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International
Britain
The Youth Are Being Denied a Future:
They Must Not Be Criminalised!
- Workers' Weekly, August 13, 2011 -
Liverpool
The unrest of the youth which exploded on the streets of
London and
other cities is a response to the anti-social offensive of this and
previous governments, and in
particular to the state offensive against the youth. The trigger was a
loss of life: the shooting of the unarmed 29-year-old Mark Duggan by
the police in Tottenham. This
much even David Cameron has been required to admit. The government's
response to the anger of the youth and their refusal to accept the
authority of the rich takes no
account of its context and the social conditions of the youth and that
of whole communities. It is making the whole issue one of law and
order, and is acting to brand the
youth as common criminals, absolve itself of any responsibility and put
in place further repressive measures both against the youth and against
society as a whole.
Already over 1,600 arrests are reported to have been
made. If this
is the number of arrests, how many then were involved in the riots?
Does this not itself give the lie
to Cameron's narrative about the issue being one of theft, pure and
simple? It could also be asked about these figures whether perhaps the
police are using the situation to
further harass the youth, and take retaliation for the challenge to
their authority. Either way, the courts themselves are reported to be
in chaos, with many trivial cases being
sent to the Crown Courts where sentences of over six months may be
imposed. The mass of the youth are being victimised and scapegoated.
The chairman of the Police Federation of England and
Wales has
described the unrest and rioting among the youth as a seismic event.
Seismic events have their causes
and their contexts. Those in authority cannot stem the movement of the
tectonic plates, but they ignore them at their peril, and if they
continue to ignore science, build on
earthquake zones, refuse to take precautions and blame the victims for
their own fate, then they are the ones guilty of criminal
irresponsibility. Riots are not unknown. The
community uprisings of the early 1980s were again a response to the
anti-social offensive, privatisation and destruction of the social
welfare state of the Thatcher era. Those
years also saw an increased offensive against the youth, especially the
African-Caribbean youth. It is not coincidence that the present
flashpoints have been among the same
communities as the so-called "austerity measures", cuts and stepped up
harassment have stoked up anger amongst the youth. Nor that the deaths
of Cynthia Jarrett in
Tottenham and Cherry Groce in Brixton as a result of police actions in
1985 were the sparks for the outpourings of anger at that time. Riots
after the uprisings in the suburbs
of Paris have hardly ceased, though largely unreported. Again, the
spark for the massive riots of 2005 was loss of life, as two young
people were electrocuted fleeing from
the police.
 
Hackney; North London
 
Clapham
The killing of Mark Duggan in Tottenham proved to be the
last straw
in a line of shootings at the hands of the police and at least 333
deaths in police custody since
1998, over which there has not been a single police conviction. In
Haringey, the borough which includes Tottenham, the unemployment rate
is 8.8%, double the national
average. Youth unemployment in London as a whole stands at 23%. In
March, Haringey Council approved cuts of £84 million from a total
budget of £273 million, and there
was a savage 75% cut to the Youth Service budget, including the closing
of the youth centres, and the brutal reduction in other services for
children and young people.
Alongside the closure of Connexions services and youth services have
gone the closure of vital street level advice and legal services. This
is anti-social vandalism of the
first order. Nationally, the gap between rich and poor has been
dramatically increasing, the top richest 10% being 100 times better off
than the poorest according to some
figures, which actually appear to play down the gap.
In Britain, the workers, women, youth and students have
not been
simply amusing themselves with demonstrations, occupations, strikes and
demands for the alternative
over the past year. The working class and people have been saying no to
the anti-social offensive and showing concern and responsibility for
the fate of society. The youth
in particular on the demonstrations upholding the right to education
have been subjected to police "kettling" and charges of mounted police.
For Cameron to moan about
the "broken society" and take no responsibility for its wrecking is the
height of arrogance, and to blame the youth for lack of respect is to
deliberately turn truth on its
head.
It is certainly no solution to the problems for the rich
to act with
self-righteous indignation, and for the politicians who represent them
to deliberate over the use of water
cannon, crowd control, curfews, plastic bullets and even armoured
vehicles and the army as per the north of Ireland during the
"troubles". Not only will these measures not
solve the problems of Cameron's "broken society". To suggest so is to
further prepare the conditions for a fascism where to show rebellion
against a government which acts
on behalf of the rich is to be branded anti-social and a criminal.
In his statement delivered to Parliament on Thursday,
David Cameron
has shown that the state is preparing the ground for further repression
and for the police to act
with impunity. This must be seen not only in the light of acting to
stop the rebellion of the youth, but also to prepare the conditions for
taking action against future struggles
of the workers and youth. The government would also like these
draconian powers in place for use during the 2012 Olympic Games.
Having created the conditions for these riots among the
youth,
generally through the anti-social offensive against all sections of the
people as well as targeting the youth
for attack, and having specifically engineered them through the actions
of the police in various ways, the Coalition united with the
parliamentary opposition, is bringing in
"strong government" as the way to deal with them. Of course, far from
resolving any of the issues and offering a way forward for the youth,
such "strong government" will
further block them, increase their anger and frustrate their demands.
