>
> WW News Service Digest #51
>
> 1) U.S. court strikes down Hawaiian-elected board
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 2) Students gear up for actions vs. IMF
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 3) Foes of sanctions on Iraq take arrests at airbase
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 4) Socialist hits prisons for profit
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 5) Texas death row prisoners escalate struggle
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 6) Pelican Bay prison explosion of anger
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 7) Report from inside north Korea
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 8) Stand with Cuba
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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>Message-ID: <008001bf8577$ba44b290$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] U.S. court strikes down Hawaiian-elected board
>Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 20:19:46 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="iso-8859-1"
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>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Mar. 9, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>THREAT TO NATIVE PEOPLES:
>U.S. COURT STRIKES DOWN HAWAIIAN-ELECTED BOARD
>
>By Chris Fry
>Honolulu, Hawaii
>
>In a ruling that can deprive Indigenous peoples all over
>the United States of their basic rights, the Supreme Court
>has voted seven to two to outlaw the election of members of
>the Office of Hawaiian Affairs by the Native Hawaiian
>people. The court ruled that restricting this election to
>Native Hawaiians is a violation of the 15th Amendment of
>the U.S. Constitution.
>
>The Office of Hawaiian Affairs administers "ceded" land
>and other assets worth $300 million. It is charged with
>providing assistance to the 200,000 Native Hawaiians who
>have survived two centuries of European and American
>interventions and outright conquest. OHA was created by an
>amendment of the Hawaiian constitution in 1978 after much
>struggle by the Hawaiian people. It is one product of more
>than 100 state and federal laws designed, at least
>partially, to defend the Hawaiian people's culture,
>education, language and other rights.
>
>With this denial of their most fundamental right--the
>right of an Indigenous people to select their own leaders--
>all the Native Hawaiian legislation is now under attack.
>Right-wing law firms are canvassing non-Hawaiian residents
>of the islands to persuade them to launch lawsuits against
>other pro-Hawaiian laws.
>
>"Someone could go into court and challenge the legality of
>the present board [OHA]. Everything is on the table,"
>threatened John Goemans, the chief attorney in the lawsuit
>against OHA.
>
>With millions of dollars of assets at stake, the rapacious
>neocolonialists are out to completely deprive the Hawaiian
>people of all right to self-determination.
>
>ISLANDS SEIZED BY U.S.
>
>Before the English explorer Captain Cook arrived at the
>Big Island of Hawaii in the 1770s, the Hawaiian people had
>a large, peaceful and vibrant community stretching across
>all of the islands. As many as 600,000 to a million Native
>people lived here.
>
>When the Europeans arrived, the Hawaiians formed a unified
>kingdom, which lasted more than a century, and was
>recognized as a legal government all over the world. But a
>steady stream of missionaries, merchants, plantation
>owners, along with several epidemics, undermined the
>Hawaiian culture and killed many Native Hawaiian people.
>
>Finally in 1893, in a brazen act of conquest, wealthy
>planters overthrew the Hawaiian government of Queen
>Lili'uokalani with the aid of 164 heavily armed U.S.
>Marines stationed on the palace grounds. This act was so
>outrageous it was condemned even by U.S. President Grover
>Cleveland. Later, the Queen was imprisoned for nine months.
>
>In 1898, violating even its own constitutional
>requirements, the U.S. annexed Hawaii. Hawaii became not
>only a source of wealth for the growing American colonial
>empire but also a huge army and navy base.
>
>But the Native Hawaiian people never stopped struggling
>for their rights. In 1920, they forced Congress to form the
>Hawaiian Homes Commission, which set aside some public land
>for "people of Hawaiian blood to again get possession of
>land in Hawaii."
>
>In 1976, the Protect Kaho'olawe'Ohana organization staged
>several "illegal" landings on the Hawaiian island of
>Kaho'olawe, demanding that the U.S. military stop using the
>island as a bombing range, and that it be returned to the
>Hawaiian people. That struggle succeeded, although the
>island is still full of explosive devices that the federal
>government is slow to clean up.
>
>In 1993, Congress was pressured into passing a resolution
>that apologized for the overthrow of the Hawaiian
>government and pledged to take steps toward
>"reconciliation."
>
>CONDITIONS OF OPPRESSION
>
>Today, Native Hawaiian people suffer from high
>unemployment, poor heath care, lack of education, and a
>high rate of imprisonment. Many of the prisoners are
>shipped off to mainland jails in Texas and other states,
>far from their families.
>
>Working people in Hawaii, who come from many national
>backgrounds, today face a depressed economy, despite the
>so-called boom in the United States. While mainland-based
>corporations rake in millions in profits from tourism,
>workers here are usually confined to low-paying jobs in the
>service industry.
