ILC
INTERNATIONAL NEWSLETTER No. 67
A dossier of
weekly information edited by the International Liaison Committee of
Workers and Peoples
February 24th, 2004
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PRESENATION
In this issue, we publish the first part of the declaration by
Louisa Hanoune, presidential candidate, "For a single and
indivisible Algeria."
From the United States we received the International Youth Appeal to the
world's youth "All Out on the Streets on March 20! Against the
American occupation of Iraq and for the immediate withdrawal of foreign
troops."
You will also find an open letter from Erwin Salazar, President of the
CGTP of the Lambeyeque region to the secretary general of the General
Confederation of Workers of Peru (CGTP): "If the country is
divided, the workers will be divided. Where does the strength of the
CGTP come from? From its unity." Also included in this issue is an
interview with an Italian union member regarding the financial scandal
of the Parmalat Group.
We also present issue No. 5 of the Revue Dialogue which has just been
published, including the call for the "May 2004 International
conference for the right of return of Palestinian refugees."
You will find an interview with Constantin Cretan who, along with Miron
Cozma, is one of the union miners pursued by the government's repression
explaining the need to increase the campaign for the liberation of Miron
Cozma together with the International Committee for the liberation of
Miron Cozma and his comrades.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
1.: Presentation
2.: Iraq - USLAW campaign for the rights of Iraqi workers
2 & 3.: Algeria "For an Indivisible Algeria" Louisa
Hanoune candidate for president of the republic
4.: United States Revolutionary Youth International -- March 20:
International Youth Appeal against war
5.: Peruvian Congress of the CGTP. An open letter to J.J. Goretti,
secretary general
6.: Italy The Parmalat affair: Interview with A. Mattioli, secretary of
the CGIL, food industry of Parma
7.: Palestine: Revue Dialogue No. 5: May 2004: international conference
for the Right of Return of Palestinian refugees
8.: Romania: Interview with Constantin Cretan, union miner
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To contact us:
ILC International Newsletter
International Liaison Committee of Workers and Peoples
87, rue du Faubourg Saint Denis -75010 Paris, France
Tel: (33 1) 48 01 88 28 e-mail: eit.ilc@frolean.com
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ALGERIA
Louisa Hanoune presidential candidate
The spokeswoman for the Workers Party in Algeria, Louisa Hanoune has
announced her candidacy for the presidential election. The Workers Party
has collected over 100,000 signatures to support this candidacy.
We publish some extracts from the Algerian press and Louisa
Hanoune's electoral platform:
Le Matin (February 21): "It is three days from the deadline,
February 23, to file papers for the presidential election on April 8 at
the level of constitutional Council, which Louisa Hanoune, henceforth
the general secretary of the Workers Party after the last congress of
the party, yesterday announced her participation in the race to the
highest office. Hanoune said over 92,300 signatures were collected in 48
wilayas, and after a speech at the central committee and national
council of her party regarding this issue, she expects this figure to
reach 108,000 signatures. This is the result of a campaign qualified as
a "victory for the party." Hanoune then spoke at length on the
reasons, which motivated the Workers Party to have her participate in
the election, although they had indicated, "the collection of
signatures has been an activity totally independent of the party."
She added, "We are not part of those who buy the consciences of
others, and the citizens have conferred their signatures with complete
democracy."
Liberté (February 21): The headline reads, "First Woman
Candidate." "Inspired by the speeches and traditional
positions of her party, the presidential candidate proclaimed that
"the country is in turmoil and one step before the precipice,"
in the months preceding the April election, which will take place in
"extraordinary conditions under which political and security
conditions for an election have not always been met." Algeria is
threatened and in danger. The next election will not fix the country's
profound problems." Her participation in the popular consultation
in April is being undertaken in an attempt to stop the chaos, which has
already begun and risks carrying off Algeria. In reference to her
campaign slogan-"Algeria must survive"-she explained that her
entry into the electoral race comes from and is inscribed directly in
the course of her fight for the survival of her country-and that she
will fight relentlessly in the direction of parties and institutions so
that Algeria does not sink into chaos."