The propaganda of the rich and powerful has gone into
overdrive in
ramming down the people's throats its version of events. The government
and the monopoly-
controlled media are to be vigorously condemned, not only for their
lack of compassion and wilful denial of what is happening before their
eyes, but for whipping up hysteria
against the youth. The state-inspired petition to remove benefit
payments for those convicted of their part in the riots is just one
example. This is a vicious move by the ruling
elite to take society back to the Middle Ages where everyone must fend
for themselves and to be a vagrant or steal a loaf of bread was a
hanging offence.
It must be emphasised that not only are the youth being
denied a
future, but they are also being blocked from even envisaging a future
in which they can participate.
The state itself promotes violence and anarchy which it then blames the
youth for taking up. It is doing so under high-flown phrases such as
"respect for society" and "the
responsibility to protect", which it is floating internationally. For
what this means one has only to look at Libya. The British government
is participating in the criminal
bombing of a sovereign country as a "solution" to a so-called lack of
legitimacy by the government in power. This bombing is causing death
and destruction, as the NATO
forces continue to kill hundreds of Libyan people, including children,
and wantonly destroy public and private buildings alike with their
attacks on the capital, Tripoli, and
other towns and cities.
The daily experience of the youth that are now being
targeted as
"criminals" is one of police harassment, of stop and search, of
repression at the slightest pretext. When
the youth step out of line, they increasingly come up against a
conscious policy of "shock and awe" on the part of the police. Such a
policy of the state is then packaged
in various television programmes to reinforce the point, and drive the
youth to actions and lifestyles which serve to harm their own interests.
The working class and people cannot accept that state
repression be
justified by the recent events. Neither can they accept that the youth
be ghettoised and criminalised
in this way. The working class and people must frustrate the plans of
the ruling elite to divert them from resolving the problems of society
and creating the alternative, and
cannot allow the state to make the "criminality" of the youth the issue
and the problem in society. Neither is it acceptable for the government
to blame the "breakdown of
the family" and other such accusations which make the people
responsible for their own problems. This is an attempt to stigmatise
the communities, to impose the values
of the ruling elite on them, and to let the government off the hook as
being responsible for the people's welfare. To describe the actions of
the youth as those of "mindless
thugs" and the like is to deny that those in authority are denying them
a future, and that the government itself is responsible for the
disintegration of the rule of law both
nationally and internationally.
What the workers and the youth see is the rich further
enriching
themselves from the public treasury, taking what they want without
compunction. As the financiers and
monopoly capitalists take their bonuses, their bailouts, their golden
handshakes, and flaunt their luxurious lifestyles ostentatiously, the
working class and people are outraged
that this is "legal" while the rioting and looting of the youth is
"illegal" and "criminal". The people have also been treated to the
spectacle of many of their so-called
representatives in Parliament, helping themselves to falsely claimed
"expenses". Even the way Parliament conducts itself is abhorrent and
uncivilised under the veneer of
being the most democratic institution. At least the youth uphold honour
and respect. It must also be pointed out that this present unrest has
come at a time when the scandals
of phone hacking and gangsterism in the highest places were coming to a
head, when the Commissioner and Assistant Commissioner of the
Metropolitan Police had had
to resign, when the connections between government and the monopoly
media were becoming ever more exposed. Now all this has been swept
under the carpet, and anyone
involved in petty looting has been painted as the most heinous criminal
and threat to society.
Furthermore, as to the pious words about wrecking
communities, the
hypocrisy of the government knows no bounds. This and previous
capitalist governments have
presided over the comprehensive destruction of the manufacturing base
of society. The example of Bombardier in Derby and the united action of
the whole community in
condemning the government's irresponsibility and lack of concern is a
recent case in point. And then the government has the gall to accuse
the youth who are at the sharp
end of this wrecking of society as themselves being the wreckers.
A society based on the people's welfare would involve
the youth in
taking responsibility for their future. It would recognise the fact
that the youth are born to society
and naturally gravitate to working together to solve its problems. It
would recognise that the youth, along with other sections of the
people, have their claims on society.
But the Cameron government recognises none of these things and its own
responsibilities, but would drive the youth to extinction rather than
sanction their claims.
The culture of vengeance, reprisals and vigilantes being
promoted by
the state must be resolutely rejected. It is true that working people
cherish their community, but
this must not be transformed by the state into channels which do not
serve their interests. It is against the state and its successive
governments with its cartel parties and its
marginalisation of the people from political life that the anger must
be directed. Far from the people rallying round Cameron's "Big
Society", this very same "Big Society"
must be seen as the government's refusal to solve the underlying
socio-economic problems of society, the increased transfer of social
wealth to the rich and powerful, and
its determination to block the progress of society.
No to the criminalisation of the youth!
State repression must not pass!
Hold the government accountable!
Open Letter to British Prime Minister
David Cameron
Riots, Jobs and Education
From: Sean Vernell and Tom Hickey (National Executive of
the
University and Colleges Union), and Jeremy Corbyn, M.P., and John
McDonnell, M.P.
Prime Minister,
We have heard much from yourself and members of your
Government
about the reasons for the rioting that has spread across Britain. You
put it down to "criminality",
"greed" and lack of "parental control". You treat it as a moral failing
of the individuals and their families, as a `loss of values'. It is as
if there did not exist a political and
social context.
