WW News Service Digest #286
1) Protest Bush on June 25
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2) Support Turks and Kurds on death fast
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3) U.S. mercenaries directed 1998 massacre in Colombia
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4) Thousands rally in Belgrade: 'Don't sell Milosevic to the West'
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the June 28, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
AS U.S. MAYORS MEET:
PEOPLE'S CONGRESS PLANS SPEAKOUT OF WORKERS AND POOR
By Kris Hamel
Detroit
Downtown at the glass-and-steel Renaissance Center,
preparations are being made for the annual meeting of the
U.S. Conference of Mayors. The city government is also using
the June 22 through 26 conference to kick off celebrations
of Detroit's 300th anniversary.
But in the neighborhoods, a different kind of preparation is
going on. Activists have been busy getting out the word
about an all-day, alternative People's Congress to be held
on Saturday, June 23, at the United Church of Christ. It
will be close enough to the Ren Cen for a 12 noon march and
rally to the site of the mayors' meeting.
The theme of the People's Congress is: "Rebuild the cities
for the people, not the corporations and rich! Stop police
brutality!"
Youths and environmental activists, African American
community leaders, union and grassroots organizers and
others have come together in a Coalition for the People's
Congress to put forward a "people's agenda" addressing the
devastating problems facing oppressed workers in major
cities like Detroit.
Organizers say the People's Congress will develop its own
program for the cities, a program for all the workers,
unemployed and poor that will contrast with "the Bush/big
business program of more giveaways to the rich and more
money for the Pentagon war machine."
Bush will hear about this personally when he attends the
mayors' conference on Monday, June 25. The People's Congress
and others will be outside picketing.
A PROGRAM FOR WORKERS AND POOR
The People's Congress will discuss a program of what to do
to stop police brutality and murders; end racist profiling,
disenfranchisement and voting rights abuses; end hate crimes
against people of color, women, and lesbian, gay, bi and
trans people; and win domestic partner benefits.
It will also focus on how to stop plant closings and
layoffs; roll back gasoline and utility prices; stop union
busting and attacks on undocumented workers; and provide
equal, quality education for all without privatization or
vouchers.
It will show that the cities could be rebuilt if there were
a moratorium on "debt" payments--Detroit pays $100 million a
year to the banks--and if the $300-billion Pentagon budget
were used instead for jobs, housing, health care and low-
cost public transportation.
The People's Congress and demonstration will be structured
so that workers and the poor can be heard. Activists and
concerned people are invited to bring their issues and
struggles before the entire body and bring their demands to
the noontime demonstration outside the mayors' conference
luncheon.
WHAT'S IN A NAME?
As the spotlight is turned on history, it turns out that
many Detroit streets are named after slave owners. So the
demonstration will stop at Jefferson and Beaubien for a
symbolic renaming of both streets.
Activists have submitted a petition to the Detroit City
Council asking that streets named for slave owners be
temporarily renamed during the U.S. Conference of Mayors,
and that a commission be set up to make the name changes
permanent. They have also called for a public hearing.
At the Saturday demonstration Cass Avenue--named for a slave
owner who ran for U.S. president in 1848--will be renamed
Paul Robeson Avenue. Woodward Avenue--named for a slavery-
upholding Detroit judge--will be called Coleman A. Young
Avenue after the city's first African American mayor. Ida B.
Wells will replace Jefferson; Washington Blvd. will become
John Brown Blvd. The name of playwright Lorraine Hansberry
will take the place of Abbott; and so on.
The largest Detroit slave owners, William Macomb and his
brother Alexander Macomb, have a street in Detroit as well
as Macomb County. W.E.B. DuBois Street would replace Macomb
Street.
The activists say in their petition to the City Council,
"The taking of [new name] nominations from city residents
would engage our community in learning the real history of
our city and its heroes, and that should be what the 300th
anniversary of Detroit is all about."
The Saturday People's Congress will run from 9 a.m. to 5
p.m. The Monday anti-Bush demonstration will gather on East
Jefferson Avenue at Beaubien at 9:00 a.m.
For more information, call the Coalition for a People's
Congress at (313) 831-0750.
From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: lauantai 23. kesäkuu 2001 06:45
Subject: [WW] Support Turks and Kurds on death fast
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the June 28, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
BOSTON FORUM:
FORMER POLITICAL PRISONER URGES SUPPORT FOR TURKS AND KURDS ON DEATH FAST
By Frank Neisser
Boston
A former Turkish political prisoner told a solidarity
meeting here on June 17 that even though 23 prisoners in her
country have died on a hunger strike and more than 50 others
have suffered irreparable loss of memory, the struggle is
continuing.
