Latin America's left turn

For four long decades in Latin America, the Caribbean island of Cuba thread a lonely socialist path through a capitalist quagmire. With the exception of the Sandinistas progressive yet turbulent rule in Nicaragua from 1979 to 1990, Communist Cuba was isolated and treated as a pariah state by the rest of Latin American countries. The latter were backed to the hilt by the United States and force fed a strict Washington Consensus diet of privatisation, neo-liberalism and free-market capitalism – euphemisms for greed, exploitation and oppression. North American dollars flowed to prop up right-wing dictators and their paramilitaries to quell popular left wing revolts. Now, with a left-tide engulfing Latin America, the political landscape has been transformed and the future of the continent’s 520 million citizens looks much brighter and full of hope.

The catalyst for Latin America’s recent surge to the left was unquestionably the 1998 election of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. Not only has Chávez radically transformed the domestic situation in his own country, by channelling massive profits from the country’s vast oil wealth to education, health and subsidised food programmes, but he has also been instrumental in the whole region. Chávez has injected vibrancy into and brought the concept of “Socialism of the 21st Century” to life. Chávez has introduced a viable and workable alternative to capitalism. With the assistance of Latin American leftist presidents he has boldly stated that “we are creating the axis of good, the new axis of the century”.

From San Salvador down to Buenos Aires, the people have reacted to the rapacious capitalist system that has wreaked havoc in the region and have voted into office one leftist president after another. In 2003 Brazil elected Lula, a founding member of the Brazilian Workers Party. Although he has proven to be one of the more circumspect leaders, he has been re-elected by an electorate who admire his more humane leadership, with his opposition to the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas and his Zero Hunger programme. In 2005 Uruguay elected its first left-wing president in its entire history, Tabaré Vasquez. Although he has moderated his socialism as a member of the centre-left Frente Amplio (Broad Front) he remains committed to social justice, wealth redistribution and against privatisation. The following year in 2006, left-leaning Michelle Bachelet beat her centre-right billionaire businessman opponent in Chile’s Presidential race. The same year also witnessed the election, for the second time, of Sandinista ex-guerrilla Daniel Ortega as President of Nicaragua. Although Ortega receives much criticism from the left over alleged corruption and a watering down of his previous firebrand Marxism, there are still progressive elements in the FSLN (Sandinista National Liberation Front).

In neighbouring Honduras President Manuel Zelaya, who was recently the victim of a reactionary right-wing coup d’état, sparked an about-turn in his country by shifting it from an unbending pro-US stance towards Latin America’s anti-imperialist crusade headed by Chavismo. Zelaya angered his country’s oligarchs with his social programmes for the poor; by raising the minimum wage by 60 percent; providing free school meals and pensions for the elderly; reducing the cost of public transport and by signing up to an alternative to the Free Trade Agreements.

More significant were the elections of Bolivia’s first indigenous President Evo Morales and Ecuador’s Rafael Correa in 2005 and 2006 respectively. These two Presidents are staunch allies of Chávez and are firmly positioned in his socialist camp. Morales has proven a fearless advocate of “Socialism in the 21st century”. When he took over he pledged that “the looting of our natural resources by foreign enterprises is over” and he has not disappointed. He has given the country’s indigenous minority, for so long trampled on, more power and dignity. He has also carried out land redistribution and renegotiated and nationalised contracts for the country’s vast gas wealth, which he is using to fund social projects for the people. His Movimiento Al Socialismo (MAS – Movement towards Socialism) grew out of the highly-organised organic social movements that brought down previous presidents over the highly unpopular and unjust attempts to privatise water in 2000, more commonly referred to as the ‘water wars’.

In Ecuador outspoken Socialist Rafael Correa has also tackled multinationals head on and has kept his promise of ensuring that the country’s natural resources will benefit its citizens. He wants to build a “more just, fair, and dignified country”. Ecuador’s recently approved new constitution is one of the world’s most progressive and Correa, ironically an economist who studied in the United States, has proven another Latin American thorn in the side of the US Imperialist Empire.

In 2008, Fernando Lugo, Paraguay’s “Bishop of the Poor” or “Red Bishop” broke the 60 year presidential stranglehold of the right and emerged victorious. He is renowned within liberation theology circles, believing that capitalism is exploitative and a sin and that through political action social justice can be achieved for the poor and oppressed. Most recently, El Salvador’s Mauricio Funes of the FMLN (Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front), former left-wing guerrillas, won his country’s presidential race. He has pledged to end the privilege of the few who have amassed their wealth at the expense of the rest and champions social justice and solidarity.

Due to these developments, all democratic and peaceful, Latin America is no longer merely an annex of the United States. The continent has suffered untold poverty, misery and exploitation at the imperialist hands of the US and its bloody military dictators and proxies. Multinational corporations no longer have as free a reign to exploit and plunder natural resources. The Washington Consensus is no longer as prevalent. Privatisations are being reversed on a frequent basis. Dignity is being handed back to citizens. The masses are being politicised and are taking their destiny into their own hands, opting for progressive change through the ballot box. With their numerous referenda, presidential and recall electoral victories, Latin America has never known such democratic Presidents as Chávez, Morales and Correa, much to the chagrin of the capitalist democratic pretenders.