Quotidien d'Oran of the same date explains: "According to
her, the question surpasses the elections for there are "those who
propose a Georgian solution," but also those who would "take
Algeria towards an Iraqi or Ivoirian scenario." With her followers,
she wants to be "the grain of sand that will stop this chaos."
Combating the present breaking up of the Algerian nation is one of the
objectives of the Workers Party through its participation in this
presidential election on April 8. This participation in the presidential
race will permit the reinforcement and consolidation of the militant
bases, said Louisa Hanoune, who wants more than ever to increase the
social base of her party. At the same time she does not hide the fact
that the political situation is "grave, dangerous."
La Tribune (February 20-21) writes that she: "Louisa Hanoune,
spokeswoman of the Workers Party, is one of the most brilliant figures
in Algeria's political landscape. One of the strongest opposition
voices. A born campaigner. When moreover, the reader or the voter
discovers in her writings her political history, it is then the image of
this admirable woman takes on a different aspect than that circulated by
the press. She is in effect, in all battles, alongside all the oppressed
and rejected, for all the liberties."
"Long live a single and indivisible Algeria"
Electoral Program of Louisa Hanoune,
Candidate of the Workers Party for the Presidential Election
On April 8, 2004
THE ALGERIAN NATION MUST LIVE!
The Algerian Republic must live!
Presidential elections have been called for April 8, 2004 in a
nation and world situation full of uncertainties.
More than ever the elections of 2002 have demonstrated, that the
conditions to avoid things getting out of control, for the will of the
people to be expressed, for the freedom of debate, is the establishment
of a real peace that implies the restitution of all liberties, cleaning
up the political and social climate by providing solutions to the urgent
problems that threaten the nation.
For its part, the Workers Party considers that real democracy implies
election to a Sovereign Constituent Assembly that would wield all
political powers, would designate a government responsible to it, would
draft a constitution that would guarantee the sovereignty of the people
over their destiny and wealth, their rights and liberties, the national
sovereignty.
The Algerians, hurt by so many sufferings, need above all to get their
breath back, to renew themselves with hope and re-establish normal
living conditions. No Algerian, dedicated to the unity of Algeria, to
democracy, to the most elementary rights of human beings, can accept a
situation in which they daily witness murders by armed violence (thugs)
and others plunged into desperation and misery, a situation in which the
families of victims are always in the most precarious conditions.
Food, health care, schooling for children, housing and work are the most
urgent questions to attend to.
In order to exercise their political rights, grasp their destiny in
their hands, the Algerians must be able to live and eat in an Algeria at
peace, one and indivisible!
The existence of our country has never been so threatened, the spectre
of dismemberment being a concrete reality.
Algeria and the Algerian people must live!
At the request of the PT, I address all concerned parties regarding
the different facets and stages of the crisis that threatens to
dismember our country: one must know how to reason as nothing can be
superior to the integrity of the nation. That is the condition for all
projects, and the regulation of problems. Everyone has the right to have
his own project of society, to have the political ambition to see it
materialize respecting the rules of democracy, political confrontation,
free arbitration, but no one has the right to threaten the existence of
the nation and the integrity of the Algerian people. Algeria must live!
That is why the Workers Party knows their top priority is to direct
their efforts to avoid Algeria falling into chaos. It is necessary to
define the national political and social priorities, to search for
Algerian national solutions to problems, to preserve the nation and
national sovereignty.
No solution will be viable if it does not come from the efforts and
research of Algerians themselves.
It is this major wish to preserve the nation and its sovereignty, which
guides the intervention of the Workers Party from the beginning of the
crisis that leads it in every case to formulate proposals for political,
democratic and Algerian solutions to the conflicts and problems.
Today, faced with immense dangers, in the name of Workers Party, I
reiterate the appeal to all:
Let us Algerians organize the rescue of Algeria!
Do not let her sink.
At the request of the PT, I address all the candidates without
exception: Algeria is Amana in each others hands and you know, El Amana
is sacred.
