March against the drones

PEACE activists marched through the centre of London to the United States embassy last week to protest at the use by the imperialist powers of unmanned drones to bring death, injury and terror to people living in Pakistan, Somalia and other places.

The demonstration was organised by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party and Stop the War as part of a worldwide series of protests against drones, the biggest protest being in Pakistan.

Members and supporters of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (the Pakistani political party headed by Imran Khan) marched from 10 Downing Street to the US Embassy in London demand an end to the use of drones – which are supposed to be targeted at “terrorists” but inevitably kill more civilians, including many children.

Their use is a violation of human rights and has sabotaged peace negotiations between the Pakistani government and representatives of the Taliban.

The US provides no evidence, no trial and no defence for those it accuses of terrorism – just an instant death sentence for them and anyone else who happens to be near them. In many cases groups of children and or field workers have been assessed to be terrorists by those remote controllers in charge of the drones and blown to pieces.

Earlier this month the German government has suspended the purchase of armed drones on the grounds that it “categorically rejects illegal killings.”

This follows a report by Amnesty International that accused Merkel’s government of aiding the US with drone strikes in Pakistan and a campaign in Germany against the use of drones.

US drone attacks have resulted in deaths of innocent civilians and extra judicial killings of suspected militants in Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan. These attacks violate human rights, are classed as a “war crime” by the United Nations and violate Pakistan’s sovereignty.

Amnesty International stated in its recent report, Will I be next?’ US drone strikes in Pakistan that Pakistan government sources confirm the US has launched 330 to 374 drone strikes in Pakistan between 2004 and September 2013.

According to these sources, between 400 and 900 civilians have been killed in these attacks and at least 600 people have been seriously injured with life changing injuries.

The PTI has been very vocal regarding its opposition of drone attacks in Pakistan since they first started in 2004. Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) believes that drones are not only in violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty, they are also a major hurdle for the way to peace and stability within Pakistan.

The LRC in debate

By New Worker correspondent

Jeremy Corbyn making a point

LONDON’S Conway Hall was once again the venue of the tenth annual conference of the Labour Representation Committee where left-wing Labour Party members – and a few others including delegates from the New Communist Party which affiliated to the LRC in February 2005.

And NCP comrades ran a joint New Worker/Searchlight stall throughout the day of debate on the most pressing issues facing the Labour and trade union movement.

Numbers were a little down this year but there were a number of other events on the same day – a march against drones and a march to demand the release of Shaker Aamer to name just two – which left activists thinly spread between events.

The conference was opened by John McDonnell MP presenting the National Committee statement, covering the long list of topics mentioned in the statement.

He was followed by journalist Owen Jones and Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the civil service union PCS.

There were many resolutions concerning the Fire Service cuts and firefighters’ pensions, the privatisation of the Royal Mail, energy prices, fracking, benefit cuts, defending the link between the unions and the Labour Party and many more.

Few were controversial but an emergency motion on Grangemouth and the privatisation of the Royal Mail from Brent and Harrow LRC led to a heated debate.

The motion was moved with passion by Graham Durham, who began by pointing out that he had been to many recent meetings of the LRC, the People’s Assembly and other forums of the left and heard exactly the same speeches from McDonnell, Jones and others but the fine words had failed to prevent the disaster of the defeat of Unite, Britain’s largest union, at Grangemouth or the privatisation of the Royal Mail.

This was the wrong message to deliver to a room of very hard-working activists, many looking well weary but still fighting. And it was unjustified. Grangemouth and the privatisation of the Royal Mail were indeed defeats for the working class but those present were not culpable.

Since the defeat of the miners’ strike, the passing of anti-union laws and the fall of the Soviet Union we have suffered 30 years of working class retreat and demoralisation but it is not the fault of those activists who have done all in their power to hold the line and are at last now beginning to have a few successes.

These include the vote in the House of Commons in September against going to war with Syria and court battles that have stopped, for the time being, cuts to Lewisham Hospital, the rescue of the Independent Living Allowance and the ruling that compulsory workfare was illegal. All proving that campaigning and activism are worthwhile and can succeed.

But the masses of the working class are not yet properly woken up and mobilised and there may be more defeats like Grangemouth. But as the oppression of the working class is ratcheted up by our greedy and callous ruling class the anger and the level of mobilisation have to grow and defeats can be reversed. It’s all a matter of numbers out on the streets – and even more important, out on strike.

There were other problems with the motion – it wanted to affiliate the LRC to the Grass Roots Left faction in Unite – and apart from the opening statement most of the motion was rejected by conference.

The afternoon session included a debate on Syria. The LRC has taken a principled position of opposing all imperialist aggression in the Middle East (Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Iran) and Libya.

But there was some controversy over the attitude to the leaderships of these countries under attack, some feeling that in addition to the imperialist propaganda they had to add their own barbs.