Anyone attempting to understand why thousands of young
people have
taken to the streets and rioted needs to begin by locating young
people's anger in the conditions
of austerity in which the young -- and working people in general -- are
being made to pay for a crisis that is not of their making. Yet anyone
who does attempt to explain
the rioting in these terms is accused of justifying looting as if it
were a solution to a social crisis that is the consequence of your
policies. There is a difference, Prime Minister,
between explanation and justification.
Government ministers have been wheeled out to denounce
young people
and any parallel to the riots of the 1980s has been denied. It is
clear, however, that many of
the issues, which are now acknowledged about the 1980s riots by these
same Government ministers, are the same issues that have fuelled
today's riots. Issues such as
unemployment, lack of educational opportunities, police harassment,
racism and public spending cuts are at the root of the problem.
In many cases young people feel even more alienated from
society
than they did 30 years ago. Unemployment for 16-25 year olds has become
institutionalised throughout
the subsequent period, reaching 1 million today. No less than 75,000
young people are statutorily homeless. No less than 600,000 live in
overcrowded homes. There are more
black people in our prisons today than are in our universities. Young
black people are still disproportionately represented amongst the
unemployed, the homeless, the
criminalized, and the marginalized and disconnected. Yet you and your
ministers speak as if racism is no longer a feature of our society.
There are only 11,000 youth clubs left after the closure
programme
of the 1980s, and three quarters of 11-16 year olds do not have an
access to a youth club. Why do
young employees not have a statutory right to paid educational leave,
and why do they not have the right of representation on workplace
training committees so that they
have some sense of control of their destiny? Why is our society driving
up the hours that we work instead of having a maximum of a 30-hour week
that would allow
employment to be spread, offering employment to a larger number of
young people. Why are there so few decision-making forums in which
young people can be
involved?
What has been your government's response to this?
Universities have
been allowed to triple tuition fees making it almost impossible for
working class people to attend.
The Educational Maintenance Allowance, which previously ensured that
many were able to attend college, has been abolished. Police powers
have been increased leading
to more young people being harassed and imprisoned. Unemployment rises
inexorably. Now you make the risible suggestion that the consequent
disaffection can be overcome
through the use of water cannon, plastic bullets, and more draconian
sentencing by the courts.
These riots have revealed the issues that need to be
addressed
urgently if our young people are to feel they have a future. As
educationalists and trade unionists we call
upon your Government to put significant resources into ensuring that
young people have real hope, a hope that matches the opportunities that
one of the richest countries
in the world should be providing for all its young, and not just for
the children of the wealthiest.
We demand that you address this problem seriously, and
implement the following policies:
- the restoration of the Education Maintenance
Allowance and the 80% Higher Education funding
cut, and scrapping of tuition fees;
- the ending of public spending cuts in general;
- repeal of the stop and search laws;
- that Job Seekers Allowance to be raised to a minimum of £110
per week;
- that an urgent building programme for properly-stafffed Youth Clubs
be put in place;
- a reversal of the cuts in schools, Further and Adult Education.
To sign this letter, click here.
Estonia
Ruling Circles Promote Nazi Celebration
- Dougal MacDonald -
On July 30, 2011, the annual get-together of the former
Estonian 20th Waffen Grenadier Division of the Nazi SS (Schutzstaffel
or "protective squadron") was held in
Sinimae Village, Estonia, site of a fierce battle between the Red Army
and Nazi troops, including the Estonian SS division, in 1944. Sinemae
is a major neo-Nazi celebration,
held since 1994, which openly uses banned Nazi symbols such as the
swastika and is attended by Nazis from all over the world. The Sinemae
celebration includes the Erna
military competition, named after the reconnaissance group that
provided the Nazis with data about the Red Army during the Second World
War. The Estonian state actively
protected the Waffen SS veterans on July 30 by banning anti-Nazi
protest rallies and by arresting prominent anti-Nazi activists.
The Hitlerites began creating non-German Waffen SS
divisions in 1940, and by the end of the Second World War these made up
about 60 per cent of the Waffen SS.
During the war, 80,000 Estonians joined the Nazi forces and another
3,000 fought against the USSR in the Finnish Army. As did the other
Waffen SS Divisions, the Estonian
Division committed countless war crimes, yet no Estonian government
since so-called independence in 1991 has prosecuted a single Nazi war
criminal, some of whom fled
to Canada under the protection of the Canadian state. The Estonian
Waffen SS massacred civilians in Estonia, the Soviet Union, Belarus,
Ukraine, and Poland; attacked small
groups of Red Army soldiers and killed Communist Party and Soviet
activists; slaughtered Jews, ethnic Russians, prisoners of war, and any
peasants who supported land
reform; and participated in the transportation of civilians to
concentration camps such as Klooga for execution.[1]
Executives of Estonia's ruling political party
officially attended the July 30 Nazi gathering at Sinimae. Prime
Minister Andrus Ansip feebly claimed that the meeting
had nothing to do with Nazi ideology, even though the Waffen SS was the
armed military force of the SS, an organ of Hitler's Nazi Party
commanded by Heinrich Himmler.