Beyond the apprehension of one another on the holding of a ballot and
whatever the nature of the problems that may arise, the guarantees and
the solutions must be exclusively Algerian. There are numerous examples
of countries that were pushed during the chaos of the occasion of
'contested' ballots bringing in foreign intervention.
Consequently the existence of our country as a sovereign nation is up to
all of us.
Let us make sure the election date of April 8, 2004 does not serve as a
pretext for our country to be placed under domination, that it is not
the spark that ignites the fatal fire.
Could we not engage together and publicly through a common charter, to
make a condition, which expresses the free arbiter of each one, that
respects the equality of chances and points of view?
But generally, it is up to Algerians themselves to establish between
them the rules consecrating the respect for democratic liberties,
multiparty, independence of justice, the equality of rights, the freedom
of the press, of opinion and organization of all without exception,
implying the raising of the state of siege, in re-established peace and
fraternity.
In the name of the PT, I address all Algerians, all parties, all
institutions, all constituted corps, all unions, all the living force of
the nation:
Warning! Warning!
Our country is in danger of falling into the precipice
That is because the armed violence we live with every day in our
country, cutting down human lives against the backdrop of an appalling,
dilapidated social state and the multiple catastrophes wherein the
disaster of May 21 and its terrible consequences are still not absorbed,
a major institutional political crisis arose after many months provoking
a rupture in the structures of the state. This crisis which revives
tribalism and feeds regionalism, enemy of the unity of the Republic and
democracy, has gained grave proportions as it crystallized around the
voting of April 2004 in conditions that opens the door of a mortal loss
of control for the country, for the Algerian people with its two
linguistic components. When in fact, it is a crisis of the dislocation
of a nation/state, which carries the risk of a civil war, which
increases every day.
This is a very serious time because on the night of Thursday, January 22
to 23, 2004 via the signature of an agreement between the government and
the delegates of the political movement named "Coordination of the
Aarouchs" regarding the dismissal of those locally and nationally
elected in the wilayas of Kabylie and increasingly from the center of
the country, an unprecedented rupture materialized. It is a step into
the precipice, which took place; a heavy step, filled with consequences
for the Algerian nation with its two linguistic components arabophone
and amazighophone and a heavy step laden with consequences for the
integrity of the Algerian people.
Who would be interested in dismembering our country on a presumed ethnic
basis? Because that is what it's about, because by selective dismissal
of those elected on the pretext that the elections had been boycotted
where they came from, and in reality it is institutionalisation of the
regional and tribal political representation against the national
political and union representations in a march towards dividing the
Algerian people according to 'linguistic' criteria, and the
dismemberment of the national common framework which is (thereby)
sanctioned.
Warning! Warning!
The national fibre is in danger of being shredded
The agreement between the government and the 'Aarouchs' indicates
that in other wilayas thanTizi-Ouzou and Bejaia, the elected results of
the communes where the vote did not take place are systematically
revocable!
What can one say? Do we want to divide the bilingual wilayas such as
Bouira, Boumerdes, Sétif, Bordj Bou Arreridj? To carve up and divide
the populations by the revocation of the elected officials in the
communes concerned in the agreement, that is to say on linguistic basis?
Is it the idea to divide the Algerian capital on the same basis since it
is 'represented' also in the aforementioned edict? By a 'delegate'?
Wasn't this what caused the rupture of Yugoslavia, and Rwanda? What is
organized at this moment the break-up of the Sudan and its capital
Khartoum? And who is interested in the collapse of our country? Not the
Algerian people, overburdened with privations and hurt by the
multiplication of problems, which have not spared any of the linguistic
components. Not the Algerian youth in search of a future, a future
conditioned by the existence of the nation, of a State that responds to
its aspirations to learn, to work. Not the oppressed Algerian women
touched in their own flesh and their social role by the national
tragedy. Not the Algerian peasants who discuss the problems and are
threatened by opening of markets to foreign products. The Algerian
nation is the product of 14 centuries of an intermingled population. To
put one's finger in this spiral would be equivalent to provoking the
generalized break-up on a national scale and in each wilaya, in each
district.
