arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)

On 27th October 2001 the Socialist Labour Party in Brighton held a meeting
about the events of Sept 11th and its consequences with 50 people in
attendance.

Dan Glazebrook from SLP Youth and also president of Sussex Uni Students
Union spoke of how this attack needs to be put in context and exposed
the genocidal campaign, conducted by the US and Britain, against the
Iraqi people. He explained how 200,000 people were killed by US and
British Imperialism in the war against Iraq in 1991, including the
infanous 'road of death' where tens of thousands of Iraqi soldiers were
blocked on a road between Kuwait and Basra and repeatedly bombed and
massacred. The US and Britain have continously and ceaselessly flouted
Geneva conventions on the use of banned weapons, Dan explained.

Sukant Chandan, national student organiser of SLP Youth and Education
Officer at Sussex Uni Students Union talked of the history of global
capitalism in the world. 200 million people being killed by the slave
trade which was a major contributor to the accumalotion of wealth for
the industrialisation of Britain, the millions killed in Ireland, Africa
and Asia by the British colonialism. If we really believe in equality,
Sukant went on, then we should respect these losses just as much as any
in the world. However, the victims of the Sept 11th attack are being
used in a racist and imperialist way to justify further attacks on the
exploited and oppressed of the world. Sukant made clear we are the real
democrats in Britain and in the US, when the US labour movement was
being attacked throughout its history, we always stood with them, when
the British working class were under attack, it is we, the
revolutionaries, who stood by them through such momentous struggles as
the 1926 general strike and the 1984 miners strike.

Rauri, of the families and friends of political prisoners in Turkey
explained that the media is strongly biased. That when massacres take
place in Turkey the press never reports it so that is why we have to
take the intiative ourselves and meet with people to inform them. He
explained that the Turkish state is enforcing isolation cells on the
poltical prisoners. They are using racist arguments such as these cells
are the ones used in Germany and in Britain, the implicit assumption
being that they are somehow superior as they are 'European' and must be
introduced in Turkey. Rauri explained that now 69 hunger strikers have
died and that there deaths will not have obituaries in the newspapers,
that only we can struggle to support their struggle.

Taimur, Punjab secretary of the Communist Mazdoor and Kisan Party of
Pakistan outlined his parties history, which is given at the end of this
report, and explained that 'fundamentalism' in Pakistan and in
Afghanistan has always been supported and encourageed by the US and
Britain, and that Bin Laden is a millionaire only because the US made
him one! He went on to explain the situation in Afghanistan, saying
that the northern Alliance is just as bad as the Taliban and should
not be supported, that the only difference would be that the Northern
Alliance would have a monarch as its head and would be more friendly to
the imperialists while carrying out the same repressive and exploitative
feudal policies of the Taliban. There exists in Afghanistan an
organisation struggling for the masses called the Afghanistan Liberation
Organisation and the Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan
which should be supported and the CMKP supports them also.

Zehra, also from the CMKP and the Literacy Brigades in Pakistan
explained that the position of women in Pakistan is quite bad and
encouraged by the right wing priests. But the people of Pakistan do not
support the fundamentalists and these people, who are getting
daily exposure in the Western press as being the irrational Taliban
supporters in Pakistan, have actually no support amongst the masses in
Pakistan.

A very lively and well spirited discussion ensued in the meeting with
people wanting to be more involved in the activities of the SLP.

slpyouth@hotmail.com
national office: 01226 770 957
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