Cemile Cakir described the murderous assault of the Turkish
Army on 21 prisons last December to try and break the spirit
of the political prisoners, who are resisting implementation
of an isolation and control system modeled on U.S. high-tech
behavior-modification prisons and called the F-system.
Although the troops massacred 34 prisoners under "Operation
Back to Life," they could not stop the hunger strike, which
began last Oct. 20 and still continues.
Cakir explained the role of the CIA and the Pentagon in
overturning civilian governments in Turkey and of the
International Monetary Fund in forcing Turkey into economic
crisis and then dictating how the economy would be run.
Members of Boston's Kurdish community were in the audience
and on the platform. Kurdish activist Umut Ozcan read moving
testimony from prisoners and families detailing the horrific
assault on Dec. 19. Dr. Huseyen Aktas, a leader from the
Kurdish community, described the U.S. role in Turkey's war
on the Kurds, and called on participants not to spend
tourist dollars in Turkey.
Palestinian activist Amer Jubran spoke of Palestinian
prisoners in Israeli jails and gave solidarity to the
Turkish prisoners.
Bob Traynham--member of Steel Workers Local 8751, Boston
School Bus Drivers, the International Action Center, and a
former Black Panther--discussed the death penalty, the
prison-industrial complex, and police repression here in the
U.S., including Boston and Cincinnati.
The meeting showed the great need right now for
international support and solidarity with the Turkish
political prisoners. Justice for Turkish Political Prisoners
and the IAC are calling on people to write Prime Minister
Bulent Ecevit demanding an end to the F-system and attacks
on the prisoners. Forward letters to JTPF, c/o International
Action Center, 31 Germania St, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130.
From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: lauantai 23. kesäkuu 2001 06:46
Subject: [WW] U.S. mercenaries directed 1998 massacre in Colombia
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the June 28, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
COLOMBIA:
SOLDIERS TESTIFY U.S. MERCENARIES DIRECTED 1998 MASSACRE OF VILLAGE
By Andy McInerney
The massacre on Dec. 13, 1998, in the northern town of Santo
Domingo was nothing unusual in Colombia, where a dirty war
against the workers and poor has raged for decades.
A roar of U.S.-made UH-1H helicopters and OV-10 fighter
planes overhead. Bursts of machine-gun fire. Cluster bombs
and rockets exploding in the town square.
Screams of fear and agony. At least 18 people killed
outright, at least 30 more injured. Sisters, brothers,
fathers, mothers--the majority Communist Party activists.
None armed. Their only crime was refusing to bow before the
oil bosses in the nearby Cano Limon oil fields, owned by Los
Angeles-based Occidental Petroleum.
The scene was all too typical. Nearly 40,000 people have
been killed in the Colombian government's dirty war over the
last decade--not mainly in battles, but in massacres.
There were differences, though, in the Santo Domingo
massacre.
First, it was carried out by uniformed Colombian government
troops. Usually, the troops shed their uniforms and blame
the massacres on paramilitary death squads. These death
squads are organized and directed--in many cases staffed--by
the Colombian military.
But the biggest difference was not on the ground.
We now know that U.S. mercenaries directed the massacre.
U.S. ROLE IN MASSACRE EXPOSED
Colombian military officers, testifying on the incident last
month in Bogotá, charged that three U.S. pilots took an
active part in the bombing, including identifying targets.
The charges were exposed in the June 15 San Francisco
Chronicle.
According to the testimony, the three U.S. pilots--Joe Orta,
Charlie Denny and Dan MacClintock--worked under contract
with Occidental Petroleum. They were responsible for flying
a Cessna 337 "Skymaster" plane equipped with infrared
sensors and high-resolution cameras.
"The coordination was done directly with the armed
helicopters supporting us and with the Skymaster plane flown
by U.S. pilots," testified Colombian Air Force pilot Cesar
Romero. "The Skymaster and gunship crews talked directly to
the ground troops."
"The Skymaster pilot chose the place for troop
disembarkment, pinpointed vulnerable areas and pointed out
guerrilla presence," according to helicopter co-pilot Lt.