Latin America socialism is not mere rhetoric. ALBA, the Bolivarian Alliance for Latin America, is proving a genuine alternative to capitalism. ALBA grew out of an original agreement between Cuba and Venezuela in 2004 and has huge potential. Now it has nine members including Bolivia, Nicaragua, Ecuador and Honduras. It is a direct opponent of the Free Trade Agreements. ALBA puts people before profit. It is a system of mutual economic aid, akin to a socialist bartering system. The perfect example is in return for daily cheap Venezuelan oil, Cuba provides doctors and health care workers. Operación Milagro (Operation Miracle) is another example of a purely socialist economic exchange at work, and has provided over 1.5 million free eye operations. There is no exploitation, no pillage of natural resources. Citizens from both countries enjoy mutual benefit. Daniel Ortega summed ALBA up stating that it “represents the American peoples’ aspirations for independence and their rejection of the policies promoted by the United States, which have created a social emergency in Latin America”. It is fitting that ALBA translates as ‘dawn’ in Spanish.

Chávez has been pivotal in expanding his 21st century socialism. He is heavily influenced by his hero Simón Bolívar, Latin America’s great revolutionary who fought for Latin American independence and unity. Through new companies and organisations, the level of Latin American integration is unprecedented. Petrosur is attempting to integrate the region’s energy industries while Petrocaribe supplies oil at preferential prices for impoverished Caribbean nations. Codesur promotes regional defence collaboration. Telesur is a network that broadcasts an alternative message to that of the right-wing capitalist dominated media. Bancosur is a creation that could see the replacement of the neo-liberal IMF in the region, by supplying loans to countries for social projects without the stringent privatisation stipulations associated with the IMF.

Unquestionably Latin America is turning red. However there is no room for complacency and the left must remain vigilant. This became all too apparent recently when Honduran troops seized President Manuel Zelaya from his bed and flew him to Costa Rica under arrest. Despite the inauguration of US President Barack Obama initially signalling new hope for the region of Latin America, the US government’s lack of action and condemnation has been striking. Despite Obama’s charm, intellect and sophisticated articulation, the United States remains a capitalist superpower committed to imperialism. They continue to send millions of dollars of aid to Honduras, have not recognised what happened as a coup and continue to maintain diplomatic ties with the illegitimate Honduran government. Evo Morales has directly accused the US of being behind the coup which is certainly not unbelievable. He stated that “the imperial structure remains in force”. Hugo Chávez has blamed the US for “giving oxygen” to the illegitimate Honduran government.

The coup’s organiser was General Vasquez, the head of the Armed Forces and graduate of the infamous School of the Americas, euphemism for the School of death squads and coups. Many former right-wing military dictators and their generals were trained by US personnel here, including Panama’s former corrupt dictator Manuel Noriega, anti-Castro terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, former army officers of Augusto Pincohet and Guatemalan general José Montt who was responsible for the slaughter of thousands of Guatemalans. If the Honduran coup is allowed to succeed then it could prove an inspiration to those who want to return to the dark days of military dictatorships and halt the spread of Latin American socialism.

The right will always react, violently if needs must, to the threat posed from the left. The US attempted to invade Cuba in 1962 at ‘the Bay of Pigs’ because it was fearful of its Socialist revolution and ideals. How dare the Cubans offer healthcare and education free to its citizens, surely these should be commodities available only to those who can afford them? In 1973 Chile’s democratically elected Socialist President Salvador Allende was viciously overthrown, with CIA connivance, by notorious human rights abuser General Augusto Pinochet who went on to rule Chile with an iron fist under a ruthless dictatorship. After the successful Sandinista revolution which overthrew corrupt dictator Anastasio Somosa in 1979, the US backed the Honduran-based ‘contras’ to fight against the Sandinistas in a civil war to prevent the spread of progressive socialist programmes and reforms. The US also funded ruthless right-wing regimes in El Salvador and Guatemala in the 1980s and 1990s to extinguish the threat from left-wing guerrillas in the popular rebellions. In 2002, the CIA was directly involved in the coup d’état that threatened to unseat Hugo Chávez from power.

The right only accept true democracy when it favours them and facilitates them to exploit the masses and hold onto their privileges. A defeat for the left in one country is a defeat for the international left. Solidarity is crucial. Not just words but actions. As the global economic system implodes, Latin American Socialism of the 21st Century provides a shining beacon to progressive people throughout the world and must be protected at all costs. Viva el socialismo del siglo 21!

Shell’s Private Army?

At approximately 4.00am on 16 April this year the Hotel Las Americas in Santa Cruz in eastern Bolivia shook with the sound of machinegun fire. Bolivian armed police stormed five adjoining rooms and shot dead three of the occupants while arresting two others. The Bolivian government subsequently announced that they had foiled a cell of right-wing mercenaries who were plotting to assassinate Bolivia’s Socialist President Evo Morales.

