadium and surrounding buildings as an honor to his father Zeus. The legend has it that he walked in a straight line for 400 strides and called this distance a “stadion,” which later became a measure of the modern Olympic stadium.

In 1833 Greek poet and newspaper editor Panagiotis Soutsos, in his poem “Dialogue of the Dead,” spurred interest in reviving the Olympic games in 1833. Greek businessman and philanthropist Evangelos Zappas sponsored the first modern games in 1859 and paid for refurbishment of the Panathinaiko Stadium for the games in Greece in 1870 and 1875. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was founded in 1894 on the initiative of a French nobleman, Pierre Frédy, Baron de Coubertin. The first of the IOC’s Olympic games were the 1896 summer games. Coubertin sought a way to bring nations closer together and to have the youth of the world compete in sports, rather than fight in war.

Coubertin’s ideals are illustrated by the Olympic creed: “The most important thing in the Olympic games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.”

Three Olympiads had to pass without the games due to World War I in 1916 and the summer and winter games of 1940 and 1944 due to World War II. Many countries have also boycotted the Olympic games. In 1980 and 1984 both the U.S. and the Soviet Union boycotted the Olympics that were held in each other’s countries.

The Olympic rings are the most widely used symbol of the global event. The five intertwined rings represent the unity of the five inhabited continents and the colors, white, red, blue, green, yellow and black, were chosen because each nation has at least one of these colors in its national flag.

Before each Olympic Games the Olympic Flame is lit in Olympia, Greece, and brought to the host city by runners carrying the torch in relay. In the stadium, it is passed from athlete to athlete until it reaches the last carrier, often a well-known athlete from the host nation, who lights the fire in the stadium’s cauldron.

This year the devastating May 12 earthquake struck as the Olympic torch relay was passing through China on its way to Beijing. The Chinese government paused the torch relay for three days to honor the memory of those who lost their lives in the quake. A national mourning including three minutes of silence was observed throughout China on May 19.

The IOC sent a letter of condolence to China’s President Hu Jintao and announced that it would donate $1 million to aid relief and recovery efforts. “I feel deeply for those affected and join in solidarity with the people of China,” said IOC President Jacques Rogge. “We send our deepest condolences to the victims and their families.”

plozano@pww.org

Israel at 60 why celebrations are muted

Sat, 24 May 2008 08:50:00 +0000

Feelings about the state of Israel occupy a broad spectrum of world opinion, from adoring admiration in some quarters to hate veering into outright anti-Semitism from some others. As an expression of the 19th- and 20th-century Jewish national emancipation movement, Israel has achieved what its founders dreamed of — a country like any other, with all the attributes, positive and negative.

Benefiting from ample U.S. aid, Israel has enjoyed unparalleled success at assimilating a majority immigrant population from all corners of the globe, many arriving as destitute refugees. Israel has revived the ancient Hebrew language not only on the street and in the classroom but in world-class literature and film. Its artists and musicians are known internationally. Israel has a highly developed economy for a country with such a small population (about 7 million), and is a leader in medicine, agronomy and high-tech industries. Its per capita income of $33,000 ranks among the world’s highest.

Celebrations of Israel’s 60th anniversary have been muted, however. Massive divides characterize Israel today. A fifth of Israel’s people live below the poverty line. One in three Israeli children suffers from “food insecurity,” i.e., hunger. At the same time that the social safety net has failed, particularly for the ultra-religious and immigrants of color, a class of billionaire plutocrats has arisen whose political influence is profoundly corrupting. A chasm likewise looms between the largely secular population and the religious minority that by historic convention holds not only the swing vote in government, but also regulatory authority over all life cycle ritual from conversion to marriage, deaths and burial.

The world hardly needs reminding, too, of the enormous gap between Jews and Israel’s Palestinian citizens (Muslim, Druze, Bedouin and Christian), who number some 20 percent of the population. Israel at 60 seems a long way from honoring the promise made in its ringing Declaration of Independence in 1948: “complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex,” and further, “freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture.”

The single most corrupting factor in Israeli life today is the occupation of Palestinian lands in the West Bank. Taken as war booty in 1967, these territories are increasingly being settled by Israelis in a movement toward expanding Israel’s borders that no other nation finds in concordance with international law. A constant assault on Palestinian pride, the occupation is a powerful impediment to the emergence of a viable Palestinian state. Sadly, two generations of service in an occupying army, with all the degradation and humiliation that implies toward the native population, have created in too many Israelis an arrogant, chauvinist mentality that ill serves the ideal of peaceful resolution of contentious problems. For all its sophistication and prosperity, Israel is living in a virtual ghetto amidst its Middle Eastern surroundings.

Numerous proposals for solving the Arab-Israeli conflict have been offered. There is by now near-universal agreement that sooner or later a Palestinian state will have to emerge on the West Bank and in Gaza, the Israeli settlers will have to move back to Israel proper behind a mutually adjusted 1967 Green Line, and the city of Jerusalem will serve as capital of both the Israeli and Palestinian states. Compensation will be made for the forfeiture of settler homes, and acknowledgment made of Palestinian losses in the war of 1948 that accompanied Israel’s independence.

