Eight leaders of the Nava Sama Samaja Party, the Sri Lankan section of the Fourth International, were arrested on 1 July while participating in a Jana Gosha (people's noise') demonstration against the government's IMF-imposed austerity programme. struggle and the role of Trotskyists. Page 6 10 Oct. 1992 No. 29 During the protest thousands of people lit firecrackers, banged pots and blew horns in a lunch-time protest. The eight included party General Secretary Vickramabahu Karunaratne ('Bahu'). All are due to appear in court on 19 November charged with violating Emergency Regulations. According to Reuters 'police Lankan section of the Fourth International var wagedby the government against the Tamil people. The NSSP has played an important ole in the anti-austerity struggle, in the fight for self-determination for the Tamil people an in the movement in defence of the 'disappeared. The NSSP affiliated to the International in 1992. Bahu's visit is a unique opportunity to hear about the Sri Lankan armed with machine guns, batons and tear gas violently dispersed demonstrators and were particularly vicious towards women demonstrating on behalf of the hundreds of 'disappeared.
Vickramabahu Karunarathne is speaking soon at a meeting in London - see advertisement on this page.
Fourth planning have thrown many firms into effective bankruptcy. Since they are only kept going by increasing state subsidies, a major battle has been raging between economic ultra-liberals around Yeltsin and his premier Gaidar, who want to force through the privatisation and bankruptcy laws, and hundreds of enterprise managers, supported by Yeltsin's deputy Rutskoi.
The old nomenklatura is caught in a trap of its own making; the West in general and the workers movement remains extremely weak. According to Nikolai Preobrazhensky, a leading activist in the new Party of Labour: ' The old trade unions enjoy no confidence, by and large; the new ones with the exception of those in the mining regions are very weak. Thereare no serious organisations expressing the interests of the workers movement nor parties which the mass of workers could consider their own, to be counted on without fear of betrayal or deception!
Vickramabahu Karunatne ('Bahu') speaks at Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, WC2 Wednesday 14 October 7.30pm The working class in Sri Lanka faces bitter struggles against austerity and the senseless