Monthly Archives: June 2010

Biplap on the Revolution in Nepal: Can We Go Ahead?

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[This is an important article by Biplap, a member of the Secretariat and Political Bureau of the UCPN(Maoist), and is most likely a disguised polemic against rightist forces in the party.  He stresses the issue of  the internal and international situations for the advance of the revolution–though he underestimates the danger of an Indian economic blockade and military intervention in the event of a Maoist victory or major Maoist advances through re-establishing the People’s War.

Biplap also discusses the key role of the reactionary, ex-royalist Nepal Army.  However he puts forth two different positions on the army.  First, he writes that “we will have to fight with army if we want to complete revolution” and speaks of the need to foster splits in the army. On the other hand, he writes that the army is a nationalist force and  that a “front between Maoist and Nepal Army is possible for national independence”–a position which leads away from the necessity to re-estabish the People’s War in order to complete the new democratic revolution.–ed.]

Can We Go Ahead?

by Netra Bikram Chanda “Biplap”

The Red Star Vol 3 issue 16

The debate in Nepal is on whether revolution is possible or not. The debate is not only ideological and general assumption; rather, it is centered on the question whether there is possibility to increase intervention in the central power state or not. Two sharp analyses have emerged on the issue. They are for and against.

The analytical perspective that sees revolution as impossible:

One of the analytical perspectives is that the revolt is impossible. Yes, it seems so from that side of perspective. This analysis has emerged mainly from the side of some leftist intellectual politicians and analysts. They have given the following reasons to justify this logic.

Unfavorable international situation-

Favorable international situation is needed for the completion of revolution. For that, there should be a crisis in the centre of capitalism and unfavorable situation should have created against them. Moreover, there should be crisis in India, America and China for the completion of revolution in a small and poor country like Nepal. Otherwise, these power centres interfere over Nepal and revolution can not succeed. Continue reading →

US-backed leader of death squads wins Colombian election

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Juan Manuel Santos

 

By James Petras

29 June, 2010,  Mycatbirdseat.com

Juan Manuel Santos, notorious Defense Minister in the regime of outgoing President Alvaro Uribe and closely identified with high crimes against humanity “won” the recent Presidential elections in Colombia, June 2010. The major electronic and print media CNN, FOX News, Washington Post, the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the once liberal Financial Times (FT) hailed Santos election, as a great victory for democracy. According to the FT, “Colombia not Venezuela is (the) best model for Latin America” (FT 6/23/2010 p. 8).

Citing Santos “overwhelming” margin – he garnered 69% of the vote, the FT claimed he won a “strong mandate” (FT 6/22/2010). In what has to be one of the most flagrant cover-ups in recent history, the media accounts exclude the most egregious facts about the elections and the profoundly authoritarian policies pursued by Santos over the past decade.

The Elections: Guns, Elites and Terror

Elections are a process (not merely an event) in which prior political conditions determine the outcome. During the previous eight years of outgoing President Uribe’s and Defense Minister Santos’ rule, over 2 million, mostly rural poor, were forcibly uprooted and driven from their homes and land and displaced across frontiers into neighboring countries, or to urban slums. Continue reading →

6,800 Palestinian Detainees, Including 300 Children, Currently Imprisoned By Israel

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by Saed Bannoura –
IMEMC News    Tuesday June 29, 2010 01:59
Abdul-Nasser Farawna, a Palestinian researcher specialising in detainees’ affairs and a former detainee himself, stated that there are currently 6,800 detainees imprisoned by Israel, including 300 children, 34 women, and 213 detainees in administrative detention.

Farawna stated that eleven elected legislators are still imprisoned by Israel, and that there are nearly 1,500 detainees who are ill and need urgent medical attention; dozens of them need surgeries and constant hospitalization.
He also said that the detainees are held in nearly twenty prisons, detention and interrogation centers, mainly in Ramon, Shatta, Galboa’, Asqalan, Hadarim, Al Damoun, Be’er Sheva, Ofer, Majoddo and the Negev detention camp.
Most of the detainees (83%) are from the West Bank, and 10.6% of them are from Gaza while the rest are Arab residents of Israel and other Arab nationals.
800 detainees were sentenced to at least one life-term; 590 were sentenced to more than twenty years; 472 were sentenced to more than 15 years; 15 were sentenced to more than 15 and less than 20 years; while 710 were sentenced to more than 20 years and several life-terms.
There are 213 detainees who are imprisoned under administrative detention orders without charges or trial, and seven detainees from Gaza are detained under for what Israel calls “illegal combatants”.
309 detainees were arrested before the first Oslo agreement and before the Palestinian Authority was established in 1994, 117 detainees were arrested since more than 20 years, and 17 detainees were arrested since more than 19 years.
Detainees Nael al-Barghouthi, Fakhri al-Barghouthi and Akram Mansour have been imprisoned since more than 30 years.
Farawna called on Human Rights groups, different related institutions and media facilities to highlight the issue of the detainees and to launch solidarity campaigns demanding their release.
He added that the captured prisoner-of-war, Gilad Shalit, held by the resistance in Gaza, should not be released until all detainees, especially those who spent so many years behind bars, and those sentenced to high terms, are released.
Corporal Gilad Shalit is the only Israeli held by the Palestinians. He was captured on June 26, 2006.