Johan Jimenez. Referring to aircraft the U.S. has provided
to the Colombian military, he added, "The Blackhawk and
Skymaster pilots are the ones that helped the pilot of our
Huey UH-1H to identify the target with visual aid from the
ground."
The massacre was explained as an attack on the Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Colombia-People's Army (FARC-EP). But
despite the massive army operation, no evidence of a
guerrilla presence at the time was ever shown. No FARC-EP
combatants--or any armed people--were among the dead or
wounded.
The testimony--blowing the lid off the "dirty secret" of
U.S. mercenaries taking part in military operations--
provoked a long string of denials. Colombian military
officers claimed the Skymaster was owned by the Colombian
Air Force and piloted by Colombian government troops.
Occidental's lawyer claimed "no contractual links" to the
plane or the pilots.
But a senior official of the Colombian state-owned oil
company Ecopetrol, which operates partnerships with
Occidental, told the Chronicle that "I have confirmed that
the plane is paid for by Occidental although the contract
has been held by either the Occidental-Ecopetrol partnership
or the Defense Ministry."
Orta, Denny and MacClintock were reportedly contract agents
of Florida-based AirScan International, which provides
private air surveillance. The AirScan website
(www.airscan.com) does not allow public access to the
company's description or services.
U.S. SECRET WAR ESCALATES
The U.S. government admits to around 200 military troops and
170 "contractors" on the ground in Colombia. While their
presence is currently explained as part of the "war on
drugs," they are increasingly involved in combat with the
FARC-EP insurgency.
U.S. Special Forces are training counterinsurgency
battalions as part of the $1.3 billion Plan Colombia
military aid package. Mercenaries have already seen combat
against the FARC-EP. Mercenaries in the largest military
outfit in Colombia, DynCorp, were in a firefight with the
FARC-EP in February.
These mercenary outfits are staffed by Pentagon "retirees"
and operate with the full knowledge of U.S. intelligence.
For example, while AirScan would not discuss how many of its
agents were former military personnel, who else have the
capability to "choose the place for troops disembarkment and
pinpointing vulnerable areas"?
As in every military operation, from Vietnam to Bosnia, the
Pentagon relies on mercenary "contract employees" to carry
out missions that need "deniability" or until greater
involvement is required.
Colombia is now the third-largest recipient of U.S. military
aid in the world. Undoubtedly the Pentagon would like to
keep its intervention limited to mercenaries and Colombian
proxies.
But above all, the Pentagon generals will not tolerate
having Wall Street lose its exclusive rights to exploit
Colombia's labor and resources. The Colombian people's
struggle to break the grip of the Pentagon and the IMF is
precisely what is drawing the Pentagon into an escalating
confrontation.
The Colombian government has been forced to try to defend
its anti-people, pro-Washington orientation in front of the
people, due to the FARC-EP and National Liberation Army
insurgencies. Half of Colombia's national territory now lies
outside government administrative control.
At the same time, Colombia's workers and peasants have
gained confidence in challenging the government despite
death squad terror. Colombia's 800,000 public sector workers
walked off the job for the second time in two weeks on June
14 against the government's pro-IMF policies.
On June 9, peasants in the northern town of Tibu burned a
U.S. refueling base to the ground, protesting the Pentagon's
fumigation campaign that is killing food crops and livestock
in addition to the ostensible target, coca leaf. DynCorp
personnel responsible for the fumigation were not on the
base at the time of the protest.
The 1998 Santo Domingo massacre shows that the Pentagon is
directing the war against the Colombian people, from the
strategic to the tactical level, in the same way it directed
the war in Vietnam. Santo Domingo is like My Lai. The
massacres will stop only when an international people's
movement forces the Pentagon out of Colombia.
From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: lauantai 23. kesäkuu 2001 06:47
Subject: [WW] Thousands rally in Belgrade: 'Don't sell Milosevic to the
West'
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the June 28, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
YUGOSLAVIA: THOUSANDS OF SOCIALISTS TELL GOV'T: "DON'T SELL MILOSEVIC TO THE
WEST"
By Pat Chin
A march to the prison holding Slobodan Milosevic paralyzed
central Belgrade traffic on June 16. Starting in Republic
Square, the marchers reportedly swelled from 5,000 to 10,000
as they neared the jail, calling for the release of
Milosevic, the former president of Yugoslavia.