>
>Many non-Hawaiian workers here told news reporters they
>also oppose the Supreme Court ruling. As Paul Cocke noted:
>"OHA trustees should be voted by the Hawaiians only,
>because they should get to vote for their own leaders. I
>would not vote in the election."
>
>As soon as the ruling was announced, Freddy Rice, a great
>grandson of one of the early missionaries to Hawaii, whose
>father had an 18,000-acre ranch on the Big Island of
>Hawaii, immediately filed suit against the OHA elections.
>Rice stated that he was somehow being denied his rights
>because he was not permitted to vote for OHA board members.
>
>Rice's Washington lawyer is Theodore Olsen, a former
>assistant attorney general under Ronald Reagan. He was a
>law partner of Kenneth Starr.
>
>The Supreme Court stated that "An inquiry into ancestral
>lines is not consistent with respect based on the unique
>personality each of us possesses, a respect the
>Constitution itself secures in its concern for persons and
>citizens." This twisted logic opens the door for attacks on
>the rights of all Native peoples to select, because of a
>shared national identity, their own leaders.
>
>Of course, state officials in Hawaii are saying that this
>ruling only outlaws the State of Hawaii's role in the
>elections. But immediately after the ruling, Hawaiian
>Governor Benjamin Cayetano announced he was going to
>dismiss nearly all of the current members of OHA because of
>their "illegal election." The board members have announced
>that they are not leaving their posts.
>
> - END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
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>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
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>
>
>Message-ID: <008601bf8577$d04098c0$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] Students gear up for actions vs. IMF
>Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 20:20:23 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="iso-8859-1"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Mar. 9, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>RALLY, TEACH-INS:
>STUDENTS GEAR UP FOR APRIL ACTIONS VS. THE IMF
>
>By Leslie Feinberg
>Buffalo, N.Y.
>
>A burgeoning coalition of students, community groups and
>labor organizations here has organized a week of activities
>on campuses and in the downtown area to help build the
>struggle against the World Trade Organization and corporate
>globalization.
>
>The coalition grew out of a January meeting called by
>students who had taken part in the November Battle of
>Seattle against the WTO.
>
>Within weeks the Western New York Coalition for World Wide
>Economic Justice grew from seven to 32 diverse
>organizations, including unions like CWA Local 1168 and
>SEIU Local 1199 Upstate as well as the Food Not Bombs,
>Center for Economic Justice, NYPIRG, UB Amnesty
>International, UB Environmental Network, Viva La Casa,
>Western New York Coalition of Safety and Health, WNY Peace
>Center, Workers World Party and the Green Party.
>
>The AFL-CIO Central Labor Council supported the anti-WTO
>week.
>
>The Buffalo events also galvanized support for the April
>16-17 protest that aims to shut down the World Bank and
>International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington, D.C.
>Organizing for the April actions is taking place on
>campuses and communities across the U.S.
>
>Already the call for mass actions on April 16 is shaping
>up to be Round Two in a fight that began as the Battle of
>Seattle.
>
>Seattle became a battleground beginning on Nov. 30, when
>riot-equipped police forces launched an attack on protests
>by youth and labor against the World Trade Organization
>meeting there. More than 50,000 activists had converged on
>the city. And some 10,000 took part in direct action
>protests. The state used tear gas, pepper spray and plastic
>bullets in an attempt to crush the bold and creative anti-
>corporate demonstrations.
>
>Now students, labor and political activists,
>environmentalists and many others are planning to confront
>the IMF and World Bank. The IMF, now dubbed the Imperialist
>Monetary Fund by movement activists, holds its next semi-
>annual meeting in Washington on April 16. The World Bank
>meets there the following day.
>
>The IMF and World Bank--even more than the WTO--are tools
>that the dominant U.S., West European and Japanese banks
>use to squeeze super-profits out of labor and natural
>resources all over the world.
>
>Organizers report planning efforts in New York City, San
>Francisco, Seattle, Winnipeg, Bloomington, Ind., Chicago
>and other communities to bring people to Washington in
>April.
>
>Groups in Haiti, Thailand, Mali, Brazil, south Korea,
>India, Pakistan, Kenya and the Philippines--countries the
>most burdened by the IMF--as well as in Canada, France and
>Britain, also are planning to send members to Washington or
>hold protests in their own country.
>
>`SEATTLE WAS JUST THE BEGINNING'
>
>Western New York Coalition organizers secured a large
>meeting hall at the University of Buffalo for the first of
>the week's teach-in events here on Feb. 21. But students
>packed the room--standing room only. Some 20 percent of the
>audience was Asian, Black or Latino; roughly one-third were
>women.
