AROUND THE WORLD
AROUND
THE
WORLD
SOUTH AFRICA Save the Upington 27! THE NEW US undersecretary of state for African affairs, Herman Cohen, has judged that there are signs of hope for a "democratic solution" in South Africa. According to him, there is a growing understanding on the part of the Pretoria regime that no new governmental system can be set up that is not negotiated with the active involvement of the Black majority. With the comfort of this expression of confidence, the South African government is going to be able to go on tranquilly with its repressive policy.
Thus, the trial of the Upington 26 has just concluded with 14 people sentenced to death, including a young man of 20 and a woman of 60. As in the case of the Sharpeville Six, the tribunal ruled that there was collective responsibility in the case of a murder that occurred in the context of a demonstration (see IV 158, March 6, 1989). Lacking evidence but considering that all the demonstrators had a "common purpose," the white judges condemned 14 Black people to death by hanging and 11 to
The Upington defendants who have been condemned have to be saved! As in the case of the Sharpeville Six, international pressure can prevent Pretoria from pursuing this repression to the end. This scandalous trial illustrates strikingly the hypocrisy now prevailing about South Africa, where a "process of democratization" is supposed to be underway. * STOP PRESS: MEXICO Campaign continues ON JUNE 3, the Mexican PRT announced that they would end the hunger strike by national and regional leaders that started on May 10 (see /V 163). This announcement followed promises by the government to release Eladio Torres in the current amnesty programme, and to reconvoke the commission investigating the disappearance of José Ramon Garcia Gomez.
A demonstration to the Ministry of the Interior on Monday June 5 to depose the 20,000-signature petition calling for the reappearance of Garcia Gomez and the freeing of Eladio Torres marked the end of this phase of the campaign, while announc26 •ing that it would continue with equal vigour in other forms. International Viewpoint #165 • June 12, 1989
USSR Pravda denounces Baltic Assembly FOR THE FIRST TIME since the elections for the Congress of People's Deputies, which the Baltic national democratic movements demonstrated their majority support, the organ of the Soviet Communist Party published an attack on them in its May 22 issue in the form of a comment on the Baltic Assembly, a conference of the national democratic movements of the Baltic republics held in Tallin on May 13-14. It was signed by a jurist, Mein Miullerson, who is also a Soviet representative on the UN Human Rights Commission.
"Assuming the pretension to express 'the reason and will' literally of all citizens of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, the organizers of the Assembly declared: 'We are convinced that...the democratic mass movements are the only guarantee of the continuation and irreversibility of a radical restructuring of the society'." Miullersoncommented: "So the Communist Party of the Soviet Union has no role to play, as if it were not the CPSU that set in motion the mechanism for renewing the country in
However, argument became more subtle as the article went on: "in fact, perestroika is advancing with difficulty, in struggle. But this is not a struggle of republic with republic, of nation with nation, or even of the periphery with the center, although the representatives of the administrativecommand system are really trying, through quiet undermining and even going on the offensive, to maintain their former positions. And we see this not only in Moscow and sometimes in other places more than Moscow. We see it also in the Baltic, in Ukraine and in the Caucasus. And nationalist ideas and expressions, and still more actions based on them, are only strengthening the positions of the enemies of perestroika. Extremes always objectively converge, however far apart they may be subjectively."
In other words, if you want perestroika, leave the problem of reforms to the esta-
He went on... Commission on Human rights...in discussing the internal problems of the Soviet Union as a whole and the Baltic ones in particular, one of my Western colleagues expressed what seems to me to be to be precisely the hope of many people in various countries in the success of perestroika in the USSR:
'I hope you will be able to solve all your problems successfully in the framework of your Union, and that they will not have any negative effect on the foreign policy of your government'." Miullerson commented: "Such concern has been expressed by other representatives of business and public circles in the West, who are concerned about the stability of the Soviet Union." * IRELAND United left forum A PROJECT of building a framework of left unity was initiated in February, sponsored principally by Sinn Féin. (See IV 160, April 3, 1989). These efforts led to the launching on May 3 of a united left forum called the "Forum for a Democratic Alternative," or FADA. The initials spell the Gaelic word meaning "long." This was apparently intentional, to indicate that the organization had a long-term perspective.
The invited speakers included Senator Brendan Ryan and Bernadette McAliskey, as well as the famous musician Christy
The press release stated that FADA "aims to provide a forum for discussion of the major issues confronting Irish society today, particularly in this year which marks the 70th anniversary of the Democratic Programme of the First Dail [the formal political leadership of the War of Independence) and the 20th anniversary of the deployment of British troops on Derry streets."
The statement went on to say: "Over the coming months, FADA will host a series of conferences on the themes of Culture, Communications and Censorship; Poverty; Trade Unions; and Women."