After US invited UCPN(M) to Boston conference, its excessive conditions were rejected

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Prachanda at the juncture

by Reed

Some Background on recent events: The constitutional republic strategy pursued by the Nepalese UCPN(M) since it abandoned the revolutionary People’s War strategy in 2006 has taken a number of twists and turns on a highly contentious path,  which appears to be reaching some sort of juncture.  While within Nepal, there has been a prolonged stalemate in relations between the UCPN(M) and the bourgeois parties with whom the Maoists have sought to unite  in a national unity government, various international powers have weighed in with attempts to influence and control, with promises, threats, bribes and conditions—all the standard methods, and all usually couched in terms of “advice”, “realism”, and “opportunities.”  The fact that, within the Maoist party, there has been an ongoing line struggle between the leading parliamentary – constitutional road, led by  Pushpa Kamal Dahal, aka Prachanda, and those advocating a rebirth of the revolutionary road, has meant that the US ,Indian, Chinese and European cajoling and threats have been grist for the mill of ongoing struggle within the Maoist party between revolutionaries and revisionist (i.e., those who have articulated and managed the retreat from the revolutionary path).

Relations between the Nepal UCPN(M) and the US

The prolonged stalemate in Nepal has increased pressure on the UCPN(M) as its “problem solving” credibility among the masses has declined; as its options have narrowed; and as the differences within the UCPN(M) central committee have sharpened and intensified.  In this context, the US has moved to strengthen its ties to the UCPN(M), along with maintaining the US ties to the bourgeois parties in the Nepal Constituent Assembly.  While the US role has been largely and carefully hidden, its strategy in this is taken from its neo-colonial “nation-building” tool-box.

A US offer was made to “assist” in solving the deadlock on the writing of a new constitution—an essential step in stabilizing Nepal.  Under the guise of a seminar or training session, all the Nepal parties were invited to Boston this week.  All were granted US visas, the State Department paid for all expenses, and then one member of the UCPN(M) delegation had his visa revoked after a complaint from Human Rights Watch.  (Human Rights Watch has an international reputation of working closely with, and sometimes fronting for,  government intelligence and counter-intelligence agencies and programs).  This visa revocation was taken by the UCPN(M) to be a humiliating and excessive condition on their delegation, so they returned to Nepal, without attending the Boston program.

Continue reading →

Communist Party of the Philippines calls for revolutionary struggle against the new US-Aquino Regime

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“In the coming years, the New People’s Army expects to recruit thousands of new Red fighters, build more platoons and companies, establish new battalions, open up and consolidate more guerrilla fronts and subregional military areas, launch more frequent and widespread tactical offensives and seize thousands of firearms from the AFP. The entire archipelago will be ablaze with the fires of the people’s war. At the same time, mass struggles against poverty and oppression; and for land reform, higher wages, jobs, lower prices, education, health and other social needs will be waged by the broad masses of the people in both the cities and countryside.”

Achieve great unprecedented strides in revolutionary struggle under the new US-Aquino regime

Communist Party of the Philippines

June 29, 2010

The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) joins the Filipino people in marking the eve of the stepping down of the US-Arroyo regime, which ruled the Philippines for nine and a half years with sheer brutality, corruption and subservience to foreign interests. At the same time, the CPP reiterates the need to persist along the path of revolutionary struggle and achieve great strides in advancing people’s war through the next several years of the new US-Aquino regime.

The Filipino people are absolutely glad to see Gloria Arroyo step down from her throne. They earnestly look forward to waging struggles to ensure that Arroyo will be prosecuted and punished for her crimes of wanton plunder and large-scale corruption and crimes against humanity in the course of the brutal war she waged against urban and rural activists and the masses in revolutionary areas. Continue reading →

Terrorizing the Democratic Space in Ranchi, capital city of Jharkhand, India

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June 29, 2010

By Gladson Dungdung

29 June, 2010

Jharkhandmirror.org

A Rally against OGH in Ranchi

In the midst of hide and seek between the Sun and the Cloud, the environment of Jaipal Singh Stadium in Ranchi, the capital city of Jharkhand was very tense on June 25, 2010. The reason was, the “Operation Green Hunt Virodhi Nagrik Manch” (Citizens Forum against Operation Green Hunt) had called for a rally and mass meeting against the cold blood murder, rape and torture of innocent villagers by the security forces in the ongoing so-called anti-Naxal operation codified as “Operation Green Hunt”. The forum has been intervening on the issues of the police atrocity since inception of the OGH. As a result, the police have declared it as a Maoist organization, which is of course, the outcome of Chidambaram’s theory of democracy, which describes as ‘this side or that side’. Therefore, whoever questions the Operation Green Hunt is considered as a Maoist, a Maoist supporter or at least a sympathizer of the Maoists. Continue reading →

Cultural Extinction? Will Louisiana’s coastal communities recover from BP’s drilling disaster?

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The toll on wildlife and Louisiana's coastal communities is devastating

By Jordan Flaherty

As BP’s deepwater well continues to discharge oil into the Gulf, the economic and public health effects are already being felt across coastal communities. But it’s likely this is only the beginning. From the bayous of southern Louisiana to the city of New Orleans, many fear this disaster represents not only environmental devastation but also cultural extinction for peoples who have made their lives here for generations.

This is not the first time that Louisianans have lost their communities or their lives from the actions of corporations. The land loss caused by oil companies has already displaced many who lived by the coast, and the pollution from treatment plants has poisoned communities across the state – especially in “cancer alley,” the corridor of industrial facilities along the Mississippi River south of Baton Rouge. Continue reading →