Although the Nuremburg Trials declared the Waffen SS to be a criminal
organization, the Estonian ruling circles defend the Waffen SS
criminals with the well-worn lies
that they were either coerced into joining the Nazis or else were
patriots fighting against "Soviet occupation" for Estonian independence.[2] These fabrications are readily
exposed by the fact that 30,000 Estonians voluntarily fought on the Red
Army side against the Nazi occupiers, as well as by the fact that it
was obvious that under Hitler's
Germany, Estonia could only ever have been a vassal state of the Third
Reich.
The openly pro-Nazi orientation of the Estonian ruling
circles became clear soon after 1991. On June 26, 1999, during the Matt
Laar administration, the remains of
Estonian Waffen SS Colonel Alfons Rebane were transferred from Germany
to Tallinn's Metsakalmistu cemetery after a state funeral, despite an
organized protest. In 2002,
Mart Laar and Tirvimi Velliste characterized the Battle of Sinimae as a
"second war of liberation." In 2005, the Estonian state funded a museum
in Lagedi which memorialized
the Waffen SS Division. In 2006, Laar declared that sooner or later a
law would be passed in the interests of those Estonians who fought on
the side of Nazi Germany. In
April 2007, Estonian authorities ordered the dismantling of a Soviet
war memorial in the capital, Tallinn, which commemorated the victory
over Nazism. Thousands of people
attempted to protect the monument but police arrested over 1,000
activists and killed one Russian national.[3]
What is the significance of this state-backed Nazi
revival in Estonia and other countries? The people must realize that it
is not just an aberration to be found there. It is a deliberate attack
by the representatives of the most powerful monopolies and their
right-wing extremist parties and governments to smash the resistance
of the working class in the advanced capitalist countries and the
peoples of the world to the neoliberal global anti-social offensive and
U.S. imperialist plans to redivide
the world so as to put down their rivals. Remnants
of the family of the Russian Czar and his retinue and similar so-called
royal families of Europe continue to plot to
repossess the properties
expropriated during the Russian Revolution and as a result of the
peoples' striving for empowerment during and after World War II. They
are endorsing resolutions which
declare the deeds of the communists to be crimes against humanity
"worse" than the crimes of the Nazis and which condone the crimes of
the Nazis, claiming their aim was
to save humanity from Bolshevism. The peoples of the world will never
permit a fascist movement to undertake imperialist wars of occupation
and other crimes against peace and humanity carried out in the name of
freedom, democracy and human rights. They despise both the old and new
Nazis. Every effort must be made to oppose the comparison of the deeds
of the communists with the
crimes of the Nazis otherwise we face worldwide disaster, in the same
way that the Anglo-American policy of conciliation with the Hitlerites
led to the disaster of the Second
World War.
Notes
1. For more details of these war
crimes, see Estonia: The Bloody Trace of Nazism, 1941-44. The
document can be found at
http://common.regnum.ru/documents/eston.pdf
2. In 1950, the U.S. High Commissioner
in Germany, John J. McCloy, who later pardoned all the Nazi war
criminals jailed by the Nuremburg Trials, began the official
"rehabilitation" of the Baltic Waffen Divisions by declaring that they
were "separate" from the Nazi SS and therefore were not a movement that
was "hostile to the
Government of the United States". As is well-known, the U.S.
imperialists recruited thousands of Nazis after the Second World War,
e.g., through Operation Paperclip to
work on the American missile program.
3. Post-1991 Estonia is also notorious
for coming as close to apartheid as any country in Europe since 1945.
The Columbia Encyclopaedia states: "Estonians
(Eestlanes) make up about 65% of the population; Russians constitute
almost 30%, and there are Ukrainian, Belarusian, and Finnish
minorities. Since independence (1991),
citizenship has generally been limited to ethnic Estonians, a practice
widely criticized because it denies political and civil rights to the
many Russian-speaking inhabitants.
In 1993 ethnic Russians were officially declared foreigners." The
Russians were stripped of their citizenship and their ID cards are now
stamped "Alien."
Campaign to Rehabilitate Nazi Executioner
Alfred Rosenberg, the subject of a new museum exhibition
in his birthplace of Tallinn, Estonia, was especially insidious as the
main Nazi ideologue in regard to the
propagation of racist theories, anti-semitism, the concept of lebensraum
(living space) to justify Nazi occupation, and "Positive Christianity",
which emphasizes
the "organizing and fighting" side of Christianity, especially against
Judaism. Positive Christianity is also espoused in the U.S. by those
evangelical dominionists who have
infiltrated the U.S. army, as well as by white nationalist Christian
Identity groups, some of whom also have connections with dominionism,
including the Posse Comitatus,
Aryan Nation, and the Ruby Ridge organization.
Rosenberg was studying in Russia in 1917
when the Bolshevik Revolution occurred and, of course, supported the
counter-revolutionaries. He joined the
German Nazis in 1919, one of the earliest members. Following the Nazi
invasion of the Soviet Union, Rosenberg was made Reich Minister for the
Occupied Eastern
Territories. After the Second World War, he was tried and hanged at
Nuremburg as a war criminal.
On August 9, Russia Today published an article
regarding the exhibit dedicated to Alfred Rosenberg. TML is
reprinting the article below.