The two components of the Algerian people have struggled together
against colonialism, consented to all sacrifices to re-appropriate the
country in its entirety, inch by inch. It is the same common struggle,
which has swept tribalism and regionalism, and welded the Algerian
people with two linguistic components in a unique and indivisible
Republic.
Isn't the recovery of the nation our most precious cause?
(To be continued next week)
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ANTIWAR
International Youth Appeal for March 20 Antiwar Protest Issued by
Revolution Youth (USA)
We, U.S. students and young workers in Revolution Youth, call on
youth the world over to take to the streets on March 20th -- the
one-year anniversary of the war -- to protest the U.S. occupation of
Iraq and to demand the immediate withdrawal of all foreign troops.
As antiwar activists in the United States, we feel it is critically
important to send out a message loud and clear to the Bush
administration that working people and youth all around the world are
still opposed to the war and occupation of Iraq.
By now it is obvious that the invasion of Iraq was based on lies. Even
U.S. government officials now admit that there were never any
"weapons of mass destruction."
Since the U.S. invasion, tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed in
their resistance to the U.S.-led occupation. The Iraqi people are
justified when they demand that all foreign troops leave immediately --
not tomorrow, but today. We must demonstrate on March 20th to support
the right of the Iraqi people to self-determination.
At home, growing numbers of U.S. soldiers and their families are calling
to "Bring the Troops Home NOW!" Thousands of U.S. and British
soldiers have already been killed or wounded. Hundreds, if not
thousands, have deserted.
The U.S. war machine must be stopped before it takes the lives of more
of our brothers and sisters in uniform -- most of them Black and Latino
youth who joined the Army to learn job skills or get funding to go to
college (what we in the United States call the "economic
draft"), or who were lured with the promise of a "Green
Card," at a time when there are hardly any jobs for young people,
especially Black and Latino youth.
An antiwar mom of a U.S. soldier put it this way in an interview with
Revolution Youth:
"I turn the news on every day to check where the casualties are.
I'm so relieved when I realize my son is not among them. But then I feel
guilty for being happy, because whoever died was someone else's son or
daughter or spouse, and I can only imagine how they're feeling. ... I
also disagree with the policies of our government. Our military is used
against working people and youth in other countries just to shore up the
interests and profits of the large corporations in our country."
We in the U.S. antiwar movement know full well that it's not the Iraqi
people who are responsible for the deaths of our U.S. troops. Bush and
all the war makers in Washington are responsible! That is why we are
demanding: "Bring the Troops Home Now!"
And we know it's not only a question of U.S. troops. Our sisters and
brothers from the Ukraine told us there have been several protests in
front of the U.S. Embassy in their country to demand, "Bring the
Ukrainian Troops Home Now! They Have No Business Being in Iraq!"
We have heard similar reports from youth activists in Spain, who have
been protesting the Aznar government's decision to send thousands of
soldiers to Iraq.
From every corner of the globe, youth are mobilizing in powerful protest
actions to say: "Withdraw all Troops from Iraq! Let the Iraqi
People Live! Let the Iraqi Nation Live!"
The U.S. government is spending $2 billion per week to occupy Iraq.
Isn't it obvious that this is linked to the fact that all across the
United States funding for public schools is being drastically cut, 44
million Americans don't have health care, and hundreds of thousands of
people are now living on the streets? That is why we will be marching on
March 20th to demand money for jobs, housing, and health care -- not for
occupation and destruction!
U.S imperialism has declared an "endless war" on the peoples
of the world. Likewise, our struggle must be international and must
challenge the U.S. government's military, social, and economic war
against humanity.
Our struggle is that of the students in France, Germany, and Britain who
are on strike to defend free public education against the plans of the
European Union.
Our struggle is that of the African youth and workers who are fighting
against the barbaric foreign debt imposed by the IMF and World Bank.
Our struggle is that of the Israeli "Refuseniks" who refuse to
take part in the oppression of the Palestinian people, just as it is
that of the Palestinian youth fighting for self-determination.
Our struggle is that of the Brazilian youth who have issued a call to
youth across the Americas to demonstrate against the occupation of Iraq
as well as against the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) on March
20th.
