AROUND THE WORLD
VENEZUELAN TROTSKYISTS STAND for the workers cause, is standing for the senate in Carabaodo, one of the three most important industrial zones of the country.
Filadelfo Aranguren and Domingo two prominent workers Figueira, are
CANDIDATES IN ELECTIONS The Organizacion Socialista Revolucionaria (OSR Revolutionary Socialist Organisation, sympathising organization of the Fourth International) which critically supports the left candidature of Jose Vicente Rangel for the presidency, has formed a Frente Unico Revolucionario (Revolutionary United Front ) with the GAR (Grupo de Accion Revolucion-
Josefina Mujica is a designer and a militant for Obrero and is standing for the
Jose Gonzalez is a young metalworker who is also standing in the legislative
Ines Mujica and Ana Maria Onofrieti are two women workers who are standing as candidates for the Lara state legislastanding respectively as candidates for the state legislatures of Lara and Valencia. Domingo is a leader of the El Salvador Solidarity Committee.
Several of these Trotskyist militants took part in the 8 day strike and occupation of the Univensa factory by metalworkers carried out in October 1983 in Barquisimento. It was one of the most important strikes that has taken place in Venezuela in recent years.
The OSR has organised public meetings, put up posters and most importantly
Action Group),
Revolutionary aria
- the EPA (El Pueblo Avana - The People
Advance) and the CUP (Comites de
Unidad Popular - Peoples Unity Comon the basis of a revolutionary
Christian committees and his support 4, 1983.
mittees)
Local socialist committees programme.
have been set up to support this initia-
DANISH PARLIAMENTARIANS
These four organisations, which tive.
support Rangel, decided to stand candi-
SUPPORT HUGO BLANCO dates in the parliamentary elections in order to differentiate themselves from the other reformist parties that also support
Twenty-two members of the Danish par- mid-1960s was crushed by savage repres-
Rangel, such as the CP, the MEP, Nueva
Alternativa, Liga Socialista, etc.
this common slate of the
Within
'frente' or Revolutionary Convergence
(Convergencia Revolucionaria), as the grouping of the four above-mentioned organisations is called, the OSR is standing Trotskyist candidates in some of the important regions — especially the industrial centres.
Ricardo Galindez is candidate for the
Senate in the Lara region. He is a young worker, editor of the weekly newspaper,
Topo Obrero (Workers Mole) and a lead-
Salvador and Nicaragua
Miguel Galindez, a priest who is well known for his work with the rank and file liament (out of a total of about 150) have signed a petition protesting the withdrawal of parliamentary immunity from the Peruvian revolutionary leader Hugo Blanco on August 29.
Blanco was accused of affronting the military honor of an army commander by calling him a murderer. On that basis, the right-wing majority removed his parliamentary immunity, in violation of the accepted parliamentary rules.
There is a long history of brutal repression in Peru. The peasant union movement that Blanco himself led in the set up various local Socialist Committees in a perspective which extends beyond the presidential elections of December sion. And such repression is on the rise again.
The petition signed by these Danish members of parliament is being circulated by the Danish Support Committee for Hugo Blanco. The signers include representatives of all the parliamentary parties except the rightists - the Socialist People's Party, the Left Socialists, the Radicals, and the Social Democrats. The committee intends to deliver the petition to the Peruvian embassy after it gets the signatures of a few more members of parliament.
er of the El solidarity committee.
PUERTO RICAN STUDENTS PROTEST AGAINST Correction FORCED MILITARY DRAFT In International Viewpoint No 39, two lines unfortunately disappeared from the top of the middle column on page 16 between our design room and the printers.
The sentence then left unfinished reads in full, "This case is a clear indication of the present dynamic of the revolution.' This referred to the Nicaraguan government's handling of a labour dispute in a privately-owned bakery, which it rapidly settled in favour of the workers.
Please accept our apologies for this. We hope it will not happen again. 26
The following is the text of a leaflet distributed by 'Students Against Draft Reg istration' in the University of Puerto Rico. As the text explains, they are protesting against attempts by the Reagan government to force poorer students to register for the draft as a condition of receiving economic help for their studies.
The sympathising organisation of the Fourth International in Puerto Rico, the Liga Internacionalista de los Trabajadores, is active in this campaign.
Recently a series of repressive meas ures have been implemented against the most exploited class of our society -the workers and their children. These measures result from the militarist policy of Reagan who defends the interests of the North American capitalist class against peoples who are struggling to end social injustice and exploitation.
The Selective Service Law is one of these measures. This law requires that all males over 18 years of age born after 1960 must register with the army or else risk a fine of 10,000 US dollars and/or 5 years prison. Faced with the refusal of thousands of young people to register, the President, looking desperately to
International Viewpoint 14 November 1983
tighten things up, got the US Congress to approve an amendment to the Selective Service Law. This amendment (the adopted in September 1982. Every male who wants to receive federal economic aid is obliged to prove that he is registered for military service. This highly repressive measure discriminates against poorer university students who cannot afford to pay for their studies.
The University of Puerto Rico is collaborating with this militarist policy. It sent out a document to all students, distorting what the law really lays down, calling on all women and men born before 1960 to register. Students are being are insufficient for the number of poor students and their needs.