How is it that left-wingers can see through the vile demonization by the ruling class media against figures like Len McCluskey and Bob Crow but believe every allegation made against Assad and Gaddafi?

There is still clearly a strong influence from Trotskyism that anyone elected to the leadership of a country, a union or a movement automatically turns into a monster on taking office and must be brought down – an attitude that is bound to doom any working class mobilisation.

This was reflected in what the movers conceded was a badly worded motion, which the NCP and its supporters  could not support, and it was easily defeated.

Resisting the enemies of democracy

By New Worker

correspondent

ANTI-FASCIST and anti-racist activists and academics gathered last Saturday at the Bishopsgate Institute in London’s East End to debate the rising threat of extreme right-wing ideas throughout Europe and the western world and how to confront it.

The conference was called by the anti-fascist magazine Searchlight, which it marking its 50th year. Searchlight editor Gerry Gable told the New Worker that “many people when looking at the far right do not see beyond the British National Party and the English Defence League”.

These organisations have suffered serious setbacks in recent years – largely because of the hard work of anti-fascists and anti-racists going round and knocking on doors wherever the BNP has been standing in elections to counter the lies put out by the BNP – and by turning out in huge numbers wherever the EDL declares it intends to march, not to fight but simply to block them.

Bothe the BNP and the EDL are declining but that does not mean that the threat has gone away.

Two recent conferences in London were organised by people who are re-inventing fascism for the modern era. One was facilitated by the Traditional Britain Group – which has links with the right-wing of the Tory Party and provides a bridge with the new fascists in same way and the Monday Club used to. The other was fully organised by the TBG.

The first, on 12th October, is entitled “The end of the present world: the post-American century and beyond”, and will feature the infamous Russian fascist Alexander Dugin and Alain de Benoist, the French New Right philosopher and writer who for the past 40 years has tried to influence the extreme-right agenda and organisations internationally.

A week later the TBG’s day-long conference entitled “The future of the nation state”, brought together a range of extremist participants.

 Among the most concerning is the rise of Generation Identity – an extreme right wing “intellectual” group that is growing across Europe, including Britain, and is re-inventing eugenics.

A leading voice in Generation Identity is Markus Willinger, who has written Generation Identity: A Declaration of War Against the ’68ers, is trying to undo all the reforms, all the advances against racism, sexism, homophobia and general intolerance that have been made since the 1960s, which he refers to as “cultural Marxism”.

And we could be seeing the influence of these ideas in the Con-Dem coalition’s demonization of the long-term sick and disabled as “scroungers” – and some of the outrageously racist and sexist utterances of various Tory councillors and UK Independence Party “loose cannons”.

Last Saturday’s conference began with a debate on the role of the trade unions in resisting fascism and racism that was chaired by Megan Dobney, regional secretary of the South East Region TUC.

Speakers at this session included Kay Carberry, who is assistant general secretary of the TUC, Mohammed Taj, a Bradford bus driver and a member of Unite who is the TUC’s first Asian President, Jo Rust from King’s Lynn trades council and Cathy Pound who is [Searchlight’s] trade union liaison officer.

The second session dealt with the “No Platform” policy chaired by Aaron Kiely, the National Union of Students Black Students’ officer and included speakers Dr Matthew Feldman who c-directs the Centre for Fascist, Anti-Fascist and Post Fascist Studies at Teesside University, Kyaz Mughal, founder and co-director of Faith Matters, veteran [Searchlight] activist Paul Crofts and journalist Tim Lezzard.

Session three was entitled: “Education in the front-line of the defence of young people” chaired by Dr Paul Jackson of the University of Northampton. Speakers included teacher David Rosenberg, Paul Mackney, former general secretary of the lecturers’ union Natfhe until it merged with AUT to become UCU, Kevin Courtney, the deputy general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, and Dagenham teacher Dominic Byrne who a long history of campaigning against racism.

The fourth and final session, on building a stronger, non-sectarian front of mutual support, was chaired by Gerry Gable. Speakers included Bob Archer, president of Redbridge NUT, Ulrike Schmidt, a musician, instrument-maker, teacher and Activist for Amnesty specialising in campaigning against the persecution suffered by the Roma community in Europe, Daphne Liddle from the New Communist Party, Steve Hart of the trade union think-tank Class and chair of Unite Against fascism, Jo Caldwell, a leader of the very successful We Are Waltham Forest, which formed to keep the EDL out of the borough but now also campaigns against cuts and Maria Nikolakaki, Associate Professor of Education at the University of the Peloponnese in Greece and an active anti-fascist.