Join us in the Revolutionary Youth International on March 20th in our
fight against war and exploitation. We have a world to win!
ALL OUT IN THE STREETS ON MARCH 20!
(Appeal issued by Revolution Youth, the U.S. section of the
Revolutionary Youth International)
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PERU
An open letter to Juan José Gorritti
Secretary general of the General Confederation of Workers of Peru (CGTP)
"If the nation is divided, the workers will be divided.
Where does the strength of the CGTP come from? From its unity, our
unity!
The statutory congress of the CGTP, our great central union, instrument
of all our battles, was held on November 5 through 8 past. As president
of the CGTP of Lambayeque, delegate to its last national congress, I am
writing this letter because after the congress I came away with many
questions and a profound sense of uneasiness.
In effect, during the congress we voted on a measure to reform the
statutes of our federation, a reform of regionalization, which we were
told was for the good of the CGTP. Let's examine the reality.
Let us first look at the manner in which imperialism acts, how it
searches all the continents to dismantle nations as it is trying to
dismantle the Peruvian nation. It tries to steal everything we have:
mines, electricity, Petroperu after decades of pillaging. It tries to
crush us with the cruel weight of the external debt. It is the same
thing that occurred in Bolivia and why our brothers arose saying:
"No, the gas belongs to Bolivia, the country is not for sale, (we)
defend the nation."
This same imperialist policy aims to impose itself in Venezuela as well
as in the Brazilian Amazon.
In this situation isn't it evident that the regionalization of Peru is a
policy that seeks to dismantle the Peruvian nation, to break the unity
of the nation, to break the unity of our national demands. Can we, the
workers, farmers, and youth of Peru, accept the destruction of the
Peruvian nation? We cannot accept it because if the country is
destroyed, the working class will be destroyed, and our rights and
conquests will be destroyed.
If the nation is divided, the workers are divided. Where does the
strength of the CGTP come from? From its unity, from our unity!
Let us analyze the following:
… Gradual transfer of state schools and hospitals to regional
governments without sufficient funds to maintain them.
… Transfer of major development projects of the State to regional
governments without the adequate means.
… Transfer of State privatisations to regional governments.
We must note that these acts are cause for concern among the country's
workers and unionists. That is why we consider it important to speak
clearly about these matters.
Regionalization is the destruction of the nation; it is a tool of
imperialism throughout the world, a tool of the IMF and the World Bank
to dismember the Peruvian nation.
We, the militants of the CGTP, should speak clearly: we are for the
unity of the country, but if we are for this unity, can we regionalize
ourselves? No, it's impossible! There is one contradiction: can we
guarantee the unity of the CGTP with
… Article 11 of the new statutes that poses the question of direct
affiliation to the CGTP?
… Article 20 of the new statutes that states: "The CGTP is
organized in regional CGTP entities in accordance with the political
division of the State?
This implies submission to the framework of regional governments. That
would mean 25 regional CGTPs, which would upset the battle for the sole
list of national union demands into branches of many federations of the
CGTP (the SUTEP, Civil Construction, FENUTSSA, FENDUP, etc.)
We are for one CGTP only. We are not for 25 CGTPs! I am perfectly aware
that all the comrades who direct the CGTP like comrade Gorriti are for
the unity of the nation and can only say: "The country is not for
sale!" We can't let imperialism destroy our nation.
That is why I address all by saying that it is necessary to reverse the
reform of the CGT's statutes, a decision which no doubt was not
discussed, nor reflected upon sufficiently.
We must return to the former statutes that founded the CGTP and which
stand for:
… A firm position to reject Yankee imperialism;
… A firm position in relation to the preservation of "class
independence vis a vis all governments and political parties;
… A firm position concerning the " union democracy which
translates into respect for the majority and representation of
minorities";
It is necessary to reaffirm that the CGTP is the CGTP, that there is
only one, for the smallest enterprise, for the smallest district, up to
the higher authority of the union; the same union for city and farm
workers, for public and private sector workers, of all sectors and all
departments of the country.