Moscow Slams Tallinn over
Nazi "Executioner" Exhibit
- Russia Today, August 9, 2011
-
Russia says that Estonia is continuing its attempts to
re-write history
and glorify Nazism masking their evil deeds as "a struggle for national
freedom."
The latest events in Estonia point towards the Baltic
state's ostensible refusal to accept the decisions of the Nuremberg
Trials, the Russian Foreign Ministry's Press and
Information Department said in a statement published on Tuesday.
In particular, the department referred to the Estonian
History Museum's exhibition dedicated to Alfred Rosenberg (1893-1946)
-- a Tallinn-born influential member of
Germany's Nazi Party who was one of the key architects of its ideology.
He was the head of the Nazi party's foreign affairs department and
Reich Minister for the Occupied
Eastern Territories. Found guilty of war crimes and crimes against
humanity, Rosenberg was sentenced to death at the Nuremberg Trials and
executed in 1946.
The republic's Ministry of Culture and the museum
administration ignored protests by national minorities over the
exhibit, which, according to the Russian Foreign
Ministry, is "a jeer at the memory of the millions of civilians who
were killed on orders from one of Hitler's executioners." That, Moscow
states, shows the type of historical
understanding Tallinn officially seeks to cultivate within society.
Back in July, the Jewish Community of Estonia sent a
letter to the Minister of Culture complaining that the Rosenberg
exhibit made no mention of his war crimes. The
community criticized the exhibition in the History Museum as well as
the one at the Gustav Adolf Gymnasium for the glorification of Nazi
crimes.
According to Moscow, a military competition called Erna
Rekt (Raid) annually held in the former Soviet republic with the
support of the Estonian Defense Ministry,
is yet another attempt to falsify history.The competition is named
after a Nazi international subversive group in Hitler's Abwehr
intelligence service, which operated in the
rear of the Soviet army in 1941.
The Russian ministry stated that attempts to portray the
group's participants as "Estonia liberators" is "a shoddy
misinterpretation of historic realities". The saboteurs
were taking part in an aggressive war on the side of the Axis powers,
which were enemies to all the nations who had initially signed the UN
Charter.
"Covering up their crimes with reference to the "fight
for national liberation" is blasphemous," the ministry concluded.
Libya
Canada Expels Libyan Diplomats
 On Tuesday, August 9, the Canadian
government ordered Libya's four remaining diplomats to leave the
country. Five diplomats were already asked to leave in May.
Canada recalled its ambassador to Tripoli last February.
On August 8, Canada's Foreign
Affairs Minister John
Baird issued the following statement:
"Canada declares all remaining diplomats at the Libyan
embassy in Ottawa personae non gratae, effective immediately.
This is the latest step Canada has
taken to isolate and delegitimize the Gaddafi regime.
"These people now have five business days to vacate the
embassy and leave the country.
"As part of this declaration, we are also cutting off
these diplomats' access to the embassy's bank accounts."
Ali Aujali, the U.S. envoy for the National
Transitional Council (NTC), announced that the NTC had written the
Canadian government to request that an NTC envoy
take over Libya's now-shuttered embassy in Ottawa. "I hope we will have
[an envoy] named for Canada soon," he said in a telephone interview
with Postmedia
News. The Canadian government has not confirmed whether NTC envoys
will take over the Libyan embassy in Ottawa. Sufyan Maghur, who was the
temporary NTC
representative for Canada has been in talks with the government about
having an official NTC envoy.
 Baird attended the meeting of the
self-appointed Libya
Contact Group on July 15 in Istanbul, following which various NATO and
allied countries declared the NTC the
sole legitimate authority in Libya. Since then, various NATO and allied
countries, such as the U.S., Britain and Saudi Arabia have expelled the
Libyan government diplomats
from their respective embassies and are now dealing with NTC envoys.
Canada is playing a large part in the NATO aggression
against Libya. Ottawa has contributed six F-18 fighter planes and a
frigate, and the NATO mission is led by a
Canadian general. A senior Canadian Forces officer, Major-General
Jonathan Vance, said Canadian planes are flying about 6 per cent of the
military sorties in the mission,
including about 8 per cent of the attack strikes, and the lion's share
of the maritime surveillance patrols.
As Rebels Fail NATO Crimes Intensify
 
Houses lie in ruins after recent NATO air strikes on
the village of Majer, some 160 km west of Tripoli.
NATO war crimes continue in Libya. Reports of civilian
deaths and infrastructure destruction are increasing, as NATO bombing
continuously intensifies in areas that
the National Transitional Council's (NTC) armed "rebels" are trying to
seize from the Libyan government. NATO airstrikes are in the main
designed to provide aerial support
for so-called rebel advance in these areas, while also weakening the
ability of the Libyan people to resist by destroying the basic
infrastructure they depend on. The so-called
rebels have been trying unsuccessfully for weeks to reach the capital
Tripoli by seizing surrounding areas, such as Zliten and nearby
villages.
NATO Crimes
On August 5, NATO air missiles targeted a children's
hospital in Zlitan, an area where intense fighting has been taking
place as the "rebels"
continually fail to take the city. At least 50 children were killed in
this attack alone. The "rebels," advancing from Misrata to Zliten (and
they hope eventually to Tripoli)
about a week ago pushed into the centre of the city only to be forced
to pull back to the outskirts by the Libyan government military.