Sutton Attacks Disabled Parking

By Adrian Chan-Wyles

THE ULTRA-right-wing Council of the London Borough of Sutton, south London, has continued to support and perpetuate the latest national trend of demonising and attacking people with disabilities.  Many people with disabilities undergo a vigorous medical test and examination when they apply to be accepted for the Blue Badge Holder Scheme, which allows for the parking of vehicles (carrying, or driven by disabled people), on double and single yellow lines for up to three hours without charge.  The Blue Badge is also for vehicles carrying disabled people to use priority parking places next hospital entrances, bus and train stations, as well easily accessible spaces in council run car parks in the borough, and so on.  The Blue Badge may also be used in this manner nationally in Britain, and throughout the European Union.

The Blue Badge Scheme acknowledges that people with disabilities, being more or less permanently excluded from mainstream society, need extra-help and encouragement to travel unhindered around the area (and country) that they live in. As rich families in such places as conservative Sutton often own more than one car, parking spaces are highly competitive and difficult to acquire, and as many people with disabilities have to exist on an ever retreating welfare system in Britain, parking can be very expensive in the area.  This social and financial pressure serves to alienate people with disabilities to an ever greater extent, and explains why the Blue Badge Scheme is important to encourage participation within society and a movement away from isolated living.

The current British Con-Dem Coalition has unleashed a tirade of anti-disability rhetoric and action across Britain, with an increase of attacks against people with disabilities by 75 per cent, as clearly shown in Katharine Quarmby’s excellent study entitled Scapegoat – Why We are Failing Disabled People.  Quarmby makes the following points that nine out of 10 people in Britain have never invited a person with disabilities into their home; only two in 10 people have disabled friends, eight out of 10 children with learning difficulties are bullied at school, nearly 50 per cent of disabled people have recently experienced or witnessed physical abuse, and the number of Disability Hate Crimes reported has risen by 75 per cent in one year alone.  This clearly shows that within a capitalist society that has a national government espousing right-wing rhetoric and pursuing hateful policies, it is the minority under-classes, such as the disabled, that disproportionally suffer the most.

On 1^st November 2013, the Parking Services department of Sutton Council issued a letter to all Blue Badge Holders within the borough, stating that residents of the exclusive Belmont area of the city have requested that Sutton Council revoke the right of disabled vehicle owners to park in permit parking bays in the area.  Blue Badge Holders are informed that Ward Counsellors are in support of this measure and that Sutton Council will soon be amending the parking law.

 Disabled people living in the area in question have not been consulted, nor have disabled people living in the borough in general.  The local non-disabled residents of Belmont have expressed a dislike for the presence of those with disabilities legally parking in the area.  What is extraordinary in this day and age of bureaucracy is that a small, bigoted group of people have had their concerns listened to, and legitimised by Sutton Council, and their demands immediately met with a change in local parking law.

 If a similar group of local residents campaigned for school, hospitals, resources, and greater understanding between ethnic groups, for example, the wheels of council administration would turn very slowly until the demands were withdrawn, forgotten, or both.  As it stands, people with disabilities living in the Belmont area, and those who would like to visit them, are now encouraged to apply for a parking permit and ”pay” like other residents in the area, thus undermining the practical and compassionate Blue Badge Scheme, and perpetuating the inequalities the scheme was set-up to over-come.         

Down with the south Korea puppet regime!

 

By New Worker 

correspondent

SUPPORTERS of the Korean revolution returned to the picket the south Korean embassy to protest against the oppressive regime, whose leader was greeted at Buckingham Palace last week. New Communist Party leader Andy Brooks joined the demonstration called by the UK Korean Friendship Association outside the embassy in London on 7^th November to protest against the state visit of fascist puppet Park Geun Hye last week.

              Dermot Hudson, KFA Official Delegate and chair of the Juché Idea Study Group, opened the picket by saying: “The south Korean embassy is a joke and should not exist as south Korea is not a state. South Korea has no independence; south Korea is totally dependent on the United States and indeed was created by the US.

“Today south Korean puppet ruler Park Geun Hye is on a state visit to the UK and is being entertained at the expense of the British taxpayer despite huge cutbacks in public spending. Park is as dictator like her father Park Chung Hee.”

General Park Chung Hee came to power in a military coup in 1961 and ruled with an iron fist until he was assassinated by the head of his own intelligence service during a power struggle in 1979. His daughter is now following in her father’s footsteps by banning the Unified Progressive Party as well as the Teachers Union.

The demonstrators waved the DPR Korea flag in front of the puppet embassy as well as the UK KFA banner and maintained a barrage of slogans throughout the 90-minute afternoon protest action.

The picketers exchanged banter with a couple of journalists from NK News, an anti-DPRK front that poses as an independent news agency, and a man who said he was a north Korean defector living in London. They also had to put up with the unwelcome attention of a member of the puppet embassy staff who went around taking close-up photographs of the protesters in an amateurish attempt to intimidate the demonstrators and presumably for the records of the south Korean intelligence service!