In room 457 lay the slain body of Irishman Michael Dwyer, a 24 year old from Balinderry, Tipperary. According to reports, Dwyer was fascinated by guns, computer war games and was an Airsoft enthusiast; a form of mock combat with replica guns. Several photographs of him brandishing guns in Bolivia have since been published. He was also employed by an Irish company, Integrated Risk Management Security, who are based in Naas, Kildare. I-RMS is owned by former Irish Army Rangers James Farrell and Terry Downes. They confirmed that Dwyer worked for them up until October 2008, and was based guarding the Corrib site in Glengad, County Mayo where Shell are attempting to construct their controversial gas pipeline.

At the end of 2007 I-RMS ‘security operatives’ replaced the majority of security guards employed by Shell. A substantial number of these ‘operatives’ have military backgrounds and dubious far-right political links. I-RMS have faced numerous complaints from protestors, having been accused of assault, heavy handedness and failure to wear or present their Private Security Authority licences. They have also routinely filmed protestors and indeed Dwyer himself was involved in this gathering of intelligence for Shell. On their website, offline and ‘under construction’ in the wake of Dwyer’s death, I-RMS had advertised their services, specialising in “international armed and unarmed security”, “customised security solutions” and “special services”, unquestionably all euphemisms for mercenary work. I-RMS have also been used by Fianna Fáil at their last few ardfheiseanna. So not only does I-RMS protect the nefarious multinational Shell in their robbery of Irish gas, they also defend the politicians who facilitated this grand theft. Who said three’s a crowd? Maura Harrington, the courageous veteran Shell to Sea campaigner, castigated I-RMS as “Shell’s private army in North Mayo”. This hired muscle for capitalism has been doing the state’s dirty work, while Gardaí turn a blind eye. They are no more than a hired gang of thugs and fascists.

Dwyer originally left Ireland in November 2008 on the pretext of doing a three month security course in Bolivia, a course that never was. He originally travelled with two Hungarians and a Pole. It is thought that he met Eduardo Rósza Flores, the leader of the mercenary cell who was also shot dead, through their mutual friend Tibor Révész, who is believed to be still resident in Ireland. Révész is the leader of the Szekler Legion, a Hungarian organisation that openly promotes neo-nazism and race hate. The other members of the Bolivian mercenary cell were Árpád Magyarosi, who was shot dead, and Elod Tóásó, who was arrested. Both were members of Révész’s Legion. On its website it sells patches emblazoned with a skull surrounded by a Celtic design associated with defending the Corrib project relating to Operation Solitaire Shield. The Solitaire is the name of the ship used for pipe-laying at sea. It has also advertised I-RMS courses. I-RMS have refused to comment on whether they had or are employing international right-wing fascists as security guards for Shell. Over a third of the 22,037 people licensed as private security guards have not undergone any form of Garda background checks and Sinn Féin’s Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Aengus Ó Snodaigh, has already demanded “an urgent investigation into what these extremists have been doing in Mayo and whether proper security checks have been followed”.

While the general Irish media have portrayed Dwyer as innocent, naïve and non-political, sinister details have been emerging ever since. While the 24 year old was in Glengad he met and befriended eastern Europeans with fascist links. Eventually he met up with Eduardo Rósza Flores in Santa Cruz. 49 year old Flores had a chequered past to say the least. He fought in the Balkan conflict in the 1990s with Croatian paramilitary troops as part of the notorious Zenga unit that took part in the ethnic cleansing of Serbs. He was a fascist mercenary, anti-communist (although he was a former leader of the Hungarian Communist Party’s youth wing), anti-semitic (though part-Jewish), a recent convert to Islam, who mixed left-wing ideals with racial and cultural separation. He seemed as politically indecisive as Senator Eoin Harris. Flores, born in Bolivia but grew up in Hungary, returned to Santa Cruz, (the eastern region in Bolivia rich in natural resources) illegally, in his own words to “organise the defence of the city and province”, and to do it not by marching with flags, but to “do it with arms”. According to Bolivian Vice-President Álvaro García Linera “Rózsa was in the country to recruit and train paramilitaries to destabilise the country”.

Bolivia’s Socialist President Evo Morales has nationalised his country’s abundant natural gas resources much to the consternation of Shell. While the multinational will face imminent court hearings in the US over the deaths of nine Nigerian activists in 1995, their mercenaries and state forces continue to be mired in deep controversy throughout the world. Is Shell’s insatiable avarice to pilfer natural resources at whatever cost the common denominator here?

The rise of the Right must be resisted

LAST WEEKEND, people throughout the 27 EU member states cast their votes to elect 736 Members of the European Parliament.

Turn-out was a paltry 43%, the lowest in the three decades of European voting. Voter apathy was widespread with over half of the electorate choosing to stay at home, politically apathetic due to ubiquitous corruption scandals, democratic deficits and failing to see a real political alternative in their respective countries. In some eastern European countries, turn-out languished around the 20% mark. Despite the fact that the European Union is responsible for 80% of member states’ legislation, to voters the EU seems distant and not worthwhile, a suspicious unelected bureaucratic monster for many with its mysterious yet powerful Commission. There was only one victor in these European elections, and it certainly was not the Left. Conservative and far-right parties enjoyed electoral success and subsequent seat gains.