Erwin Salazar Vásquez,
President of the CGTP of the Lambayeque region
*******************
ITALY
Parmalat's financial crash
Interview with Antonio Mattioli, secretary of the CGIL - Food products
division, Parma
"Our national work contract prevents discount
competition."
Our Italian correspondents sent us this interview of a union member
regarding the crash and financial scandal of the Parmalat Group. We give
our readers several indications on this financial scandal labelled the
European Enron: Parmalat is an agricultural/food products enterprise
with headquarters in Parma and employs 36,000 workers in about 30
countries, 4000 of whom are in Italy. It is one of the few Italian
companies with international links.
The group's collapse was revealed after an announcement by the Bank of
America that a private document proved that Bonlat (one of the
affiliates based on the Cayman Islands) was holding 3,95 million Euros
was false. This is what La Repubblica published on December 20:
"The collapse of Parmlat opens a dramatic crisis for Italian
capitalism, for the confidence of the investors for the international
credibility of the country. The Economist labelled it the
European Enron. There are many analogies between this crash and that of
the energy company in Texas, which bankrupted two years ago, heralding a
long series of financial scandals in the United States. But the
dimensions are proportionally analogous: Parmalat, which was founded by
Calisto Tanzi, is one of ten most important Italian companies, and a
brand known throughout the world.
"The hole of 4 million revealed by the Bank of America could lead
to other surprises, due to the opacity of its accounts, diversified and
hidden according to the Enron method, in offshore societies based in the
Cayman Islands. It is a true crisis of the system, like that of the
American one, not only because it questions the habits of Italian
capitalism, but also a system complete with rules, controls, and the
supervision of institutions and authorities. The workers and the small
investors are the victims without defence, but also foreigners, who are
holding a worthless piece of paper: American investors hold 2.5 million
shares in Parmalat. The
government of Berlusconi, mixed up in a conflict of interest, allergic
to rules and regulations, just wiped a sponge over the false accounts.
For years this executive has fought with judges. He has delegitimized
all independent authorities."
Question: What are the consequences of the Parmalat crash for
workers?
Mattioli: We must review the course of events: Parmalat has
36,000 workers throughout the world, and 4,000 of them in Italy. There
are 126 establishments, 20 of them in Italy. In 1999 we had negotiated a
plan of reorganization and restructuring due to the fact that Parmalat
had purchased Eurolat and the fact that antitrust laws required
renouncing some parts so as not to run afoul of monopoly laws.
Parmalat announced 1200 layoffs and the closing of 78 establishments,
but we fought and gained pre-retirement for 600 employees and the
maintenance of all establishments. Shortly before the crisis this
autumn, we had a very heated discussion with Tonna [financial director
of Parmalat- Editor's Note] as we were contesting the financial
credibility, since we did not understand the action they took if the
enterprise was sound. We were threatened because of the questions we
posed.
We must start with the fact that the production system is sound, as is
our battle to disassociate the problem of production from that of the
financial management. There was a threat hanging over 36,000 employees,
and for the moment our fight, our menaces had blocked the situation.
There are other places where the situation is critical as in Brazil and
Hungary, and we are totally opposed to the so called 'splitting up' and
breaking the group into different affiliates, as if we break the unity
of the enterprise and the chain of production, administration everything
becomes harder for the workers. I would like to underline that jobs have
been saved for the time being by strict respect for contractual
agreements, but we had to threaten with a stronger fight, occupation and
strikes.
Question: What counted up to the present in this fight?
Mattioli: Up until December, we had put in place a system of
mobilization around the world:
Suppliers, breeders, workers, threatening a fight, which would have
consequences for all.
Question: What was the role of Enrico Bondi, (1) the
administrator named by Berlusconi?
Mattioli: What could one predict? We were aware and managed to
get him to admit that he could not transfer (funds) without an
agreement. In every case we were opposed to the break-up of the unity of
the group as well as the suggested one to separate various branches
country by country. And then there was the problem of the pressure of
the banks. The banks were willing to transform the credit into
shareholding, in order to attempt to realize immediate profits and sell
off piece by piece the more profitable factories of the Parmalat group.