A one-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian predicament may seem equitable on its face, but a miniscule percentage of Israelis or Palestinians actively seeks such a state. Israel is here to stay, and given a 2,000-year history of exile and oppression, most Jews will not abandon their national homeland. And most Palestinians would rather control their own government, institutions and land. Utopian proposals at this moment are illusory and counterproductive.

Most Jews in Israel and elsewhere support a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine, and would negotiate with anyone to achieve it. Indeed, such an outcome is essential to Israel’s very survival. How many more generations of war, violence, occupation and global displeasure can the country take? Already, more than a million Israelis have bailed out by emigrating with their talents and families. For the sake of the Israeli and the Palestinian peoples, as much as for peace itself, our elected officials and the incoming U.S. president must devote everything it takes to bring about a comprehensive settlement in the Middle East.

Ari Goldman is active in the progressive Jewish American movement.

Siege mentality prevails in Bogota

Wed, 21 May 2008 07:49:00 +0000

Without warning, the Colombian government shipped 14 imprisoned paramilitary chieftains to the United States on May 13 for prosecution on drug trafficking. The Alvaro Uribe government has intensified accusations that the Venezuelan and Ecuadorian governments are tied to groups it calls terrorists, specifically the insurgent Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Critics see these developments as attempts to deflect problems.

The heads of the United Self Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) were in prison as part of a deal. Under Colombia’s 2005 “Justice and Peace Law” they agreed to tell the truth about crimes in return for demobilization of some 20,000 troops and short stays in low security jails. Over decades, the AUC massacred thousands, took over peasant lands, and displaced millions.

What prosecutors, Colombia’s Supreme Court and reporters learned from the detainees hurt. Politicians allied to President Uribe were seen to have protected the AUCs in exchange for money and election support. Over 60 congresspersons, 31 of whom are in jail, are being investigated along with mayors, municipal councilors, governors and former legislators.

As disclosures mounted, authorities moved the AUC heads to secure prisons and extended sentences. Then retired Supreme Court President César Valencia Copete claimed that the President pressured him to secure the release of former Senate head Mario Uribe, his cousin, jailed for securing AUC support for Alvaro Uribe’s election in 2002.

In early May, further devastating testimony circulated in the press. Jailed paramilitary Francisco Villalba charged that Alvaro Uribe, as governor of Antioquia, helped finance, plan and celebrate a 1997 AUC attack in El Aro that killed 15 peasants and displaced hundreds. Allegedly brother Santiago Uribe was involved. Other reports connect Uribe and Vice President Francisco Santos with efforts to build up AUC presence in Bogota.

Their hard disks, laptops and cell phones were in the airplane along with the extradited AUC leaders. U.S. courts will not be looking at human rights abuses. Gary Leech asserts that regarding the AUC role in Colombian politics, President Uribe has “stymied future investigations into the so-called para-politics scandal.” (Colombiajournal.org) Investigator Claudia Lopez points out, “They’ve taken away all the witnesses.”

The government’s publicity campaign highlighting Venezuelan and Ecuadorian complicity with FARC insurgents is characterized by critics as another effort at damage control, as a smokescreen used to distract and obscure. The media have focused on computers found at the site in Ecuador where the Colombian military killed 20 FARC combatants on March 1.

Colombia alleges that information contained in three laptops, three flash drives, and two hard drives demonstrate Venezuelan and Ecuadorian ties to the FARC. Officials sent the material to the international police agency Interpol for corroboration.

That agency’s report announced May 13 may have backfired. Acknowledging that “no evidence of tampering” was found, it stated that “verification ... does not imply validation of the user files ... or source of the user files.” OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza dismissed the report as a technical opinion unrelated to production or content. Critics suggest that Interpol violated forensic standards by breaking the “chain of custody” and “failing to copy original computer material.”

The report failed to mention emails leaked by Interpol or Colombia and used by Spanish and U.S. media to associate the Venezuelan and Ecuadorian governments with the FARC.

Signaling Colombian dependency on the U.S. military, the Uribe puppet regime allowed Washington’s ambassador to Colombia William Brownfield to announce early plans for a U.S. base in La Guajira, Colombia adjacent to Venezuela’s oil-rich Zulia state. The lease on the U.S. military base in Manta Ecuador is not being renewed.

Over 60 Colombian troops are reported to have entered Páez municipality in southwestern Venezuela on May 16. Signs of mounting regional tension occur amidst preparations in Colombia for Uribe’s second re-election campaign in 2010, presently barred under Colombia’s 1991 constitution.

atwhit@ road runner.com

Responding to disasters

Sat, 17 May 2008 09:15:00 +0000

Cyclone hits Myanmar. Earthquake rocks China. In each case, thousands of lives have been snuffed out by nature’s wrath. Given the combination of global warming and extreme poverty, we’re likely to see more extreme natural and human calamities. Here in the United States, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 resulted in almost 2,000 deaths, and hundreds of thousands of people are still displaced.

When a disaster strikes the natural reaction of people is to want to help. This is a good and important thing. But natural disasters don’t happen in a vacuum. They occur in the context of human-made political and economic problems and inequalities.

In Myanmar, the military dictatorship failed its people before, during and after the storm. It has refused many offers of aid. Yet, the hypocrisy of George and Laura Bush chastising the junta for failing to respond is stunning. The world vividly recalls Bush’s callous failure to respond to Katrina. His belligerent foreign policies have increased tensions and fueled distrust of the U.S. His economic policies have widened the wealth gap in the U.S. and increased global poverty.