Martin Schulz, German MEP and leader of the Party of European Socialists group, admitted: “Overall, this is a very bitter evening for us.” The centre-right consolidated its power whilst the xenophobic far-right made worrying forays into the political mainstream. With the scapegoating of immigrants for society’s ills, the far-right appealed to a substantial number of voters, some for different reasons.

The British National Party (BNP), heirs of the neo-nazi National Front, won two European Parliament seats. Veteran racist and former National Socialist Movement and National Front member Andrew Brons was elected for Yorkshire and Humber with the BNP polling nearly 10% there. Their leader, Nick Griffin, pelted by eggs on Tuesday by anti-fascist protesters at an aborted BNP press conference at Westminster, won a North-West seat with 8% of the vote, an increase from last time out. This is a party that refuses membership to black people and has stated that “Britain is full up” and immigrants should be ‘sent back’. The BNP actually secured fewer votes than last time out but gained two seats – its first ever – because of the low turn-out for the other parties, particularly Labour. It is the Labour Party’s worst election since 1918.

FRACTURED LEFT
In France, Prime Minister Nicolas Sarkozy and his conservative UMP convincingly defeated a fractured left that is in disarray. In neighbouring Spain, the ruling socialist PSOE were beaten into second place by the centre-right Partido Popular.
In Italy, although controversial leader Silvio Berlusconi’s Freedom Party support dropped slightly, his far-right coalition partners, the xenophobic Northern League, which prides itself on its anti-immigration stance, rose to 10.6%. Italy’s main opposition, the Democratic Party, an eclectic mix containing Christian Democrats and Socialists, nosedived 7%.

The German Social Democrats suffered electoral ignominy with its worst showing since the Second World War. Even the new left German Party, Die Linke (The Left), failed to fulfil prior expectations, polling only 7.5%. In Poland, the governing pro-capitalist Civic Platform party amassed 25 seats, with the homophobic Law and Justice party scooping 15. In the Czech Republic, the centre-right Civic Democrats were successful despite the appallingly low turn-out of below 30%.

The far-right gained considerably in the Netherlands with a return of four MEPs for Geert Wilder’s Freedom Party, criticised for its anti-Islamic nature. Austria’s Freedom Party polled around 13%. In Hungary, the notorious radical, anti-Semitic and neo-fascist Jobbik Party won three seats, almost beating the ruling Socialists, rocked by corruption scandals, who got one more. Fidesz, the main centre-right opposition won 14 of the available 22 seats.

Romania’s far-right Greater Romania Party also increased its vote and in Denmark, running on a nationalist, anti-immigrant and populist platform, the Danish People’s Party got two seats. Glimmers of hope for the Left surfaced only in Greece, Latvia, Malta, Slovakia and Sweden.

PROTEST VOTE OR SINISTER DEVELOPMENT?
So does one take this electoral advent of the far-right as a consequence of a protest vote or is it a more sinister development with fascism being embraced by some as an alternative? Voter apathy is a major problem. The rise of the Right has been possible due to the crisis on and fragmentation of the Left. There are nominal socialist parties throughout Europe who have failed to articulate an alternative to the current capitalist system that is in crisis.

Instead of moving to the centre, these parties should be forging left links, building a mass movement and tackling xenophobia, racism, and sectarianism head-on. We should be countering the Right’s attempts of dividing the working-class along religious, ethnic, national or whatever lines. The sore of fascism will fester only if the Left continues to be its worst enemy and turn on itself. The collective energy of the Left should be aimed at combating and defeating the Right. The EU is once again in the hands of the Right, though not in the right hands. A ratification of the Lisbon Treaty would have major repercussions which such pro-capitalist parties at the European helm.

Four years after the Wall Street Crash and Great Depression, Hitler came to power in Germany. It is the Left’s role to ensure that such a development is never allowed to happen again.

Thatcher: 30 years on

Marking 30 years since Margaret Thatcher came to power
14 Bealtaine 2009


WITH the possible exception of the genocidal Oliver Cromwell – whose men butchered thousands of Catholics in Ireland in the mid-17th century – nobody provokes such vitriol and anger from Irish republicans as Margaret Thatcher. Just over 30 years ago, on 4 May 1979, Thatcher became Britain’s first female prime minister. She continued at the helm of British politics for over 11 years, leaving in her wake deep social unrest, mass unemployment, poverty and death. She had the audacity to paraphrase St Francis of Assisi as she first arrived at 10 Downing Street, stating: “Where there is despair, may we bring hope.”

Thatcher became notorious for her obduracy and inhumanity with her refusal to negotiate with the 1981 Hunger Strikers, which culminated in the deaths of 10 republican prisoners. These men were fighting for their five demands. Thatcher was adamant that she would not negotiate with “the men of violence”, rather hypocritical in that she befriended and supported US war-monger Ronald Reagan and Chile’s murderous dictator, General Augusto Pinochet.