Similar crimes have been reported in nearby areas. Mussa
Ibrahim, Libyan government spokesperson, told reporters that on August
8 NATO air strikes targeted the village
of Majer, 10 km south of Zlitan. Eighty-five villagers were killed in
this attack, comprising 33 children, 32 women and 20 men in what
Ibrahim described as a "massacre"
of civilians. The NATO attack was aimed at helping the "rebels" reach
government-held Tripoli from the south. Col. Muammar Gaddafi, Libyan
government head, said that
the Euro-American powers would be held responsible for this "ugly
massacre committed by NATO," according to the official JANA news agency.
This takes places as on-the-ground journalists report
intensified, indiscriminate NATO bombing of civilian areas on August 8
and 9 in Tripoli, Zliten and many other
cities. Libyan tribal spokespersons in these areas have vowed to fight
the NTC forces should they move westward against Tripoli from their
position in Misrata. Since it was
reported that the Libyan Supreme Tribal Council issued a proclamation
to the African Summit condemning NATO and the NTC, and vowing to expel
the crusaders by the
end, reports have increased of tribal leaders vowing to continue
fighting the NTC in whatever areas they seize from the Libyan
government. Similarly, protests and
demonstrations against NATO and the NTC across the country continue,
including in NTC-held areas.
In related news, Tripoli and surrounding areas are
currently experiencing electricity blackouts due to NATO bombing. The
gas facilities in Zliten, where electricity is
generated for Tripoli, have been immobilized as a result of NATO aerial
bombardment. Two electricity towers, respectively in Jalo and Ojala
were also deliberately attacked
by NATO. A power station in Tiji, which the Libyan government is now in
the process of repairing, was also bombed, among others. NATO's
objective is to create power
shortages as part of its psychological warfare against the Libyan
people and their resistance to foreign intervention.
Anniversary of U.S. Imperialists' Use of
Agent Orange in Vietnam
Compensate Victims of U.S. Chemical Warfare
- Prof. Marjorie Cohn, August 10, 2011 -
 Today marks the 50th
anniversary of the start of the chemical warfare program in Vietnam
without sufficient remedial action by the U.S. government. One of the
most
shameful legacies of the Vietnam War, Agent Orange continues to poison
Vietnam and the people exposed to the chemicals, as well as their
offspring.
H.R. 2634, the Victims of Agent Orange Relief Act of
2011,[1] which
California
Congressman Bob Filner just introduced in the House, would provide
crucial assistance for social and health services to Vietnamese,
Vietnamese-American, and U.S. victims
of Agent Orange.
From 1961 to 1971, approximately 19 million gallons of
herbicides, primarily Agent Orange, were sprayed over the southern
region of Vietnam. Much of it was
contaminated with dioxin, a deadly chemical. Dioxin causes various
forms of cancers, reproductive illnesses, immune deficiencies,
endocrine deficiencies, nervous system
damage, and physical and developmental disabilities.
In Vietnam more than three million people, and in the
United States thousands of veterans, their children, and
Vietnamese-Americans, have been sickened, disabled
or died from the effects of Agent Orange/dioxin.
Vietnamese of least three generations born since the war
are now suffering from disabilities due to their parents' exposure to
Agent Orange or from direct exposure
in the environment. The organization representing Vietnam's victims,
the Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin, has set up
some ‘peace villages' to care
for the severely disabled, but many more such facilities and services
are needed. Dioxin residues in the soil, sediment, and food continue to
poison many people in 28 "hot
spots" in southern Vietnam.
U.S. protest seeks
justice for victims of Agent Orange.
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Many U.S. veterans suffer from effects of Agent Orange
due to their exposure in Vietnam, as do their children and
grandchildren. Vietnamese-Americans exposed
directly to Agent Orange and their offspring suffer from the same
health conditions.
The bill, which the Vietnamese Agent Orange Relief &
Responsibility Campaign assisted Congressman Filner in writing, defines
"victim" as "any individual who
is a Vietnamese national, Vietnamese-American, or United States veteran
who was exposed to Agent Orange, or the progeny of such an individual,
and who has a disease
or disability associated with this exposure." In addition to
compensating the victims of Agent Orange, H.R. 2634 would also clean up
the toxic hot spots in Vietnam.
One provision of the bill would expand programs and
research for the benefit of U.S. vets and establish medical centers
"designed to address the medical needs
of descendants of the veterans of the Vietnam era." This creates a
presumption that certain birth defects that children and grandchildren
of exposed victims suffer would be
considered the result of contact with Agent Orange.
While the U.S. government has begun to fund
environmental cleanup in Vietnam, it has refused to recognize its full
responsibility to heal the wounds of war and
provide assistance to Vietnamese, Vietnamese-American, and U.S. victims
for the serious health and environmental devastation caused by Agent
Orange.
There has been some compensation for U.S. veteran
victims of Agent Orange, but not nearly enough. In spite of President
Richard Nixon's 1973 promise of $3.25
billion in reconstruction aid to Vietnam "without any preconditions,"
the Vietnamese and Vietnamese-American victims of the disgraceful
chemical warfare the United States
conducted in Vietnam have not seen one penny of compensation.