China responded markedly differently than Myanmar, with the Communist government immediately mobilizing, in a transparent way, massive resources to the affected areas.

What can the world do when disaster strikes? Many good organizations raise funds for humanitarian aid, including unions, women’s organizations and health care groups, and we can donate to such efforts. There are also countries that always go above and beyond – Cuba, for example, offered doctors and other aid for the Katrina victims (Bush rejected Cuba’s offer) and sends trained personnel and other resources to numerous countries in time of need.

Americans want to help when disaster strikes. One way is by making donations for relief aid. Beyond that, working to change U.S. policies to favor human needs and our planet, not global capital, is necessary to help prevent catastrophe when possible and to save and rebuild lives wherever disaster hits.

The Kurdish question and the fruits of imperialism

Thu, 15 May 2008 23:24:00 +0000

An ongoing guerilla war is raging in Southeastern Turkey and Kurdish regions of U.S.-occupied Iraq. The war is led by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which since its inception in Turkey has fought for a socialist Kurdistan that would bring together oppressed Kurdish minorities from contiguous regions. As I see it, the events are a textbook case of how imperialism cynically operates to divide and exploit peoples

Kurds are a people who trace their history to biblical times. They have risen up over and over again against powerful pre-capitalist empires, centered in recent centuries in Turkey and Iran, which oppressed them. Today there are an estimated 25 million Kurds, the majority — 50 percent to 65 percent — in Turkey, followed by Iran, Iraq and Syria

After World War I, Kurdish people fought for independence and self-determination, believing that it had been promised to them by the Allied powers. They, along with other peoples, soon discovered that “self-determination” was meant for Europeans, not for them.

Mustapha Kemal’s nationalist regime in Turkey, the new British colonial regime in Iraq and the Iranian monarchy all worked to suppress Kurdish rebellions. Britain, like the U.S. today, maintained the fiction that it was preparing Iraq for self-governance and even had its Iraqi colony admitted to the League of Nations in the 1930s at a time when Iraqi forces massacred Kurds demanding self-determination.

Turkish policies toward Kurds, suppressing the Kurdish language, literature and press, were particularly brutal. These policies, while they have been moderated, continue to this day.

After its founding in Turkey in the 1970s, the PKK adopted various strategies rooted in assassinations, bombings and later “people’s war” tactics associated with the Chinese revolution. The PKK also faced relentless repression by the Turkish military and police.

In the aftermath of the dismemberment of the Soviet Union, the PKK moved away from Marxism-Leninism, although it still defines itself as seeking a socialist Kurdistan. At the same time, it extended its people’s war tactics to suicide bombings and attacks against Turkish embassies and officials abroad, leading the U.S., NATO, and the European Union to officially declare it a terrorist organization.

Where does the U.S. — which has never defended Kurds’ human rights in Turkey and supported Saddam Hussein in the 1980s while he was massacring Iraqi Kurds — fit into all of this?

Hussein’s Baath regime offered Kurdish Iraqis a very limited autonomy over territories in the north, but excluded some of the richest lands and most importantly all of the oil lands, and used both chemical warfare and mass killing to crush resistance. Between the first Gulf War and the 2003 U.S. invasion, U.S.-NATO protection enabled Iraqi Kurds to gain significant autonomy.

The PKK has used, and continues to use, Iraq’s Kurdish region as a base for its extensive “people’s war” in southeastern Turkey. With one hand U.S. military and intelligence services cooperate with Turkish forces in attacks against the PKK in Turkey and Iraq. With the other the U.S. tries to control attacks in Iraq so as not to upset its strategic position or overly humiliate its dependents in Bagdad, and in order to try to sustain long-term control over the Kurdish oil region. Kurds, Turks and Iraqis who perish in this conflict, often as innocent bystanders, mean little to the contending parties and nothing to U.S. imperialism.

The welfare of Kurds in either Turkey or Iraq, and the future of democracy in either Turkey or Iraq, have absolutely nothing to do with these calculations.

Bringing Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey together with Kurdish representatives to conclude a regional settlement that will include cooperative economic development and political and cultural civil rights is the only real basis for a solution to this bloody conflict. Neither the Bush administration nor its predecessors have ever contemplated such a settlement, preferring to control oil and use Turkish military might for their own purposes.

A progressive U.S. government should advance such a settlement, and reject the classic imperialist policy that sees Kurds as pawns, Turkey and Iran as knights, and the oil of the region as king on a chessboard.

As a postscript, the only state in which a Kurdish minority was given full cultural freedom and equal rights was Soviet Armenia. After the dismemberment of the Soviet Union, these rights were largely lost, another example of how the Soviet Union’s destruction strengthened imperialism and undermined people’s rights.

Norman Markowitz is a history professor at Rutgers University.

China launches massive rescue after Sichuan earthquake

Wed, 14 May 2008 09:01:00 +0000

The Chinese government’s response to a massive earthquake in Sichuan Province May 12 has been swift, according to a number of news sources. The government said that tremors and aftershocks were felt in 16 provinces, from Tibet to Beijing. Up to 15,000 people have been killed with many tens of thousands more still missing and injured, and over 500,000 houses have been destroyed.