Even after Bobby Sands secured 30,493 votes and became MP for Fermanagh/South Tyrone, making a mockery of the British Government’s attempts to criminalise the republican struggle, and her insistence that the ‘terrorists have no mandate’, Thatcher remained intransigent, insisting:
“We are not prepared to consider special category status for certain groups of people serving sentences for crime. Crime is crime is crime. It is not political.”
It must be noted that Special Category Status (POW status) was removed in 1976 by a Labour Government but Thatcher was insistent on carrying on. When Bobby Sands MP died on 5 May 1981, after 66 days of a tortuous and selfless brave hunger strike, Thatcher remarked:
“Sands was a convicted criminal. He chose to take his own life.”
Always first to claim that she was protecting democracy against evil, Thatcher’s government hurriedly ratified the Representation of the People Act, which prevented other IRA prisoners from contesting elections. The British criminalisation policy was shown up, with fellow Hunger Striker Kieran Doherty TD for Cavan/Monaghan, blind and on his deathbed, defiantly declaring:
“Thatcher can’t break us; I’m not a criminal.”

FERVENT UNIONIST
Thatcher was a fervent unionist, once proclaiming that “Ulster is as British as Finchley” (her north London constituency which first elected her MP in 1959). She revelled in her nickname ‘The Iron Lady’, given to her by the Soviets.

Her record in the North of Ireland became synonymous with controversial policies.
From 1982, the infamous shoot-to-kill policy was employed by British forces (the SAS being the main culprits) carrying out extra-judicial executions of IRA members and suspected republicans. In tandem with collusion, it was a method of eliminating political opponents without recourse to the law. All of this, obviously sanctioned in the British corridors of power, resulted in many unarmed republicans being executed by British forces. The British Army and RUC were also culpable of deliberately killing suspects without any attempts to arrest them and bring them to trial. This was Thatcherite democracy in action. The ‘supergrass’ (paid perjurer) system was also deployed from this time, rewarding informants with financial gain and immunity from prosecution. Nevertheless, many convictions based on the supergrass testimonies were later overturned.

In the early hours of Friday 12 October 1984, an IRA bomb ripped through Brighton’s Grand Hotel, location of the Tories’ annual conference. Thatcher was extremely fortunate to escape with her life as the explosion destroyed her bathroom. The subsequent IRA statement urged Thatcher to “Give Ireland peace and there will be no more war.”

On 15 November 1985, Thatcher and Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald signed the Anglo-Irish Agreement, which gave a formal role in relation to the North to elected representatives of the 26 Counties, albeit restricted to matters of security and the treatment of Catholics. Gerry Adams dismissed this as “a powerless consultative role given to Dublin”.

RUTHLESS
Thatcher displayed equal ruthlessness in her own country. Her name is inextricably linked to neo-liberalism, privatisation and free-market capitalism. She became known as ‘Thatcher the Milk Snatcher’ when, as Education Secretary in the mid-1970s she presided over education cuts, including the abolition of free milk provision for schoolchildren. In 1975, she surprisingly became leader of the Tories. In power, she reduced public spending in education and housing. Unemployment rocketed to 3.6 million while manufacturing crumbled.

On 2 April 1982, Argentina attempted to reclaim the Islas Malvinas (Falkland Islands) and Thatcher ordered a military response. The war lasted over two months, claiming 258 British casualties. Thatcher’s domestic popularity rose on a wave of jingoistic nationalism and she cruised to a second electoral victory.

She continued selling most of the large national utilities to private companies. In 1984, she shifted her attention to trade unions, particularly the National Union of Miners. She was adamant and largely successful in neutering the power of British trade unions as she labelled the miners, with their just demands and courageous working-class defiance, as “the enemy within”. It was a calculated attack and an act of class warfare on behalf of the powerful and wealthy.

Thatcher’s rejection of imposing economic sanctions in 1986 on apartheid South Africa further exposed her immorality. Thatcher also caused outrage with her complete support for Pinochet in Chile, who violently ousted the democratically-elected socialist leader, Salvador Allende. She commended the bloodthirsty fascist on “bringing democracy to Chile”.

NO SUCH THING AS SOCIETY
In 1987, Thatcher infamously stated that there is “no such thing as society... only individuals and families”. She signalled it was not the state’s role to provide housing for the homeless or financial assistance to the poor. It was essentially up to individuals to work hard and sort out their own problems. Her beliefs spurred on personal greed. Her introduction of the Poll Tax was instrumental in signalling the beginning of the end for the Iron Lady as thousands took to the streets to protest. According to this highly inequitable tax, she thought it positive that “the duke and the dustbin man” should pay the same amount of local tax despite the differences in their wealth and the value of their property. Protests culminated with 200,000 angry protestors engaging in pitched battles with police in London’s Trafalgar Square.
When she resigned in November 1990, she was driven away from Downing Street in tears. She left behind a quarter of British children in poverty and a country in the depths of recession.

By her own admission her greatest achievement was the creation of ‘New Labour’, a party addicted to privatisation, profit and capitalism. Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, who adopted Thatcherite policies, have brought Britain to the brink of economic collapse and social implosion. New Labour’s affair with Thatcher continues with current attempts to privatise the Royal Mail postal service.

At 84, now Baroness Thatcher’s time on earth is coming to a close. A state burial has been mooted but this has been met with murmurs of opposition. The Iron Lady’s reign was too corrosive and divisive for so many people who suffered from it.