Organized by the Socialist Party of Serbia, the action was
held under the banner of "Against The Hague, For Freedom for
Milosevic and Serbia," reported Tanja Djurovic, writing in
the German daily Junge Welt.
This protest--the latest in a series--also targeted the
United Nations War Crimes Tribunal based in The Hague.
Demonstrators demanded that no Yugoslav citizen, including
Milosevic, be extradited to stand trial before the
Washington-controlled war crimes court.
Milosevic, who is also SPS president, was arrested March 31
by the new anti-socialist Democratic Opposition of Serbia
coalition government that came to power last December with
open U.S. support and money. His arrest on charges of
corruption and abuse of power was a first step in satisfying
demands of the United States and European Union governments
that the former president, who had resisted NATO bombing for
two and a half months in 1999, face a trial for war crimes
before the International Tribunal in The Hague.
The DOS regime hasn't produced any evidence against
Milosevic. But it has kept him imprisoned, in ill health,
while it maneuvers a draft law through the parliament that
would legalize the extradition of Yugoslav citizens. This is
being done even though recent polls show that the majority
of the people oppose it.
Rally speakers blistered the DOS with criticism for selling
out the country's sovereignty. "The crowd booed at every
mention of the tribunal in fiery speeches," said a June 16
Associated Press dispatch.
SPS Vice President Branislav Ivkovic told the gathering that
"The leaders of the Democratic Opposition of Serbia are
haggling with the so-called international community about
the price to sell Milosevic for," reported Djurovic.
Former Foreign Minister and SPS Vice President Zivadin
Jovanovic denounced the pressure being unleashed by the U.S.
and its junior NATO partners to force Milosevic's
extradition.
It "would be a disgrace to the office of the presidency in
this country itself, no matter who holds that office," said
Jovanovic in his speech. Turning Milosevic over to the UN
tribunal would be "an ultimate treason," he warned.
Jovanovic called on the so-called international community to
address instead the real issue of NATO's responsibility for
the war and to demand payment of reparations for damages
caused by the savage 78-day bombardment of the country,
which cost hundreds of lives and billions in damage to the
infrastructure.
"Enough with the treason," said the placards carried by
marchers. After reaching the prison, they pelted the
guardhouse windows with stones, rattled the gates and
chanted against the government.
Many activists from the movement against the 1999 war came
to Belgrade from other countries over the weekend to support
the protest.
The U.S. capitalist government, while under a new
administration, continues to play a central role in the
bloody breakup of Yugoslavia that started in 1991. The
collapse has been so devastating in human terms that
Washington must continue its feverish manipulation of public
opinion through the media in order to hide its crimes in the
Balkans.
In an obvious tit-for-tat, only three days after the
International Monetary Fund had approved a stand-by loan for
Yugoslavia, government ministers finally okayed the
controversial Draft Law on Cooperation with The Hague pushed
by the imperialists. "Yugoslavian President Vojislav
Kostunica, who initially opposed extradition, announced the
move on television after the Cabinet meeting," reported the
Associated Press on June 14.
Representatives from the Socialist People's Party of
Montenegro oppose the extradition portion of the bill, which
is set for debate in the federal parliament June 21. In
order to pressure the lawmakers, the DOS Justice Minister
has threatened to resign if it's not passed.
Zoran Djindjic, Serbia's prime minister, showing his
subservience to Berlin and Washington, says that the country
must cooperate with the tribunal or face the loss of massive
foreign investment from the U.S. and Western financial
institutions. Claiming that "the sky will fall on our heads
if we fail to write off at least 65 percent of our foreign
debt," the collaborationist leader also says that the
question of extradition is a false one, the real issue being
integration versus isolation.
Integration at what cost and in what form? As events in
Romania, Bulgaria and other countries devastated by the IMF
and World Bank show, there is no guarantee that Yugoslavia
will get the huge influx of funds that's being promised in
return for Milosevic's head. His extradition would be just
the beginning.
European and U.S. imperialism have no plans to accept
Yugoslavia as a full--or even junior--partner. "Integration"
in fact will mean the nation's submission to predatory
imperialist financial interests that have become emboldened
since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
If the Yugoslav leaders forget the old saying that "all that
glitters is not gold," then their homeland could be reduced
to an outpost of the imperialist empire, stripped of all
sovereignty and human dignity.
The SPS protests shows that not everyone has forgotten the
heroic history of that country, nor are they all being
fooled by the seductive illusions of capitalism. The
struggle continues.