After the quake, Chinese President Hu Jintao “immediately ordered prompt actions to rescue the injured and to secure life in the disaster-stricken areas,” according to a news communique from China.

Premier Wen Jiabao, who heads the State Council, flew to Sichuan May 12 to direct the rescue and relief work. He oversaw the establishment of an ad hoc command center for disaster relief and the setup of eight disaster-relief working groups to aid victims.

Wen pledged to rescue as many people as possible and to rebuild the disaster area quickly, according to Chinese media reports.

The Chinese military, also known as the People’s Liberation Army, the police, local Communist Party committees and local governments have pitched in to assist and coordinate relief efforts.

Chinese media reports say that roads, communications and power supply to the epicenter areas in Sichuan were all cut off by the quake. Premier Wen asked the army to enter the worst affected areas by any means, even if they had to get in on foot. He stressed that every second of delay meant more lives lost.

As many as 20,000 members of the army and police have been deployed to disaster areas to aid in rescuing victims. Another 24,000 troops have been airlifted to the worst affected zones, and 10,000 more have been transported by railroad to help provide emergency relief. An additional 3,000 firefighters and special police were being rushed to surrounding communities shaken by the quake.

Meanwhile, China’s International Search and Rescue Team also joined the rescue and relief efforts. The Ministry of Civil Affairs delivered to Sichuan 5,000 tents from a national disaster relief center in Xi’an.

The Ministry of Public Security issued an emergency notice calling for the mobilization of the entire police force for an all-out effort to join the quake relief and work to save as many lives as possible.

The Ministry of Health assembled and sent 10 emergency rescue teams to Sichuan to provide medical care. Other departments involved in communications, transportation, and reconstruction have also been mobilized.

The Chinese government’s swift response to this disaster sharply and sadly contrasts with the recent disaster in Myanmar (Burma) where a sluggish response by the country’s military regime to a massive cyclone last week that may have cost the lives of as many as 128,000 people.

While poverty, population density and poorly constructed buildings in Sichuan likely contributed to the heavy toll in lives, the Chinese government’s response also contrasts with the poor efforts on the part of the Bush administration after the Hurricane Katrina disaster along the Gulf Coast in 2005 cost the lives of nearly 2,000 people.

International offers of aid have poured into the Chinese government. Wang Zhenyao, who heads the Ministry of Civil Affairs, welcomed offers of financial aid and supplies, but stated that additional rescue personnel could not be accommodated at this time.

So far, the Chinese government has allocated $123 million for the rescue efforts, according to China’s Xinhua news agency.

jwendland @ politicalaffairs.net

The May Day story we never forget

Wed, 14 May 2008 04:55:00 +0000

CHICAGO — It’s a May Day story my mother never lets me forget. Both my parents, avid community activists at the time, were lead organizers of a local march and rally for international workers’ day and immigrant rights in the Pilsen neighborhood on Chicago’s southwest side. The year was 1977 and the march was scheduled for May 1.

That morning, my mother, who was pregnant with me, began to feel labor pains. She thought it was nothing to worry about but the pains became sharper and she decided to have my father take her to the hospital.

It was morning time and my father was responsible for making sure the sound system and speakers were at the rally for the May Day action, which was set to begin at noon. My mother insisted my father stay with her at the hospital. In those days no one had cell phones and you couldn’t call someone to pick up the equipment instead, she recalls.

When the doctors checked my mother they found my heart rate was low. They said they needed to do an emergency C-section surgery to get me out right away. They asked if someone was waiting outside the room. “Yes, my husband,” she replied. Little did she know that my father had left the building. “Oh, boy, that was your father for you,” she says.

My mother became worried and anxious. “Do anything you have to do, just save my baby,” she said. All of a sudden she felt the urge to push. “I need to push, I need to push,” she told the doctor. “Are you sure, mother?” the doctor asked. “Yes!”

“They wanted me to wait but I couldn’t and the doctor literally caught you,” my mom tells me. As I was born around 1:05 p.m. my father, the late Rudy Lozano Sr., was marching down the streets of Chicago for the rights of workers and immigrants.

My parents decided to give me the middle name Alberto after Albert Parsons, one of the labor leaders who fought for worker unity and for the eight-hour workday in Chicago back in 1886. Along with other leaders, Parsons was rounded up and executed after being accused of inciting a riot with the Chicago police at Haymarket Square. Parsons and his comrades are remembered as martyrs who sparked an international movement for working class unity. They, and the history of the U.S. labor movement, are honored worldwide every May Day.

This May Day I turned 31 years old. My father was only 31 when he was gunned down 25 years ago. He is remembered as a loving son, brother, husband and father, and an outstanding union and community organizer. He dedicated his life to fighting passionately for social justice, labor solidarity and the equal rights of all people.

My father believed in building the broadest possible unity among all workers with or without documents, and he lived a life committed to the values and traditions of May Day’s history.

If Rudy Lozano Sr. were alive today, I know he would have been proudly marching alongside my mother and my two brothers this May Day. I am also confident that he, too, would be marching toward November to ensure that we make voter history in this country and reverse the Bush policies.