Sri Lanka

Brutal Slaughter of Tamil Civilians


A largely defenceless people struggling to survive and hemmed in on a narrow strip of land while facing ruthless indiscriminate airstrikes, assault from gun boats and subjected to cluster bombs by a well equipped government army, conjures up the image of the recent Israeli invasion of Palestine’s Gaza Strip. However, in Sri Lanka, where since the start of this year government forces have stepped up their campaign of wiping out the separatist LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) militant group, which has fought a 25-year war for Tamil independence, the situation has culminated with the brutal slaughter of thousands of Tamil civilians who have literally become trapped in a war zone. The silence in the media in comparison to the daily headlines of Israel’s recent wanton destruction of Gaza has been deafening.

UN figures stated that 2,000 people have died in the fighting in the last month, not including last week; the most brutal. The civilian death toll has eclipsed 6,500 since the end of January and some 200,000 Tamil civilians find themselves trapped amongst the LTTE rebels on a tiny sliver of northern coastline measuring 10 sq km; surrounded by the Sri Lankan army who continue to pound the area with air strikes and heavy artillery fire, intent on exterminating the rebels and apparently unconcerned about the growing civilian death toll.

Sri Lanka is facing a growing humanitarian crisis. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has already accused the Sri Lankan government of “causing untold suffering”. The vast majority of aid workers have been refused access to the euphemistically labelled “no-fire zones”, and journalists have been completely denied entry. Make-shift hospitals are crumbling under the demand, and people are reportedly dying of malnutrition. The Tamil civilians who are “rescued” by Government forces are being rounded into internment camps.

BLOODBATH
The international community has been pathetic in its response. Although on Sunday the LTTE announced a unilateral ceasefire, the government have not reciprocated insisting that they will push on to secure complete rebel surrender, at whatever expense. The International Committee of the Red Cross has described the war zone as a “catastrophic bloodbath”.

Sri Lanka, an idyllic island off the southern tip of India and home to 20 million people, is a tropical paradise boasting golden beaches straddled by palm trees. It is a land of unquestionable beauty, abundant in resources from tea and rubber, to coconuts and diamonds. However the ordinary people of Sri Lanka live in dire poverty and the country has been torn apart by civil war. Those civilians currently trapped inside the “no-fire zone” are being forced to endure hell on earth.

Sri Lanka’s current problems can be traced back to the legacy of British colonialism. It achieved independence in 1948 as Ceylon, changing its name to Sri Lanka in 1972. The ethnic make-up of the country includes 80 per cent Sinhalese, and 10 per cent Tamil (both Indian and Sri Lankan). The Tamils, Sri Lanka’s largest ethnic minority, are mainly concentrated in the north and east of the island. After independence, the Sinhalese government introduced controversial discriminatory policies including: stripping the Tamil plantation workers of their citizenship, unfair education laws; anti-Tamil employment rules and through the ‘Sinhala Only Act’ made Sinhala the only official language of the island. Initial Tamil resistance to these policies were peaceful, but were met with repression. Civil war erupted in 1983. After the LTTE killed 13 Sri Lankan soldiers in an ambush, 3,000 Tamils were slaughtered in government-instigated Sinhalese programs in ‘Black July’. Since then the violence has spiralled out of control, claiming over 70,000 lives.

The LTTE were formed in 1976 by current leader Velupillai Prabhakaran. They seek a separate nation for Tamils, to be called Tamil Eelam, in the north and east of the country. With the failure of politics to achieve any equality for the Tamil population, the LTTE became stronger, more numerous and eventually crushed or consumed other Tamil militant groups. It soon became one of the world’s most feared and best equipped rebel groups. It has a sea and air force, and previously launched attacks on government military airports. It killed former Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa in 1993. However, it has also attracted negative attention for deploying suicide bombers and has been lambasted for allegedly recruiting children as young as twelve to engage in armed combat against government troops.

INTERNATIONAL RESPONSE
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaska has been widely accused of presiding over a racist regime, intent on crushing any dissent. The Asian Development Bank named Sri Lanka as one of the “world’s most politically unstable countries”. Human Rights Watch labelled the Sri Lankan government as one of the “world’s worst perpetrators of enforced disappearances”. It is the fourth most dangerous place on earth for journalists to venture.

The international community must act to force the Sri Lankan Government to halt its bloody offensive and Tamil civilians must be granted freedom of movement and provided with sufficient humanitarian aid. The government-run internment camps, housing fleeing civilians, are horribly overcrowded, surrounded by barbed wire and controlled by government troops, and should be shut down. Those civilians escaping the violence deserve access to adequate food, shelter and health care.
All Sri Lankans need an all-inclusive political process, based on equality, inclusion and mutual respect. There can never be peace without social justice, and Tamils should no longer be treated as the inferior race. The International Community, through the UN, should facilitate this process. The root cause of the conflict needs to be addressed, that is the grievances of the Tamil population, those very civilians that have been risking their lives to flee to India in ramshackle boats. Civilians must stop being used as disposable pawns in this bloody political power struggle. The time has come for not only peace, but also prosperity and social justice for this majestic island and all who inhabit it.