The University of Puerto Rico, in addition to refusing to inform people of the legislature funds, is making students sign a document that classifies them as registered' or 'unregistered'. This, more than just refusing the grants to those who are not registered, will make it easy for the US government to identify young working class people (since rich people do not need to fill in documents claiming economic aid) who have not complied with the law on obligatory military service, thus facilitating legal action against them.
Many young people have not registerothers have done so under protest.
character of the law and the
We have to be alert measures taken by the University to facilitate the work of the Selective
Military Register. We have to organise such as mass meetings, demonstrations, etc. to show our opposition to militarisation.
FOR A DEMOCRATIC AND
CRITICAL UNIVERSITY!
- FOR A UNIVERSITY FOR THE
SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF WORK-
ING PEOPLE!
- NO TO MILITARISATION!
- IF STUDENTS ARE UNITED, coerced and pressured to say whether Everyone is indignant about the com- THEY WILL NEVER BE DEFEATED! they are registered or not. sity has threatened us with cutting off our economic aid if we do not give this SUPPORT GROWS FOR THREE FRENCH SOLDIERS information.
If we analyse this situation in the capitalist colonial context, we can see how Support is growing for the three young port of the three were collected in a few the system forces us to leave university, throws us on the dole queues, obliges us to emigrate or to join the army. We are obliged to join the same vaded us in 1898 and that is now trying to do the same thing against our sister peoples. Indeed, we question the type of democracy which reigns in our country, where only the working masses suffer the consequences of these measures.
The University is still being used as a filter to recruit young people to the North American army. It sanctions us not only for not registering but also for refusing to give information, for not collaborating with the army, in open violation of our privacy and normal safeonly alternative left for young people paying for their own studies who refuse to register or give information will be jobs available and paid on a day-to-day or short-term contract basis. But the University administration covers up our right to request that the officials of the Economic Assistance Board make a re-evaluation in order to grant us economic aid.
French draft soldiers stationed in West Germany, on charges of 'incitement to insubordination'. The three, Olivier Lecour Grandmaison and Laurent Fritz of the 32nd Engineers Regiment at Kehl, and
Patoor of the 13th Engineers Regiment at Treves, face possible sentences of two to ten years (see International Viewpoint No 39, October 31, 1983.
The charges arise because the three signed a call for the withdrawal of all foreign troops from Germany, and in particular for the immediate withdrawal of the French troops. This appeal has now been signed by 150 members of the French forces in Germany.
The three at Landau prison can see from these actions that they are not alone, their ideas are shared by an increasing number of other young men forced to serve in an army protecting the interests of the imperialists and capitalists.
There have also been more direct exnatures for the national appeal in days in France. Around half that number were collected in West Germany in the same period. The appeal was launched over the signatures of many well-known French personalities including Simone de Beauvoir writer and feminist, Costa Gavras film maker, Pierre Broue Trotskyist historian, Alain Krivine of the LCR, and Arlette Laguiller of Lutte Ouvriere.
Statements of support have come from in which all three were active, and the national teachers union of which Laurent Fritz is a member. on the minister of defence to make a justification for the charges.
The three have also received many letters and telegrams assuring them of individual and personal support, which are warmly received. The address for such letters is: Landau Military prison, Mangin Dorenberg Strasse, Landau, FDR.
Statements of support to:
Millaud, 50 boulevard JeanJaures, 92110 Clichy-la-Garenne, France.
INPREKOR SOLIDARNOŚĆ Z SOLIDARNOŚCIA !
Students who do not register or who refuse to give the relevent information can request that their situation be evaluated and dealt with in relation to the funds that the legislature allocates to the
The legislature funds have nothing to do with the federal aid. For this reason someone who does not register still has the right to receive economic aid from the legislature when they cannot pay for their studies.
According to Mrs Luz M. Santiago, Auxiliary Director of the Economic Aid Programme, in reply to questions posed by a group of students, any young person who refuses to fill in the whole document has a right to be enrolled and to receive a cheque for books (which is covered by the legislature funds) but cannot receive the three cheques corresponding to the federal grants distributed each term. The students have until August 30 to hand in this document.
alternative of the legislature funds is only partial because the funds International Viewpoint 14 November 1983
POLISH INPRECOR
No 12
IS OUT NOW!
Contents of this issue:
Dossier:
Work relations and conditions for struggle in the factories.
Round up of recent strikes as appendix.
- We put our trust in the factory commissions':
Interview with two Solidarnosc leaders from the Lublin region.
Interview with activists from a big factory in Wroclaw.
The state of Solidarnose in
Silesia.
The strikes at Pavlovo in the
USSR.
The struggle for class independence and workers management in
Bolivia.
12
(październik listopad
1983
Price 15 FF, 2.50
US dollars,
£1.50 single copies; 1 year subscription 75 French Francs.
Orders to
PEC,
2 rue Richard Lenoir, 93108
Montreuil, France.
27
decision to participate to 'individual conscience'. Both the Socialist and Catholic major union federations were present, alongside the peace movement CNAPD, the ecologists, Flemish antinationalist, NAP, Cadared press the bi gese etc. Pierre Galand, of the
Mass