I know in my heart that every May 1, my father is smiling somewhere in heaven, thinking of my mother and sharing with angels a May Day story he will never forget.

International Workers Day celebrated in Cuba, Latin America

Wed, 14 May 2008 04:45:00 +0000

Celebrations of International Workers Day throughout Latin America testified to working class determination, especially in Cuba where millions marched. Honoring workers’ struggles and achievements, many observances centered on specific national challenges.

In Caracas, over 300,000 workers and families gathered to applaud labor unity, steel nationalization and a 30 percent minimum wage hike announced that day. In Colombian cities, tens of thousands demonstrated against killings of unionists and against the U.S. free trade pact with Colombia. In Mexico workers marched in support of collective bargaining and against oil privatization, while in Paraguay demonstrations centered on worker unemployment approaching 50 percent.

In Havana, Salvador Valdes, secretary general of the Cuban Workers Federation, addressed 500,000 Cubans gathered in the Plaza of the Revolution. He echoed themes explored two days earlier by President Raul Castro before the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party. Evidently the two, both relatively new in their jobs, are as one in advocating the necessity of melding socialist ideals with resourcefulness in dealing with a host of pressing issues.

Valdes cited our “own dissatisfactions” as stimuli for change, stressing equitable distribution of benefits and rational use of energy, raw materials and financial resources. He called for discipline and organization under Communist Party leadership while condemning “violations of the established order” and criminal and corrupt behaviors directed against “the ethical and moral integrity of our collective labors.”

“It is fundamental,” he declared, “to concentrate efforts in building production, above all of food,” and in the process reduce Cuba’s dependency on imported goods. Like President Castro, Valdes alluded to dangers poised over all humanity, specifically climate change, rising food and fuel prices, and wars over resources.

Castro described food production as “a matter of national security” and emphasized that “the greater the difficulties, the more order and discipline are required, and for that, it is vitally necessary to reinforce the country’s institutions.” He announced that the 6th Congress of the Cuban Communist Party would be held in late 2009 and said pending death sentences will be commuted.

Castro led the Workers Day celebration, but did not speak. Over ten thousand students were at the head of the parade entering the Plaza. Almost 1,500 delegates from 61 countries and 175 organizations throughout the world joined with Cubans in observing the day.

atwhit@ roadrunner.com

Mexico oil privatization dispute rages

Tue, 13 May 2008 07:16:00 +0000

While the rest of Latin America moves left, Mexican President Felipe Calderon is pushing hard in the other direction with a thinly disguised plan to privatize PEMEX, the huge state oil company that provides 40 percent of the Mexican government’s revenues. But resistance to privatization is very strong.

PEMEX was created after 1938 when then President Lázaro Cardenas nationalized foreign oil companies’ holdings after these companies simply refused to obey Mexican labor laws.

PEMEX has certainly not been well managed in recent decades. There has not been enough investment in finding and exploiting new oilfields or even in maintaining existing infrastructure. Frequent accidents have damaged the environment, imperiled health and safety and outraged public opinion. Opponents of the government hint that this may have contained an element of deliberate sabotage to prepare public opinion for privatization.

In 1989, President Raúl Salinas of the Revolutionary Institutional Party (PRI) struck hard against the oil workers union, arresting and jailing the leadership on trumped up arms charges, then maneuvering to put pro-government union leaders in their places. At the time, commentators speculated that this was the first step toward privatization, since the union had been a strong force in support of maintaining public ownership. Public opinion in Mexico then and now, however, has been against such a move, especially if the privatizing agents include foreign corporations.

So Calderon’s radical privatization plan had to be dressed up as something else. Though, under his plan, the vast majority of corporate functions, including exploring new oilfields, drilling test wells, pumping, building and maintaining pipelines, transportation and storage would be contracted out to private industry, in some cases in exchange for a share of the profits of new wells instead of just for a fixed contractual amount as the law now requires, this was not really “privatization,” Calderon assured his countrymen, because PEMEX would still exist in name. But many aren’t buying this charade.

On April 10, legislators affiliated with the left wing of the Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD) and allies, backed up by mass organizations including grassroots women’s collectives called “Las Adelitas,” seized the podium of both houses of the Mexican Congress and locked out the rest of the Senators and Congresspersons. Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the leader of the Broad Popular Front (FAP) to which this section of the PRD belongs, said they did this because they got information that Calderon’s National Action Party (PAN) and the formerly ruling Revolutionary Institutional Party (PRI) were cooking up a lightning dawn action (albazo, for “alba,” dawn in Spanish) to ram through the Calderon privatization plan before opposition could be mounted. The government denied this, but had called for a strictly parliamentary debate lasting 50 days, and vote on the Calderon plan by the middle of the summer. The FAP and Lopez Obrador, on the other hand, had demanded a much longer period of discussion, 120 days with mass public participation all over the country – basically, a massive referendum on the issue.

After two weeks, the occupation of the podia of the Congress was ended, and the details of the debate on the government’s energy reform program are now being worked out.

On May Day, which has traditionally been a mass labor event with government sponsorship in Mexico, President Calderon decided not to show his face to the workers, a glaring contrast with previous presidents. The topic of the privatization of PEMEX and other public entities, Calderon’s threatened “labor law reform,” and other reactionary and neo-liberal policies of the government came under sharp attack from union speakers, though many noted the complete absence of Petroleum Workers Union president Carlos Romero Deschamps, who has yet to speak out on the PEMEX privatization issue.