G20 London

Report from the frontline of protests at the G20 world leaders' summit in the City of London

‘Conditions ripe for arguing for a socialist economy’

AS the G20 leaders met in London last week to resuscitate capitalism, thousands of protesters took to the streets to voice their objection to the world’s dominant economic system that continues to implode and wreak social and economic havoc. On Saturday 28 March, 35,000 people marched under the slogan of ‘Jobs, Justice and Climate’ in a demonstration organised by Britain’s Trades Union Congress.

On 1 April – labelled ‘Financial Fools Day’ – some 5,000 protesters descended on London’s Bank of England. Peaceful protestsers converged at this bastion of capitalism. Regrettably, the carnival atmosphere later turned sour as a considerable section of those in attendance, masked and intent on causing trouble, hemmed in the crowd and proceeded to engage in indiscriminate and intermittent thuggery. They were the British police.

While a nearby climate camp with 1,500 environmental activists was baton charged, I found myself, along with 5,000 other protesters, hemmed in at Threadneedle Street, home to the Bank of England and nearby RBS bank. For eight hours the police refused to let anyone leave or enter the area, denying access to water, food and sanitation. Parents were even denied the chance to go back to collect their children.

This controversial tactic is known as ‘kettling’, whereby police hold protesters for hours on end against their will. This is clearly illegal detention and inevitably resulted in peaceful protesters becoming frustrated and angry. When we were eventually allowed to leave, one by one, each person was escorted out by a riot police officer, a number photographed, details taken, questioned and then searched. An estimated 122 protesters were arrested... but not a single banker.

Ian Tomlinson, a 47-year old shopworker, died of a suspected heart attack during this protest. The Independent Police Complaints Commission has received numerous corroborating complaints from observers who have stated that Ian Tomlinson was brutally assaulted by police and subsequently denied medical attention. A full public inquiry has been demanded.

‘SOCIALISING BANKS’ LOSSES’
In terms of the economy, US President Barack Obama remarked after the summit that “the patient had stabilised and was in good care”. However, the measures agreed at the G20 summit merely prescribed more neo-liberal medicine to be forced on the reluctant patient without operating on the terminal cancer of capitalism.

The G20 leaders agreed on a $1.1 trillion injection of financial aid into the global economy, trebling the resources of the IMF to $750 billion and promising the naming and shaming of tax havens. However, according to American Nobel prize-winning economist Joesph Stiglitz, throwing billions of public money into bankrupt private banks is tantamount to “the privatising of gains and the socialising of losses”. The avaricious bankers have been bailed out by their political friends while the ordinary working people suffer.

The key challenge for the Left now is to prevent neo-liberalism reasserting itself, which is exactly what the G20 decisions are attempting to facilitate.

NEO-LIBERALISM
Neo-liberalism is the cause of this crisis, the economic ideology largely attributed to Reagan and Thatcher in the 1980s, supporting free trade, the free market, privatisation, limits on public spending and lower taxation.

Post-G20 and the architecture of the world’s financial system remains virtually the same. As socialists, we must be adamant that capitalism cannot be reformed to ensure a fairer society. I applaud the direct actions of workers, faced with redundancy, occupying their factories from Waterford to Belfast, and also those French workers who have detained their capitalist bosses and compelled them to agree to justified job and wage demands.

We must resist house repossessions, job losses and welfare cuts. Mere political rhetoric is not enough, nor is resorting to settling for a ‘moral’ capitalism. An economic system that is guided by the principle of production for private profit and not for social need is anathema to any genuine socialist.

As economist John Maynard Keynes said: “Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men, for the nastiest of reasons, will somehow work for the benefit of us all.” The fact that the task of saving the world economy has been handed over to the IMF is outrageous. This organisation has been notorious in forcing the ‘Washington Consensus’ on poor and developing countries. Through its ‘structural adjustment’ programmes it has forced numerous countries, in return for receiving loans, to radically reduce health, education and welfare spending; to privatise and deregulate state enterprises, and to constrain and even cut wages and roll back worker rights. Even on the day of the G20, the IMF was in Latvia, forcing the government to reduce public spending by 40 per cent in return for a loan.

The IMF is a weapon of mass economic destruction, controlled by the US with its veto power. It is inconceivable that this organisation, with its undemocratic governance and obsession with the economic policies that have propelled the world into the current crisis, has been awarded the task of reviving the world’s economy. The economists in the IMF and World Bank amass more in a day than what the poor earn in a year.

ECONOMIC APARTHEID
We are living in a 21st century apartheid system, created and maintained by capitalism. The capitalist class of bankers and elite politicians are creaming off profits and living luxurious lifestyles on the backs of workers who are now losing their jobs and homes.

The words ‘credit crunch’ sound like a breakfast cereal instead of mass unemployment, homelessness, poverty, inequality, despair and frustration.
We should not be surprised that the G20 agreed to revive capitalism. As James Connolly stated: “Governments in a capitalist society are but committees of the rich to manage the affairs of the capitalist class.” We do not need the reform of the capitalist system, we need it replaced.

Capitalism is unsustainable; financially, socially and environmentally. Politicians have called for measures to ensure financial stability but was the situation so rosy before?