>
>UB student Mike Schade co-chaired the event. He told those
>gathered that this campus event--and others to follow that
>week--were organized as teach-ins. He said that teach-ins
>had been successful tools to educate, transform
>consciousness and mobilize during the anti-Vietnam war and
>anti-apartheid movements and labor struggles.
>
>Two videos shown at the Feb. 21 teach-in gave those in
>attendance a vivid picture of this super-exploitation of
>workers. And the audience saw first-hand how the industries
>run for the profits of the giant banks and corporations
>from the imperialist countries ravage and despoil the air,
>water and land around the world with impunity.
>
>Students learned that in the last four years of the 20th
>century, the number of people around the world living in
>abject poverty grew by 200 million. During the same years,
>the planet's 200 richest individuals doubled their wealth.
>
>But the videos also brought into focus a glimpse of
>struggles by people in this country in solidarity with
>those being oppressed by U.S. corporations. A successful
>campaign in the U.S. against The Gap, for example, won
>reinstatement of workers in El Salvador who had been fired
>after forming a union.
>
>Students on campuses across the country have also held
>building occupations, rallies and other forms of protests
>to force their administrations to stop selling goods made
>in sweatshops around the world.
>
>Teach-in organizers performed a skit about the World Trade
>Organization called "The Free Trade Zone," done as a parody
>of the television series "The Twilight Zone." The skit
>illustrated how the WTO always rules in favor of the
>corporations.
>
>Student organizers polled those gathered for ideas about
>an anti-WTO resolution that could be submitted to the
>Common Council--Buffalo's city council.
>
>A student organizer who co-chaired the event raised the
>idea that a rally outside the Common Council meeting might
>encourage the politicians to pass the progressive
>resolution. Another student suggested that the process of
>community outreach about the ideas raised in the resolution
>would be the most lasting contribution.
>
>Others raised the importance of linking local efforts--
>like saving the Great Lakes water being siphoned off for
>sale and supporting an upcoming picket by SEIU Justice for
>Janitors--to the anti-WTO organizing.
>
>Coalition organizers announced that plans were already
>underway to send people to the April actions in Washington.
>
>Student co-chair Eric Bebernitz concluded that "Seattle
>was just the beginning" and that the April 16-17 events in
>Washington "will be the Seattle of the East Coast."
>
>VIOLENCE BAITING
>
>The only corporate media present at the UB event was
>Channel 2 television. Its coverage presented the coalition
>and its teach-in as attempting to instigate riots.
>
>The television coverage was not the only source of
>violence-baiting. Mike Schade told Workers World newspaper
>that the FBI or some other outside police agency had
>reportedly been calling area college and university
>administrators in an effort to encourage them to cancel the
>teach-ins scheduled on their campuses. These officials were
>told that the coalition is made up of "violent groups."
>
>Schade said officials at Niagara University had originally
>agreed to provide space for a Feb. 23 teach-in and then
>abruptly cancelled the event. Twenty students on campus
>showed up in spite of the baiting. Schade said that after
>the students there return from spring break, the coalition
>will try to reschedule the teach-in.
>
>In spite of the baiting, successful teach-ins took place
>as scheduled at Canisius College on Feb. 22 and Buffalo
>State on Feb. 24.
>
>STUDENTS, WORKERS HELP EACH OTHER OUT
>
>On Feb. 25, students from the week's teach-ins helped beef
>up the SEIU Local 200-C rally and protest to demand justice
>for janitors at Main Place Tower. The Tower owners fired
>the union cleaning contractor and union janitors on Feb. 14
>and replaced them with scabs. In a show of solidarity, SEIU
>janitors came to the coalition rally that evening.
>
>More than 150 people attended the evening rally that was
>the culmination of the week of outreach and education. The
>audience included representatives from many of the groups
>that make up the coalition.
>
>Bev Hiestand, chief steward of CWA Local 1168, talked
>about the attempts by U.S. pharmaceutical giants to block
>affordable AIDS drugs in South Africa.
>
>Monica Moorehead, a national organizer for Millions for
>Mumia and the 2000 presidential candidate for Workers World
>Party, spoke about the impact of the global assembly line
>on women. She explained that workers and peasants had won
>substantial and significant gains after carrying out
>revolutions in the Soviet Union, China and other countries
>attempting to build socialism. But since socialism was
>overturned in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, "the
>giant monopolies created by capitalism have been relatively
>free to roam the globe and impose their will upon the
>workers and the oppressed," with women the most affected.
>
>Mary Ellen Heimberger, from the Coalition for Economic
>Justice, discussed how corporate globalization results in
>suffering for workers worldwide.
>
>Kevin Donaher, from Global Exchange, talked about the
>Battle of Seattle. He said it could prove easier to shut
>down the IMF meeting than the WTO because Washington has
>more major cities nearby to draw from and because the
>
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