Everything that breaks the unity of the group exposes the workers to
worse consequences, which we hoped to avoid for the time being. The
situation is still in a development stage, but there is a strong will to
fight, which is born in the fact that the workers are united in saying
that Parmalat is able to produce.
Question: Had there been any recent restructuring and dismissals?
Mattioli: There was a veritable massacre in Brazil. When Parmalat
arrived, we went from 30 to 8 establishments. In Italy, we were able to
avoid this process by the 600 pre-retirements.
Question: What links are there between financial investments and
the productive sector?
Mattioli: The added value produced was always under-invested in
production and over-invested in finance, with veritable frauds that
appear now in the light of day. This applies to all sectors and to the
entire Italian industry. But one can say that Parmalat is an industry
that produces, that it is a real activity, even if important capital has
been misappropriated.
Question: In your fight and by the results you have obtained thus
far, how important is the existence of a national contract?
Mattioli: It is fundamental. We have a national contract and a
group agreement. The national contract prevents discount competition,
otherwise facing a crisis such as this, we would immediately have been
carried in a destructive course on working conditions and salaries. If
we faced salary differentiations, it would be much harder to defend.
(1) Enrico Bondi, named Parmalat's administrator by Berlusconi, due to
his previous service. Bondi had previously organized the liquidation of
Montedison and the privatization of Telecom Italy 8NDLR).
**********
PALESTINE
No. 5 issue of "Dialogue" magazine has just appeared
May 2004: International Conference for the right of return of
Palestininan refugees
On June 15, 2003 in Geneva, assembled at a conference for the
defense of the conventions of the ILO (International Labor
Organization), around 50 worker activists and unionists from all
continents launched an appeal "For the right of return of
Palestinian refugees"
This appeal was circulated throughout the world. Over 3000 people in
over 50 countries signed it: Palestinian refugees, activists, rank and
file unionists, democrats
In the tragic situation in Palestine, the information that comes from
the refugee camps is daily more terrifying. Can one accept the fate
reserved for millions of refugees in the camps in Gaza, the West Bank,
Lebanon, Jordan (1)?
It is not we who say this, but institutions such as the NGOs (Non
Governmental Organizations) whose program is not to promote the
"right of return."
Take this report, for example from the territories occupied in 1967:
"Many indicators concerning living conditions show that
non-refugees live better than the refugees. For example, in 2002 the
unemployment rate among refugees reached 35.2% compared with 28.7% for
non-refugees. Over the last 30 months there has been a serious
deterioration in the living conditions of Palestinians in the post-1967
occupied territories. Estimates for 2002 concerning the level of poverty
show that two out of three homes live under the poverty line (the
poverty line being fixed at under 1.97 dollars per person, per diem in
2002). The Gaza Strip where two out of three homes belong to refugees
has suffered the most. For the refugees, statistics show that three out
of four homes are under the poverty line, compared with two out of three
for the total population of the territories. (Source: Hasan ABU-LIBDEH,
Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Second conference balance
sheet on the research for Palestinina refugees, Ottawa, Canada, June
17-20, 2003)
That is why Dialogue magazine addresses the initiators of the
appeal for the right of return of the refugees, in order to organize at
the end of May 2004 in Paris, an International Conference of Palestinian
refugees, activists and workers, democrats, whatever your thoughts,
experiences, to debate together these questions.
For our part, we do not think that the right of return is compatible
with the pretended solution of "two States." We believe the
right of return poses the need for one State only - a Democratic and
Secular Palestine on all the Palestinian territories, guaranteeing all
citizens complete equality of rights. Was it by chance that the US
Secretary of State, Colin Powel, categorically "rejected the idea
of one State, declaring that only a solution of two States could work to
end the violence." (AP, January 8, 2004)?
But we say today: Whether you share this point of view or not, it is
urgent to open the discussion among all who agree on the terms of the
appeal of June 15, 2003, which states:
"In the diversity of our opinions, we all agree that democracy
demands respect for the right of return for Palestinians. Without
democracy, it will not be possible to have a durable peace. Like all
peoples of the world, the Palestinian people have the right to land,
peace and liberty."