Fifty years is long enough. It is high time to
compensate the victims for this shameful chapter in our history. H.R.
2634 will go a long way toward doing just
that.
Note
1. View text at
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h112-2634
Korea
Korea's Liberation from Japan
Detail of the Mansudae
Grand Monument in Pyongyang, commemorating the heroism
of the Korean patriots in the anti-Japanese war. (Brian Hughes)
On the occasion of Korea's liberation from Japanese
imperialism, August 15, 1945, the Democratic People's Republic of
Korea's Permanent Mission to the UN issued
a statement emphasizing the significance of this day, which was an
historical turning point that enabled the Korean people to be free from
colonial slavery under the Japanese
imperialists and begin to fully realize an independent path of
development, fully in control of the state and society.
Kim Il Sung (middle
back) with the
anti-Japanese guerilla army.
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Sixty-six years ago, following the defeat of the
Japanese imperialists, the Korean people under the leadership of
President Kim Il Sung, pioneered the cause of people-centred socialism
based on the Juche idea. Juche
is the guiding ideology of the DPRK based on the theory and principles
put forward by President
Kim Il Sung based on the experience of the anti-Japanese war and the
right to maintain the DPRK's independence ever since. The underlying
principle of Juche,
the statement points out, is that the masses of the people are the
masters and also the motive force of the revolution and construction.
The DPRK has consistently adhered
to its Juche ideology, as manifest in its independence in
politics, self-sufficiency in the economy and self-reliance in national
defence. Meanwhile, the Workers'
Party of Korea has been built and developed into a Party that takes
responsible care of the people's future -- under a government that
looks
after each household,
ensures the people's livelihood, and ensures that the Korean People's
Army is the defender of the freedom and happiness of the people.
Despite all the pressures and attacks to give up this
hard-won independence and its socialist system, the DPRK has
consistently adhered to the banner of socialism. Its
people have firmly defended their idea and system and their cause for a
long period of 66 years, never flinching from the road of socialism of
their own choice, as seen in
the people's indomitable dignity and pride.
Over the last 66 years after Korea's liberation, the
Korean people have firmly safeguarded the sovereignty of the country
and the nation, the statement affirms. This
includes defeating the U.S. in the Korean War (1950-1953), a country
which had boasted of being the "strongest" in the world. In the
following decades the Korean people
have frustrated at every step the imperialists' military threats,
provocative war moves, economic blockade and sanctions, and the
attempts to undermine the DPRK from within,
thus successfully defending their national sovereignty. In the course
of this experience, they have keenly felt that the only way to counter
the hard-line policy of imperialism
is with a tougher policy, the statement notes.
As such, the persistent nuclear blackmail of the U.S.
against the DPRK was such that the DPRK created its own nuclear
deterrent in order to cope with the threats and
war exercises. It is now building up this deterrent force, the DPRK
Permanent Mission to the United Nations informs, adding that this
principled stand is
supported by the international community
because it not only serves to safeguard Korea's national independence
but also global peace.
In the last 66 years since Korea's liberation the Korean
people have built a solid political and economic foundation to ensure
their well-being and prosperity, the
Permanent Mission explains. Immediately after liberation the DPRK
carried out democratic reforms including the enforcement of land
reform, and laws to protect workers'
rights and uphold gender equality. It also undertook the
nationalization of major industries. In a short span of four to five
years, the Korean people completed the rehabilitation
of the economy out of the debris of the Korean War and the socialist
transformation of the relations of production in the urban and rural
communities, and thus established
the socialist system in an all-round way in 1958.
They also carried out the historic task of
industrialization in a brief period of 14 years, turning what was once
a colonial agrarian state into a developed socialist industrial
state.
Firmly based on this outlook that upholds self-reliance,
the people's well-being, sovereignty and socialism, the DPRK is making
vigorous advance toward building a
thriving nation. The Permanent Mission points out that in spite of the
recent world-sweeping financial crisis, during the recent period, the
DPRK has achieved the successful
launch of its second artificial satellite Kwangmyongsong No. 2, and
made unprecedented increases in production by widely introducing
computer-numerical-control technology
and perfecting its Juche-oriented cokeless steel-making
system.
The year 2012 will be the centenary of the birth of
President Kim Il Sung, father of socialist Korea. Through the
leadership of Kim Jong Il and the people's dedication
to the socialist nation-building project, the DPRK will mark this
auspicious anniversary by affirming themselves as a thriving socialist
nation, part of an unbroken string of
victories from 66 years ago to the present, made possible by the defeat
of the Japanese imperialists and all other foreign interlopers.
Open Letter to U.S. and South Korean Authorities
 The United States and the
south Korean authorities are
contemplating staging again the provocative Ulji Freedom Guardian
joint military exercises from
August 16 to 26 despite the unanimous desire of the people at home and
abroad for peace on the Korean Peninsula.
In view of such situation sparking another danger of war
on the peninsula, the Panmunjom Mission of the Korean People's Army
(KPA) on August 7 sent the U.S. and
the south Korean authorities the following open letter reflecting the
unanimous will of the army and the people of the DPRK:
Peace is the strong desire
and invariable requirement of
the army and the people of the DPRK.