At the May Day rallies, Martín Esparza, head of the Mexican Electrical Workers Union, asked if they would allow “petroleum profits to be carried away by transnationals?” Rather, he said, Mexican labor should organize campaigns of civil resistance, because “if the energy reform is passed, they will also pass the labor reform” so as to destroy the unions and collective bargaining. Valdemar Gutiérrez Fragoso, secretary general of the Union of Social Security Employees, which has itself been having a long struggle against the government’s privatization efforts, pledged that his union would help to lead in the struggle to prevent privatization both of PEMEX and the electrical energy system.

Indian peoples theater inspires workers

Sat, 10 May 2008 08:27:00 +0000

DELHI, India — Some evenings you will see a small jeep driving around this city, weaving its way through the impossible traffic. The driver and passengers are amateur actors dedicated to the education and rights of the working class. They are on their way to perform in slums, industrial areas and other sites where workers may be.

Such was the evening I spent with Jana Natya Manch (Janam) or People’s Theater Forum.

Six actors gather at Delhi’s historic mosque, Jama Masjid. Pulling out costumes, blankets and props from the jeep, the actors and their supporters from the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and the Center for Indian Trade Unions, get to work.

One comrade holds the red flag with its white hammer and sickle against the mosque’s gate. A blanket is put down on the dusty street full of taxis, two- and three-wheelers, vendors and their carts, pedestrians, beggars — many children and disabled — and numerous men carrying loads on their shoulders, some of their burdens looking like cartons of office supplies.

A crowd starts to gather as an elderly man starts his fiery speech in Hindi. He tells the people about the necessity to fight for rights, saying if you do the work you are entitled to decent pay. A younger woman starts to pass out flyers about minimum wage and advocating a strike. Hands reach over the heads of others to take the information. Muslim women comrades offer their help with the leaflets.

Then the skits begin.

There are four, two with a serious tone and two with comic hilarity. They deal with health and safety, wages and letting people know they have the right to organize and demand a better living.

The first comic sketch portrays an old-style fat capitalist who tells workers they don’t need more money but more religion. The second one provokes more laughter when the “new-style” capitalist in techno, almost hip hop style “cool,” takes the stage. “So cool,” the actresses croon. He’s got it all, they say, an MBA from Australia and ... a “mobile” (cell phone).

The crowd responds with loud laughter and smiles as the troupe combines this age-old theater form with working-class politics and struggle. Then it’s the end. The troupe asks for donations. Even one rupee will help, they say. They go through the crowd and some people give.

Then it’s on to the next spot, which tonight happens to be right around the corner at another entrance of the mosque. This time the sun is setting and the group has to wait until the call to prayer is over. Then again the show begins. This time a crowd of some 200 with children sitting at the front encircle the group.

Leaflets and laughter travel throughout the audience.

The last performance of the night is at a dirt- and rock-strewn parking lot which serves as home for bicycle rickshaw drivers, sandwiched between a totally congested street (due to a street being closed next to a nearby bridge) and a train line. There is a makeshift kitchen/house in the lot. Maybe most of these drivers stay here overnight. There are two light bulbs, one over the tent/kitchen and the other about 20 feet away. The group sets up right under the other light bulb. They place their blankets down and drivers begin to sit and congregate.

Afterwards they pass out tea to the performers and supporters. People talk and then say goodbye. These dedicated actors work their paying job during the day and then perform seven nights a week. “We are either working or rehearsing,” said one actress.

“There has been such an attack on the working class and erosion of rights,” said Sudhanva Deshpande, a leader of the theater group. “What was established as labor law has been so eroded that we have to struggle to reestablish them.”

For example, he said, workers aren’t put on the employers’ master list, which means if they are hurt or killed on the job, they don’t exist and families won’t be able to get compensation. Or the minimum wage, he said, is constantly ignored by employers.

We hope our skits will inspire workers to stand up for their rights, he said.

talbano@pww.org. For more stories and photos from India go to www.pww.org.

After elections, Nepal searches for a unified path forward

Sat, 10 May 2008 07:17:00 +0000

The surprise results of Nepal’s elections are now giving way to the next, perhaps more challenging, step of piecing together a coalition to write a new constitution and move toward abolishing the monarchy. In the recent election, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) won the most seats — 220 out of 601 — in the Constituent Assembly that is tasked with writing the constitution and deciding on the political framework for the Himalayan nation. Nepal has been ruled by a Hindu king for more than 200 years.

The Nepali Congress Party came in second with 110 seats and the Communist Party of Nepal – UML was a close third with 103 seats. The current prime minister is Girija Prasad Koirala of the Congress Party.

In the round of voting, which used proportional representation, the Communist UML received 20.5 percent, while the Nepali Congress got 21 percent and the Maoists topped with 29 percent.

Thanks to patient persuasion by left and democratic forces of Nepal, as well as of neighboring India, the Maoist CPN-M entered the electoral arena last year and ended its 12-year long “People’s War.” An end to the stalemate between the Maoists and the monarchy, with its brutal suppression of the people and all political activists, was necessary in order for Nepal to move forward.