Extracts from the magazine 'Dialogue'
(1) Estimated number of Palestinian refugees in 1998 (sources:
Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics): in Cisjordania, including
Jerusalem: 593,724; Gaza strip: 797,449; Israel: 219,325; Jordan:
1.766,057; Lebanon: 382,594; Syria: 431,986; Egypt: 40,468; other Arab
countries (Saudi Arabia, Gulf countries, Iraq, Lybia): 493,538; rest of
the world: 393,411. Note that these figures that date to 1998 are only
an estimate that are often contested upwards by Palestinian refugees.
Table of Contacts of Issue No. 5 of Dialogue:
Presentation (page 3)
The "Wall of Apartheid": discussion with Rania, Palestinian
activist exiled in Geneva, organizer of the campaign in Switzerland
against the "Wall of Apartheid" (page 6)
An interview with the Israeli movie star Eyal Sivan, author along with
Michel Khleiri, of the documentary Route 181 (page 9)
One State or Two? Interview with Dr. Sami Aldeeb, President of the
Association for One Democratic State in Palestine/Israel (page 12)
The 1948 partition, its causes and consequences (Second Part), by Elie
Aminov (page 15)
Opinion: My road between the camp of the oppressors and the oppressed ,
by Arié Ben-David (page 22).
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ROMANIA
Interview with Constantin Cretan, union miner
"It is probable that when Romania enters the European Union (in
2007) I will be in prison"
Constantin Cretan is along with Miron Cozma, one of the Romanian
union miners pursued by government repression. He talked to us about his
long journey as an activist, and the struggle he and Cozma and hundreds
of other activists have undertaken for independent unionism in Romania.
Question: To begin with, a few words on your activist journey?
Cretan: Immediately after the revolution in 1990, we founded an
independent union, where I was elected president, at the mine where I
worked, Tismania, where there were over 1,200 workers. Today there are
only 230. In 1992, I was elected vice-president of the federation of
mining unions in the Rovinari region, a post that I held until 1999.
Question: And after 1999?
Cretan: After the protest movement of the miners, the bureaucracy
of my old union (tied to the then government) suspended me on the
pretext of my participation in "illegal demonstrations." With
some other comrades I founded another union. I also helped to create the
association of "dismissed" miners in the Oltenie region, where
I was elected president. This association is now called League of Miron
Cozma workers, in homage to the leader who has been condemned to 18
years prison for having committed the 'crime' of respecting his union
mandate, in 1991 and 1999, without submitting to the demands of the
government, that wanted to liquidate the mining industry.
Question: You have alsobeen sentenced
Cretan: Yes, like other comrades, to five years in prison by the
court of appeals of Bucharest, in December 2003 for "attempting to
usurp the power of the State" after the demonstrations in 1999. For
these acts, Miron Cozma was condemned to an additional 10 years. That is
why it is probable that when Romania enters the European Union (planned
for 2007) I will still be in prison.
Question: Let's discuss Europe
Cretan: Regarding Europe, one must point out that in 1999 after
the savage repression of the miners' protest movements, a repression
where many were wounded, the European commissioner for Expansion of the
EU (Max Van Deb Brock) was the first to congratulate the powers in
Bucharest for their "handling of the crisis". As I have stated
repeatedly, the anti-worker Europe of Maastricht already applies in
Romania.
It is not that Europe we want to join, but a united Europe, where jobs
are created not destroyed, to a democratic Europe, where unionists are
not subjected to repression.
Question: What do you think of the independent inquiry commission
that will go to Romania to demand the release of Miron Cozma?
Cretan: The fact that Miron Cozma and the other leaders have been
declared innocent of the charges for which they were condemned by this
commission had an enormous impact in Romania. All the press discussed
it.
The facts, established in an undisputable manner by the inquiry
commission that Cozma and the other union leaders had acted in the
course of these happenings as the responsible carriers of the miners'
claims respecting the mandate conferred on them, should on the one hand
permit in Romania as before, to end with slander campaigns calling the
miners 'hooligans', stopping the violence, and favoring the expansion of
the campaign for the liberation of Cozma in the workers' movement and
international democracy.
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