Capitalism has caused 1.5 billion people to struggle to survive on less than $1 a day. It leads to a child dying from hunger every few seconds, while the world’s rich minority live lavish lifestyles of abundance.

The fact that there is world mass unemployment while there are a shortage of doctors, teachers and social workers makes a mockery of capitalism. The vast majority of those in employment work too many hours in monotonous roles.
The conditions are ripe to be arguing for a socialist economy, one that is planned and not subject to the volatile whims of a free market based on greed.
People are citizens, not merely consumers. The crisis in capitalism is not just a crisis in derivatives, toxic assets and the sub-prime mortgage sector; the crisis is the system itself.

One positive to emerge from the crisis is that socialism is more popular. As a saying by North America’s Cree Indians goes:
“Only after the last tree has been cut down and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught, only then will we realise that money cannot be eaten.”

Another left-wing election win in Latin America

El Salvador’s FMLN celebrates capturing presidency


FOR 12 years between, 1980 and 1992, the streets and hills of El Salvador in Central America ran red with blood as it endured a vicious civil war that claimed 75,000 lives and displaced thousands more. On 15 March last, its towns and villages were once again submerged in red, but this time it was the crimson banners, flags and T-shirts of the FMLN that provided the colour.
The FMLN’s popular candidate, Mauricio Funes, a 49-year-old former journalist and broadcaster, emerged victorious from El Salvador’s presidential campaign. He secured 51.3 per cent of the vote compared to 48.7 per cent gained by his opponent from the right-wing ARENA party, Rodrigo Ávila. The latter was a former police chief and protégé of outgoing President Elias Antonio Saca. He was also a former army sniper who killed FMLN Marxist guerrillas during the uprising and is a vocal supporter of the now deceased Roberto D’Aubuisson, the infamous founder of ARENA who commanded death squads responsible for the torture and slaughter of thousands.

GROUND-BREAKING
The election of Funes is ground-breaking in that not only does it end the 20-year dominance of ARENA but it also shatters the 130 years of military and oligarchic rule of El Salvador.
Funes inherits a country virtually bankrupted by the right-wing. ARENA privatised the country’s banks, pension system and telephone and electricity companies. The cost of basic foodstuffs have spiralled out of control and gang violence is a serious problem.
Wealth distribution is shameful with the share of income held by the top 10 per cent more than 57 times higher than the share held by the bottom 10 per cent. The precarious economy relies on the significant remittances sent home by the 2.5m Salvadorans in the US, some $3.7bn last year, the equivalent of one-fifth of the country’s GDP. El Salvador is one of the poorest countries in Latin America with 40 per cent of its population struggling to exist on $2 per day.

SHERATON HOTEL
In 1989, the Sheraton Hotel in the capital, San Salvador, was the venue of one of the most famous battles of the war, where left-wing FMLN guerrillas battled right-wing-controlled soldiers floor by floor. Twenty years on, it was in the same hotel that the FMLN’s Funes delivered his victory speech.
Funes showed caution with a conciliatory oration, emphasising the need for national unity, safe change and stability. He even pledged to keep his country in the Central American Free Trade Agreement and to retain the dollar as their currency. Although the FMLN became El Salvador’s largest political force last January, gaining 35 seats in the legislative election, the right-wing coalition possess 43. As neither grouping has enough to secure a two-thirds majority required to pass important legislation, compromise is a necessity.

BACKGROUND
For those on the right, Funes is no more than a popular figurehead who will be controlled by the communist hardliners in the FMLN. To critics on the left he is a moderate and opportunist. Funes is an open admirer of Brazilian President Lula (his wife Vanda Pignato is a Brazilian who represented Lula’s Workers’ Party in El Salvador).
Funes is the first FMLN candidate with no guerrilla background, although he lost his brother to Government forces and subsequently interviewed FMLN revolutionaries during the war. He stated that he wants to “end privilege for the few” and that “the time has come for the excluded, the opportunity has arrived for genuine democrats, for men and women who believe in social justice and solidarity”.
He also aspires to crack down on tax evasion and corruption and implement policies to help the poor. His right-hand man is new Vice-President Salvador Sánchez Ceren, a former FMLN guerrilla commander, and they will assume presidential office on 1 June for a five-year term.

OBAMA REACTION
In a notable shift in US foreign policy, the Obama administration in the United States promised to work with whoever was elected El Salvador’s new president, in stark contrast to the Reagan government who ploughed $7bn into attempting to crush the FMLN over a ten-year period and prevent the spread of “evil communism”.
Five years ago, former President George W Bush threatened to stop US aid to El Salvador in the advent of a FMLN victory as a continuing show of US support for ARENA, who reciprocated by sending 6,000 Salvadoran troops to Iraq, the last few of whom have just recently returned.

POIGNANT
It is rather poignant that Funes won the presidency by 75,000 votes, the same number of people who lost their lives in El Salvador’s bloody conflict.
With Funes and the FMLN, El Salvador now at last has a definite sense of hope after decades of arduous struggle and sacrifice in its quest for social justice and an end to repression.
The current political context would not have been achieved without the bravery and selflessness of those Salvadoran freedom fighters that died. Let their deaths not be in vain.

Viva el FMLN y el pueblo salvadoreño!