However, the situation on the peninsula long ago inched
close to a touch-and-go situation, after the fragile state of the
armistice was undermined.
This situation is attributable to the hostile policy
enforced by the U.S. toward the DPRK, failing to match its words with
its deeds and the anti-DPRK policy of
confrontation followed by the south Korean authorities, toeing its
line. It is, at the same time, a direct product of the evermore
undisguised war hysteria kicked up by the
military warmongers against the north, pursuant to it.
The Ulji Freedom Guardian is part of this
hysteria for a war of aggression against the north.
This can be explained by the fact that the planned joint
sabre-rattling are dangerous war manoeuvres to be staged by the U.S.
and the south Korean military warmongers
in accordance with a newly revised and supplemented war scenario
against the north. This is also evidenced by the fact that the
projected joint exercises will be all-out nuclear
war manoeuvres involving modern armaments including improved means of
nuclear attack, huge aggressor forces and even local administrative
organs and non-governmental
enterprises.
What should not go unnoticed is the fact that they are
going to stage such reckless sabre-rattling though they must be well
aware of the resentment and hatred of the
servicepersons and people of the DPRK and their determination to take
revenge on the military warmongers of south Korea for their hideous
provocations.
The KPA Panmunjom Mission is authorized to raise the
following principled demands of the U.S. and the south Korean
authorities in view of the prevailing grave
situation:
1. The U.S. and the south Korean authorities should show
the DPRK the will for the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula by
making a bold policy decision to cancel
the planned joint military exercises.
If they stage actions of blackmail by mobilizing the
super-large nuclear aircraft carrier group and strategic nuclear strike
flying corps, while urging the other party to
show a sincere attitude towards denuclearization, this will amount to
breaching the principle of simultaneous action for denuclearization.
The denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula cannot be
achieved by one side only.
There should be comprehensive and fair denuclearization
including the removal of nuclear threats to the DPRK.
The army and people of the DPRK are not what they used
to be in the past. They do not hide that they have had access to a
nuclear deterrent powerful enough to protect
themselves.
If the other party launches a nuclear war, the DPRK is
ready to counter it with nukes. It is its solemn declaration.
The U.S. and the south Korean authorities had better
face up to the changed situation and properly understand who their
rival is. They should show their willingness
to denuclearize the peninsula in the eyes of the world by cancelling
the projected nuclear war exercises.
2. By cancelling the exercises the U.S. and the south
Korean authorities should make a bold practical decision to replace the
armistice system by a peace-keeping
mechanism on the Korean Peninsula.
War and peace can never go together.
Nothing is more shameless a political artifice than
showing such poor double-dealing tactics as making preparations for a
war behind the scenes while paying lip-service
to peace and dialogue.
The annual repetition of such war provocations as the Ulji Freedom Guardian
will only maintain the evil cycle of mistrust and
confrontation and this is bound to lead
to a war.
The U.S. and south Korea are gravely mistaken if they
think they would remain safe in case of a war on the Korean Peninsula.
If a war breaks out, the DPRK will abandon the military
demarcation line and gain national reunification, the cherished desire
of the nation. The DPRK is full of
confidence and optimism about it.
If the U.S. is truly willing to replace the armistice
system by a peace-keeping mechanism, it should show its practical
willingness to do so at home and abroad as a big
power by cancelling the joint military manoeuvres for this year at
least.
3. The U.S. and the south Korean authorities should
officially show their willingness to normalize the DPRK-U.S. relations
and the inter-Korean relations by cancelling
the planned joint military exercises.
The normalization process should begin with ending
hostile relations.
To call for reconciliation, cooperation and improvement
of relations and then to stage war exercises to do harm to the other
side would be the height of double-dealing
tactics.
The U.S. incurred the towering grudge of Koreans and the
south Korean authorities ruined the June 15 era, bringing untold pain
to the people. But the army and people
of the DPRK are ready to subordinate everything to the great cause of
peace, reunification, reconciliation and cooperation.
The U.S. and the south Korean authorities should no
longer commit such a policy error as misjudging the will of the DPRK.
This August 15 [the 66th anniversary of Korea's
liberation from Japanese colonialism] is supposed to offer a new
watershed for the improvement of the relations between
the north and the south. In the light of the public expectation for
this, it would mean the total denial of the improvement of relations if
[the U.S. and south Korea] start the
joint military exercises against the DPRK beginning August 16.
Frankly speaking, as far as the issue of improving the
DPRK-U.S. relations and the inter-Korean relations is concerned, the
U.S. and south Korea are more pressed for
time than the DPRK.
The DPRK has so far followed its path without having had
its relations normalized with the U.S. and south Korea and it will
thrive and live better off in the future
too.
They must officially make public their willingness to
cancel the military exercises targeted against the army and people of
the DPRK, if they want to normalize the
relations with the DPRK.
The army and people of the DPRK remain unchanged in
their will and stand to counter the said exercises with the toughest
stand.
The U.S. and the south Korean authorities should behave
with discretion, cogitate and choose a wise way out at the crossroads
of dialogue or confrontation and peace
or war.
The army and people of the DPRK look forward to a
positive response to their just call.
August 13, 2011 Bulletin • Return to Index • Write to: editor@cpcml.ca
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