The U.S. government provided millions of dollars in military aid to fight the Maoists, which it considers a terrorist group. The “terrorist” designation is now under review by Washington. Former President Jimmy Carter, whose team was part of the international election observers, suggested that the U.S. should welcome the Nepal developments.

Parchanda, the chairman of the CPN-Maoists, issued a statement renouncing “all forms of violence,” saying “we want to show a new model of peace process.”

Both of Nepal’s giant neighbors, China and India, congratulated Parchanda (whose name means “one who is fired up for victory”) for his party’s success. China recently offered to build a rail link from Lhasa, Tibet, to Khasa, Nepal, within the next five years. Such a railway would bring more trade and tourism, and also promote more people-to-people contact in the Himalayan heights.

The king of Nepal, whose powers were drastically curtailed in a pre-election agreement and interim constitution, said he is satisfied with the people’s participation in the election process.

But the situation is full of thorny issues. The Nepali Congress Party said it will not “give up government leadership” unless the Maoists surrender their weapons to the army. But the agreement, said the Maoists, was not to surrender arms, but to merge their army with Nepal’s army.

The Maoists have approached national and regional parties, including the UML, to form a coalition that would give them a two-thirds majority necessary for anything to pass in the Constituent Assembly.

One of the regional parties they have approached — the Madhesi People’s Rights Forum of the southern Himalayan slopes bordering India, which has 30 seats in Nepal’s Constituent Assembly — demands a separate state.

In addition, Congress leader Sher Bahadur Deuba urged his party to continue the present government of seven parties, under Prime Minister Koirala, and not hand over power to the Maoists. The rationale, he argues, is that the interim constitution says a two-thirds majority vote is required, but the Maoists may not be able to cobble together the necessary votes.

The UML is discussing whether it should join with the Maoists. But one of its demands is that the Maoists disband their youth wing because of their coercive tactics, including using arms, throughout the elections.

Separatist vote threatens Bolivias progress

Sat, 10 May 2008 07:14:00 +0000

In a blow to the revolutionary Bolivian government of President Evo Morales, overwhelmingly elected in 2005 as the nation’s first indigenous president, a much anticipated autonomy referendum in Bolivia’s Santa Cruz department gained approval by an estimated 80 percent of voters on May 4.

Earlier, the government had cited rulings and statements from Bolivia’s Congress, Constituent Assembly and National Electoral Court as well as the Organization of American States to declare the referendum illegal. Spokespersons called for a boycott, and some 40 percent of the voters complied, with another 15 percent destroying their ballots. Racist Santa Cruz youth groups intimidated indigenous voters, while referendum opponents blocked highways and burned ballots found marked “yes’ prior to the voting. Arrests totaled 100; another 40 were wounded. One elderly man was killed.

Economic, class and racial divisions underlie confrontation in Santa Cruz, long controlled by European-descended commercial and landowning classes. Indigenous Bolivians and Bolivians living in poverty each comprise two-thirds of the country’s population. By contrast, Santa Cruz, in Bolivia’s east, accounts for 30 percent of the country’s GDP; 15 families there own 1.2 million acres. Neighboring Tarija department, expected soon to mount its own autonomy referendum together with two other eastern departments, produces 80 percent of Bolivia’s natural gas.

Having nationalized 44 oil and gas companies, the government enjoys $2 billion in annual revenues from hydrocarbon production, up from $180 million in 2005. This is used to fund social programs and expanded pension coverage. Stepped-up land re-distribution is directed at preventing inequalities exemplified by 100 Bolivian families owning 62.5 million acres, five times the holdings of two million other families. Last December, the Constituent Assembly approved a document ensuring indigenous rights and state control over natural resources. At that point, Santa Cruz announced its autonomy referendum.

Many government supporters viewed the statute as portending separation. It calls for control by Santa Cruz over natural resources, fiscal management, land distribution, transportation networks, agricultural sales, telecommunications, the police and military forces.

Bolivian armed forces remain supportive of the government. On May 3, General Luis Trigo cited constitutional authority for the military’s role to defend the whole state. A week earlier Vice Admiral Jose Luis Cavos noted that “We are a people in arms ...We will defend unity all our lives.”

As head of the Santa Cruz Civic Committee, Branko Marinkovic personifies the autonomist movement. His riches serve to illustrate economic realities propelling the struggle. The immigrant from Croatia owns 100,000 acres, has interests in a transnational gas pipeline company and holds “complete control of the soybean and sunflower industry.” Accused of illegally owning 50,000 acres, he faces the loss of 35,000 acres to agrarian reform.

The Morales government has blamed the campaign to divide Bolivia on U.S. manipulation, a claim consistent with author Eva Golinger’s charge that Washington has dispensed $129 million to Morales’ opponents over three years. U.S. ambassador Philip Goldberg has been characterized as the “ambassador of ethnic cleansing” from his State Department experience in helping to destroy Yugoslavia. Observers have noted increased U.S. military activity in Paraguay, adjacent to Santa Cruz.

Speaking to the nation late on May 4, President Morales praised the abstention and defacing of ballots by a possible majority of Cruzanos as a “great rebellion.” They were acting in “defense of the interests of the majority.” For him, the vote was a “simple poll without any legal value.”