In the Dublin Community Workers Co-op newsletter, John Meehan, a leader of the Irish section of the Fourth International, made the following comment about the implications of the launching of FADA:
"We should seek British military withdrawal from the North, but there is no real chance of achieving this unless an all-Ireland mass movement starts to be built.
"This is the big unresolved question lurking behind the FADA debates. As a beginning there could be discussion of forms of electoral unity, elaborating a platform which tackles both the economic and social issues and the issues of repression
"If the right can unite on essential issues...surely the left can do the same and give some hope to the many impoverished victims of partition, including the millions who had no choice but the boat and the plane [emigration]."
Further information can be obtained from FADA, PO Box 2537, Dublin 7, Ire-
Spanish state: Eighth congress of the LCR
Enthusiasm, militancy
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL NEWS the uneven development of the class struggle, this approach has left open the question of the concrete response by Basques and
Catalans to the right of self-determination at specific times.
Since 1986, the national congresses of the
LKI and the Lliga [Fourth Internationalist and self-confidence THE CONGRESS of the Liga Comunista Revolucionaria (LCR, section of the Fourth International in the Spanish state), was held in Santander from May 19-21. It was attended by more than 200 delegates, as well as about a hundred guests, coming mainly from Euskadi, Catalonia and Galicia. DANIEL BENSAID
T WAS striking that at the congress the numbers of men and women were nearly equal. Nearly half the delegates were women. Another notable feature was the unity of the generations. Although a few had fallen by the wayside, the "young veterans" of the struggle against Francoism were much evidence. They have been welded together by 25 years of common battles and trials. Now they have been joined by the young guard of more recent mobilizations. About 20 per cent of the delegates were under 23 years of age.
Many guests from sections of the Fourth International (Italy, Belgium, France, Portugal), as well as friendly organizations (the Communist Movement [MC] and Herri Batasuna) followed all the debates of the
The statutes of the LCR require the calling of congresses every four years. Unlike the congresses of other sections, those of the LCR give priority to a few big questions and leave most matters of tactics and ongoing work to the Central Committee (even participation in elections).
Besides electing the leadership and voting on amendments to the statutes, this congress had four major points on the agenda - the state of relations with the MC, feminism and the women's liberation struggle, the national question and the political situation and tasks.
So the second major point on the agenda was around feminism and the women's liberation struggle. The high-quality debate that followed the reports reflected the experience accumulated over 15 years and the decisive role played by LCR and MC members in maintaining an active feminist movement, the contribution made by their close relationships with the women's movements in Latin America and the collective thinking in the framework of the Fourth International.
The presentation of this question and the documents were prepared by a meeting of women in the LCR about a year ago. The report and the theses, as well as a corresponding change in the statutes, were approved unanimously by the congress.
The national question was undoubtedly the thorniest point at the congress. The LCR has been long committed to defending the rights of the oppressed nations. It has never failed to offer solidarity to revolutionary nationalists who have been victims of repression. In the 1986 European elections, the LCR (as well as the MC) called for a vote for Herri Batasuna's slate at the Spanish state level.
Traditionally, the LCR has defended the right of self-determination of oppressed nationalities and the perspective of a socialist federation of Iberian republics. But, in view of the political situation and organizations in the Basque country and in Catalonia respectively] have adopted the demand for independence. The congress therefore had to deal with this question. And without challenging the sovereignty of the national bodies on questions concerning them, it had to lay out the general lines of a programmatic approach for the Spanish state as a whole.
In so doing, the congress had to steer clear of two dangers. One was looking at things exclusively from the standpoint of the class struggle in the Spanish state. In the policies of the reformist parties, this has meant in practice opposing the democratic demands of the oppressed nationalities. The other was adopting the outlook of the nationalist currents who are waging a liberation struggle on their own turf without any regard for (and sometimes to the detriment of) the common class struggle against the
The report and theses defined the Spanish state as a belated and uncompleted nation-state. They adopted the demand of independence for Catalonia and Euskadi (the parts in both the Spanish and French states). But this raised a problem: On the basis of what criteria could this demand be extended to Galicia, the Canary Islands and Andalusia?
The documents established a distinction between the historic nations, defined not by formal criteria but by history, and mobilizations around the national question. This was one of the most animated points in the
The documents, along with their organizational implications, were finally adopted virtually unanimously. There are now three sovereign Fourth Internationalist organizations in the Spanish state — the LCR, the Lliga in Catalonia and the LKI in Euskadi, which together form the section of the Fourth International in the Spanish state. In a common congress, they elected a Central Committee made up in part of members elected by the entire congress and in part of members delegated by the Lliga and the LKI.
Finally, the political resolution, which dealt mainly with the Single European Act (SEA) and the social situation following
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