“We want autonomy for the people,” he asserted, “not only for the rich.” Bolivia’s proposed new constitution provides for autonomy of indigenous groups, departments and municipalities. Morales suggested that if his Santa Cruz opponents had waited to work toward autonomy through a fully approved constitution, their efforts would have been legal.

Morales assured listeners that his government sought equality for all and an end to “internal colonialism.” Analyst Nelson Valdes, over the Internet, predicts that “We might see, shortly, a ‘dual power’ scenario — usually the beginnings of a revolutionary, counterrevolutionary or civil war situation.”

atwhit@ roadrunner.com

Zimbabwe opposition leads in close vote, faces runoff

Wed, 07 May 2008 08:48:00 +0000

Five weeks after casting their votes on March 29, Zimbabweans learned this month that their liberation leader and president for nearly 30 years, Robert Mugabe, lost the popular vote to opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangirai.

Confirming projections by independent observers, however, the Zimbabwe Election Commission on May 2 declared that Tsvangirai did not win the required 50-percent-plus-one necessary to avoid a runoff with Mugabe.

The announcement sent officials from Tsvangirai’s party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), scrambling to come up with a consistent response. While repeatedly rejecting a runoff, insisting their candidate had won outright in the first round, they have been lobbying regional leaders to demand foreign supervision of a second round.

It is clear the MDC has been caught off guard by the government’s verification of their success in the parliamentary and presidential elections. As even the pro-MDC Financial Times of London reported, “the MDC is wavering over its previous refusal to take part in a second round. Tsvangirai risks looking as if he is unwilling to compete if he shies away from a runoff, and could hand victory to his rival by default.”

Instead of planning for the widely-anticipated runoff, Tsvangirai, from his base outside the country in neighboring Botswana, has been traveling around southern Africa meeting with governmental and civic leaders, urging them to pressure Mugabe to step aside.

But, according to the official results, Tsvangirai missed winning an outright majority in the first round, capturing 47.9 percent compared to Mugabe’s 43.2 percent of the vote. The remainder was split among other candidates.

The elections have highlighted the deep divide in Zimbabwe between Mugabe’s loyalists, including the majority in the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), and those seeking his ouster, who blame his government for spiraling inflation and food scarcity. Mugabe’s support is especially pronounced among veterans of the country’s liberation struggle who back his program of redistributing land occupied by European settlers during the heyday of British colonialism.

Divisions between and within southern African nations also have been revealed. While the governments of Angola, Nambia and Tanzania remain staunchly allied with Mugabe, a few leaders in the region, most notably Zambia’s Levy Mwanawasa, have been more critical of Mugabe’s handling of the elections.

In South Africa, President Thabo Mbeki, who serves as an African Union-appointed mediator between ZANU-PF and the MDC, has been accused of being “soft” on Mugabe. Jakob Zuma, head of South Africa’s ruling-African National Congress, criticized the delay in announcing elections results, but refused to blame Mugabe’s government for any post-election violence.

Outside the region, the United Nations Security Council in late April rejected U.S. and British demands for the dispatch of a fact-finding mission or special envoy to Zimbabwe to investigate alleged human rights violations. The MDC claims that in the weeks since the elections, Mugabe’s government has waged a campaign of persecution against its supporters, especially in rural areas. But, South Africa’s UN ambassador Dumisani Kumalo said the situation in Zimbabwe did not merit Security Council intervention, arguing, “Different countries hold elections; some do it very well, some do it not so well.”

At April 18 independence day celebrations, Mugabe pointed to the hypocrisy of capitalist nations judging Zimbabwe’s elections. He said: 'We, and not the British, established democracy on the basis of one man, one vote. We are the ones who brought democracy in this country.”

Meanwhile, Zimbabweans wait for the government to announce a date for the runoff. While the MDC has predicted holding a second round would spark more violence, a ZANU-PF official was quoted in Zimbabwe’s Herald newspaper as saying, “We are urging our people to go and campaign peacefully. We are also urging the opposition to avoid violence and respect people's lives.”

It remains unclear whether the MDC will participate in the runoff despite its strong showing in the first round as well as the extensive assistance it is receiving from Washington and London. If it boycotts the runoff, Mugabe automatically wins re-election.

Many observers and Zimbabweans themselves place hope in the possibility ZANU-PF and the MDC will negotiate to form a national unity government. The MDC has ruled out accepting a role for Mugabe in a power-sharing deal, but most officials in ZANU-PF remain loyal to the “old man” as he is called by Zimbabweans.

There is a recent model in Africa for a negotiated end to an electoral stalemate: in March the opposition party in Kenya agreed to a national unity government despite universal allegations of fraud by the ruling party in that country’s December elections. After weeks of negotiations spearheaded by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Raila Odinga of the Orange Democratic Movement, setting aside demands for a new election, agreed to serve as prime minister in incumbent President Mwai Kibaki’s administration.

It is worth noting that, in the case of the Kenyan elections, the corporate media obediently failed to condemn the U.S.-backed Kibaki as he stole the election, censored the media and violently suppressed mass protests. Their response to the Zimbabwean elections, declared free and fair by the African Union and which Mugabe’s government concedes it lost, speaks volumes to the double standards of the capitalist powers.